Contribution Of Information And Communication Technologies Research Articles

The Use of ICTs in Front Office Department

This research project investigates the effective implementation and impact of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) within the Front Office Department of hotels. The study aims to evaluate the contribution of ICTs to operational efficiency, customer satisfaction, and overall performance in customer-facing organisational functions. Utilising a cluster sampling approach, incorporating surveys, and case studies, the research assesses the current usage of ICT tools, identifies challenges and opportunities, and proposes strategies for improved integration. The study explores the diverse ICT applications adopted by front office departments, including customer relationship management (CRM) systems, communication platforms, and data analytics tools. The research assesses the efficacy of these technologies in streamlining processes, enhancing communication, and cultivating a responsive and customer-centric environment. The findings offer valuable insights for both academic researchers and industry practitioners that are seeking a comprehensive understanding of the ways in which ICTs influence front office operations. The research not only highlights successful implementations but also addresses potential hurdles and considerations for hotels aiming to harness ICTs for optimal front office performance. Lastly, the study provides a solid foundation for future research and offers practical recommendations to guide hotels in elevating their front office capabilities through thoughtful ICT integration.

Does ICTs Usage Facilitate Access to Market? An Empirical Evidence of Market Gardeners in Benin

ABSTRACT Imperfect information is a major obstacle for agricultural businesses in developing countries. The resulting information asymmetry increases transaction costs and affects the behavior of market stakeholders. In Benin, market gardeners’ participation is limited by geographical isolation and poor communication and transport infrastructures. Information and communication technologies (ICTs) now offer a fast and less costly means of accessing and disseminating information for more active market participation. The aim of this article is to measure the contribution of ICTs to market participation by testing whether they improve participation. Using a recursive bivariate probit model, our results indicate that market gardeners who use ICT to access information have a higher frequency of market participation than those who do not. Cell phones, radios, and televisions lead to a 35.3%, 25.6% and 8% higher probability of market participation respectively than those who don’t use them. These results suggest that a platform for disseminating knowledge via ICT could be set up to increase market participation.

Cognitive-motivational engagement in ICT mediates the effect of ICT use on academic achievements: Evidence from 52 countries

Despite huge investment of information and communication technology (ICT) in schools across the world, recent studies showed its non-positive association with academic achievement. While educators or policymakers may doubt the contribution of ICT in education, few studies examined the indirect effect of ICT use on academic achievement via ICT-related dispositions, such as students' perceived autonomy, competence, and interest in ICT (cognitive-motivational engagement in ICT). Guided by self-determination theory (SDT) and related literature, we hypothesized a three-level structural equation model to examine the interplay between ICT use, cognitive-motivational engagement in ICT, and academic achievement based on 15-year-old secondary students from 52 countries in the PISA 2018. The results showed cognitive-motivational engagement in ICT exerted a positive mediating effect between ICT use and academic achievement at the student and school levels, indicating ICT use exerted an indirect positive effect on academic achievement, and satisfaction of students' basic psychological needs in a specific area such as ICT is likely to promote their optimal functioning in other areas such as learning. Hence, students should be provided more opportunities to orchestrate technologies in formal and informal contexts helps develop their self-determination, discernment, and self-regulation in ICT use, and thereby creating the conditions in which better learning outcomes are more likely to occur. These findings also deepen our understanding of SDT and provide a guiding framework for educators to design pedagogies that can better address students’ ICT-related psychological needs. Finally, this study shows that a quadratic term should be modeled when examining the relationship between ICT use and academic achievement.

How do financial development and ICT moderate financial resource curse hypothesis in developing countries?

Sustainable resource utilization and economic prosperity are one of the ultimate goals worldwide; mainly, resource-abundant emerging countries are more concerned with identifying the factors of sustainable development in confronting the resource curse. Over the last two decades, tremendous progression in information and communication technology (ICT) and financial development (FD) has triggered economic prosperity. In this aspect, the study evaluates the dynamic impact of natural resources (NR), ICT, and FD on economic growth in eleven developing economies from 1990 to 2021. Moreover, the study confirms the presence of a curse paradox or blessing associated with NR by employing a cross-section augmented distributed lag (CS-ARDL) estimator after resolving the cross-section dependency and heterogeneity issues. The findings exhibit that NR is inversely associated with economic development, confirming the resource curse problem in these economies, while FD and ICT encourage sustainable growth. Manifestly, the indirect moderating contribution of ICT and FD reveals that when resource-abundant countries are embodied with a well-developed financial sector and ICT infrastructure, resources are efficiently consumed, leading to inclusive economic progress. In addition, the identical outcomes are echoed by utilizing the alternative panel techniques. Overall, the study recommends valuable policy strategies in resource utilization for sustainable development.

