Magister Library and Information Studies - MLIS / The advent of the 21st century and its dynamic information environment have changed higher education considerably including the library spaces. Library patrons, namely undergraduates, postgraduates, and academics are placing heavy demands on academic libraries requiring support in research, teaching and learning. As a result, academic librarians globally have undertaken major re-evaluations of what they do and how they do it, to ensure relevance amongst their diverse user communities. The new information landscape is fraught with controversies that prompt opposing perspectives towards change acceptance amongst librarians. In Zimbabwe, academic libraries seemed to be lagging behind regarding changes presented by this information landscape. Given this context, the study sought to understand how librarians are adjusting to the 21st century environment against the expectations of the students and academics. The Diffusion of Innovation Theory crafted by Rogers (2003) and the McKinsey 7S model propounded by Waterman, Peters and Phillips (1982) were used as theoretical and conceptual frameworks. The research further applied a conceptual framework from the literature to determine the expectations of students and academics of the academic library in the 21st century. For data collection, the study adopted a case study design and a mixed methods approach using Web-based questionnaires, follow-up interviews and website content analysis. Data was collected from students, academics and librarians at three selected Zimbabwean universities. All data collecting tools were pre-tested amongst librarians, academics, postgraduate and undergraduate students prior to collecting data. Data collected using questionnaires was analysed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) and Microsoft Excel while interview data was analysed using thematic text analysis. Findings of this study revealed that the Midlands State University Library had to a larger extent embraced new trends which are in-line with the 21st century environment compared to the National University of Science and Technology and Lupane State University libraries. The Library and Information Science qualification remains important in service delivery among academic librarians. Inadequate funding, limited time due to multitasking, slow uptake of new concepts and limited knowledge and skills were barriers to keeping up with new trends amongst librarians. Academic librarians collaborated with academics in collection development, Information Literacy Skills (ILS) teaching and uploading theses and research papers into the Institution Repository (IR). / 2018-12-14

Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to study business clients’ technology acceptance of e-commerce within business-to-business in the work wear sector. In specific, develop and test a framework in order to analyze the antecedents of perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use behind business clients’ behavioral intention to the usage of e-commerce. Problem: There is not sufficient research regarding industries and companies that are categorized as laggards (Del Aguila-Obra & Padilla-Melendez, 2006), and furthermore regarding clients’ technology acceptance in a business-to-business context (Doherty & Ellis-Chadwick, 2010). Actors within the work wear sector conduct their businesses in the most traditional way, with physical stores (Ekberg, Fraenkel, Gustavsson, Hamsten & Hedin, 2014). The question is whether this traditional way remain due to skepticism among the business clients’ and their level of technology acceptance. Method: A proposed framework is developed by the authors, adapted from Technology Acceptance Model (Venkatesh & Davis, 2000) and Diffusion of Innovation Theory (Rogers, 1983). This framework is tested through quantitative research, and more specific a questionnaire. Subsequently, the empirical data gathering is assembled, analyzed and concluded into a final proposed framework.  Findings: The final proposed framework incorporates antecedents from the proposed framework, but also new influences that are identified in the empirical findings as relevant. These influences are Age, Gender, Experience and Compliance. Further, the antecedents presented in the final proposed framework are the following: Subjective norm/Opinion leaders, Job relevance/Compatibility, Output quality, Result demonstrability/Observability and Trialability.

Social media has changed the way businesses relate to their customers. Since the beginning of social media, traditional methods of communicating with customers have begun to decline. The purpose of this multicase study was to determine the strategies of 5 owners of small restaurant businesses in Western North Carolina who successfully used social media marketing for 1 year or more. Rogers's diffusion of innovation theory was the conceptual framework for this study. Data collection included semistructured interviews, documents pertaining to social media marketing strategies, and social media pages and websites from the participating restaurants. These data were analyzed following Yin's 5-step analysis plan. The themes that emerged were social media platforms, word-of-mouth, and challenges implementing social media. Facebook, Yelp, and Instagram were the most used social media platforms. The participants implied that word-of-mouth has the potential to increase sales and to grow business. Challenges implementing social media included the ability to be consistent and actively engaged on the social media sites to allow business owners to respond quickly to negative posts made by customers. Small restaurant businesses can be successful if they develop and implement a social media presence, encourage customer feedback, and formulate a plan to overcome obstacles and challenges that may arise with implementing social media marketing strategies. These findings contribute to positive social change by increasing the sustainability of small businesses in the community, which may drive economic development and improve community relations.

