Review Reports

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript approaches an important and actual subject, especially for the education sector, particularly for the universities, taking into account the use of the digital technology, starting with COVID-19 times.

The literature review is relevant, the research design is appropriate and clearly stated, the results are discussed and the conclusions are consistent with the results.

I have some comments and suggestions for the authors.

Reconsider writing all the references in the text. They should be added as: “word”, “break”, “reference in brackets” and “dot” (i.e. row 44: relevant [2].)

Row 25: change “Universities” with “universities”.

Rows 27-29: paragraph not clear, should be reformulated.

Row 153, 342 and 358: delete “below”.

Rows 191-197: reference [31] is missing; possible to be (Sipe 2018)?

Rows 216 and 245: please do not use signs (&) in the title, use “and”.

Rows 288 to 308: too many free rows

Rows 308 and 309:

- I would suggest to name the section as “Method” or “Research design”, instead of METHODOLOGY and Materials and Method

- moreover, it is not needed to have a subtitle “Materials and Method”, if there is not at least a second one

Row 315: change the references like [7, 11, 49, 50]

Row 330: I would suggest to name the section as “RESULTS” instead of “DATA ANALYSIS”

Row 344: above the cutoff of 0.80 (instead of 0,70)

Page 16 (DISCUSSION), second paragraph: [17, 18], instead of [17] [18]; similar for [20] [21]

Figure 1:

- figure is too dark

- title given in the figure (CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK) is not needed, is the same with the figure title (Conceptual model)

- figure title: not capitalize each word; Conceptual model in stead of Conceptual Model

- figure 1 is not commented, explained

Figures 2 and 3:

- the font size is very small, difficult to read; there is some more space available for a bigger figure

- figures are not commented, discussed

Figure 4 (if it remains, see comment for Table 5):

- title given in the figure (Importance-Performance Map) is not needed, is the same with the figure title (Importance Performance Map)

- figure title: not capitalize each word

- yellow color for “Ideate” is not visible, please change the color

Table 1: “Purposive sampling”, instead of “Purposive Sampling”

Table 2:

- “Factor loadings”, instead of “Factor Loadings”

- cut the space between Emp 2, Emp 3, Emp 4 (should be Emp2…)

Tables 3 and 4:

- tables titles: not capitalize each word

- shouldn’t they have the same parameters in the tables’ heads?

- shouldn’t they have the same “Relationship”?

- tables are not commented, explained

Remove Table 5. It gives the same values as presented in Figure 4. Or, remove Figure 4 and leave Table 5. Either, or!

Author Response

File attached with responses.

 

Thank you for your constructive comments. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

11.10.2022 review

 

 Design Thinking Approach for Increasing Innovative Action in Universities: ICT's Mediating Effect

 

First, I would like to congratulate the authors for the effort put into this work and for the courage to submit a paper for review. The article presents an excellent academic-level of research journal.

The paper deals with Design Thinking (DT) and Information and Communication Technology (ICT). The case study was based on the academic environment, and the researchers surveyed the students in the eastern region of Saudi. The article's topic corresponds well with the scope of the Sustainability journal of MDPI. It Is worth highlighting that the authors put considerable effort into the correct structure of the paper; each chapter is well-structured and contains needed content.

Regardless of the excellent level of the paper, there are a few comments to improve and organize the paper better:

1.    In the abstract, please add the full description of ICT (Information and Communication Technology) in line 18, not as it is now in line 28/29.

2.    I believe there is a misspelling in the abstract, and there should be 300 questionnaires, not 500 (because in line 312, there is the number 300).

3.    In the literature review, there are two full paragraphs without any references to the literature- I believe that if this chapter is all about literature review that it is some mistake.

4.    Regarding the quality of the figures, please change the background of Fig. 1. Because of the background, it might be hard to read.

5.    Also, figures 2 and 3 need improvement in the graphic to be easier to read; consider changing the colours.

6.    There are a few typing errors, such as in line 202 (space).

7.    I have one question for the authors, did you consider different types and needs of studies, for example, art and architecture have, by default, Design Thinking in their designing processes? Maybe dividing students by the fields of study would provide more interesting data?

