Major Motivations Research Articles

Tourists' Motivations, Emotions, and Memorable Local Food Experiences

This study aimed to explore tourists' general local food preferences, whether tasting local food was one of their major motivations for undertaking a recent trip, the emotions they associated with the experience, and what constituted a memorable local food experience. Data were collected using an open-ended questionnaire. Based on the survey responses of 210 tourists, almost all the respondents were Indian nationals. The majority of the respondents could be categorized as food neophiliacs, since they exhibited a tendency to seek new food tastes while traveling. For more than half the respondents, tasting local food was one of the main motivations for taking particular trips and was considered a primary activity. Experiencing novelty and local culture were the main motivations for tasting local food. In connecting local food consumption memories with emotions, respondents experienced the positive emotions of joy and love. This article proposes a new conceptual framework for memorable local food experiences, which comprises several components: taste, socializing with friends and family members, novelty, authenticity, ambience, affordable price, and interacting with locals. The findings provided little evidence of special occasions, hospitality, or food souvenirs contributing to a memorable food experience, as claimed by previous studies, suggesting that such factors are not inevitable components of all tourist food experiences.

Parenting, Major Choice Motivation, and Academic Major Satisfaction Among Filipino College Students: A Self-Determination Theory Perspective

Guided by Self-Determination Theory (SDT), this study examined the relationships among parenting (autonomy-supportive and controlling), major choice motivations (autonomous and controlled), and academic major satisfaction with a sample of 525 Filipino college students. Consistent with the hypotheses, the results of structural equation modeling indicated that perceived autonomy-supportive and controlling parenting were positively associated with autonomous and controlled major choice motivations, respectively. In addition, autonomous and controlled major choice motivations differentially predicted academic major satisfaction. Findings also revealed that while autonomous major choice motivation mediated the relation between autonomy-supportive parenting and academic major satisfaction, controlled major choice motivation mediated the association between controlling parenting and academic major satisfaction. Practical implications and directions for future research are discussed.

대학생의 전공선택동기에 따른 중도탈락의도, 전공만족도, 대학생활적응, 학업성취도 차이

대학생의 전공선택동기에 따른 중도탈락의도, 전공만족도, 대학생활적응, 학업성취도 차이

Visitor's Characteristic and Motivation at Museum Prasasti as Dark Tourism Site in Jakarta

Tourists are pushed to travel to different destinations, either pleasant or macabre destinations, for various motives. Tourist motivation which determines one’s behaviour can be used to understand the tourists’ needs, destination, and choice of activities. This research aimed to investigate local tourists’ characteristics and motivation for visiting Museum Prasasti, which formerly served as a Dutch cemetery. It was conducted due to the limited number of researches on tourists’ visitation to cemetery sites in Indonesia. The research was conducted at Museum Prasasti, Jakarta. The data collection gained from the paper-based questionnaires using the Likert scale. This quantitative method was used to measure tourists’ tendency during their stay at Museum Prasasti. The measurement of motivation was divided into four major motivations: engaging entertainment, dark experience, unique learning experience, and casual interest. By collecting the data from101 responses, this research shows that local tourists at Museum Prasasti are mostly female, under the age of 30, students, and come from lower-middle-class society. The unique learning experience is the most favourable motivation that drives local tourists to visit Museum Prasasti. They visit the museum for educational purposes (to increase their knowledge, understand well-known places regarding their historical heritage, and learn their history). The dark experience motivation least likely motivates them (to see well-known locations for their paranormal activity, experience paranormal activity firsthand, and witness the aftermath of deaths).

USES AND GRATIFICATIONS THEORY AND DIGITAL MEDIA USE: THE TEST OF EMOTIONAL FACTORS

We study online digital media use by adoption uses and gratifications theory and technology acceptance model. With an online survey, we collected data from 73 college students who enrolled in an IT course and analyze the data by using stepwise multiple regressions and semi-structured analysis. Through principal component analysis and multiple regression analysis we identify major motivations of online newspaper use. The purpose of the analysis is to understand whether affective constructs--entertainment, perceived enjoyment, and perceived playfulness--are different. The results suggest that entertainment is the most important use motivation of digital media use. Interestingly, information motivation is not the most salient motivation, assumed to be the major reason for media use. From the results we can see that the motivation of digital media is different from traditional media. Along with the theorization of the technology acceptance model, we also identify that perceived enjoyment and entertainment motivation are different constructs. The structured relationship of motivations and use intention is also tested.

