Can traffic light nutritional labels induce healthier consumer choices? Experimental evidence from a developing country

In a context of increasing health problems related to bad dietary habits in developing countries, simplified nutritional label formats may be a promising policy alternative. The aim of this study is to assess whether the multiple traffic light (MTL) system can improve the nutritional quality of consumer decisions. We conducted a selection experiment in Peru, where participants were offered a choice between three alternatives in two different food categories (crackers and beverages). Individuals were randomly assigned products with MTL labels on them. Our results reveal that exposure to MTL labels significantly increases the probability of avoiding the least healthy options and of choosing the healthiest items among the alternatives provided. These effects are large in magnitude and seem to be driven by individuals that are female, report average or above average dietary habits, and lack basic nutritional knowledge. However, our findings also suggest that the effectiveness of MTL labels may be sensitive to the specific characteristics of the set of options provided. These findings contribute to the emerging experimental literature on MTL labels in two ways. First, we provide evidence that this system can be effective in inducing consumers to make healthier choices in real‐life situations. Second, we explore which individuals are more likely to benefit from exposure to MTL labels, as well as potential limitations to their effectiveness. Overall, our results provide new insights on how to assess the issue of bad nutrition in emerging economies.     

Exploring the relationship between employees’ CSR perceptions and intention to emigrate: Evidence from a developing country

This study contributes to the burgeoning research on corporate social responsibility (CSR) at the individual level of analysis, in a hitherto largely neglected developing country context. Using survey information collected from 297 employees in public and private enterprises in Kosovo, this study examines how and to what extent employees’ perceptions of their employer's CSR activities are associated with their intention to emigrate. Applying a needs-based framework, this research provides evidence that employees’ perceptions of CSR are positively related to the meaningfulness of their work and job satisfaction and negatively related to intention to emigrate. Additionally, results confirm that the association between CSR perceptions and emigration intention is mediated by the meaningfulness of work and job satisfaction. From a practical point of view, this research should encourage private and public enterprises in developing countries to enhance and extend their CSR engagement.     

The effect of online scheduling on employees’ quality of life

Online employee scheduling has increased in popularity in recent years, especially among hourly workers who have grown up in the information age and the flexibility it provides increases their sense of job autonomy. This article reports on two studies that investigated the impact of work scheduling flexibility on employees’ personal well-being. One study collected data from current users of an online scheduling product and the other study collected information from hospitality management students who are potential future users of online scheduling software. The studies found that online scheduling helps to enhance employees’ personal well-being through satisfaction with schedule flexibility and job autonomy.     

How different are corporate social responsibility motives in a developing country? Insights from a study of Indian agribusiness firms

Against the backdrop of increasing foreign direct investment flows in the developing economies in Asia, the investigation of topical aspects of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in the region increases in importance. We examine the CSR motives of four large indigenous agribusiness firms in India with a view of assessing the validity of the claim that CSR in this country, compared to developed countries, is influenced substantially more by moral, cultural, and religious considerations and less by self‐interest and profit seeking. Unlike numerous other investigations of CSR that rely on questionnaires and company reports, our data are drawn from in‐depth interviews and theme analysis revealing some intricate motives behind CSR behavior and business conditions that inspire them. Our findings challenge some previously reported results and indicate that the degree to which such a behavior is affected by the state of economic development and cultural differences may be smaller than is often argued.     

Persistence of innovation and firm’s growth: evidence from a panel of SME and large Spanish manufacturing firms

This paper estimates the effect of persistence of innovation on employment in Spanish manufacturing firms during the period 1990–2008. Using GMM-system estimations, we study the importance of persistence of product and process innovation on employment growth according to the size of the firms. The results support that process innovation shows a positive effect on employment, especially for SMEs, while the effect of product innovation is not significant. The study also distinguishes that this effect appears in the contemporaneous year but it increases with the number of lags. This result confirms that compensation effects of process innovation may appear with a certain delay justifying the importance for SMEs of being persistent in innovation strategies to make them compatible with employment growth.     

Diehard or delicate? Violence and young firm performance in a developing country

Business Economics - The genesis and survival of new businesses is an important determinant of entrepreneurial dynamism. With the recent surge in security challenges, the issue of young...     

Dismissal protection and small firms’ hirings: evidence from a policy reform

Small firms are important drivers of employment creation and innovation. Dismissal protection raises firms’ adjustment costs and thus reduces worker flows. In many countries, small firms are exempted from dismissal protection regulations in order to increase their flexibility. This paper exploits a shift in the firm-size threshold of the German dismissal protection law in 2004 to analyze the causal effects of relaxed dismissal protection on the hiring behavior of small firms. Using difference-in-differences techniques, we find positive effects on hirings. Placebo treatment tests based on pre-treatment periods and a fake treatment group confirm the validity of our empirical strategy.     

