The integrated model of smartphone adoption: hedonic and utilitarian value perceptions of smartphones among korean college students

Abstract This study aims to propose an integrated model of smartphone adoption that incorporates social influences (SIs), perceived technicality, as well as hedonic and utilitarian attitudes into the technology acceptance model. The proposed model was empirically evaluated by using survey data collected from 239 Korean college students to investigate their perception and attitudes toward smartphone adoption intention. Our results show that users' attitudes and their adoption intention are highly influenced by SI and positive self-image. This implies that a smartphone is a symbolic product that can signal affiliation and enhance the users' status in a group. The results also indicate that hedonic enjoyment is equally important as utilitarian usefulness in predicting the adoption intention, and the two variables mediate the relationships between SI, positive self-image, perceived technicality, and the intention to use. Consequently, the results reveal that smartphones are convergent media that can be viewed as both task-oriented and entertainment-oriented devices.     

Technology Usage and Sales Teams: A Multilevel Analysis of the Antecedents of Usage

Extensive research has investigated the antecedents and impact of adoption of technology in the sales force. Interestingly, even though sales teams have proliferated, most research on adoption to date is at the individual level of analysis. Therefore, we conduct research of individual and team characteristics and their influence on technology adoption through a multilevel analysis of adoption. We use survey data from 673 salespeople at a pharmaceutical firm distributed among 224 sales teams who reported to 122 external managers. Our results validate the importance of investigating relationships at multiple levels. Specific effects from individual experience, which is important within the typical individual analysis, did not have an impact within our study. Instead, the average experience of the team was a stronger antecedent to adoption within a sales team. The strong effect of peer usage of technology within a team compels us to recommend that managers create teams that include users with strong computer self-efficacy in order to accelerate adoption by those less inclined to adopt. Also, team adoption was strengthened by sales teams who accepted the goals of committed management. However, both empowerment of teams by management and team potency had a significant negative effect on adoption.     

Themes of Hope and Healing: Infertile Couples' Experiences of Adoption

Using a qualitative approach, the authors explored the experiences of becoming parents through adoption after unsuccessful infertility treatments. During in‐depth narrative interviews, 39 infertile couples shared their stories of how they determined that adoption was an acceptable parenting option, the vicissitudes of the adoption process, and their experiences of becoming adoptive parents. Phenomenological analysis of these data revealed 3 overarching themes. These findings are discussed in terms of their implications for counselors who work with infertile couples considering adoption, clients engaged in the adoption process, and those who have recently made the transition to parenthood through adoption.     

Religion and Public Opinion Toward Same‐Sex Relations,Marriage, and Adoption: Does the Type of Practice Matter?

This study examines how religion's impact on Americans’ attitudes toward same‐sex practices varies by the type of practice being considered. We theorize that same‐sex romantic and family practices such as sexual relations, marriage, and adoption represent distinct practice types, differing in degrees of legality, cultural legitimacy, and in their internal power dynamics. Consequently, we expect that Americans view each practice type somewhat differently and their opinions on each may be influenced by religion in distinctive ways. Drawing upon national‐level data, we estimate and compare the relative net effects of a comprehensive battery of religious measures on support for gay sex, marriage, and adoption, both for the full sample and across religious traditions. Analyses demonstrate that public opinion toward gay sexual relations is more strongly related to religious practice and theological conservatism compared to attitudes regarding same‐sex marriage or adoption. Moreover, frequent religious practice and conservative theological beliefs about the Bible tend to be more strongly associated with attitudes toward same‐sex relationships for evangelicals, compared to mainline Protestants and, to a lesser extent, Catholics. Findings ultimately affirm that the type of same‐sex practice being considered (sex, marriage, or adoption) serves to moderate religions’ impact on Americans’ support for such practices.     

Negotiating Identity: Post-colonial Ethics and Transnational Adoption

This paper examines the overwhelming desire of transnational adoptees to establish a connection with their origins in order to both come to terms with the past and develop an understanding of their identity. It considers the ethical ramifications of the commodification of human bodies. It is suggested that the idea of displacement is most helpful in approaching questions of transnational adoption. In this way, we can look at transnational adoption as a ‘beginning’—one that disappears into the present moment, becoming the constitutive reality underlying Derrida's concern with displacement—rather than its origin. For, what does the quest for a return to the point of origin entail? Transnational adoptees, when they embark on the journey of reclaiming their past, of coming to terms with their sense of loss, realise that there is no simple comfort in returning—that they are inevitably caught in the two worlds in which they co-exist. It is through this recognition of the traces that are contained in them, through this displacement, that they are able to negotiate identity.     