Level of teachers’ information and communication technology (ICT) integration in teaching and learning English

This study highlighted the level of teachers’ ICT integration in teaching and learning English. This determined the English teachers’ attitude towards ICT integration. The study was anchored on Davis’s Technology Acceptance Model which originated from Ajzen & Fishbein’s Theory of Reasoned Action. Moreover, the descriptive research method was used in this study, involving a purposive random sampling method in obtaining data from respondents. Teachers were profiled, details and results were enumerated. Several findings were made about the English teachers, that there is no significant difference in the ICT integration in teaching and learning when grouped according to their highest educational attainment; there is no significant difference in the ICT integration in teaching and learning when grouped according to teachers’ seminars/trainings in ICT; there is no significant difference in the ICT integration in teaching and learning when grouped according to perceived usefulness of ICT in teaching and learning; and the perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use highly influenced the teacher-respondents’ actual usage of ICT. English teachers’ level of ICT integration in teaching and learning is fair or below satisfactory. Recommendations included school administrators, teachers, and future researchers, to support the integration of ICT in the teaching and learning process, create more opportunities for students to experience impactful learning with ICT, so that these interventions may further substantiate the contribution of ICT in the field of education, especially in English language teaching and learning. Further research anticipated to be undertaken leveling up to more focused tasks on ICT-centered activities.

A Study of Internet Literacy Rate in India

The Internet and information and communication technologies (ICT) have accelerated development in the 21st century in several industries, most notably education. The development of ICT has opened new options for residents of the twenty-first century. Therefore, to adapt to the modern age, people require a wide variety of skills, competencies, and talents. The expanding significance of ICT, its broad range of applications, and its impact on numerous aspects of people's daily lives are discussed in this paper's literature review. Additionally, the concept of digital literacy is evolving because of ICT advancements, and it helps people reach sustainable development goals. The work done in this field of digital literacy is summarized, as well as the contribution of ICT to the development of many sectors, particularly the education sector. Three novel models of digital literacy the four-gear model, the model for flexible learning, and a model illustrating how ICT affects the learning process are presented at the end of the study.

Teaching and Learning Processes in Physics: Using Information and Communication Technology: Advantages, Challenges and Remedies

A nation with significant human capital that can govern science and technology will be competent to exist in the future. The success of applying basic science, particularly physics, to numerous technologies is primarily responsible for the advancement of technology today. Physics is a natural science that has made the greatest contribution for the development of many technologies and engineering applications that make life more convenient for humans. As numerous, Physics principles are very abstract and require very depth knowledge and experience to explain to students. The question arises, how to make physics education more engaging, lucid and relevant for students? At this point, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) becomes very beneficial because of its capacity to ease the abstract subject, stimulate interest and enhance learning outcomes in physics education. Despite the importance of ICTs and educational software, these technologies have yet to be incorporated properly into physics education.This article focuses on the contribution of ICT in physics education along with challenges and their remedies. The online link of several ICT platforms that could be utilized in the teaching and learning of physics is also mentioned, which are open source and can be used freely. The benefits of employing instructional software and incorporating ICTs into the physics curriculum are becoming essential in the current scenario. The barriers to ICT integration in the physics classroom are also discussed. It is experienced and recommended that ICT can be used in the form of blended learning as well as potential solutions to the issues that physics teachers /instructors confront.

ITC Contribution in Surveys

This paper aims to underline the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) contributions in survey implementations. We used ICT tools in Chad Malaria Indicators Survey (CMIS). We found ICT are revolutionizing surveys. Their implementation considerably improves the survey operations by eliminating some over budgeting steps, enriching the quality of data and facilitating some data manipulations. This bringing leads us to highlight the contribution of ICT in smart surveys. And smart surveys in which ICT tools are used were exposed with a focus on ITC contributions in these surveys. A use case was giving through our implementation of smart survey.

