The differing roles of success drivers across sequential channels: An application to the motion picture industry

In several product categories, it is typical to release products sequentially to different markets and customer segments. Conventional knowledge holds that the roles of various product success drivers do not differ significantly across these sequential channels of distribution. The authors examine sequential distribution channels within the motion picture industry and develop a model that proposes that such differences exist between a primary (short- and long-term theatrical box office) and a sequential (video rental) channel. The authors test their model with a sample of 331 motion pictures released in theaters and on video during 1999–2001 using partial least squares. Results reveal differences in the impact of success factors across channels. For example, cultural familiarity enhances box office success but relates negatively to video rental success, and distribution intensity and date of release enhance box office outcomes but have no impact on rental revenues. Thorsten Hennig-Thurau (tht@medien.uni-weimar.cie) is a professor of marketing and media research at Bauhaus-University of Weimar’s Media School and Honorary Visiting Professor of Movie Marketing in the Faculty of Management of Cass Business School, City University London. He has published articles in theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of Service Research, theInternational Journal of Electronic Commerce, theJournal of Interactive Marketing, Psychology & Marketing, and theJournal of Consumer Affairs, among others. He is author of the monograph Relationship Marketing, which has been translated into Chinese. He is member of the editorial board of three journals and serves as reviewer for theJournal of Marketing andMarketing Science. He has won eight Best Article and Best Paper Awards, including the Overall Best Paper Award of the 2005 American Marketing Association Summer Educators’ Conference and the 2002JSR Excellence in Service Research Award. Mark B. Houston (houstonmb@missouri.edu) (PhD, Arizona State University) is the David and Judy O’Neal MBA Professor at the University of Missouri-Columbia. His research on strategy, interfirm relationships, and innovation has been published in leading journals, including theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of Marketing Research, theJournal of Consumer Research, Marketing Science, theJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, and theJournal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis. He cochaired the 2005 American Marketing Association (AMA) Summer Educators’ Conference and served for two terms as vice president of the AMA’s Technology and Marketing Special Interest Group. Gianfranco Walsh (g.walsh@strath.ac.uk) received his MPhil degree from UMIST (England) and PhD (2001) and Habilitation (2004) degrees from Hanover (Germany). His research focuses on consumer behavior, corporate reputation, and e-commerce. He has presented numerous papers at international conferences. His work has been published in, among others, theAcademy of Marketing Science Review, the International Journal of Electronic Commerce, theJournal of Consumer Affairs, theJournal of Interactive Marketing, theJournal of Macromarketing, and theJournal of Marketing Management. He is the Chair of Marketing and Electronic Retailing at the Institute for Management, University of Koblenz-Landau.     

The Economics and Bioeconomics of Folk and Scientific Classification

Synopsis This paper is the product of a collaboration between a biologist (Ghiselin 1997) who works on the philosophy of classification and an economist (Landa 1981, 1994) who works on the ‘Economics of Identity’: how and why people classify people based on identity in the context of a theory of ethnic trading networks. In developing the ‘bioeconomics’ (the synthesis of economics with biology) of classification, we crossed a number of disciplinary boundaries—anthropology, economics, sociology, biology, and cognitive psychology including evolutionary psychology’s ‘fast and frugal’ heuristics. Using a bioeconomics approach, we argue that folk classifications—the classifications used by ordinary persons—have much in common with scientific classifications: underlying both is the need for economy of information processing in the brain, for the efficient organization of knowledge, and for efficiency of information acquisition and transmission of information to others. Both evolve as a result of trial and error, but in science there is relatively more foresight, understanding, and planning.     

The Study of Ethnicity and Nationalism Needs Better Categories: Clearing up the Confusions that Result from Blurring Analytic and Lay Concepts

Synopsis It has been difficult to make progress in the study of ethnicity and nationalism because of the multiple confusions of analytic and lay terms, and the sheer lack of terminological standardization (often even within the same article). This makes a conceptual cleaning-up unavoidable, and it is especially salutary to attempt it now that more economists are becoming interested in the effects of identity on behavior, so that they may begin with the best conceptual tools possible. My approach to these questions has been informed by anthropological and evolutionary-psychological questions. I will focus primarily on the terms ‘ethnic group’, ‘nation’, and ‘nationalism’, and I will make the following points: (1) so-called ‘ethnic groups’ are collections of people with a common cultural identity, plus an ideology of membership by descent and normative endogamy; (2) the ‘group’ in ‘ethnic group’ is a misleading misnomer—these are not ‘groups’ but categories, so I propose to call them ‘ethnies’; (3) ‘nationalism’ mostly refers to the recent ideology that ethnies—cultural communities with a self-conscious ideology of self-sufficient reproduction—be made politically sovereign; (4) it is very confusing to use ‘nationalism’ also to stand for ‘loyalty to a multi-ethnic state’ because this is the exact opposite; (5) a ‘nation’ truly exists only in a politician’s imagination, so analysts should not pretend that establishing whether something ‘really’ is or is not ‘a nation’ matters; (6) a big analytic cost is paid every time an ‘ethnie’ is called a ‘nation’ because this mobilizes the intuition that nationalism is indispensable to ethnic organization (not true), which thereby confuses the very historical process—namely, the recent historical emergence of nationalism—that must be explained; (7) another analytical cost is paid when scholars pretend that ethnicity is a form of kinship—it is not.     