A league of their own: services exporters – a developing country perspective

This paper provides a firm-level portrait of services exporters along with goods exporters in a developing country. Current findings of firm-level services trade literature suggest that the stylized facts of goods trade apply to services trade as well for a set of developed countries. This paper investigates if similar results hold for a developing country, Turkey, for the period 2003–2008. Most results lend support to the evidence found in the previous literature. However, the analysis of Turkish data shows that firms that export both goods and services are larger than those exporting goods or services only while multinationals that sell only goods are bigger than multinationals exporting both goods and services or those exporting only services.     

Voluntary disclosure of internal control and auditor’s attestation: evidence from China

We examine what determines a firm’s decision to disclose a self-assessment report on its internal control (IC) system and to further attain an auditor’s attestation on the report, using a sample of firms from the Shanghai Stock Exchange during the period 2006–2010. We hypothesize and find supporting evidence that the likelihood of having voluntary disclosure of IC self-assessment with an auditor’s attestation is positively related to future equity refinancing, mutual-fund shareholding, and whether the firm is controlled by the government, especially the central government. Our study also takes the identification problem into consideration, as our sample includes firms with IC weaknesses/deficiencies. Our study not only makes an incremental contribution to the literature, but also has practical implications, especially for regulators and investors in China.     

Exploring different airport users’ service quality satisfaction between service providers and air travelers

This study investigates appropriate attributes— physical environment, outcome, and interactional quality—to measure users' satisfaction that influences airport users' satisfaction level. With these three attributes and users’ perspectives for air travelers and service providers, we generate a conceptual model of airport service quality and satisfaction. The findings indicate that different perceptions exist between airport service providers and air travelers. Air travelers are more concerned with interaction and outcome (convenience) quality attributes, while services providers reflect on interaction and physical environment (servicescape) quality attributes. The airport service quality is found to be significantly related to airport reuse, and destination revisits. An appropriate service-training program is needed to reduce the gap in the level of satisfaction.     

Do young managers in a developing country have stronger entrepreneurial intentions? Theory and debate

We examine whether the young managers in a developing country have stronger entrepreneurial intention than those in a developed country, within the context of the Theory of Planned Behavior. This study is based on the data from two distinct and strategically important countries: India and Japan. We analyze the linkage between entrepreneurial intention, country culture and proactive behavior. We postulate a theoretical model to incite others to pursue further research. Bateman and Crant’s (1993) questionnaire was used for the measurement of the aforementioned variables. We found that the managers in a developing country need not have stronger entrepreneurial intentions.     

Dynamics of FII flows and stock market returns in a major developing country: How does economic uncertainty matter?

We apply the wavelet coherency and phase difference methodology to explore the nature of the relationship and the direction of causality between foreign institutional investment (FII) flows and stock market returns across time and frequency domain for the fast-growing Indian economy. Since both variables are affected by economic uncertainty, we have estimated the partial wavelet coherency and the phase difference to discern the impact of economic uncertainty on the dynamic relationship and causality between those variables. Both the FII flows and the stock market return move together during the periods of the global financial crisis and the European sovereign debt crisis without any causality in the short run, but the stock market leads the FII inflows in the long run. However, in the bull market the stock market Granger causes the FII inflows both in the short run and in the long run. Nonetheless, economic uncertainty drives the co-movement and also masks the causality effect between those two variables. Thus, the results require policymakers to set out a transparent economic environment to reap the benefits of FII flows. As far as the FII outflows are concerned, profit booking and economic uncertainty drive the relationship and the causality in the short run. Hence, policymakers and portfolio managers should be concerned about FII outflows in the long run, while in the short run, it is a normal trading activity.     

A cross-national study of Twitter users’ motivations and continuance intentions

Given the explosive popularity and growth of microblogging worldwide and its potential use in the areas of public policy, civic activism, as well as marketing and advertising, the questions of why and how individuals use these services warrant a comprehensive research. While some studies addressing motivations to join and continue using Twitter have been published, no research to date has investigated these issues in the context of developing economies. This exploratory study seeks to build an understanding of Twitter usage and continuance motivations in Ukraine, and compares them to those of the US users. The findings of the study suggest that participants in both countries use Twitter for professional development, entertainment, status maintenance, and social interaction and exchange. The Ukrainian participants, however, emphasize Twitter use for identity negotiation and self-expression, as well as for news updates and sharing. The study also examines how different motivations of joining Twitter affect current Twitter usage and continuance intentions, and provides implications for public policy and advertising.     

