Flexible service systems

Service science combines scientific, management, and engineering disciplines to improve the understanding of how service systems cooperate to create business value. Service systems are complex configurations of people, technologies, and resources that coexist in a common environment of service provisioning. While the general concepts of service science are understood and agreed upon, the representation of service systems using models is still in its infancy. In this chapter, we look at business processes and their role in properly representing service systems. We propose flexible process graphs, a high-level process modeling language, and extend it in order to specify service systems and their compositions within shared environments in a flexible way. The discussion in this chapter is the first step towards a formal description of service science environment, including service systems, networks, and whole ecology.

Mammographic density-a review on the current understanding of its association with breast cancer

There has been considerable recent interest in the genetic, biological and epidemiological basis of mammographic density (MD), and the search for causative links between MD and breast cancer (BC) risk. This report will critically review the current literature on MD and summarize the current evidence for its association with BC. Keywords 'mammographic dens*', 'dense mammary tissue' or 'percent dens*' were used to search the existing literature in English on PubMed and Medline. All reports were critically analyzed. The data were assigned to one of the following aspects of MD: general association with BC, its relationship with the breast hormonal milieu, the cellular basis of MD, the generic variations of MD, and its significance in the clinical setting. MD adjusted for age, and BMI is associated with increased risk of BC diagnosis, advanced tumour stage at diagnosis and increased risk of both local recurrence and second primary cancers. The MD measures that predict BC risk have high heritability, and to date several genetic markers associated with BC risk have been found to also be associated with these MD risk predictors. Change in MD could be a predictor of the extent of chemoprevention with tamoxifen. Although the biological and genetic pathways that determine and perhaps modulate MD remain largely unresolved, significant inroads are being made into the understanding of MD, which may lead to benefits in clinical screening, assessment and treatment strategies. This review provides a timely update on the current understanding of MD's association with BC risk.

Broken gates and leaky graves : spectral language and Australia's ghost stories

Ghost stories are unusual amongst supernatural literatures in their modelling of a recognisable, mimetic reality interrupted or infiltrated by immaterial forces. In its discussion of Australian ghost stories, this thesis advances a new approach to ghost narratives which seeks to model and articulate the mechanics of ghosts and hauntings as something reliant on and engaged with the material and the mundane.

Understanding the academic environments : from field study to design

Ethnographic methods have been widely used for requirements elicitation purposes in systems design, especially when the focus is on understanding users? social, cultural and political contexts. Designing an on-line search engine for peer-reviewed papers could be a challenge considering the diversity of its end users coming from different educational and professional disciplines. This poster describes our exploration of academic research environments based on different in situ methods such as contextual interviews, diary-keeping, job-shadowing, etc. The data generated from these methods is analysed using a qualitative data analysis software and subsequently is used for developing personas that could be used as a requirements specification tool.

Understanding and impacting the practice of business process management

This presentation will explore how BPM research can seamlessly combine the academic requirement of rigor with the aim to impact the practice of Business Process Management. After a brief introduction into the research agendas as they are perceived by different BPM communities, two research projects will be discussed that illustrate how empirically-informed quantitative and qualitative research, combined with design science, can lead to outcomes that BPM practitioners are willing to adopt. The first project studies the practice of process modeling using Information Systems theory, and demonstrates how a better understanding of this practice can inform the design of modeling notations and methods. The second project studies the adoption of process management within organizations, and leads to models of how organizations can incrementally transition to greater levels of BPM maturity. The presentation will conclude with recommendations for how the BPM research and practitioner communities can increasingly benefit from each other.

Facilitating query decomposition in query language modeling by association rule mining using multiple sliding windows

This paper presents a novel framework to further advance the recent trend of using query decomposition and high-order term relationships in query language modeling, which takes into account terms implicitly associated with different subsets of query terms. Existing approaches, most remarkably the language model based on the Information Flow method are however unable to capture multiple levels of associations and also suffer from a high computational overhead. In this paper, we propose to compute association rules from pseudo feedback documents that are segmented into variable length chunks via multiple sliding windows of different sizes. Extensive experiments have been conducted on various TREC collections and our approach significantly outperforms a baseline Query Likelihood language model, the Relevance Model and the Information Flow model.

Task-relationship-self : a framework for understanding service encounter behaviors

Research conducted over past decades has investigated selected service encounter behaviors from either a customer or service provider perspective. However, a comprehensive, dual-perspective framework is lacking. Such a framework is needed to organize knowledge of these behaviors, and thereby provide structure, clarity, and parsimony to the field. This paper describes a three-tier framework of service encounter behavior that was developed by applying grounded theory principles to interviews with customers, service employees, and other stakeholders. These informants described many ways in which they behave when executing service exchanges, dealing with service difficulties, and managing themselves in the process. Using an iterative inductive approach, a conceptual framework was developed in which specific (Tier 1) behaviors were placed within broader (Tier 2) categories, and these lower classification levels were, in turn, interpreted within a conceptual space defined by the (Tier 3) dimensions of task, relationship, and self. This framework was then elaborated and refined by reference to the psychology and marketing literature, a set of 157 audio-recorded service interactions, and an expert panel study. The paper includes comparisons between the framework and those previously proposed, propositions regarding service encounter processes and outcomes, and implications for future research and practice.