A conceptual tool for environmentally benign design: development and evaluation of a “proof of concept”

AbstractDesign is a decision-making process for which knowledge is a prerequisite. Most decisions are taken at the conceptual stage and have pronounced influence on the final design. The literature, therefore, recommends the incorporation of sustainability criteria, such as environment, at this stage. Difficulty in performing life cycle assessment (LCA) due to low availability of information at the conceptual stage for evaluation and highly abstract nature of solutions, inadequate incorporation of DfE (Design for Environment) guidelines and LCA reports into the design process, and a lack of effective communication of the same to the designers for prompt decision-making are major motivations for the development of a support. This paper discusses a “conceptual Tool for environmentally benign design” – concepTe – that supports designers in decision-making during the conceptual design stage, by offering environmental impact (EI) estimates of abstract solutions with associated uncertainty, for evaluation and selection of the most environmentally benign solution as concept. The EI estimates are calculated by a module in the tool based on a proposed EI estimation method, which requires the support of a knowledge base to fetch appropriate LCA information corresponding to the design element being conceptualized. This knowledge base is grounded in the domain-agnostic SAPPhIRE model ontology, allows semantic operability of the knowledge, and offers the results to the designers in a familiar domain language to aid decision-making. A “proof of concept” of the tool is developed for application in design of building in the AEC (Architectural design, Engineering, and Construction) domain. Further, empirical studies are conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the “proof of concept” to support decision-making and results are found favorable. The paper also discusses the future scope for further development of the tool into a holistic design decision-making platform.

Young People Collecting Natural Souvenirs: A Perspective of Sustainability and Marketing

Collecting of natural souvenirs causes destruction of the natural environment as well as social and economic problems. The article shows that the next generation will have a tendency to aggravate such problems by collecting natural souvenirs. To discover the preferences of young people related to collecting natural souvenirs, the authors performed a survey in Poland on a sample of 426 persons aged 21–30. The survey has shown that 80.7% of young people participating in tourist trips bring souvenirs to their places of residence. As much as 61.4% collect natural souvenirs. Most people bring shells (53.9%), rocks (22.7%), and sand from seaside beaches (18.0%). Natural souvenirs are important to young Poles. This is confirmed by the following major motivations for collection: natural souvenirs are unique (26.2%), genuine (23.8%), bring back the best memories (22.6%), and cannot be bought in stores (14.5%). Only 9.8% of those surveyed oppose bringing of natural souvenirs, 5.2% deem such practices unlawful, and 11.2% recognize their detrimental effect on local tourist attractions. The article presents demarketing actions, which can largely stem the negative phenomenon of collection of natural souvenirs.

Self-repair in consecutive interpreting: similarities and differences between professional interpreters and student interpreters

ABSTRACT The present study investigates the similarities and differences between professional and student interpreters in their use of self-repairs, in terms of form and motivation, and analyzes the impact of expertise on fluency. To this end, a retrospective interview-based Chinese-to-English consecutive interpreting experiment has been carried out, of which the results are as follows. First, both groups adopt repetition, restart, replacement, rephrasing and delayed repair as repair techniques. Second, repair of errors and appropriateness constitute major motivations for self-repair, and repair for output idiomaticity and repair due to errors in the original speech are also observed, enriching the classification of repair motivations in the C-E consecutive interpreting context. Third, in comparison with the student group, the professional interpreters pay more attention to semantic reproduction and are more proficient in syntactic structure conversion, leading to fewer syntactic error repairs and D-repairs in the professional group. The differences in repair models between the two groups can thus be attributed to their varying capabilities in processing syntactic structures and semantic representations.