The healthcare system in the US faces substantial challenges related to cost, access and quality. Health Information Exchange (HIE) has been widely viewed as a viable solution for dealing with those challenges. Despite the potential contributions to the healthcare system that HIE promises, adoption and use of HIE have always been difficult, and the past two decades have witnessed significant HIE implementation failures. The limited understanding of HIE is a major obstacle for HIE success. Only recently in-depth research about HIE starts to appear in top IS journals. In addition, the uniqueness of healthcare industry adds to the complexity to HIE. Our study attempts to address this research gap by systematically examining multiple factors that influence HIE adoption and use. Using social exchange theory (SET) and diffusion of innovations theory, a research model was developed to empirically test major factors that impact healthcare providers’ relative advantages and risks perceptions for adopting and using HIE. It is further proposed that relative advantages and risks in turn impact organizations’ intentions for adopting and continuously using HIE. As such, we posit that organizations’ assessments of relative advantages and risks associated with HIE mediate the impacts of organizational and technological factors on organizations’ adoption and use intentions. This study uses questionnaire surveys for data collection. Out of a total of 163 responses, 117 surveys were completed and were analyzed using Partial Least Square software SmartPLS 3. Data analysis finds that most of the relationships were in the hypothesized directions with some of the relationships being significant. Specifically, top management support, absorptive capacity, trust, and HIE innovation characteristics positively affect relative advantages and negatively affect risk. Furthermore, relative advantages positively affect adoption/continuance intentions, whereas risk negatively affects adoption/continuance intentions. This study contributes to the literature and offers important practical implications. It is one of the early empirical attempts to understand the key factors that affect HIE’s adoptions and use. The research can also serve as a starting point for more in-depth studies in the future. Moreover, practitioners can use the several newly-developed scales to empirically examine healthcare providers’ adoption and use intentions.

The purpose of this research is to study the role of information and communication technology (ICT) and information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) in Cambodian non-government organizations (NGOs). By focusing on a workshop on the ICT applications Unicode and Open Office, initiated by the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia (the CCC), I intend to see how these applications were adopted, how they are used and what the future is for ICT and ICT4D in Cambodia. The research is based on qualitative, semi structured interviews with employees at CCC as well as NGO workers who were participants at the workshops. The theories that I have used are Amartya Sen’s capability approach, Everett Rogers’ diffusion of innovation theory and intercultural communication. This study shows that ICT is considered to be a very important tool for the development of Cambodia. Unicode has contributed with an easier way to type and read documents in Khmer and it is considered to promote the Khmer language. Open Office have not found its renaissance yet since people find it difficult to use although the NGOs sees its’ potential and wants to learn it. According to the NGO workers, ICT and ICT4D will play an important role for the Cambodian development in the future but because of a lack of infrastructure and proper knowledge about the new technology, it has not been used to its full capacity. In order for us to understand how ICT can reach its full potential within NGOs, there have to exist an understanding of Cambodian culture and history since the Khmer people’s values affect how the NGO workers look at development and the tools they are using.

Sustainable tourism development is widely accepted as an alternative approach to tourism development in many countries. However, the sustainable tourism development concept remains problematic, in both definitional and operational terms, attributable in part to a lack of effective channels for diffusion and communication of the concept to destination stakeholders. As such, this thesis aims to identify, understand, and describe effective communication mechanisms for the dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept, with the aim of facilitating a more effective implementation of it. To achieve this, three important issues are addressed. Firstly, identification of destination stakeholders’ understanding of the sustainable tourism development concept; secondly, determination of the communication channels for diffusing the sustainable tourism development concept; and thirdly, identification of the key actors of the social system for transferring information about sustainable tourism development. In exploring these issues, the thesis is underpinned by diffusion of innovations theory, which constitutes an explanatory framework for considering the findings of 55 in-depth interviews with key tourism stakeholders on Kret Island, Thailand. The findings reveal that sustainable tourism development is considered important for tourism development in the destination; however, the implementation of such principles remains problematic as the term is complex and there is no common understanding of its implementation. In terms of the dimensions of sustainable tourism development, while economic, environmental and socio-cultural as the triple-bottom line aspects are still embedded in the concept, there are four additional dimensions of sustainable tourism development found in Kret Island, Thailand; these are the community integration, education, tourist satisfaction, and regulations dimensions. The findings further reveal that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept occurs through interpersonal as well as media communication, and that while these two types of communication have differing roles to play in disseminating information, there is synergy between them. Key actors in relevant social systems which facilitate dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept to destination stakeholders are change agents; members of social networks and opinion leaders. Each actor has both differing roles and attributes when it comes to transferring information. The findings of this research provide a contribution to knowledge by highlighting that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept is related to aspects and qualities of the concept itself, the communication channels employed in its diffusion, both interpersonal and media, and the relative time of diffusion and adoption within the social system. It also offer some guidelines according to the characteristics of the people involved, the social systems involved and communications channels used for the key stakeholders on the island to develop appropriate communication channels in order to diffuse tourism information regarding sustainable tourism development to other destination stakeholders. Both the contributions and implications of this research have the potential to contribute to better dissemination of information regarding sustainable tourism development to destination stakeholders as a whole.

