Suchergebnisse

Purpose
The Metaverse is rapidly reshaping the understanding of tourism, yet the public perception of this new domain remains largely uncharted empirically. This paper aims to build on the technology acceptance model (TAM) and diffusion of innovations theory (DIT) to fill this gap, offering crucial insights that could inform scholars and practitioners in both the tourism and technology sectors.


Design/methodology/approach
Using a big-data approach, the authors applied machine learning to scrape comments made by social media users on recent popular posts or videos related to tourism in the Metaverse from three prominent social media platforms. The cleaning process narrowed down 15,461 comments to 2,650, which were then analysed using thematic, emotion and sentiment analysis techniques.


Findings
The thematic analysis revealed that virtual tourism evokes a complex range of public beliefs. While many express awe and excitement toward its immersive capabilities, others remain sceptical about authenticity compared to physical travel. Additional themes show people draw comparisons to real-world tourism, discuss technology's role and note educational value and novelty. However, some comments raise concerns about potential societal harms, exploitation and mental health impacts. Sentiment analysis found over half of the comments positive, though some were negative. Emotion analysis showed contentment, happiness and excitement as most frequent, though sadness, worry and loneliness also featured. Overall, perceptions of Metaverse tourism encompass enthusiasm yet substantial ambivalence.


Originality/value
To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is one of the first to comprehensively analyse public discussions on Metaverse tourism. It takes TAM and Rogers's DIT a step further and provides fresh insights into how these theories can be employed in the emerging field of Metaverse tourism. The themes revealed new conceptual insights into multidimensional factors shaping public beliefs about Metaverse tourism and thus informing scholarly research on virtual interaction and technology acceptance regarding Metaverse tourism. In addition, the results can help tourism providers, platforms and marketers address salient public beliefs and sentiments/attitudes in developing marketing offerings, experiences and communications. Over time, this analysis methodology can be used to track the evolving public perceptions of Metaverse tourism.

This research investigates resettlement stress among African migrants in Australia and how migrants manage stress. The research used 30 semi-structured interviews with African migrants in Western Australia. Participants used various strategies, including reliance on family as a community and on God – usually constructed by alliance rather than kinship – to manage stress. The article's key contribution highlights the multilayered approach for social work to integration strategies for migrants. The study identifies three significant issues emerging: the importance of 'families' as community networks, the experience of discrimination and the significance of faith in God as crucial migrant support factors.

This study examines generational differences in valuing the sources of motivation in workplace behaviour between millennials and older generations, with a view to assist managers in making employment decisions and maintaining multigenerational staff in the services sector. Based on systematically sampled data, the authors used Gagné et al.'s Multidimensional Work Motivational Scale (MWMS) to measure the different facets of work motivators alongside a three-item measure of employee overall work motivation (designed for this study) to address the hypotheses. Using structural equation modelling procedures to analyse the data, the authors found that four out of six motivators regress differently to overall work motivation. In other words, both extrinsic regulation–material and identified regulation are valued more by millennials compared to older generations, while extrinsic regulation–social and introjected regulation are valued less by millennials compared to older generations.

AbstractThe research aims to empirically validate a multidimensional measure of total quality management (TQM) benchmarking within a humanitarian setting. This study is the first to investigate the dimensionality of the TQM benchmarks as used by international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs). The proposed four‐dimensional construct for measuring quality lends itself to lean and practical TQM framework for INGOs, allowing them a greater awareness and an appetite for aligning their operations with TQM principles. Utilizing survey data collected from participants working for United Nations agencies in the Middle East, the methodology consisted of a set of literature‐backed quantitative procedures to test the validity of the previously suggested theoretical TQM‐measurement model. An alternate model emerged and revealed that the TQM‐benchmarking measurement model is a four‐factor variate. The implications of the proposed model for implementing lean management practices by INGOs are discussed.

We examine the predictive power of individual differences based on the Five-Factor Model (FFM) for stress among undergraduate students in private universities in Malaysia. One hundred thirty-one undergraduate students from three private universities were surveyed. A partial least square structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) was utilised to analyse the data. Our findings indicate that Neuroticism and Agreeableness positively predict student stress. Whereas openness to experience, conscientiousness and extraversion do not exhibit significant or sufficiently sizable predictions of student stress. Notably, female students are found to report higher levels of stress than males. Emotionally unstable students tend to be more vulnerable to forms of stress. Agreeableness signifies the predisposition to be kind and supportive instead of suspicious or an adversary towards people. Thus, highly agreeable students may expose themselves to discretionary stress to meet their classmates and tutors' expectations. Our results are discussed. Further, practical and research implications are provided.

Migration Practice as Creative Practice: An Interdisciplinary Exploration of Migration presents an in-depth evaluation of migrants' contributions to modern socio-economic structures. Leading with a discussion of the historical construction of migration and what it signifies in the modern globalised economies, an interdisciplinary range of contributors examine the interaction of migrants with new cultures, migrants' embeddedness into new environments and what that signifies for community relations. The book discusses the creative energies that migrants bring to the private and public spheres. Migration Practice as Creative Practice examines how migrants use their social lives, lived experiences, the process of identity formation and histories to inject positive 'newness' into host cultural and economic architectures. The book calls for more creative ways of researching migrant lived experiences and brings to life the different ways of approaching migrant research for scholars today.