A FIELD SURVEY OF FACTORS AFFECTING THE ADOPTION AND PERCEIVED SUCCESS OF DIVERSITY TRAINING

Seven hundred and eighty-five human resource professionals responded to a questionnaire about diversity issues in their organizations. Analyses were conducted to determine the factors associated with (a) adoption of diversity training and (b) perceived training success. Results revealed that both training adoption and perceived training success were strongly associated with top management support for diversity. In addition, training adoption was associated with large organizational size, positive top management beliefs about diversity, high strategic priority of diversity relative to other competing objectives, presence of a diversity manager, and existence of a large number of other diversity-supportive policies. Perceived training success was also associated with mandatory attendance for all managers, long-term evaluation of training results, managerial rewards for increasing diversity, and a broad inclusionary definition of diversity in the organization. Suggestions for future research are offered.     

Children's beliefs about adoption: A developmental study

Attributions about adoption were examined in adopted and nonadopted children between the ages of 6 and 13 years. Results indicated that nonadopted children had a more negative view of adoption than their adopted age-mates, at least during the early to middle childhood years. By 10–11 years, however, no group difference was noted in adoption beliefs. In addition, with increasing age nonadopted children became less negative about adoption whereas adopted children became more negative about adoption. These results are discussed in the context of differential socialization for adopted and nonadopted children. Implications of adoption beliefs for children's adoption adjustment also are raised.     

Internationally adopted children’s cognitive and social-emotional development during the first post-adoption year: A longitudinal study

Research is consistent in showing that international adoption is an intervention leading to great recovery for adopted children, but there is a need of research on factors associated with recovery. The present study is aimed at: (a) assessing children’s cognitive skills and social-emotional dimensions on their arrival to their new family; (b) evaluating their development after one year; (c) identifying which factors influence development, taking into account children’s gender, age, health status on arrival, years of institutionalization, and the initial psychological delay. Participants were 53 internationally adopted children (30 boys and 23 girls), aged 5.68 years old on average at placement (range 2–14). Results showed that children’s development one year after adoption was extraordinary, both in cognitive skills and in social-emotional dimensions. The children more delayed on arrival showed the larger progress over time, and their recovery was greater in cognitive skills than in social-emotional dimensions.     

Adoptive parents' satisfaction with the adoption experience and with its impact on family life

In this study, we discuss the relevance of adoptive families' satisfaction in the assessment of adoption processes. The effects of adoption on a sample group of 272 adoptive families are analyzed. Most families show high levels of satisfaction as to: their decision to adopt, the features of their adopted children and how adoption has affected them as individuals and as a family. Statistical analyses show that these families can have different satisfaction levels depending on certain features of the adoptees, of the adoptive families or of their educational style. Life satisfaction of the adoptees is also related to how their adoptive parents evaluate the adoption.     

The international adoption waiting period: waiting experience and coping strategies

The adoption waiting period is a powerful stressor that can affect the well-being and configuration of future family life. Adoption research and practice have not paid enough attention to this phase. The principal aim of this study is to address prospective adoptive parents' experience of and coping with this period. For this purpose, 63 families answered a feelings scale, a coping resources scale and a needs questionnaire, all elaborated for the study. Results show that a shorter length of waiting time, using cognitive and learning coping strategies and associative participation were related to a better general experience of adoption whereas process-centred strategies were related to a worse experience of adoption. Families would like to see more speed in the process, more warmth and humanity in their relation with institutions and better information about their expedients. We conclude by proposing some activities and services during the waiting period that could be useful for post adoption.     

Performing great and the purpose of performing better than others: on the recursiveness of the achievement goal adoption process

The purpose of the present research is to complement and extend previous achievement goal research by emphasizing that great performance may serve as an antecedent of performance‐approach goal adoption, that is, the wish to outperform others. A consistent finding across the three studies is, indeed, that great (perceived) performance and high performance expectancies are associated with the adoption of performance‐approach goals. It is concluded that the process of goal adoption is a dynamic, recursive process in which performance attainment is most likely to operate as both an antecedent and a consequence of goal adoption. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Birth Parents Who Relinquished Babies for Adoption Revisited

The fact that adoption records may be opened by court decree to enable adoptees to have access to identifying information about their birth parents makes it incumbent upon those concerned with adoption practices to study the impact of this on adoptees, adoptive parents, birth parents, and professional practice. This paper reports on research addressed to the attitudes and feelings of birth parents years after they relinquished babies for adoption.     