Emerging “2.5-dimensional” Culture: Character-oriented Cultural Practices and “Community of Preferences” as a New Fandom in Japan and Beyond

Emerging “2.5-dimensional” CultureCharacter-oriented Cultural Practices and “Community of Preferences” as a New Fandom in Japan and Beyond Akiko Sugawa-Shimada (bio) What is “2.5-dimension (2.5 jigen)”? In recent years, the term “2.5-dimension (ni-ten-go jigen)” has gained much attention within popular culture studies. The term “2.5 jigen” roughly means the space between the two-dimensional (fictional space where our imaginations and fantasy work) and the three-dimensional (reality where we physically exist). Within Japanese anime fandom, fans often use “two dimensions” to mean anime characters, stating, “I am only capable of loving the two-dimensional [characters] (2 jigen shika aisenai).” However, due to the growing success of cosplay and 2.5-D stage performances (theatrical adaptations of manga, anime, and videogames) since the early 2000s, the 2.5-D has begun to be used as an umbrella term to express virtuality embodied by actual human bodies as well as human bodies that look unreal, which I call “virtual corporality” (kyokô teki shintai). A magazine specializing in 2.5-D theatrical performances, Stage Push!, was published in 2014, and in 2016, the March issue of Da Vinci, Kadokawa’s entertainment magazine featuring 2.5-D, was immediately sold out.1 These magazines usually focus on 2.5-D stages under the name of “2.5 jigen.” In 2018, when NHK’s year-end traditional entertainment event, Kôhaku utagassen (Red and White Singing Festival) invited the singing group, Tôken danshi, from one of the most famous 2.5-D musicals, Musical Tôken ranbu as a guest, 2.5-D theatrical performances gained national recognition in Japan. Academic critical attention has been also drawn by some publications such as art and culture magazines Yuriika (2015, Eureka) and Bijutsu techô (2016 and 2016, The Art Handbook), featuring special issues on the 2.5-D cultural phenomenon. These magazines primarily focus on 2.5-D stages as cultural products. The Japan 2.5 Dimensional Musical Association, founded in 2014, defines 2.5-dimensional musicals as “theatrical presentations based on Japanese manga, popular animation and video games.”2 This is the typical categorization [End Page 124] of 2.5-D stages as seen from the production side for promotional purposes. However, fans use 2.5-D very differently, usually taking pleasure in realistic reproduction and reenactment of anime/manga/videogame characters (“virtual corporality”), fictional worlds, and the interaction between characters/actors and fans. As a matter of fact, 2.5-D theatrical performances are not stand-alone productions but, just like anime and manga, they have multiple episodes within a series, called a “season” (shiizun) in Japanese. For example, the first season of Musical Prince of Tennis ran from 2003 to 2010, with sixteen plays (or episodes) in which each had a run of between a few days and a few months.3 The merchandise sold during the event is one of the major motivations for fans to visit theaters. They exchange their unwanted merchandise among fans outside the theaters for their desired products, such as canned badges and photos of cast members in costumes. This exercise is called “trading,” and these venues serve as sites for fans to construct their communities of fandom. As such, if we can extend the scope from the cultural products themselves to the fans’ engagement developed through their deep commitment to character-oriented consumption of popular culture, then 2.5-D can be utilized as a means to detect wider cultural phenomenon among fans of popular cultural contents such as manga, anime, and videogames. I define the 2.5-dimensional culture as “cultural practices which reproduce the fictional space of contemporary popular cultural products (such as manga, anime, and videogames) along with the fans’ interplay between the real and fictional spaces.”4 Emerging as a cultural phenomenon in Japan in the early 2000s, 2.5-dimensional culture includes 2.5-D theatrical per-formances, cosplay, voice-actor/character concerts such as Love Live! School Idol Project (2010–), anime-induced tourism (also known as contents tourism), cheering-along version of anime movie screening (ôenjôei), and virtual YouTuber (or V-Tubers, such as Kizuna Ai). Ôenjôei...

