Dr. Mbarika's Two Major Research Streams
(see a listing of  current publications and working papers on my CV or CLICK HERE)


Information and Communications Technology (ICT)  Transfer and Management in Developing Nations: A focus on Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

Research focused on ICT Transfer and Management in Sub-Saharan Africa, a major region within the world’s second largest continent, is almost non-existent in mainstream information systems research!!!  In fact, as of November 2003, a search of five major IS publication outlets (MIS Quarterly, Information Systems Research, Communications of the ACM, Journal of the AIS, and Journal of MIS) revealed only a single article (in JMIS) published related to Sub-Saharan Africa[de Vreede et al. 1998]. Similarly, only two articles (both in Communications of the ACM) published any ICT work emphasizing Sub-Saharan Africa (Goodman et al. 1993 and Mbarika et al. 2002). There are other journals such as the Journal of Global Information Management (JGIM) and the Journal of Global Information Technology Management (JGITM) that are dedicated to information systems in a global context, which would include research on sub-Saharan Africa. These two journals have published research with such a focus.

Although ICTs have been well established in the more developed and industrialized parts of the world, the same is not true for developing countries in general. Even the relatively little research in the developing countries' context has often overlooked the particular situation of Sub-Saharan Africa, home to 32 of the world’s 48 least developed countries. Our research presents the need for focused research on the transfer and management of ICT  infrastructures and Internet-based technologies and applications for Sub-Saharan Africa. We argue that the information system research community has a unique and valuable perspective to bring to the ICT infrastructure challenges this region faces, hence extending the work in ICT transfer and management. We contend that there are a plethora of benefits that could accrue to SSA countries based on sound ICT transfer within the region. Some of these benefits include:


Individual and Organizational Learning Through Multimedia Systems.

In this research stream we examine potential relationshipsbetween the use of multimedia instructional materials and higher order cognitive skill improvement with two intervening variables: the learning-driven factor and the content-driven factor. The learning-driven factor is composed of constructs that show the intrinsic value of the instructional materials to the end user. The learning-driven factor also explains how the multimedia instructional materials were used as a tool to challenge the end user in learning difficult management and technical topics, in connecting theories and practice, in improving students’ understanding of basic concepts, and in providing the students a platform on which to learn from one another. The content-driven factor is composed of constructs that measure the extrinsic value provided to the end-user by the use of multimedia instructional materials. The end user has no control over the design of this factor. This factor constitutes the technical quality of the multimedia instructional material, how easy it is to use and locate information contained on the instructional material, and how the design of the instructional material helped to make it easier and more feasible to complete assigned tasks in a timely manner.

Economic Development Conference
Southern University at Shreveport, LA


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