Factors Associated with Opinion Seeking

Abstract

This study examines the relationship between opinion seeking and cultural values and individual characteristics in the context of electronic products by surveying cosmopolitan adults of 15 nationalities, namely, American, Australian, British, Dutch, Filipino, German, Hong Konger, Indian, Italian, Japanese, Malaysian, New Zealander, Singaporean, Swedish, and Thai. It finds (i) positive correlation between opinion seeking and power distance, category knowledge, category purchase intention, category innovativeness, opinion giving, market maven, brand loyalty, and susceptibility to interpersonal influence, (ii) negative correlation between opinion seeking and the masculinity and uncertainty avoidance cultural dimensions, category ownership, self-esteem, education, and age, and (iii) no correlation between opinion seeking and individualism, long-term orientation, and risk taking. It then discusses the managerial implications of the findings.     

Circular of the Ministry of Commerce on Further Improving Examination and Approval of Foreign Investment

Competent commercial authorities of provinces, autonomous regions, municipalities directly under the Central Government, separately planning cities, Harbin, Changchun, Shenyang, Jinan, Nanjing, Hangzhou,Guangzhou, Wuhan, Chengdu, Xi＇an and Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, national economic and technological development zones, and national border economic cooperation zones,For the purpose of carrying out the scientific outlook on development, and according to the requirements of the important spirits of the Second Plenary Session of the 17th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on promoting the reform of the administrative system of ex- amination and approval and constructing service-oriented gov- ernment, the Ministry of Commerce will, based on expanding domestic demand and maintaining the stable and rapid growth of Chinese economy, determine to continuously deepen the reform of the administrative system of examination and approval of foreign investment and further expand the administrative authority for examination and approval of foreign investment of local competent commercial authorities and national economic and technological development zones. The relevant issues are hereby notified as follows.     

中产阶层的法律行为方式与和谐社会构建

和谐社会是建立在社会主义市场经济经济基础之上,以社会秩序的和谐稳定为整体目标,以社会利益关系的合理配置、人际利益关系协调整合为核心内容,以民主法治、公平正义和平等自由为价值依归的社会秩序状态.和谐社会在形式方面表现为人与人之间、人与自然之间关系的稳定性、进程的连续性、主体行为的规范性、财产和心理的安全性等.其实质方面意味着社会利益的公平合理配置和整合,社会利益冲突按照民主法治的原则和机制得以公平合理的解决,进而实现多元社会利益动态综合平衡.中产阶层的法律行为方式具有理性化、讲平等、重诚信、守法度等特点,它对于构建和谐社会、缓和与消解社会矛盾和冲突具有重要社会功能.     

Moving from subject-object to subject-subject relations: Comments on “figuring companion-species consumption”

The analytical themes Bettany and Daly pursue touch upon several topics noteworthy in consumer and marketing research past and present — namely, relationships between consumers and consumption offerings, between marketers and consumers, between academics and practitioners, and between culture and nature. In discussing each, the present article extends Bettany and Daly's insights, posing challenges at once playful and very serious for consumers, marketers, researchers, and public policy analysts.     

高新技术产业投资环境的因子构成及影响分析

高新技术产业投资环境归结为自然环境、法律法规、经济发展水平、基础设施、财税支持、市场因素、就业与利税贡献、人文环境因素、科技因素、社会因素十大因素,以及基础性因子、激励性因子、创新性因子和政府意志因子四类因子。对高新技术产业投资环境的因子构成及影响的研究,对于区域高新技术产业投资环境基础设施建设、发展政策的制定、政府对高新技术产业化的推动都具有十分积极的作用。     

中国企业赴巴西直接投资的机遇与挑战

近年来,中国对巴西投资迅猛增长,2010年中国成为巴西外国直接投资的第一大来源国。中企赴巴西投资在面临巴西地理位置优越、自然资源丰富、经济发展稳定、市场潜力巨大、劳动力资源丰裕、基础设施完备、经济政策稳定且开放、科技水平和研发能力较强、外债风险持续缓解、中巴双边贸易快速增长等良好机遇的同时,也面临整体税负偏重、基础设施滞后、社会治安状况堪忧、教育水平不高、居民素质参差不齐、资金和劳动力成本高企、劳工法律苛刻、币值波动较大等挑战。中国政府和企业要从完善投资保险机制、签订投资协定、做好市场调查、政策分析、实行"本地化"策略等方面沉着应对。     

生态旅游资源开发研究——以大丰麋鹿自然保护区为例

通过对大丰麋鹿自然保护区的观察,与其他保护区在资源保护性开发方面的比较,以及走访了保护区内的游客、管理者、开发者以及当地旅游部门,发现保护区存在的问题主要体现在知名度不够高,开发深度不够深;基础设施不够完善,利用程度低;旅游开发管理的体制不够健全;生态旅游资源的开发与保护没有协调统一等方面。大丰麋鹿自然保护区应抓住生态旅游飞速发展的良好机遇,找准市场定位和开发与保护的平衡点,不断完善规章制度,打造生态化、特色化旅游产品,加强生态旅游宣传力度,提高公众的生态意识,加强麋鹿和其他动植物保护与持续利用研究,从而提升自身的价值以带动盐城生态旅游的发展。     

Self-Ratings and Expectations of the U.S. President, Ideal Physicians, and Ideal Automechanic

Relationships between self-ratings and expectations of an ideal U.S. president, were studied in 43 men drawn from a university setting in the eastern coast of the U.S.A. The men first rated themselves on personality variables, life choices (agentic and communal), peacefulness, spirituality, and morality. Then they were presented with a vignette requesting that they describe an ideal U.S. president on inventories measuring personality variables, life choices, peacefulness, spirituality, and morality. For the rating of the ideal U.S. president, they also were asked to respond to a 20 item questionnaire that was a composite of several factors on organization and leadership, morality, spirituality, and peacefulness. The respondents belonged to one of seven different political persuasions, similar in some ways to different cultures. Self-ratings of the men and expectations of the president were highly correlated for extraversion, openness, trait morality, agentic and communal life choices. However, no significant correlations were found between the self-ratings and expectations of the president for neuroticism, agreeableness, conscientiousness, peacefulness, nor state morality. The men were also presented with vignettes for the ideal physician and ideal automechanic and asked to rate each of them on the inventory items. Overall, the U.S. President was rated as more neurotic and immoral in terms of ingrained ideas of right and wrong, but also as more caring for others, transcendent, seeking goodness and truth, forgiving, cooperative, and most concerned with matters of justice and mercy, and more concerned with both agentic (power-seeking) and communal (community-minded) life choices than were either the ideal physician or ideal automechanic. The ideal physician was rated as highest in extra-version, openness, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and overall peacefulness, and lowest in neuroticism. The ideal automechanic was rated as highest in state or situational immorality, and lowest in both agentic (power-seeking, business-mindedness) and communal (community-mindedness) life choices, and also lowest in caring for others well-being, transcendence, seeking goodness and truth, forgiveness and cooperation, being concerned with justice and mercy, overall expectations, overall spirituality, and overall organization and leadership. In general, the self-ratings were significantly related to ratings/expectations, of the U.S. President, ideal physician, and ideal automechanic. The men seemed to identify more with the automechanic than with the present or physician.     

企业采购人才需求分析

企业对基层采购人员(采购专员、跟单员)的需求量最大,也最迫切;企业需要基层采购人员具备采购管理、物流管理、生产管理、市场营销、计算机软件、社交礼仪、社会心理等方面的知识,合作与沟通能力及采购操作技能,具有责任意识、效率意识、组织意识、诚信意识、协作意识、创新意识等职业素质;企业将学历、所学专业、工作经验(经历)、身体条件、心理素质、职业资格证书作为采购人员入职的必备条件,最看重学历和工作经验.     

大学生坚持诵读经典名篇有利于培育健全人格

中华民族历经千百年岁月淘洗流传下来的经典诗文,不但是汉语言文学的典范和精华,更是蕴蓄着中华民族的精神和品格.组织大学生诵读语言凝练、意存高远、富有哲理的经典诗文,有利于学生增进语文能力,提高文化素养;有利于开发学生的记忆潜能.培养好学精神;有利于大学生陶冶高雅情操.提升人生境界;有利于开拓心胸志趣,锻铸坚强意志;更有利于把传统优秀文化的种子播撒到学生幼稚的心田,让学生成长的根深深扎在民族文化的沃土里.     

Methodological Expectations for Studies Using Computer Simulation

Simulation is often used in papers and studies across diverse fields like logistics, supply chains, health care, manufacturing, and defense. But simulations must be properly done, including input and model building, designing/analyzing the simulations, and model verification/validation. Unfortunately, simulation studies are not always done well, even though great effort could have gone into the model building and coding. This paper specifies, in brief outline, what authors and researchers need to do, when using simulation as a main tool, to build a convincing case for their findings and conclusions. Considerations on the input side of the model are enumerated, including specification of input distributions and processes; nonstationarity; random‐number generation; and generating realizations of random variables and random processes. On the output side are issues of statistical analysis of simulation output; comparison, selection, and ranking of simulated scenarios; variance reduction; and optimum seeking. Involving matters on both the input and output sides are the essential activities of verification and validation. The intent is to establish expectations on what acceptable papers need to do if using simulation, and to serve as a guideline to applied simulation studies. Such papers and studies will then be more valid, more precise, more useful, and ultimately more convincing.     

中外高校会计学专业人才培养模式的比较研究

通过对我国与英国、美国、澳大利亚高校会计学专业人才培养模式特点的比较,发现我国的教育培养模式存在着人才培养偏离市场需求,教学重理论轻实践,会计专业的课程体系不合理等方面的差距;人才培养目标、课程设置、以及教学方法上亦存在着不足。国外对我国高校会计学专业人才培养模式的启示在于：在培养目标上,应注重对学生的综合素质和能力的培养,加快完善课程体系建设,引入案例教学法;在人才培养模式上,应着力于缩短人才培养与社会需求差距,构建人才培养的双学位模式,以此满足社会需求,推动社会经济发展。     

海南兰花网络营销的机遇与挑战

海南兰花营销：发展机遇与挑战同在,价值存在提升空间。但一直以来海南兰花产业发展缓慢,目前流通模式仍是“公司＋基地＋农户”,导致物流成本居高不下。网络营销有利于兰花形成产、供、销一体化,降低成本。随着海南兰花网络营销条件日趋成熟,电子商务平台的构建,为供应链中生产、采购、销售等各个环节提供了实时信息和技术服务。能促使兰花生产从粗放型向集约型转变,有效地实现市场信息、技术信息和产品信息的共享,能大大提高兰花的附加值与竞争力,增加销售额。海南应加大政府资金投入,提高从业人员的素质,加强与教育部门等单位合作;健全兰花产品质量标准体系;大力研发新品种。调整兰花品种,完善物流体系,早日成为国内最大的兰花交易网络平台。     

Emerging Paths of Family Entrepreneurship Research*

This futuristic commentary reviews family business research since its beginning more than 30 years ago. Prior to 2000, disciplinary roots, professional organizations, and early milestones are identified. More recent books, journals, and special issues are noted, and conceptualizations, theories, and databases are compared and contrasted. Lastly, current and future research paths or directions are identified and discussed, and researchers are challenged to move ahead into new and different research arenas.     

The Future of Digital Communication Research: Considering Dynamics and Multimodality

Digital communication, the electronic transmission of information, reflects and influences consumers’ perceptions, attitudes, behaviors, and shopping journeys. Thus, data stemming from digital communication is an important source of insights for retailers, manufacturers, and service firms alike. This article discusses emerging trends and recent advances in digital communication research, as well as its future opportunities for retail practice and research. The authors outline four consumer–retailer domains relevant to digital communication, which in turn frame their discussion of the properties of communication dynamics (e.g., trends, variations) within messages, communicators, and their interaction, as well as communication multimodality (i.e., numeric heuristics, text, audio, image, and video). These factors are critical for understanding and predicting consumers’ behaviors and market developments. Furthermore, this article delineates conceptual and methodological challenges for researchers working in contexts that feature dynamics and multimodality. Finally, this article proposes an agenda for continued research, with the goal of stimulating further efforts to unlock the “black boxes” of digital communication and gain insights into both consumers and markets.     

