Information Technology Workers Research Articles

A practical approach to internationalizing information systems & computer science courses (seminar)

The IS '97 Model Curriculum reaffirmed the need to prepare information technology students to work effectively in an international environment. Yet, as computer science educators, we face a never-ending struggle to stay current in our field. How can we incorporate yet another educational goal in the curriculum? What is "internationalization"? What form might "internationalization" take in our courses? This seminar will answer some basic questions about internationalizing our courses. In addition, the seminar will provide practical suggestions, examples and resources to help you easily infuse an international perspective in your courses.As participants in a global economy and society, exposure to international perspectives can help us build, maintain and support global information systems and technology. Computer science and information systems bring to the world technologies that advance global interaction. Information technology workers are building systems that will be used by people from many different backgrounds and experiences. In the United States, the work force is becoming more diverse. And with the growing focus on collaboration, teamwork and virtual offices, projects will often involve working closely with people around the world. In such an environment, an awareness of other peoples and cultures becomes increasingly important.There have been a number of initiatives in government, education and information technology that emphasize the need for increasing our knowledge of other countries, nations and cultures. This session will endeavor to help participants become acquainted with the move to "internationalize" curriculum and suggest some practical ways to implement "internationalization" in computer science and information systems.

Challenges facing information specialists in Malaysia's multimedia super corridor

This paper describes the development of the Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) and challenges associated with the mega‐project such as the shortage of skilled information technology (IT) workers, and the need to increase the rate of adoption and innovative use of IT. It presents an analysis of strategies that are being implemented to meet the challenges. It analyses how librarians and others are planning, designing curricula, upgrading staff skills and organisation infrastructures, experimenting, and working to educate various segments of the Malaysian community to become IT, information, and network literate citizens to meet the demands of the MSC. It provides a case study of how librarians at the University of Science Malaysia (USM) systematically identified, analysed and responded to the Internet training and usage needs of faculties.

Economy-Wide and Industry-Level Impact of Information Technology

Efforts by economists to measure the contribution to output growth of investment in information technology (IT) equipment have proven inconclusive, and studies of the productivity of IT workers are relatively scarce. In the present study, we attempt to fill this gap in our understanding of the impact of IT capital and labor in the production process. We use industry data to extend the previous studies in three ways: 1) by using more recent data (1983 to 1993); 2) by covering manufacturing and non-manufacturing industries, including services; and 3) by treating IT workers and non-IT workers as two distinct categories of labor. We adopt a log-linear production function approach, usually used in conjunction with company data, but apply the model to industries. We first estimate the model for the aggregate economy by pooling eleven cross-sections for 58 industries after establishing that elasticities are invariant over 1983 to 1993. We find that all the economy-wide elasticities are positive and lie between zero and one, consistent with a priori expectations. Also, the sum of the elasticities is about 0.9, implying decreasing returns to scale. In the time-series analysis, the results focus on each of the 58 industries separately. For two-thirds of these industries, the estimated elasticities are non-negative with respect to IT equipment; for ten of them, marginal returns to IT equipment are statistically significant and quite high, with nine exhibiting annual rates of return in excess of 100 percent. Not surprisingly, average returns to IT investment for the entire economy and most of the major industry sectors are not only lower, but also more plausible, a consequence of averaging the diverse results from component industries. We obtain similar results in the case of IT labor. Two-thirds of all industries show non-negative elasticities, with ten showing statistically significant positive coefficients. In five of these industries, both the IT capital and the IT labor coefficients are positive and significant. Though the marginal products derived from the estimated coefficients seem inexplicably high, especially for IT workers, they suggest that the returns to IT labor are quite large in some industries. Marginal products estimated for the entire economy and for major industrial sectors, such as manufacturing and non-manufacturing, however, fall within plausible ranges.

Two Faces of Information Technology

ABSTRACT The relationship between social work and information technology (IT) is explored and conclusions are drawn about using IT effectively within a social work value framework. Conceptions of the nature of IT within social work are reviewed, followed by a discussion of different paradigms of social work. Behavioural social work is used as an example of effective interaction between IT and social work. It is argued that IT can enhance professional practice across the whole spectrum of social work approaches without compromising their humanistic value base.

The impact of portable computers on pupils' attitudes to study

Abstract Over two hundred pupils in nine schools were provided with a personal portable computer for a whole school year. One aspect of the research was to assess the impact which high access to information technology (IT) had on the pupils' attitudes to their schools and to the core disciplines: mathematics, English and science. The attitudes of the experimental and control groups (those with and those without portables) to the disciplines and to their schools were measured using 25‐item semantic differential and 28‐item Likert instruments respectively. Factor analysis revealed that positive impacts of high access to IT upon the attitudes of pupils was relatively marginal and confined to instances where the pupils' process‐based IT work transferred to the content domains in their disciplines. An interpretation of these affective findings, informed by recent National Curriculum research, is offered.

Technical change and the gender division of employment: the new information technology industries in Britain

This paper discusses recent changes in the gender division of employment in the new information technology (IT) industries in Britain, in the light of an examination of past relations between technical change and the gender division of employment. The paper has two main sections: first, the historical section and, second, a section in which employment data from 1970–1984 on the IT industries in Britain are analysed. The historical section argues that in situations of technical change women were recruited as workers in circumstances where they were cheaper to employ than men and were more willing than men to adopt new methods of working. However, the recruitment of women in these situations generally has only been successfully accomplished where it did not significantly affect male domination of better paid or supervisory and managerial jobs, or seriously threaten patriarchal relations in the home. The section on recent changes in the British IT industries shows that the increase in their employment of women during the 1970s has been reversed. The number and proportion of women IT workers is falling in the conurbations and most of the ‘peripheral’ areas of the U.K. To the west of London and in Fife and the Borders, although the number of women employed has increased slightly, their proportion in the workforce has declined. In general, women are becoming more concentrated in clerical occupations within the IT industries and operator jobs held by women are being lost. This paper concludes that the future for women workers in the IT industries does not look promising without significant political and social change.

Community Technology? Issues in Computer-Supported Work

In this paper I wish to discuss a number of issues concerning work practices, especially communication and cooperation among people, and examine how we can use the computer as a tool and/or medium for supporting such group activities. The intent is not to substitute computer-mediated for face to-face or other forms of communication, but rather to discover if there are <em>additional</em> possibilities that may be afforded us through use of computing technology. My emphasis is not with the <em>technology</em> per se, but with people, their needs and activities. My focus is on how we can augment human capabilities through use of the technology, rather than on how to simulate or replace labour processes with machines. I believe, along with Rosenbrock and many others, that our present-day utilization of information technology in work has tended to restrict, rather than expand human potential. This is not due solely to the nature of the technology itself, although it is not a neutral element, but also to the organization of work around the technology, and the general socio-economic and political rationale within our society which develops these machines and industrial systems. The paper does not present a carefully compiled rationale for an alternative technology, or an argument for the construction of new ''widgets'', but consists of a number of observations, reviews of rcsearch, experiences with current technologies, and speculations about possible future uses of technology in promoting communication between people. The intent is to sharpen our understanding of everyday activities, and open up alternative paths for future design of support technology. Reaction in the form of supportive or negative examples of technology use in group settings is particularly welcome from readers.