Design of a garment for data collection of toddler language and physical activity

Design process phases of development, evaluation and implementation were used to create a garment to simultaneously collect reliable data of speech production and intensity of movement of toddlers (18-36 months). A series of prototypes were developed and evaluated that housed accelerometer-based motion sensors and a digital transmitter with microphone. The approved test garment was a top constructed from loop-faced fabric with interior pockets to house devices. Extended side panels allowed for sizing. In total, 56 toddlers (28 male; 28 female; 16-36 months of age) participated in the study providing pilot and baseline data. The test garment was effective in collecting data as evaluated for accuracy and reliability using ANOVA for accelerometer data, transcription of video for type of movement, and number and length of utterances for speech production. The data collection garment has been implemented in various studies across disciplines.

Educational paradox : the hidden obstacles to the integration of mobile phones in the language classroom

This paper reports on the findings of an international telecollaboration study using Facebook, in which teachers studying in M. Ed programs in Australia and Greece, discussed the use of mobile phones in language classrooms. Results suggest that invisible barriers exist in the use of mobile phones in the classroom, including bans on use in schools, lack of familiarity with educational uses for mobile phones, and negative perceptions about mobile phones specifically in terms of classroom management.

Service encounter needs theory : a dyadic, psychosocial approach to understanding service encounters

Interactions between customers and service providers are ubiquitous. Some of these encounters are routine, but many are characterized by conflict and intense emotions. This chapter introduces a new theory, service encounter needs theory (SENT) that aims to elucidate the mechanisms through which service encounter behaviors affect outcomes for customers and employees. Evidence is presented for the preeminence within these encounters of eight psychosocial needs, and propositions are advanced regarding likely antecedents to fulfillment and violation of these needs. Emotional experiences and displays are viewed as important consequences of need fulfillment and violation, as are numerous cognitive, behavioral, and health-related outcomes.

Contemporary cultures of service delivery to families : implications for music therapy

Family-centred and early intervention and prevention programs are a strong focus of current policy objectives within Australia, and a significant area of practice within the music therapy community. Recent shifts in the culture of policy and practice increasingly reflect ecological understandings by focussing on integrated and place-based approaches to service delivery. Further, current funding opportunities are strongly concerned with the extent to which interventions are able to reach out to highly vulnerable families that typically do not engage with services easily. Music therapy holds unique promise within these cultural shifts and thus advocates must develop a solid understanding of the concepts and related language in order to confidently engage with both funding and service systems. This paper uses an integrative review to first define and summarise current knowledge in three key areas relevant to contemporary Australian policy and practice: hard-to-reach families, home visiting as assertive outreach, and integrated or place-based service delivery. Evidence for the effectiveness of music therapy in relation to these key themes is then presented. Finally, the paper discusses the implications for the future of music therapy within the current Australian early intervention and prevention policy context and makes recommendations for moving forward on both practice and research fronts. While there is growing evidence and theory to suggest that music therapy may be uniquely efficacious in this area, greater Australian Journal of Music Therapy Vol 25, 2014 149 advocacy, documentation, research and adjustment of practices and language will further cement the position of the industry.

Children's understanding of the concept of physical activity

This study evaluated 4th-grade students' understanding of the concept of physical activity and assessed the effects of two interventions to enhance the students' understanding of this concept. Students were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 conditions: the video group (n = 40) watched a 5-min video describing physical activity; the verbal group (n = 42) listened to a generic description of physical activity; the control group received no instruction (n = 45). Students completed a 17-item checklist testing their understanding of the concept of physical activity. Compared to controls, students in the verbal and video group demonstrated significantly higher checklist scores, with the video group scoring significantly higher than the verbal group. Only 35.6% of the controls, compared to 52.4% and 70.0% of the verbal and video groups respectively, could classify greater than or equal to 15 of the checklist items correctly, The results indicate that, without intervention, children have a limited understanding of the concept of physical activity.

Understanding negation and family history to improve clinical information retrieval

We present a study to understand the effect that negated terms (e.g., "no fever") and family history (e.g., "family history of diabetes") have on searching clinical records. Our analysis is aimed at devising the most effective means of handling negation and family history. In doing so, we explicitly represent a clinical record according to its different content types: negated, family history and normal content; the retrieval model weights each of these separately. Empirical evaluation shows that overall the presence of negation harms retrieval effectiveness while family history has little effect. We show negation is best handled by weighting negated content (rather than the common practise of removing or replacing it). However, we also show that many queries benefit from the inclusion of negated content and that negation is optimally handled on a per-query basis. Additional evaluation shows that adaptive handing of negated and family history content can have significant benefits.

The role of desire in understanding intentions to drink responsibly : an application of the model of goal-directed behaviour

This study models young people's moderate drinking decision-making using the Model of Goal-Directed Behaviour (MGB), thus presenting insights into young people's desires and intentions to drink responsibly. Testing the applicability of the MGB to quantitatively analyse responsible drinking, the explanatory sphere of the MGB is extended. An online survey resulted in 1522 completed questionnaires from respondents aged between 18 and 25 years. Collected data were analysed with structural equation modelling (SEM) using SPSS AMOS21 (IBM, New York, NY, USA) software. The key finding of this study is that an individual's desire to drink moderately is the most important predictor of young people's responsible drinking intentions. Our use of MGB provides further evidence that there is a strong distinction between consumer desires and intentions.