A sequential targeting nanoplatform for anaplastic thyroid carcinoma theranostics

Effective accumulation of nanoparticles (NPs) in tumor regions is one of the major motivations in nanotechnology research and that the establishment of an efficient targeting nanoplatform for the treatment of malignant tumors is urgently needed for theranostic applications. In this study, we engineered multifunctional sequential targeting NPs for achieving synergistic antiangiogenic photothermal therapy (PTT) and multimodal imaging-guided diagnosis for anaplastic thyroid carcinoma (ATC) theranostics. Antibody bevacizumab with an affinity towards vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) on the tumor cell surface was conjugated onto the surface of polymer NPs for VEGF targeting and antiangiogenic therapy. Encapsulated IR825 was employed as a photothermal agent (PTA) with a mitochondrial targeting capability, which further cascades NPs into mitochondria to enhance hyperthermic efficiency in the ablation of tumor cells. Importantly, the combination of bevacizumab and IR825 in a single nanosystem achieved desirable accumulations of NPs and that sequential targeted PTT combined with antiangiogenesis significantly promoted the therapeutic efficiency in eradicating tumors by near-infrared (NIR) laser irradiation. Furthermore, these NPs are extraordinary contrast agents for photoacoustic, ultrasound and fluorescence imaging applications, providing multimodal imaging capabilities for therapeutic monitoring and a precise diagnosis. Therefore, this multifunctional nanoplatform provides a promising theranostic strategy for extremely malignant ATC. Statement of significanceAnaplastic thyroid carcinoma (ATC), with extremely aggressive behavior, lacks a satisfactory therapeutic method and a comprehensive early diagnostic strategy. Herein, we successfully synthesized a sequential targeting nanoplatform (IR825@Bev-PLGA-PFP NPs) with theranostic function, which specifically binds to VEGF on the tumor cell surface and further cascades into mitochondria to achieve effective accumulation of NPs in the tumor regions. As a result, it solves the urgent demand for ATC detection and therapy. By breaking the limitation of traditional target, such as low efficacy and frequent recurrence as the results of low accumulation, sequential targeting combined with synergistic antiangiogenic PTT completely eradicates tumors without any residual tissue and side effect. Therefore, this strategy paves a solid way for further investigation in the theranostic progressing of ATC.

The quest for global talent for changing economic needs: a study of student mobility and job prospects for returnees in China

ABSTRACTAspiring to become a world power in an increasingly globalised world, the Chinese government recognises the importance of restructuring its economic structure to sustain its economic structure to sustain future economic growth. The Chinese government has also tried to adopt appropriate measures to transform not only the economic structures but also the education systems to produce future workforce with adaptive skills catering for the changing economic and labour market needs. The major objectives of this article is to critically examine the major motivations of students choosing international learning programmes either on offer in the mainland or studying abroad, and their career developments after returning home.

HEALTH LITERACY, MEDICAL NON-ADHERENCE, AND SELF-REPORTED HEALTH PROBLEMS AMONG OLDER INTERNET USERS

The Internet presents new options for the elderly to gather information to support their health care. Health information gathering is among the major motivations for using the Internet among aging baby-boomers. However, insufficient e-health literacy presents challenges for the aging baby boomers. We examined the extent to which health-related internet use and e-health literacy are associated with non-adherence and self-reported negative health outcomes. Respondents were randomly sampled from the largest national online probability-based research panel (N = 710; M= 48.8, SD= 16.4). The age range in our research allowed us to examine the hypothesized associations across the full sample while focusing on older adults (age ≥ 60; N = 194). Older adults with greater e-health literacy reported higher averages for non-compliance because of information obtained from the Internet [(t (194) = 5.06, p ≤ .0001]. Ordinary least squares regression analyses showed that older adults who reported greater averages on health-related internet use reported higher averages on self-reported health problems (β = .292, p ≤ .01). However, women reported fewer health problems (β = -.217, p ≤ .01). Non-adherence with doctor recommendations is a significant positive predictor of self-reported health problem in the full sample (β = .244, p ≤ .0001) but not among older respondents (β = .032, p ≤ .061). Older individuals will make better utilization of the Internet if health professionals guide them to credible sources for health-related information. Empowerment of individuals to utilize the Internet in an informed manner requires addressing their needs for e-health literacy skills.