The Nexus between Information Communication Technology and Human Rights in Southern Africa

The study sought to empirically test the contribution of information and communication technology (ICT) to the advancement of human rights, drawing on the fact that safeguarding human rights through the use of ICT is a field of increasing interest to academics and those working towards the advancement of human rights and development practitioners. The literature on ICT and human rights holds the view that ICT can play a significant role in the advancement of human rights. ICT has become an essential instrument for realising human rights, and ensuring its accessibility must be a primary concern for all governments. However, despite the increase in ICT usage, the southern African region has been marred by atrocities and human rights violations. Many southern African governments regularly impose restrictions on human rights defenders, journalists, and rights activists, often to suit political goals. The use of ICT has extensive effects on the human rights agenda and forms an important tool in its endeavours to gather, analyse, and spread information and advocate for fitting remedies in response to human rights infringements. It is against this background that this study sought to examine the contribution of ICT to the advancement of human rights. The study was quantitative in nature, using panel data to estimate its model. The findings reveal a weak positive relationship between ICT and the advancement of human rights. The study recommends that governments and civil society encourage the use of ICT functionality in ways that advance human rights.

Does information and communication technology really affect human development? An empirical analysis

ABSTRACT Positive effect of information and communication technology (ICT) on human development (HD) is not guaranteed simply by the availability of technology; this gap is especially pronounced for developing countries. Using the Capability Approach framework, we collected data from 115 countries for 2019. We tested a sample to determine stable groups of countries and split the dataset into two groups, which homogeneity differs significantly. Finally, we estimated the hypotheses predicting the influence of ICT on HD for both groups using a path modelling technique. Our results confirm the significant positive contribution of ICT on all kinds of conversion factors (CFs), except social ones in developing countries. However, the way to transform capabilities into functionings differs. In developing countries, ICT contributes to HD at the individual level only. For developed countries, ICT contributes more to social CFs and less to personal ones.

Information and communication technologies in emergency care services for patients with COVID-19: a multi-national study

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are known for supporting healthcare services in dealing with adverse situations. However, little is known on the contribution of ICTs in a prolonged crisis involving a new disease, such as the COVID-19 pandemic. In this study, we carry out an exploratory investigation of which ICTs contribute the most to the emergency care of patients diagnosed with COVID-19 according to healthcare technology experts and how physicians perceive these contributions. Initially, we applied an online survey to 109 healthcare technology experts. Then, we conducted 16 in-depth follow-up interviews with emergency medicine professionals from 10 countries to identify the ICTs contributing the most to treat COVID-19 patients. Results from the survey indicated four ICTs as the most useful to support the treatment of COVID-19 patients; they are remote consultations, digital platforms for data sharing, digital non-invasive care, and interconnected medical decision support. The interviews provided insight into the applicability of those ICTs for the studied context. The four main ICTs were also found to be logically compatible with the complexity of the pandemic, reducing undesirable complexity attributes (e.g. physical proximity between caregivers and infected patients) and amplifying desirable ones (e.g. interactions that support collaborative work and knowledge sharing).

The composite impact of ICT industry on lowering carbon intensity: From the perspective of regional heterogeneity

The balance between low carbon development and rapid economic growth is a ‘Gordian knot’ for most countries. This study aims to explore the practicable route of lowering carbon intensity with the expansion of the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) industry in China. Using the provincial panel data from 2000 to 2017, the paper employs five indicators to empirically investigate the determinant mechanism of carbon intensity based on the refined Stochastic Impact by Regression on Population, Affluence, and Technology (STIRPAT) and spatial econometric models. The findings demonstrate that the ICT industry is the main force in adjusting carbon intensity. Despite constraint by the rebound effect, the net effect of the ICT industry shows a significant positive impact on lowering carbon intensity under the consideration of spatial dependence. Furthermore, compared with developed regions, the contribution of ICT on regional inequality of carbon intensity shows a higher share in developing regions. By applying the Oaxaca-Ransom counterfactual decomposition, the results reveal that there are substantial regional gaps between multi-comparable groups. The composite effect of informatization, industrialization, and urbanization accounts for the major share of the regional gap. Thus, policymakers should pay more attention to enhancing the ICT infrastructure in developing regions, boosting the ICT-related technology investment in specific sectors, coordinating regional cooperation, and balancing the migration of skilled workers.

