Motivators and barriers to sustainable food consumption: Qualitative inquiry about organic food consumers in a developing nation

The present research attempts to qualitatively explore the motivators and barriers of organic food consumption in the Indian context. The data were collected using semistructured in‐depth interviews and analyzed using grounded theory. The theoretical sampling technique was used to interview 34 consumers who have purchased organic food in the past. The findings reported health consciousness, environmental consciousness, social identity, consumer ethnocentrism, and concern for farmers as the factors that motivate organic food purchase among consumers. The factors such as high prices of organic food, unavailability, trust issues, and limited marketing communications from the firms were identified as major barriers to organic food purchase and consumption. The study is one of the initial attempts to qualitatively explore the consumers' motivation for organic food consumption in the Indian context. The findings will help policymakers to devise suitable strategies so that they can effectively target the organic food choices by understanding the motivators/barriers, and promote the sustainable lifestyle in the society, as food consumption plays a crucial role in achieving environmental sustainability.     

National Cultures,Information Search Behaviors and the Attribution Process of Cross-National Managers: A Conceptual Framework

Teaching Business Ethics - Cross-cultural management researchers haveobserved that when presented with similarethical dilemmas and problems, managers raisedin different cultural environments...     

Exact finite sample properties of double k-class estimators in simultaneous equations

In our earlier paper [Srivastava, Agnihotri and Dwivedi (1980)] the dominance of double k-class over k-class with respect to exact mean squared error matrix criteria is established. It is observed that given a member of k-class, one can pick up a member of double k-class that will provide an improved estimator of the coefficients. This result prompted us to study the exact finite sample properties of the double k-class estimator. For this, we have considered a structural equation containing two endogenous variables and have investigated the properties of double k-class estimators of the coefficients of explanatory endogenous variables assuming characterizing scalars to be non-stochastic.     

Determining the going market value of a business in an emerging information technology industry: The case of the cellular communications industry

Given the phenomenal growth or the anticipation of growth in certain information technology industries, concerns for economy of scale, market access and expansion, and the need for ongoing research and development are resulting in mergers, acquisitions, and strategic alliances. A key question in such industries is what is, or should be the going market value of a business? This paper suggests an approach to imbed market penetration models in the popular value-based planning approach suggested by Rappaport [36] to obtain the going market value of a business. The model developed in implementing the approach is tailored for the cellular communications industry. Limitations and adaptations of the approach to other industries are discussed.     

A Corporate Social Responsibility Framework for Accounting Research

Over the past two decades, there has been growing interest in corporate social responsibility (CSR) among accounting scholars. As a testament to this growing interest, two review papers on CSR were published last year in accounting journals. Implicitly guiding hypothesis development in CSR studies is the notion of a conflict between shareholders and stakeholders. We define CSR in terms of a win-win situation for shareholders and stakeholders: a CSR framework for strategic business purposes. We provide evidence supporting this outlook for CSR using cases pertaining to specific companies and findings from archival empirical studies. According to our CSR framework, resources allocated for CSR activity also help propel business strategy; as such, it is difficult to isolate CSR inputs and/or outputs due to problems of non-separability and multidimensionality. While measurement is a challenge, our framework nonetheless opens up various promising avenues for future research.     

Are all outside directors created equal with respect to firm disclosure policy?

Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting - This study looks into the role of corporate life cycle on market discounts and firm performance in private placements. Using the standard event study...     

Is doing good good for you? how corporate charitable contributions enhance revenue growth

This study examines the impact of corporate philanthropy growth on sales growth using a large sample of charitable contributions made by U.S. public companies from 1989 through 2000. Applying Granger causality tests, we find that charitable contributions are significantly associated with future revenue, whereas the association between revenue and future contributions is marginally significant at best. We then identify the mechanism underlying our findings. Our results are particularly pronounced for firms that are highly sensitive to consumer perception, where individual consumers are the predominant customers. In addition, we document a positive relationship between contributions and customer satisfaction. Overall, our evidence suggests that corporate philanthropy, under certain circumstances, furthers firms' economic objectives. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Role of search for domain knowledge and architectural knowledge in alliance partner selection

Research Summary: The literature on technological alliances emphasizes that search for knowledge drives alliance formation. However, in conceptualizing technological knowledge, prior work on alliances has not made a distinction between domain knowledge—knowledge that firms possess in distinct technological domains—and architectural knowledge—knowledge that firms possess about how to combine elements from different technological domains. We argue that firms seek partners that are similar in domain knowledge to deepen their knowledge, and partners that are dissimilar in architectural knowledge to broaden their knowledge. Our results indicate that the likelihood of alliance formation increases when two firms are similar in domain knowledge and dissimilar in architectural knowledge. Further, our results show that these effects are positively moderated by the degree of decomposability of a firm's knowledge base. Managerial Summary: In dynamic environments, companies need to continually deepen and broaden their technological knowledge, and they often look for alliance partners who can provide them that knowledge. For knowledge deepening, companies are more likely to form alliances with those companies that have expertise in similar technological fields. For knowledge broadening, they are more likely to form alliances with those companies that have expertise in the same technological fields, but have different recipes for combining knowledge from those fields. Furthermore, a company with a modular knowledge base is more likely to seek a partner that has expertise in similar technological fields or whose recipes for combining knowledge from different technological fields are different from the recipes it has.