The First Replacement of the RF Window of the ACS Cavity

In 2013, the Annular-ring Coupled Structure (ACS) cavities were installed to the Japan Proton Accelerator Research Complex (J-PARC) linac. Since then, the ACS cavities have been stably running. Although any serious problem induced by the RF window had not yet observed, we decided to replace the RF window of one ACS cavity by the newly manufactured one. The major motivations of the replacement are to check the surface condition of the RF window which have been under operation for nearly five years, to confirm that the new RF window fully meets specifications, and to learn how much time is required for high-power conditioning of the new RF window. By making use of the summer maintenance period of 2018, we carried out the replacement. This was the first experience for us to replace the RF window installed to the ACS cavity in the linac accelerator tunnel. As for the removed RF window, there was no any abnormal warning found with the visual examination. At the resuming of the cavity operation after the maintenance period, we conducted the high-power conditioning in a measured manner. It took around fifty hours so that the targeted peak power was stably input to the cavity through the new RF window. The ACS cavity with the new RF window is now stably operating.

Challenging identity: development of a measure of veterinary career motivations

BackgroundWhile little is known about the motivations underpinning veterinary work, previous literature has suggested that the main influences on veterinary career choice are early/formative exposure to animals or veterinary role...

Time-sharing in parental leave: Why and how fathers assess their time to care home alone

Abstract With recent developments, parental leave policies may also be seen as gender equality policies, namely when fathers are given substantial and non-transferable well-paid home-alone time and encouraged by the policies themselves to take it (‘use it or lose it’/extra-time bonuses). Portugal is one of the countries where this type of time was introduced: parents are given an extra well-paid month of main leave after birth (‘initial parental leave’) if each one stays home alone at least 30 days after the other return to work. Given the way it challenges traditional gender roles in family life and in the labour market, a qualitative study was carried out in order to grasp the motives of 24 fathers (non-probability purposive sample) who took this home-alone sharing bonus. Findings reveal that fathers’ motives impact the amount of time they take. From the interactions between two major motivations – care and instrumental – and other social circumstances, such as family negotiation and labour contexts, several time-sharing profiles are identified. Each one making a difference in terms of the amount of time shared by fathers, with those where fathers exceed the one-month bonus-sharing being of particular interest.

Spreading Ideas: TED Talks' Role in Cancer Communication and Public Engagement.

Technology, Entertainment, Design (TED) Talks have represented a broad source of health communication since 1984. However, to date, no studies exist on how this tool addresses the question of cancer. In this paper, we aim to illuminate two major issues: (1) Are TED Talks a good source for cancer communication? (2) How does the public respond to cancer-related TED Talk lectures? To this end, we searched for the keyword 'cancer' on the TED.com website in January 2018. All transcripts were obtained along with related information such as numbers of views, like and dislike rates. We also analysed a sample of 938 comments, corresponding to the 10 most relevant (if existing) regarding each video on TED.com and YouTube platforms. From the 49 videos pertaining to cancer, 33 were scientific-related, whereas 11 focused on speakers' personal experiences. Only three videos approached prevention themes of major relevance for cancer communication to broad audiences. Instead, they brought more therapy (16) and diagnosis (12) issues and often promoted exaggerated extrapolations of research results (20). Scientific lectures also made frequent use of a 'bad vs. good' duality discourse by criticizing current science/policies and then offering a solution/hope. Regarding the public response, non-scientific lectures had more negative votes than scientific counterparts. Moreover, the audience exhibited two major motivations to provide a comment: to judge the lectures and to share personal stories. We believe that our observations are of considerable relevance for helping in enhancing this tool as a substantial cancer communication source.

Water-in-PDMS Emulsion Templating of Highly Interconnected Porous Architectures for 3D Cell Culture.

