Relationship between economic indicators and volume of mortgage loans in Turkey

The primary purpose of this research is to identify the relationship between economic indicators and volume of mortgage loans in Turkish housing market. The economic indicators, which are used in the study, are mortgage loan rates, 12-month interest rate of Treasury bill, consumer price index, consumer confidence index, gross domestic product and monetary aggregate （M2） for the period January 2002 through December 2009.     

A predictive filtering approach for clarifying bibliometric datasets: an example on the research articles related to industry 4.0

ABSTRACT

This study proposes a filtering approach based on text classification and a fuzzy multi-criteria decision-making technique to select the relevant bibliometric data for further analyses in the scope of bibliometrics, scientometrics, and related methodologies. The proposed approach is illustrated on Industry 4.0 and internet of things which are the concepts that currently draw utmost attention with a growing number of research and applications. Accordingly, various findings are presented revealing the characteristics of the selected bibliometric data with the help of text and network analytics. The potential contribution of this study is two-fold such that the study not only suggests a novel approach for clarifying the retrieved bibliometric data but also emphasises the mainstream research areas and directions of Industry 4.0 along with the concept of the internet of things. Thus, an analysis framework with computing techniques has been used to reveal the characteristics of literature in a field of technology.     

Understanding Managerial Work Values in Turkey

The objective of this study was to explore certain managerial work values in Turkey. A total of 1023 managers from six Turkey regions participated in the study and filled out the questionnaires. Findings were analyzed using regression and anova analyses. A total of three managerial work value factors emerged, which was supported by the current value literature. It was found that there was a relationship between work values and organizational size. The lower the organizational size, the higher the proper values are held. However, organizational tenure, the number of subordinates a manager is responsible, and the educational level of a manager had no significant effect on holding work values. The proper values outnumbered the improper values significantly. The three most held work values were integrity, doing work with care and discipline, and achievement. The three least held values were cliquishness, laziness, and hypocrisy.     

Currency crises and monetary policy: A study on advanced and emerging economies

The studies regarding the appropriate monetary policy response in defending the domestic currency following a currency crisis do not gather around a robust answer. This study tries to emphasize the notion that there is no single policy applicable for all currency crises happened and happening in the global world. The approach of the study is presenting empirical evidence by focusing separately on the advanced and emerging economies and proving that the monetary policy response for the emerging economies should be different from the advanced economies, depending mainly on the vulnerabilities of these economies preceding and during the crisis periods. The study includes twenty four economies, in which fifteen of them are emerging and nine of them are advanced, for the crisis periods between 1986 and 2009. The main finding of the study is that the tight monetary policy is effective in the advanced economies, and detrimental in the emerging economies faced financial turbulence. The monetary policy has no significance in recent crisis episodes both for advanced and emerging economies. Advanced economies besides having more independent central banking, lower country riskiness and almost no default history; mainly have second generation model weaknesses which cause the increased interest rates to be successful in stabilizing the exchange rates. For the emerging economies the third generation model weaknesses play a major role together with the first generation model vulnerabilities. Thus the major policy implication follows that the policy makers should take into account the economic fragilities during the crisis in implementing the monetary policy.     

The Effects of Framing on Inter-group Negotiation

The present paper explores the way in which groups cognitively represent information framed as danger and the way in which such collective cognitive representations influence group performance during inter-group negotiations. One hundred and two participants were distributed over 34 three-person groups and were involved in a negotiation game developed by Lewicki et al. (1999, Negotiation: readings, exercises and cases. McGraw-Hill, Boston). The groups were organized in 17 pairs and each pair played the negotiation game in two rounds. The game rules and the available resources were the same for both groups, but one of the groups in each pair received the game information framed as “danger”, while the other group in the pair received a neutral framing. The groups with a “danger” frame developed a more defensive strategy during negotiations, adopted more often a collaborative approach and had a significantly lower performance as compared to the groups in the non-framing condition.     