How do consumers categorize new hybrid products?

This article investigates how consumers categorize new hybrid products (NHPs). Given the limitations of the classical theories of categorization in the specific case of NHP, affordance, mobilized infrequently in marketing, turned out to be a useful categorization concept. Five types of NHP categorizations by consumers, based on the degree of affordance (low vs. high) and type of innovation (incremental vs. radical), have been detected and filled a gap in the literature on the subject.     

一种最大分类间隔SVDD的多类文本分类算法

文本分类是信息检索和文本挖掘的关键技术之一。提出了一种基于支持向量数据描述(SVDD)的多类文本分类算法,用支持向量描述训练求得包围各类样本的最小超球体,并使得分类间隔最大化,在测试阶段,引入基于核空间k-近邻平均距离的判别准则,判断样本所属类别。实验结果表明,该方法具有很好的泛化能力和很好的时间性能。     

部门预算定额的分类分档研究

部门预算是市场经济国家普遍采用的一种预算管理制度，近年来在我国得到广泛地应用和推行。在部门预算编制中，定额的分类分档和定额标准的测算是两个关键问题。从理论与实践的结合上，就部门预算中定额分类分档的意义、原则、标准及划分方法等问题进行探索和研究，提出部门预算分类分档的建议方案对我国预算管理改革作用甚大。     

Host Country National Employees’ Prosocial Behavior toward Expatriates in Foreign Subsidiaries: A Common Ingroup Identity Model Perspective

Social categorization is predominately assumed to have negative effects on the prosocial behavior of host country national (HCN) employees toward expatriates in foreign subsidiaries. Challenging this assumption, I draw on the common ingroup identity model to propose that dual identity – simultaneous identification with membership in a subgroup and in a superordinate group – reduces HCNs’ intergroup biases and facilitates prosocial behavior. More specifically, I hypothesize that HCNs’ organizational identity has a moderating effect on the positive relationship between HCNs’ expatriate outgroup categorization and dual identity, such that this relationship is weaker when organizational identity is low. Furthermore, I hypothesize that dual identity mediates the relationship between expatriate outgroup categorization and two prosocial behaviors: information sharing and affiliative citizenship behavior. Results from the data collected from 1,290 HCN employees in Japan provide support for these hypotheses and the moderated mediation model.     

“老好人”能当好团队领导吗?——团队领导宜人性与团队创造力的关系

中国人自古有"不得罪人""以和为贵"等方面的文化沉淀。受传统文化的影响,中国企业在团队管理实践中不免出现团队领导的"老好人"式管理。团队领导当"老好人"是会促进还是会阻碍团队创造力的提升,这在理论探讨和管理实践上是个有趣的议题。在倡导企业创新驱动的新时代背景下,本文针对团队领导"老好人"现象,从信息加工视角,运用自我分类理论观点,建立团队领导宜人性、团队信息深度加工与团队创造力之间传导作用机制研究模型。本研究通过对中国企业166个团队进行问卷调查,收集了132份有效团队样本数据,并采取调节路径分析方法进行了实证分析。研究发现,团队领导宜人性会通过团队信息深度加工影响团队创造力,过高或过低的宜人性都不利于团队创新。有"老好人"倾向的团队领导应展现中等水平的宜人性特征,防止陷入过低或过高宜人性的怪圈,并应重视推动团队信息的深度加工,这样才能最大限度地促进团队创造力的提升。本研究拓展了团队领导个性特征对团队创造力的影响机制研究,同时对于中国企业领导干部提高团队创造力也具有一定的指导意义。     

财政收支分类改革后财政科技投入构成分析及政策启示

财政收支分类改革后科技投入的科目、构成发生了很大变化,本文在对新旧科目转换对比的基础上,分析了新科目下科技投入构成及重点科目,给出建设"创新型"国家的科技投入政策启示。     

透析企业进出口商品归类的法律风险

企业在进出口商品归类时面临申报不实的法律风险,该风险源于商品归类的技术性和制度性困难。申报不实作为行政违法行为,与归类差错的区别在于其构成要件应包含主观过错。企业可提出归类差错而非申报不实的抗辩,并利用预归类、商品归类行政复议及申报不实行政复议等防范和救济途径。