8.    Please add the numbers of main sections and subsections for a better understanding of the structure of the paper.

9.    Please check the references style to fit it into the journal guidelines.

10.  Although the abstract contains all the needed information, please rewrite it with the journal guidelines.

 

For this reason, I consider the present study's contribution to this field, and I recommend its publication with some adjustments considered as "minor revisions".

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

File attached with responses.

Thank you for your constructive comments. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The research question is very topical and combines two important fields like design thinking (through innovation) and universities’ development through ICT.

The Title –is clearly formulated and focused on the research core.

Abstract: The abstract has an atypical formulation and presents a brief summary phrase about each section of the paper. There is provided quite abstract information about methodology and results. Should be included more focused information about the scope, the research method and results.

KEYWORDS – are accordingly.

 

The Introduction: presents the paper framework and connection between DT (design thinking) and ICT skills development for university students – arguing also the necessity of this approach.

Within the Introduction there are several sections for concepts presentation:

Even if is a section of subjective contribution, the Introduction should also be more documented.

References should be improved in order to create a solid argumentation for the research question and to provide the necessary correlations with published research and validated results from other similar surveys in the academia. -https://doi.org/10.1080/1331677X.2022.2086597; -https://doi.org/10.3390/su132212927; -https://content.sciendo.com/view/journals/mdke/mdke-overview.xml; -https://books.google.ro/books?hl=ro&lr=&id=vY5TEAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA361&ots=MRvHBVXQOy&sig=3AtpYJpPsICjdfwbn50-fHXOQak&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false; DOI: 10.24818/EA/2018/49/583; DOI 10.25019/MDKE/5.4.07

 

Literature Review – Context

Literature review is presented after the Introduction section and is divided into different sections for concepts description and argumentation: Design Thinking (DT) and ICT; Design Thinking Process; Constructivism's Relationship to Design Thinking; Empathy & Define Process; Ideation & Prototype.    

Literature review comprises the many perspectives debated about the core concepts the paper is built on but is rather confusing and is missing to express clearly what are the connections between the concepts and what they rely on.

Literature review includes references for supporting the researched concepts according to this journal standards and could be improved on the university’s strategies regarding students’ development.

Literature review refers to defining the concepts, to characterizing the concepts, to framing the concepts in the actual literature landscape. The literature review has little flow, the concepts are presented rather as distinct sub-sections but instead more connections between the concepts are needed.

 

Methodology – is based on a structural equation modelling with Smart PLS in several stages.

The steps of the research are clearly explained and represented in suggestive figures.

The research questions and the objectives are rather overlapping as they relate to the same ideas.

These should be reformulated or structured differently. Also, they should be included in the Methodology section.

The authors dive directly into the model and don’t explain the constructs.

Table 3 – is presenting data about 5 hypothesis which are not previously neither stated nor argued.

Hypothesis should be previously explained and supported with clear ideas from previous research and using adequate references, in order to reflect what each one is focusing on.

 

Results & Discussions

The presentation of outputs and results is mostly technical, repeating in detail information about the SMART-PLS equation system.

The Discussion section needs proofreading. The statements are not clear in delivering the information.

The Discussion Section, throughout the formulated statements induces some doubts regarding the whole research construct due to the fact that many of the hypotheses have not been confirmed and the values indicate “no significant effects” or weak correlations.

The authors should clearly summarize the numerical data and significance of indicators and afterwards should comment on the connections between the theoretical issues.

This section is oriented towards the presentation of quantitative results and their significance. We suggest a more detailed discussion of results from practical perspective also. We suggest the authors to focus more on the original contributions brought to the existing literature on the topic, to emphasize the usefulness of results for the academia and for practice.

This section should integrate arguments for supporting the research results in accordance to previous studies or research papers. The discussion section must correlate the proposed objectives of the research to the real results and provide a detailed argumentation in order to reveal the utility of the present research.

Conclusions

Conclusions are formulated rather brief. Authors insist on the results but they fail in connecting their results into the global framework of the domain, both in theory and practice.

Conclusions should be more comprehensive and edifying in relation to the research question, the research path and the final results.

The paper style should be improved in order to resonate with a wider and diverse audience, as specific to this journal.

References

References are rather heterogeneous and don’t emphasize any fundamental titles or names in the domain.

Authors must check and cite more mdpi references.

 

There are too many old sources, they could be replaced with more updated ones, even from the same authors, but new versions.

Author Response

File attached with responses.

Thank you for your constructive comments . 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf