Marketplace orchestration of taste: insights from the Bridgewater Hall

ABSTRACT

The aim of this paper is to explore how a concert hall can orchestrate and shape individuals’ classical music tastes. The paper is based on an 8-month ethnography at the Bridgewater Hall concert venue in Manchester. Our emergent findings illustrate how classical music tastes are influenced via the spatial meanings of the concert hall. These meanings include various physical, historical and sociocultural aspects that are revealed in the context of the Bridgewater Hall. Our study contributes to various streams of consumer culture theory research and opens up avenues for future research on the interrelationships of space and place with taste.     

城乡居民收入性质对城乡消费差距的影响研究

针对中国城乡居民消费差距高位徘徊、消费结构二元并行格局的研究要突破收入数量视角,从收入性质视角予以深刻剖析。基于经典消费理论核心思想,引申出收入的暂时性、流动性、相对性、可预期性和跨期支配性等性质,并采用1991—2013年中国29个省份的相关数据,运用固定效应变系数面板模型实证分析收入性质对城乡消费差距的影响,研究表明：在收入量既定的条件下,收入性质对城乡消费差距的影响显著;农村居民持久收入增长幅度超过城镇居民、收入向上流动幅度大于城镇居民,才能使城乡消费差距缩小;农村居民对正向不确定收入的消费倾向于抑制,而对负向不确定收入的消费则存在棘轮效应;农村居民收入跨期支配性对城乡消费差距具有弥合效应。因此,在增加农民收入数量的同时,也应注重其收入性质的改善,才能有效缩小城乡消费差距。     

终极控制人特征和创业导向关系的实证研究——市场化进程的调节作用

以中国创业板上市公司为样本,探讨了市场化进程对终极控制人特征与企业创业导向间关系的调节作用。层次回归分析结果发现:整体强度方面,非国有企业比国有企业具有更强的创业导向,终极控制人存在两权分离的企业的创业导向比不存在两权分离的企业更强;选择倾向方面,国有企业和存在终极控制人两权分离的企业更倾向于选择资产增值型创业导向;市场化进程负向调节终极控制人特征与创业导向选择倾向的关系,这说明市场化进程的提高可在一定程度上缓解终极控制人创业导向选择中的代理问题。     

“互联网+”促进我国消费升级的效应与机制

“互联网+”时代的消费升级具有追求个性化、品质化、体验化、情感化的本质特征。“互联网+”不仅可以影响生产的数量和层次,即催生供给侧革命,而且可以影响消费的数量和层次,即催生需求侧革命。“互联网+”通过对传统产业消费主体、消费客体与消费载体的整合改造,使传统产业通过互联网实现产业间互联互通,重塑消费环境、重建消费逻辑与重整消费层次。“互联网+”通过打造多点支撑的消费增长格局,培育和发展消费新热点和新兴消费,从而实现从需求侧推动消费升级。“互联网+”通过驱动制造业转型升级,推进生产组织模式变革,推动个性化定制生产方式,从而实现从供给端发力促进消费升级。     

老龄化、服务性消费与第三产业发展--来自中国省级面板数据的证据

本文基于2003－2013年的中国省级面板数据,通过引入老龄化与服务性消费比重的交互项,综合运用多种静态和动态面板数据模型和稳健性分析,考察老龄化通过服务性消费渠道对第三产业发展的影响。研究结果表明,老龄化对第三产业发展具有负向影响,但老龄化引致的服务性消费比重的提高能显著减弱这一负向影响。进一步扩展讨论的结果证实,服务性消费确为老龄化影响第三产业发展的重要渠道,提高民生性财政支出、保障公共服务均等化及提升金融发展水平有利于释放老年人口的服务性消费需求,拉动第三产业发展。     

Media effects on sustainable food consumption. How newspaper coverage relates to supermarket expenditures