The development of advanced techniques of fabrication of three-dimensional (3D) microenvironments for the study of cell growth and proliferation has become one of the major motivations of material scientists and bioengineers in the past decade. Here, we present a novel residueless 3D structuration technique of poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) by water-in-PDMS emulsion casting and subsequent curing process in temperature-/pressure-controlled environment. Scanning electron microscopy and X-ray microcomputed tomography allowed us to investigate the impact of those parameters on the microarchitecture of the porous structure. We demonstrated that the optimized emulsion casting process gives rise to large-scale and highly interconnected network with pore size ranging from 500 μm to 1.5 mm that turned out to be nicely adapted to 3D cell culture. Experimental cell culture validations were performed using SaOS-2 (osteosarcoma) cell lines. Epifluorescence and deep penetration imaging techniques as two-photon confocal microscopy unveiled information about cell morphology and confirmed a homogeneous cell proliferation and spatial distribution in the 3D porous structure within an available volume larger than 1 cm3. These results open alternative scenarios for the fabrication and integration of porous scaffolds for the development of 3D cell culture platforms.

Understanding Dropouts in MOOCs

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have developed rapidly in recent years, and have attracted millions of online users. However, a central challenge is the extremely high dropout rate — recent reports show that the completion rate in MOOCs is below 5% (Onah, Sinclair, and Boyatt 2014; Kizilcec, Piech, and Schneider 2013; Seaton et al. 2014).What are the major factors that cause the users to drop out?What are the major motivations for the users to study in MOOCs? In this paper, employing a dataset from XuetangX1, one of the largest MOOCs in China, we conduct a systematical study for the dropout problem in MOOCs. We found that the users’ learning behavior can be clustered into several distinct categories. Our statistics also reveal high correlation between dropouts of different courses and strong influence between friends’ dropout behaviors. Based on the gained insights, we propose a Context-aware Feature Interaction Network (CFIN) to model and to predict users’ dropout behavior. CFIN utilizes context-smoothing technique to smooth feature values with different context, and use attention mechanism to combine user and course information into the modeling framework. Experiments on two large datasets show that the proposed method achieves better performance than several state-of-the-art methods. The proposed method model has been deployed on a real system to help improve user retention.

Satisfaction and limitation of primary health care nurses' work in rural areas.

The health workforce is crucial to reduce inequalities in health and health care in rural areas, and nurses, although there are few professionals and these are poorly distributed compared to other professionals. There are few studies addressing nurses' work in the rural context. This study aimed to investigate the satisfaction and difficulties of the work of primary health care (PHC) nurses in rural areas. This is a case study with a qualitative approach, whose subject was the health units in the rural area of a large city in the state of Paraíba, Brazil, with Family Health Strategy teams. Eleven nurses working in rural areas participated in the study. Data were collected through interviews with semi-structured scripts and submitted to content analysis. The study revealed that nurses working in rural areas have experienced job satisfaction with the recognition and gratitude of families, one of the major motivations for professionals interviewed. The nurses are committed and have adequate training in their area of activity. The working conditions, infrastructure, forms of access to the workplace and distance from the decision center are factors that stand out as difficulties of work. The nurses appreciate each other in their work, establish good relations with the population and work as a team despite the difficulties. The study reveals that nurses and the population experience isolation in the rural area as well as difficulty in accessing the workplace, in the case of practitioners, and in consolidating policies maintained in the urban area. It evidences the nurse as an essential element for PHC in the rural setting, which can make the difference in the care of populations often in the sideline of health services.

Electric characteristic and cavitation bubble dynamics using underwater pulsed discharge

Underwater pulsed discharge is widely applied in medicine, machining, and material modification. The induced cavitation bubble and subsequent cavitation collapse are considered the major motivations behind these applications. This paper presents an underwater pulsed discharge system. The experimental setup is established to induce and investigate the cavitation bubble assisted with a high-speed camera. Three aspects, including the characteristic of the discharge with different applied voltages and conductivities, the evolution of the cavitation bubble profile, and the energy efficiency of cavitation bubble inducing, are investigated, respectively. Especially, the mechanism of pre-discharge time delay in the low field intensity case is explained using the Joule heat effect. The results show the validity of the underwater pulsed discharger and experimental setup. The present underwater pulsed discharger is proved to be a simple, portable, and easy-to-implement device for the investigation of cavitation bubble dynamics.