The effect of information releases on the pricing and timing of equity issues

With time-varying adverse selection in the market for new equityissues, firms will prefer to issue equity when the market ismost informed about the quality of the firm. This implies thatequity issues tend to follow credible information releases.In addition, if the asymmetric in information increases overtime between information releases, the price drop at the announcementof an equity issue should increase in the time since the lastinformation release. Using earning releases as a proxy for informativeevents, we find evidence supporting these propositions.     

THE IMPACT OF PRICES AND CONTROL POLICIES ON CIGARETTE SMOKING AMONG COLLEGE STUDENTS

Smoking among youths and young adults rose throughout the 1990s. Numerous policies were enacted to try to reverse this trend. However, little is known about the impact these policies have on the smoking behavior of young adults. This article uses a dichotomous indicator of daily smoking participation in the past 30 days, an ordered measure representing the frequency of cigarette consumption, and a quasi-continuous measure of the number of cigarettes smoked per day on average to examine the impact of cigarette prices, clean indoor air laws, and campus-level smoking policies on the smoking behaviors of a 1997 cross section of college students. The results of the analysis indicate that higher cigarette prices are associated with lower smoking participation and lower levels of use among college student smokers. Local- and state-level clean indoor air restrictions have a cumulative impact on the level of smoking by current smokers. Complete smoking bans on college campuses are associated with lower levels of smoking among current smokers but have no significant impact on smoking participation. Bans on cigarette advertising on campus as well as bans on the sale of cigarettes on campus have no significant effect on the smoking behavior of college students.     

A Model of the Effects of Self-efficacy on the Perceived Ethicality and Performance of Fear Appeals in Advertising

The primary purpose of this study was to better understand the effects of consumers' perceived self-efficacy on their perceptions of the ethicality of a fear appeal and subsequent attitudes towards the ad, the brand, and purchase intentions. In this study, a total of 305 consumer responses were investigated to determine attitudes toward a fear appeal ad. The results suggest that the use of strong fear appeals may not be perceived as unethical if consumers feel they can use the recommended product to effectively eliminate the threat posed by the ad.     

Sex-Role Stereotyping, Gender Biases, and Job Selection: The Use of Ordinal Logit in Analyzing Likert Scale Data

Sex-role stereotyping and gender biases are examined in a study of 246 individuals. Results show that previous gender biases in job selection have all but disappeared; however, biases still seem prevalent in the assessment of individuals' long term success on the job. Specifically, the findings showed that while gender biases are found only slightly in the hiring decisions of male and females evaluators, the perception of the applicant's future job performance was generally less favorable toward the female applicant as compared to males. An important contribution of this study is in the methodology. It introduces the use of an ordinal logit framework which improves upon previous research by exploiting the simultaneous and ordered nature of a Likert scale.     

Asymmetric information and the medium of exchange in takeovers: theory and tests

In a model of takeovers under asymmetric information, we identifya separating equilibrium in which the value of the bidder firmis revealed by the mix of cash and securities used as paymentfor the target. The model predicts that the revealed biddervalue is monotonically increasing and convex in the fractionof the total offer that consists of cash. We examine the modelrestrictions using data from Canada, where mixed offers areboth relatively frequent and free of the confounding tax-relatedoptions characterizing mixed offers in the United States. Wefind that the average announcement-month bidder abnormal returnin mixed offers is large and significant. However, maximum likelihoodestimates of parameters in both linear and nonlinear cross-sectionalregressions fail to support the model predictions.     

Information search in health care decision-making: a study of word-of-mouth and internet information users

This paper investigates how individual consumers may differ in their information search behavior in health care decision-making. Results indicate that most consumers still use word-of-mouth as a primary information source for health care decisions. However, usage of the Internet is increasing. The results of this study indicate that consumers who are most likely to use the Internet for health care information are single, younger, and less educated, whereas consumers who are most likely to use word-of-mouth are middle-aged, married, with higher income and higher education. Surprisingly, no significant gender difference was found in information search behavior for health care decision-making. The results also suggest that consumers with the highest tendency to use word-of-mouth are also the lowest users of the Internet in health care decision-making. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

European monetary union and asymmetric shocks in a new Keynesian model

This paper attempts to quantify the costs imposed by asymmetricshocks under European Monetary Union compared to free floating.A simple two-country model is examined where policy is set inan optimal, time consistent manner. Nominal and real rigiditiesare present in both economies, but prices are set in a forwardlooking manner and expectations are rational. Results suggestthat the costs of asymmetric shocks under EMU may be significantlyhigher than under free floating, particularly if fiscal policyis not used for demand management.