Sustainable tourism development is widely accepted as an alternative approach to tourism development in many countries. However, the sustainable tourism development concept remains problematic, in both definitional and operational terms, attributable in part to a lack of effective channels for diffusion and communication of the concept to destination stakeholders. As such, this thesis aims to identify, understand, and describe effective communication mechanisms for the dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept, with the aim of facilitating a more effective implementation of it. To achieve this, three important issues are addressed. Firstly, identification of destination stakeholders’ understanding of the sustainable tourism development concept; secondly, determination of the communication channels for diffusing the sustainable tourism development concept; and thirdly, identification of the key actors of the social system for transferring information about sustainable tourism development. In exploring these issues, the thesis is underpinned by diffusion of innovations theory, which constitutes an explanatory framework for considering the findings of 55 in-depth interviews with key tourism stakeholders on Kret Island, Thailand. The findings reveal that sustainable tourism development is considered important for tourism development in the destination; however, the implementation of such principles remains problematic as the term is complex and there is no common understanding of its implementation. In terms of the dimensions of sustainable tourism development, while economic, environmental and socio-cultural as the triple-bottom line aspects are still embedded in the concept, there are four additional dimensions of sustainable tourism development found in Kret Island, Thailand; these are the community integration, education, tourist satisfaction, and regulations dimensions. The findings further reveal that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept occurs through interpersonal as well as media communication, and that while these two types of communication have differing roles to play in disseminating information, there is synergy between them. Key actors in relevant social systems which facilitate dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept to destination stakeholders are change agents; members of social networks and opinion leaders. Each actor has both differing roles and attributes when it comes to transferring information. The findings of this research provide a contribution to knowledge by highlighting that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept is related to aspects and qualities of the concept itself, the communication channels employed in its diffusion, both interpersonal and media, and the relative time of diffusion and adoption within the social system. It also offer some guidelines according to the characteristics of the people involved, the social systems involved and communications channels used for the key stakeholders on the island to develop appropriate communication channels in order to diffuse tourism information regarding sustainable tourism development to other destination stakeholders. Both the contributions and implications of this research have the potential to contribute to better dissemination of information regarding sustainable tourism development to destination stakeholders as a whole.

Sustainable tourism development is widely accepted as an alternative approach to tourism development in many countries. However, the sustainable tourism development concept remains problematic, in both definitional and operational terms, attributable in part to a lack of effective channels for diffusion and communication of the concept to destination stakeholders. As such, this thesis aims to identify, understand, and describe effective communication mechanisms for the dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept, with the aim of facilitating a more effective implementation of it. To achieve this, three important issues are addressed. Firstly, identification of destination stakeholders’ understanding of the sustainable tourism development concept; secondly, determination of the communication channels for diffusing the sustainable tourism development concept; and thirdly, identification of the key actors of the social system for transferring information about sustainable tourism development. In exploring these issues, the thesis is underpinned by diffusion of innovations theory, which constitutes an explanatory framework for considering the findings of 55 in-depth interviews with key tourism stakeholders on Kret Island, Thailand. The findings reveal that sustainable tourism development is considered important for tourism development in the destination; however, the implementation of such principles remains problematic as the term is complex and there is no common understanding of its implementation. In terms of the dimensions of sustainable tourism development, while economic, environmental and socio-cultural as the triple-bottom line aspects are still embedded in the concept, there are four additional dimensions of sustainable tourism development found in Kret Island, Thailand; these are the community integration, education, tourist satisfaction, and regulations dimensions. The findings further reveal that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept occurs through interpersonal as well as media communication, and that while these two types of communication have differing roles to play in disseminating information, there is synergy between them. Key actors in relevant social systems which facilitate dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept to destination stakeholders are change agents; members of social networks and opinion leaders. Each actor has both differing roles and attributes when it comes to transferring information. The findings of this research provide a contribution to knowledge by highlighting that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept is related to aspects and qualities of the concept itself, the communication channels employed in its diffusion, both interpersonal and media, and the relative time of diffusion and adoption within the social system. It also offer some guidelines according to the characteristics of the people involved, the social systems involved and communications channels used for the key stakeholders on the island to develop appropriate communication channels in order to diffuse tourism information regarding sustainable tourism development to other destination stakeholders. Both the contributions and implications of this research have the potential to contribute to better dissemination of information regarding sustainable tourism development to destination stakeholders as a whole.