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and Economic Growth in Malaysia

This study aims to examine the impact of information and communication technology (ICT) on economic growth in Malaysia. The motivation of this study is to estimates the impact of ICT advancement towards the performance of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Malaysia. The domestic GDP is selected as the dependent variables while the labour force participation, the contribution of ICT, the mobile cellular subscriptions and the individual usage of internet are utilised as the independent variables for this study. The time-series data collected for this study is for the period of 25 years, which is from the year 1994 until year 2018. The data set is then being further tested by using the unit root test which includes the Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) test and the Kwiatkowski-Philip-Schmidt-Shin (KPSS) test. Meanwhile, estimating the cointegration and relationship between the variables will tested using the Johansen and Juselius (J&J) Cointegration Test, the Vector Error Correlation Model (VECM) and the ranger Causality test. Based on the result of this study, the mobile cellular subscriptions and individual usage of internet are estimated to have a significant and positive relationship with the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Malaysia. The findings of this study show that the contribution of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) assist to enhance the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Malaysia. The estimations from this study hopefully will support the active role played by the government in creating the network society by prioritizing the policies that will become the enablers in the advancement of ICT environment in the country and eventually support the economic growth of Malaysia.

Methodological Evaluation of the Use of ICTs in Mixed Method Research in Education

The purpose of this phenomenological research was to evaluate the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in mixed method research (MMR) in education from a educational researchers’ methodological perspective. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 educational researchers. The data were analyzed by thematic content analysis. Nine themes were identified in the interviews with educational researchers. The most emphasized contribution of ICTs was found to be about data collection. Six of the themes explained the need for new data collection tools and positive evaluations of ICTs on triangulation and transformation of data by collecting massive, in-depth and original data for MMRs. Two themes were about the role of the researcher in MMRs. Educational researchers argued that the use of ICTs in MMRs can support collaborations among researchers and reduce researcher limitations. Finally, educational researchers underlined the critical importance of the discovery of new MMR models in digital age.

Contribution of ICTs to the performance of MFIs in Cameroon

The objective of this article is to assess the contribution of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to improving the performance of Cameroonian MFIs. To achieve this, data was collected from 88 MFIs through a survey by the use of questionnaires. Main Component Analysis, correlation testing and the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) method were used. The results obtained show that, in terms of ICT, the use of several computers, an internet connection and an intranet within the company can enhance the MFI's social performance. Furthermore, then the existence of a website does not favour financial performance, with the overall performance, it is rather an asset in the same way as the intranet. These results highlight the need to strengthen access to the commercial internet.

Digital Literacy

Information and communication technologies (ICT) along with the internet have fueled advancements and growth in banking, transportation, economics, and most of all in education in the 21st century. The 21st century citizens are provided with new opportunities that have been created with the advancement of ICT. Hence, individuals need a wide range of abilities, competencies, and skills to adapt to the technological era. This paper provides a literature review of the growing importance of ICT, its wide array of usage, and its influence on various facets of people's daily lives. In addition, the emerging concept of digital literacy through ICT developments, contribution of digital literacy towards the achievement of sustainable development goals, contribution of ICT towards the development of various sectors particularly the education sector, and the work done in this area of digital literacy are summarised. The paper concludes with three new models of digital literacy: four gear model, model for flexible learning, and a model showing the impact of ICT on the learning process.

