(l to r) Dr Garry and Professor Ooi make their mark in the field.

Adding on to their achievements in the field, UCSI University’s Faculty of Business and Management (FBM) dean Professor Ts Dr Ooi Keng Boon and Associate Professor Dr Garry Tan Wei Han’s research paper was recognised as one of the Top Social Media Articles 2019-2020 - 3^rd place -  in the Journal Technological Forecasting and Social Change (TFSC) from Elsevier Ltd. TFSC is a ranked A journal in the Australian Business Dean Council (ABDC) Journal Quality List and is also rated as a Level 3 journal according to the Academic Journal Guide 2018 by the Chartered Association of Business Schools. TFSC is also currently indexed with Clarivate Analytics; Social Science Citation Index (SSCI) and has an impact factor of  5.846 based on the Journal Citation Report 2019 (JCR) by Clarivate Analytics.

The article is titled “The age of mobile social commerce: An Artificial Neural Network analysis on its resistances” where the Artificial Neural Network analysis was employed to understand the linear and nonlinear relationships between mobile social commerce usage resistances and the intention to use mobile social commerce. It was co-authored with Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman academics Dr Lee Voon Hsien, Dr Leong Lai Ying and Mr Hew Jun Jie. The findings suggest that most of the resistances are positively correlated with usage intention, reaffirming the “privacy paradox” phenomenon among Malaysian mobile users.

The coexistence of privacy concerns and usage intention is generally known as the “privacy paradox” phenomenon. In the context of the study, it is suggested that mobile users do not apply their concerns to usage behaviours even if they are showing a high level of privacy concern. In other words, mobile users are still willing to use mobile social commerce in future although they possess high level of privacy concerns.

“This achievement is significant as it signifies the relative popularity of this journal article in social media compared to other articles published in Technological Forecasting and Social Change. The paper was also listed as one of the 'Top Downloaded Articles' (Ranked 15/25) in 2019,” said Dr Garry.

As for how this achievement impacted them as academicians in the field of Business, the two academicians agreed on this: “Social media plays a vital role nowadays to everyone, including academicians, as it connects academicians around the globe easily. This achievement supports this notion and suggests that we should be open-minded to extend our collaboration network wider in order to deliver more impact to the academicians”.

Thus, it is crucial to encourage the adoption of mobile social commerce, especially now, given that the COVID-19 pandemic has forced us to accept the “new normal” way of life in which face-to-face interactions should be kept at a minimum level.

“In recent years, many of my staff have been actively involved in research and it is my pleasure to see them publishing in well-known journals. As the dean of FBM, I take it as my duty to set a good example for them to follow. Seeing my staff making good progress in publishing has motivated me to achieve more in order to lead them by a better example. I hope that this award can better motivate them to continuously publish in good journals,” said Professor Ooi.

“To me, this success indicates the powerful role played by social media in sharing research outcomes. With this, I strongly believe that this social media-related award represents a new era in sharing knowledge. Researchers and publishers should work closely to explore more potential of social media in advancing our current state of knowledge,” Professor Ooi added.

In encouraging other academicians wanting to do research in the same field, both Professor Ooi and Dr Garry would encourage them to dare trying to send their papers for possible publications in potential journals. They believe in “never try, never know”; you will never know the outcomes if you dare not try in the first place. Their advice to students in pursuing future or current research studies is to be persistent.