STRATEGIC WITHHOLDING OF FIRM‐SPECIFIC SKILLS IN WAGE BARGAINING

The bargaining relationship between a firm and its incumbent worker who possesses firm‐specific human capital is examined. It is shown that the worker's ability to withhold his/her skills strategically increases his/her bargaining power. Multiple efficient as well as inefficient equilibria involving delays in negotiation are characterized. When the firm has outside options, the range of both efficient and inefficient equilibria shrinks; moreover, delays are shortened in inefficient equilibria. The model predicts that wages are procyclical.     

Social cognition and personality traits related to risky driving in a Turkish sample

Aims: The aim of the study was to make a theoretical contribution by investigating social cognitive factors and personality traits related to risky driver behaviour in a Turkish sample. The study tested three theoretical models by Structural Equation Modelling: (1) a model using risk perception and attitudes towards traffic safety to predict driver behaviour, (2) a model which used normlessness and sensation-seeking traits to predict such behaviour and (3) a model which used both the social cognitive factors and personality traits to predict driver behaviour. Methods: A questionnaire survey with validated measurement instruments was conducted in a sample of Turkish drivers (n?=?213). The response rate was 61%. Results: A combined social cognitive and personality trait model had tolerable fit and explained 24% of the variance in driver behaviour. The relations between personality traits and risk perception with driver behaviour were mediated through attitudes towards traffic safety. Risk-taking personality traits had relatively strong relations to unsafe driver behaviour, whereas risk perception had a relatively weak relation to such behaviour. Conclusions: A combined social cognitive and trait approach may be efficient in human factor campaigns aimed to reduce risky driver behaviour in Turkey. Personality traits may be important for driver behaviour because they influence the attitudinal determinants of such behaviour. Increased police enforcement of road traffic regulations may reduce risky driving among individuals with normlessness and sensation-seeking traits. Personality traits may also guide efforts aimed at early identification of risky drivers and campaigns could be tailored to specific personality characteristics.     

A Study on the Travel Patterns of Physically Disabled People

The main objective of this paper is to highlight the travel patterns and experiences of people with a physical disability. To understand better the travel needs of people with a physical disability, it is useful to examine how travel patterns differ across demographic variables. The method chosen for the empirical data collection was a self-completed web-based questionnaire, which was answered by a total of 596 physically disabled people. The data obtained were evaluated using frequency, percentage, arithmetic average, t-test, chi-square and factor analysis. The research findings reveal that people with physical disability in different demographics groups differ in their travel patterns.     

Identification of adopter categories for online banking in Turkey

This article reports the results of an investigation of demographic and lifestyle characteristics of adopters of online banking services in Turkey by using the Bass diffusion model. The results of multinominal logistic regression analysis suggest that there are significant differences both in demographic characteristics, such as age and gender, and psychographic characteristics, such as leadership, non-traditionalism, innovativeness, and practicality among the different adopter categories. Thus, new variables such as gender and lifestyle, which have not been investigated in the literature, could be introduced as segmentation variables to develop more effective marketing strategies tailored to each adopter category in online banking services.     

Free trade versus strategic trade as a choice between two ‘second best’ policies: A symmetric versus asymmetric information analysis

Abstract

We analyse the following policy dilemma: strategic trade policy versus free trade when the domestic government is bound to intervene only after the domestic firm's strategic variable in the form of R&D investment is chosen, and when the information can be either symmetric or asymmetric. The novel feature of our model is that the information asymmetry stems from the assumption that the government may not a priori know the true mode of competition. The intervention in the above set-up allows the domestic firm to manipulate the domestic government and results in a socially inefficient choice of the strategic variable. However, commitment to free trade leads to forgoing the benefits from profit-shifting. Yet, from the social point of view, free trade may be optimal even under the assumption of symmetric information. Due to costly signalling, this result is reinforced in the case of asymmetric information.