Sustainable tourism development is widely accepted as an alternative approach to tourism development in many countries. However, the sustainable tourism development concept remains problematic, in both definitional and operational terms, attributable in part to a lack of effective channels for diffusion and communication of the concept to destination stakeholders. As such, this thesis aims to identify, understand, and describe effective communication mechanisms for the dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept, with the aim of facilitating a more effective implementation of it. To achieve this, three important issues are addressed. Firstly, identification of destination stakeholders’ understanding of the sustainable tourism development concept; secondly, determination of the communication channels for diffusing the sustainable tourism development concept; and thirdly, identification of the key actors of the social system for transferring information about sustainable tourism development. In exploring these issues, the thesis is underpinned by diffusion of innovations theory, which constitutes an explanatory framework for considering the findings of 55 in-depth interviews with key tourism stakeholders on Kret Island, Thailand. The findings reveal that sustainable tourism development is considered important for tourism development in the destination; however, the implementation of such principles remains problematic as the term is complex and there is no common understanding of its implementation. In terms of the dimensions of sustainable tourism development, while economic, environmental and socio-cultural as the triple-bottom line aspects are still embedded in the concept, there are four additional dimensions of sustainable tourism development found in Kret Island, Thailand; these are the community integration, education, tourist satisfaction, and regulations dimensions. The findings further reveal that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept occurs through interpersonal as well as media communication, and that while these two types of communication have differing roles to play in disseminating information, there is synergy between them. Key actors in relevant social systems which facilitate dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept to destination stakeholders are change agents; members of social networks and opinion leaders. Each actor has both differing roles and attributes when it comes to transferring information. The findings of this research provide a contribution to knowledge by highlighting that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept is related to aspects and qualities of the concept itself, the communication channels employed in its diffusion, both interpersonal and media, and the relative time of diffusion and adoption within the social system. It also offer some guidelines according to the characteristics of the people involved, the social systems involved and communications channels used for the key stakeholders on the island to develop appropriate communication channels in order to diffuse tourism information regarding sustainable tourism development to other destination stakeholders. Both the contributions and implications of this research have the potential to contribute to better dissemination of information regarding sustainable tourism development to destination stakeholders as a whole.

Sustainable tourism development is widely accepted as an alternative approach to tourism development in many countries. However, the sustainable tourism development concept remains problematic, in both definitional and operational terms, attributable in part to a lack of effective channels for diffusion and communication of the concept to destination stakeholders. As such, this thesis aims to identify, understand, and describe effective communication mechanisms for the dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept, with the aim of facilitating a more effective implementation of it. To achieve this, three important issues are addressed. Firstly, identification of destination stakeholders’ understanding of the sustainable tourism development concept; secondly, determination of the communication channels for diffusing the sustainable tourism development concept; and thirdly, identification of the key actors of the social system for transferring information about sustainable tourism development. In exploring these issues, the thesis is underpinned by diffusion of innovations theory, which constitutes an explanatory framework for considering the findings of 55 in-depth interviews with key tourism stakeholders on Kret Island, Thailand. The findings reveal that sustainable tourism development is considered important for tourism development in the destination; however, the implementation of such principles remains problematic as the term is complex and there is no common understanding of its implementation. In terms of the dimensions of sustainable tourism development, while economic, environmental and socio-cultural as the triple-bottom line aspects are still embedded in the concept, there are four additional dimensions of sustainable tourism development found in Kret Island, Thailand; these are the community integration, education, tourist satisfaction, and regulations dimensions. The findings further reveal that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept occurs through interpersonal as well as media communication, and that while these two types of communication have differing roles to play in disseminating information, there is synergy between them. Key actors in relevant social systems which facilitate dissemination of the sustainable tourism development concept to destination stakeholders are change agents; members of social networks and opinion leaders. Each actor has both differing roles and attributes when it comes to transferring information. The findings of this research provide a contribution to knowledge by highlighting that diffusion of the sustainable tourism development concept is related to aspects and qualities of the concept itself, the communication channels employed in its diffusion, both interpersonal and media, and the relative time of diffusion and adoption within the social system. It also offer some guidelines according to the characteristics of the people involved, the social systems involved and communications channels used for the key stakeholders on the island to develop appropriate communication channels in order to diffuse tourism information regarding sustainable tourism development to other destination stakeholders. Both the contributions and implications of this research have the potential to contribute to better dissemination of information regarding sustainable tourism development to destination stakeholders as a whole.