Information provision is often considered to have an important role to play in changing consumers' choices. However, there is still no consensus on the mechanisms by which information might influence specific consumer expenditures, especially in relation to environmentally friendly food products. This paper explores whether the public debate on sustainable consumption in UK broadsheets and tabloids relates to observed consumers' expenditures. It does so by relating the number of published articles on selected sustainability topics to consumers' food expenditure in a leading UK supermarket from May 2009 to May 2011, using regression analysis. We selected only regular supermarket's shoppers who frequently buy the Sunday editions of the analyzed newspapers. Results indicate very sparse and inconsistent correlations suggesting that the impact of information is only minimally effective. The number of newspaper articles relates mainly to expenditures on organic, wholegrain and low salt products, possibly indicating a preference for healthy food. No consistent effects are observed when media target a change in more general food categories (e.g. a reduction in food of animal origin), although we observed some influence on purchases of fish. Finally, results indicate some correlations with purchases of meat for the readers of the Telegraph. In order to contextualize some of the results, we applied content analysis to a subsample of published articles on organic food. The qualitative approach shows that the framing of the news is important: change is positively related to information proposed uncritically; and negatively to information contextualized as a highly structured debate.     

退休冲击、消费动态支出变动及消费结构优化*——基于企业、机关事业单位退休人员消费影响因素的比较

中国经济已进入新常态,然而老龄化趋势日益严重,靠出口和投资拉动的滞后经济增长模式,使得中国转型阶段面临两大核心挑战--退休冲击和国内消费不足。如何应对退休危机,提升居民消费,是亟待解决的问题。本文从中国“养老金双轨制”这一热点问题切入,选取了中国1998-2014年30个地区宏观面板数据分静态和动态两大部分对理论进行实证检验,重点分析企业和事业单位退休冲击对城镇居民消费的影响。在居民总消费支出水平方面,企业单位退休冲击对其具有显著抑制作用,机关事业单位退休冲击对其具有显著正向效应。居民消费结构方面,情况较为复杂。产生这些异质效应的主要原因在于退休双轨制造成的不平等差异和两类退休人群自身主观区别等。鉴于此,本文提出了释放并轨改革的消费效应,完善养老、医疗等社会保障体系,稳定居民消费预期,调整市场结构,推动老龄产业和银发市场的发展等政策建议。       

The relationship between ownership and possession: observations from the context of digital virtual goods

This theoretical article highlights limitations in the current trend towards dichotomising full ownership and access-based consumption by recognising a broader, more complex array of ‘fragmented’ ownership configurations in the context of digital virtual goods (DVGs). In challenging this dichotomy, we recognise that the relationship between ownership and possession becomes particularly significant. We therefore consider how prominent DVG ownership configurations may shape the way in which possession is assembled, potentially reducing consumers’ scope of action relative to DVGs and leaving possession susceptible to disruption. Conversely, we acknowledge ways in which consumers’ continued attempts at possession may impinge upon the agency of ownership mechanisms within the market. Our analysis ultimately builds upon existing understandings of both ownership and possession, theorising their often overlooked relation in consumption.     

Becoming respectable: low-income young mothers,consumption and the pursuit of value

Teenage mothers find themselves caught between two discourses: the irresponsibility of youth and the responsibility of motherhood. We unravel some of the complexities surrounding the performance of socially approved ‘good mothering’, from a social position of restricted resources. We demonstrate the relevance of Skeggs’ notion of respectability in order to forge a deeper understanding of how young, low-income new mothers seek to secure social value and legitimacy via the marketplace. We identify a number of consumption strategies centred around identification and dis-identification, yet we recognise that young mothers’ careful marshalling of resources, in relation to consumption, risks being misread and could leave young women open to further scrutiny and negative evaluation, ultimately limiting their opportunity to secure a legitimate maternal identity.     

外生驱动互联网消费增长的微观空间计量研究

文章从外生驱动视角探讨中国互联网消费的全域增长问题,试图通过理论探讨与实证分析挖掘微观社会互动促进互联网外生消费的机理与手段。文章利用数字内容产品在线消费的省域数据,使用空间面板固定效应模型识别互联网环境中促进外生消费增长的外溢与滞后因素,分析了中国文化与地理空间的社会互动对互联网外生消费增长的影响,为中国互联网消费的全域内生增长探索新的规律与方式。研究发现互联网消费空间中存在着地理临近性与文化相似性。这不仅是一次理论研究,其规律将帮助政府与企业理性认识互联网消费的空间传染方式,指导制定最佳的网络经济发展战略。