Application of ICT tools in food crops monitoring in Indonesia

Indonesian “Working Cabinet” 2014-2019 is placing more attention on agricultural sector, particularly self-sufficiency program for major food crops such as rice, corn/maize and soybean. The government has been planning to achieve self-sufficiency in rice production by 2016, corn production by 2017 and soybean production by 2018. Indonesian government has also inspired to renewed enthusiasm to use new information and communication technologies (ICTs) for agricultural services. Driven by significant role of ICT, research institute, universities, and related associations have actively involved in ICT application in agriculture for recent years. The aim of the paper is to review/analyze role, potential and contribution of ICT in agriculture and to explore opportunities for use of IT in various fields of agricultural sector in Indonesia. The paper reviews and analyzes various ICT-based information dissemination models application in agriculture. In addition, success story of ICT applications in agriculture are presented i.e. Application of Standing Crop for Rice Monitoring, Modeling of maize self sufficiency in Indonesia, KATAM: Cropping Calendar, Android based Tani Hub Application, Pantau Harga: Android application for agricultural prices monitoring, SMS based cropping area monitoring, e-Rice consultation services version 1.0, and e-IRKB: Online based Indonesia Rice Knowledge Bank. The findings provide a useful direction for researcher and practitioners in developing future ICT based information dissemination systems. ICT tools ensuring farmers and increases their capacity to make effective and informed decisions.

Enhancing visitor experience with war heritage tourism through information and communication technologies: evidence from Spanish Civil War museums and sites

ABSTRACT War tourism is increasingly capturing the interest of both visitors and scholars. Notwithstanding, academic research has paid little attention to the use of technology in visitor experience co-creation in war heritage tourism sites so far. The present paper aims to gain an understanding of tourist experience through personal reflections held by visitors of war museums, historical sites, and visitor interpretive centers. Comments posted in one of the main online review sites of travel-related services by visitors of these war heritage centers specialized in the Spanish Civil War 1936–1939 have been analyzed in order to provide insight into the emotions of the visitor experiences, and usefulness of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) as facilitators of visitor experience co-creation through eliciting emotions. From the evidence obtained from qualitative research, ICT solutions stand out as a useful tool to engage visitors in experience co-creation in war heritage tourism sites and encourage spontaneous positive electronic word-of-mouth communications. This study provides a first insight about the potentiality of technology to enhance the post-visit cognitive and emotional impact of war heritage tourism sites that may inspire further research evaluating the contribution of ICT to co-create the war heritage visitor experience through on-site data collection using an experimental and/or correlational approach.

Exploring the Application of Information and Communication Technologies in the Acquisition of Information Resources in Three Academic Libraries in North-West Nigeria: Preliminary Findings

Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) incursion has brought a lot of changes to libraries activities. ICTs are used to manage libraries more efficiently and in meeting customers’ demands more appropriately at the right time. Despite the contribution of ICTs to library and information work, many libraries are yet to adopt these technologies especially in the acquisitions of library materials. This study was carried out in three selected university libraries in North West Nigeria. The objectives of the study were to: determine the influence of performance expectancy on academic librarians’ intention to use ICT for acquisition; establish the influence of effort expectancy on academic librarians’ intention to use ICT for acquisition; find out the extent of social influence and facilitating conditions on academic librarians’ intention to use ICT for acquisition and lastly to proffer recommendations. This study adopted a positivistic approach and used a questionnaire administered to 224 librarians to collect data in the three selected libraries. The study is guided by the Unified Theory Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) developed by Venkatesh. Findings from the study reveals that academic librarians are supportive on the use of ICT in their work; ICTs are significantly important, trainings were organized mainly for librarians on general use of ICT not only on acquisition, but also on the general issues related to library activities; librarians also have the knowledge necessary to use ICT for acquisition in their libraries. The study recommends among others that the parent universities should increase the funding of their libraries with adequate supervision, so that such funds are well utilized for ICTs application; university libraries should continually sponsor their academic staff on modern computerized ways of using ICTs to source for materials and the acquisition of information resources in academic libraries should be given all the seriousness it deserves by enacting legislation to allocate a reasonable percentage of the university’s budget to it.

The Impact of Information and Communication Technology on the Tourism Sector

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has changed the global businesses environment by a wide range of tools, methodologies and functions, facilitating the strategic management and supporting firms to achieve a long term competitive advantage. The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of the new applications of Information Communication Technology in tourism industry, the contribution of ICT to the promotion of the tourist product, as well as the potential to the tourism management and the process of decision-making. One important tool, which helps in making decisions in the field of tourism economy, is the Geographic Information System (GIS), which provides a comprehensible representation of the statistical figures of the tourism economy by facilitating decision-making on tourism policy. In this paper is presented some tourist financial figures and their visualization through graphs by Geographic Information System.