Changes in Attachment‐Related Behavioural Problems of Internationally Adopted Toddlers in Finland: Results from the FinAdo Study

This study investigated attachment‐related behavioural problems and their change over time among internationally adopted toddlers (N = 171, boys 40%) in Finland. The parents filled in questionnaires posted in 2007 and again in 2009. At the baseline (on average, 1.9 years from adoption), the mean age of the adoptees was 2.8 years. The comparison group (N = 244, boys 46%) was collected through well‐baby clinics. Results from the paired t‐test and mixed models showed that the adoptees' attachment‐related behavioural problems decreased during the 2‐year follow‐up and that they did not manifest more problems than their age‐mates any more 4 years after adoption. The decrease in behavioural problems was associated with the child's female gender, country of origin and adoptive parents' positive experience about adoption. A child's stereotypic or self‐injurious behaviour was not associated with the change in attachment‐related behaviour over time, although both were associated with behavioural problems. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

CONSTRAINTS ON THE ADOPTION OF PSYCHOLOGY-BASED PERSONNEL PRACTICES: LESSONS FROM ORGANIZATIONAL INNOVATION

Surveys of organizational personnel practices often indicate that techniques advocated by industrial and organizational (I/O) psychologists are used with less frequency than might be expected given their technical merit. This article attempts to explain this phenomenon by viewing the adoption of I/O-type personnel practices as organizational innovations that are subject to the mechanisms and processes described in the innovation-diffusion literature. It is argued that the adoption of I/O-type personnel practices constitutes administrative innovation and that such innovation is not strongly influenced by technical merit. Rather, imitation processes, environmental threat, government regulation, and political influence often dominate highly uncertain adoption processes. Recommendations are made for enhancing the adoption rate for psychology-based personnel innovations.     

Spiritualists,Aliens and UFOs: Extraterrestrials as spirit guides

One of the most striking innovations within contemporary North American Spiritualism is the adoption of extraterrestrials as spirit guides by some contemporary Spiritualists. It is here that the New Age fascination with extraterrestrials and UFOs has taken on a uniquely Spiritualist form. Extraterrestrials have come to represent for many Spiritualists the successful achievement of the ultimate Spiritualist goal: the union between spirituality and science. Extraterrestrials are seen as spiritually superior to us because their science exceeds our own; their ‘science’ is perceived superior because it incorporates recognition of spiritual ‘truth’. Consequently, within the North American Spiritualist context, the adoption of extraterrestrials as spirit guides can be seen both as a ‘rationalisation’ of Spiritualist belief through a strong idealisation of ‘science’, and as a critique of orthodox science for ignoring the ‘spiritual’ realm. For several of the Spiritualists with whom I worked, extraterrestrials have consequently become excellent choices for spirit guides.     

Bridging the divide: openness in adoption and postadoption psychosocial adjustment among birth and adoptive parents

Using 323 matched parties of birth mothers and adoptive parents, this study examined the association between the degree of adoption openness (e.g., contact and knowledge between parties) and birth and adoptive parents' postadoption adjustment shortly after the adoption placement (6 to 9 months). Data from birth fathers (N = 112), an understudied sample, were also explored. Openness was assessed by multiple informants. Results indicated that openness was significantly related to satisfaction with adoption process among adoptive parents and birth mothers. Increased openness was positively associated with birth mothers' postplacement adjustment, as indexed by birth mothers' self-reports and the interviewers' impression of birth mothers' adjustment. Birth fathers' report of openness was associated with their greater satisfaction with the adoption process and better postadoption adjustment.     

Genetics and adoption: Forming a partnership

Genetic issues are demanding more attention in the area of public health. Adoption agencies and policymakers are beginning to address these issues where they relate to the adoption process and to the many families involved in adoption in this country. Genetic counselors need to play an active role as both educators of and consultants for adoption professionals and the families with whom they work. To facilitate a partnership between genetics and adoption we have developed a workshop intended to educate adoption professionals about the lifelong implications of genetic conditions on the adoption triad.     

The Prize:

The Prize: Disability, Parenthood, and Adoption details the concerns and experiences of the author and her husband, an inter-racial couple with disabilities, during the process that culminated in the adoption of their daughter. The author discusses the reactions of others-relatives, social workers, doctors, lawyers, friends, and her husband-to her desire to have a child, and reveals her own considerations and fears. She also documents the couple's experiences, good and bad, with fertility doctors, support groups, adoption agencies, and private adoption lawyers. The article should be of special interest to those involved or interested in the adoption process, particularly as it applies to disabled and/or interracial couples.     

Adoptive Family System Dynamics: Variations by Level of Openness in the Adoption

This study examines the consequences of variations in levels of openness in adoption, especially focusing on the dynamics of the adoptive family system from the perspective of the adoptive parents. Participants included the father, mother, and at least one adopted child in 190 adoptive families, and 169 birthmothers, drawn from adoption agencies across the United States. Families included 62 confidential, 17 time-limited mediated, 52 ongoing mediated, and 59 fully disclosed adoptions. When compared to parents in confidential adoptions, those in open adoptions generally demonstrated higher levels of acknowledgment of the adoption, empathy toward the birthparents and their child, a stronger sense of permanence in the relationship with their child as projected into the future, and less fear that the birthmother might try to reclaim her child. Despite these mean differences, variations within all levels of openness were present, and results are discussed in terms of the ongoing process involved in building a family through adoption.