The legal and ethical components of executive decision-making: A course for business managers

The debate on whether and how to teach business ethics in graduate business programs continues. The authors of this article suggest specific content and processes for a course aimed at giving MBA candidates the awareness, tools, and mental processes necessary to recognize and address ethical issues in decision making. The inclusion of labor law, discrimination issues, consumer protection legislation, securities laws, and an overview of the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights coupled with the development of utilitarian, deontological, and egalitarian analysis of ethical issues provides the tools and processes necessary for ethical decision making. These tools and processes are applied in several class experiences using cases, moral audits, and the development of a code of ethics to help students acquire the knowledge, skills, and values needed in ethical decision making.S. Andrew Ostapski is Associate Professor of Management and Information Systems at the College of Business Administration, Valdosta State University, Valdosta, Georgia. His teaching and research interests include the legal environment, business ethics, and international business.John E. Oliver, is presently Professor and Head of the Department of Management and Information Systems at Valdosta State University's College of Business Administration.Gaston T. Gonzalez is an Aggregate Professor at Universidad Simon Bolivar and Visiting Professor at IESA both at Caracas, Venezuela. His teaching and research interests focus on strategic management, business transformation through information technology, and the application of system thinking to the institutionalization of ethics in organizations.     

Customization in bicycle retailing

The purpose of this paper is to explore the process of customization by investigating how retailers and consumers interact in bicycle retailing. The paper focuses on three high-end bicycle retailers. Building on qualitative data gathered through interviews and netnography, this study takes both retailers’ and consumers’ processes into account. The results show that retailers capitalize on external and internal opportunities for co-creation, including new technologies, production and distribution innovations, and social media. Retailers’ planning for co-creation plays a significant role in providing a unique shopping experience for consumers. This includes supply chain solutions such as effective inventory and warehousing systems, partnerships and outsourcing, tracking, and postponement, which facilitate simplicity. Retailers rely on feedback from consumers to improve their planning and implementation processes. In terms of consumer processes, several emotions are evident, including the sense of standing-out and self-esteem, fun and coolness, creativity and imagination, and most importantly, the possibility of reflecting one’s personality in self-designed bikes. Systems that are easy to interact with, such as interactive online configurators, contribute to consumers’ cognitive processes. Loyalty and positive word-of-mouth turns out to be a common manifestation of the behavior associated with such co-creation processes. We also reflect on how, by what means, and why consumers and retailers engage in co-creation through customization, mainly pertaining to learning and innovation. Our results also point to various possible outcomes from such processes for consumer and retailers; including expressing ones personality and individuality for consumers, and providing product variety efficiently, and boosting brand image for retailers.     

Using Teams to Manage Collaborative Relationships in Business Markets

Within the context of collaborative relationships between supplier firms and customer firms, this paper examines the increasingly important, yet relatively neglected, area of marketing in the group-on-group mode of interfirm interaction in business markets. Central to this work is the delineation of important relational framing, structure, and process characteristics of group-on-group, interfirm interactions. In particular, five relational processes, called recurrent relationship management tasks are examined. Based upon the works of Dwyer, Schurr, and Oh (1987), Frazier, Spekman, and O'Neal (1988), and Anderson and Narus (1991) on relationship development, Kahneman and Tversky's (1979) seminal research on prospect theory, the efforts of Ruekert, Walker, and Roering (1985) on organizational structure, and recent studies in managerial decision- making, a series of propositions and a framework that link team structure and framing to relationship management task performance are presented. Along the way, those aspects of partnering and group-on-group relations that have implications for the design and implementation of marketing efforts are described. Finally, some suggestions for group-on-group research, which is inherently difficult to conduct, are offered.     

北京市“三城一区”创新能力评价指标体系构建研究

近年来，北京市立足 “三城一区”科技创新中心的主平台，持续深化科技创新体制改革，全面推进全国科技创新中心建设，取得了一系列的成效。本研究在梳理北京市“三城一区”建设历程和目标定位的基础上，借鉴国际典型创新能力评价体系，从创新环境、创新平台、创新投入、创新产出和创新绩效五个维度构建北京市“三城一区”创新能力监测评价体系，并针对北京市“三城一区”的定位，指出未来重点监测指标。最后，本研究从促进技术创新、强化资金支持和人才保障、把握市场机遇、深化创新协同等方面提出建议，以期更好地推进北京科技创新中心建设。