Matching of police and hospital road crash casualty records – a data-linkage study in Malaysia

Underreporting of road crashes hampers the development of appropriate road safety countermeasures in many countries. In this study, police and hospital records from road crash casualties in the Melaka Tengah district in Malaysia from 2014 were collected to determine their matching and reporting rates. Based on authentic personal identifiers from both types of records, Microsoft SQL was used to reveal how the matching rate varies due to multiple factors. The results showed that 311 cases (of 7625 hospital records) could be linked to both databases, yielding a 4.1% matching rate and a 4.7% police reporting rate. Both the reporting and matching rates increased with the level of injury severity. The significant underreporting in the police database showed that complementary data are necessary for enhancing the current official crash data records.     

Dimensions of service quality and satisfaction in healthcare: a patient’s satisfaction index

The assessment of patients’ satisfaction levels, and the knowledge of what factors influence satisfaction are very important for healthcare managers as it influences healthcare results and healthcare institutions financial results. The objective of this research is to analyse patients’ satisfaction levels in a set of four Portuguese primary Healthcare Centres, through the estimation of a satisfaction index, which simultaneously explains which dimensions of healthcare quality influence that satisfaction the most. For that, a conceptual model of patients’ satisfaction in primary healthcare was tested using data from a sample of 414 patients. Partial Least Squares path modelling (PLS) was the technique chosen to evaluate the proposed model. The results show that patients’ satisfaction is 60.887 in a scale from 1 to 100, revealing only a medium level of satisfaction. It is also possible to conclude that the most important positive effects on satisfaction are the ones linked to the patient/doctor relationship, the quality of facilities and the interaction with administrative staff, by this order.     

Relationships between process quality,outcome quality,satisfaction, and behavioural intentions for online travel agencies – evidence from Taiwan

Instead of using the SERVQUAL-type scale, this study conceptualizes e-service quality by two dimensions – process quality and outcome quality – and explores the relationships between process quality, outcome quality, satisfaction, and behavioural intentions in the context of online travel agencies. Using an empirical survey consisting of 240 Taiwanese respondents who have purchased online travel agents' products, the results reveal that process quality and outcome quality have significantly direct and positive effects on satisfaction. In addition, there exists a significant influence of satisfaction on behavioural intentions. While supporting the quality–satisfaction–behavioural intentions relationship overall, this study specifically provides more insights into the construction and effects of e-service quality.     

Country and industry factors in returns: evidence from emerging markets’ stocks

This study examines the influence of country and industry factors on the cross-sectional variance and correlation structure of returns. I use new data on emerging markets’ stocks obtained from the Emerging Markets Data Base. I find that emerging markets’ returns are mainly driven by country factors, as it was shown previously in studies for mature markets, and that cross-market correlation is not affected by the industrial composition of the indices. These results have important implications in regard to international portfolio diversification: cross-market diversification seems to be a better bet than cross-industry diversification. A finer industry partition shows, however, that ignoring the industrial mix leads to an important loss of diversification benefits.     

Global competitiveness,consumer choice and ‘country of origin’ effect: an exploratory East–West study

As protectionist sentiments rise in many countries in light of the 2008–2009 financial crisis, it is more important than ever to understand the potential role of homophily on the country of origin (COO) effect in consumer purchases and how it can impact trade and investment. This study examines these attitudes using a sample of 139 university students from different ethnic backgrounds in Vancouver (Canada), one of the most culturally diverse cities in North America. The results confirm the importance of ethnicity in affecting attitudes toward different countries, including the impact of political/cultural ties and current/historical events on their formation. Variations among different ethnic groups were found, however.     

Effects of social media on consumers’ purchase decisions: evidence from Taobao

Given the rapid growth of social media, it is important to understand the effects of social media on consumers’ purchase decisions in the e-commerce environment. However, although some e-commerce sites have started to link themselves to social media to enhance user interactions, previous studies of social media and service management have shed little light on the effects of social media on consumers’ purchase decisions. This study proposes a theoretical research model that includes social media factors, social impact transfer factors, and e-commerce outcome factors. We posit social interaction ties and social media commitment as key elements of social media. An online questionnaire was conducted to test the research model and hypotheses based on survey data collected from Taobao, the largest e-commerce site in China. The analysis results indicate that social interaction ties have significant positive effects on social impact transfer factors and trust in online vendor, whereas they do not directly influence visit intention. Social media commitment plays a crucial role in increasing social impact transfer factors and e-commerce outcomes. The findings reveal the different effects of normative and informational social influences on consumer purchase decisions. Further implications are discussed.