Influence of design on tourists’ recommendation intention: an exploratory study of fjord cruise boats

ABSTRACT

In this article we study the influences of esthetic, functional, and symbolic dimensions of design on attitude toward fjord cruise boats and intention to recommend using the product. Also, we argue for the importance of a product to blend in with the surroundings in which it is used – contextually congruent design. In two studies we find that aesthetic, functional and contextually congruent design has positive influences on attitude toward fjord cruise boats. Designers of fjord cruise boats should develop boats with designs that are congruent with the surroundings in which they will be used.     

“This is who i am”: Identity expressiveness and the theory of planned behavior

This paper explores the role of self‐identity expressiveness and social identity expressiveness in the context of Multimedia Messaging (MMS) adoption. An extended version of the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) including a wider array of identity and social influences is developed and tested. As hypothesized, self‐identity expressiveness and social identity expressiveness prove to be significant determinants of intentions to use. Moreover, the extended TPB model explains 62% of the variance in usage intentions. The paper also investigates the relationship between self identity expressiveness and attitude and between social identity expressiveness and subjective norm. The study results indicate that the concept of subjective norm alone is insufficient to capture the rich universe of identity and social influences driving behavioral intentions. Implications for marketing managers and scholars are discussed. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Sex and environmental policy in the U.S. House of Representatives

Using LCV score data, we find that female legislators favor stricter environmental policies than do their male counterparts. Moreover, gender-corrected estimates suggest that voters do not push environmental policy towards the middle, but rather select the ideologically closest candidate.     

Can sickness absence be affected by information meetings? Evidence from a social experiment

During the last decade several empirical studies have stressed the importance of norms and social interactions for explaining sickness-absence behavior. In this context, public discussions about the intentions of the insurance, and of the rights and duties of the receivers, may be important for reducing the sickness absence. In this article, we study whether information meetings about the Swedish sickness insurance affect the length of sickness-absence spells. The study is based on experimental data on individuals with weak labor market attachments. The displacement of when the call to the meeting was sent out was randomized. Comparing the survival functions of those called immediately with those whose calls were delayed (by about 30 days) makes it possible to study whether the length of sickness absence is affected by receiving the call earlier. The result suggests that the length is reduced by, on average, 20%. In the long term (12 months later), there is no effect of the information meeting. This suggests that attendance to the information meeting does not change individuals’ long-term behavior.     

Entrepreneurial response to interstate regulatory competition: evidence from a behavioral discrete choice experiment

Journal of Regulatory Economics - Despite a developing literature exploring the relationship between regulation, taxation and business startups, few studies have utilized artefactual experimental...     

Internet service provision and content services: paid peering and competition between internet providers

We consider the relationship of Internet service providers (ISP) and content service providers (CP) in the Internet ecosystem. Currently, the position of ISPs is challenged by the emergence of powerful content service providers, especially with the spreading of bandwidth-demanding video services. The further investment in the network capacity may be hindered by prevailing business models that largely exclude the ISPs from sharing in the major cash flows resulting from content provision. We develop modeling tools for evaluation of business models of ISPs and present results of an analysis of two models with the potential for the generation of additional cash flows for ISP: paid content peering and service differentiation. Firstly, we show that under certain conditions on the cost structure and the level of demand elasticity and uncertainty, it can be profitable for a powerful content provider to resort to paid content peering, thus transferring to the ISP a part of his content provision revenue. The resulting business model may provide substantial benefits to all major participants in this ecosystem: network providers, content and service providers and end users. After this we consider competition in the Internet provision sector and show that - also in this case - the paid content peering can help ISPs to expand the network capacity and at the same time increase profits of content providers. The end users benefit from the lower prices for content services. Finally, we consider the situation when an ISP differentiates the service offer by engaging in content provision, thus entering in direct competition with content providers.     

Organizational Culture and Organizational Change: The Transformation of Savings Banks in Denmark, 1965-1990

In this article, I argue that organizations' historical narrativesare a basic and important component of their culture and identity,and that these narratives can be resources as well as constraints.I combine a narrative approach with Joanne Martin's three perspectivetheory of organizational culture, and using the transformationof Danish savings banks as a case, I demonstrate how a narrativeapproach can provide a new and better understanding of organizationalbehaviour and change than mainstream economics and the abundantfunctionalist organizational culture literature. I demonstratehow, when change was called for by external pressures, the savingsbanks choice set was constrained by a shared narrative abouttheir historical origins. This narrative, in turn, constitutedthe identity, image and organizational culture of savings banksand to a high degree restrained learning capabilities, createdorganizational inertia and delayed the adoption of a new strategy.     

International experience,growth aspirations,and the internationalisation of new ventures

The aim of this paper is to investigate the impact of the breadth and depth of international experience on subsequent new venture internationalisation and to what extent growth aspirations moderate these relationships. Drawing upon previous literature on international new ventures, human capital and growth aspirations, we tested our hypotheses using longitudinal data from the Comprehensive Australian Study of Entrepreneurial Emergence (CAUSEE). Our results support the hypothesis that breadth of international experience has a positive impact on internationalisation. Depth of international experience on its own does not predict subsequent internationalisation activities. However, results support our hypothesis that the interplay of a high growth aspiration and depth of international experience has a positive effect on internationalisation activities. Our study contributes to the research stream on new venture internationalisation by distinguishing between breadth and depth of international experience, suggesting that these dimensions are differentially linked to internationalisation. Further, we test for interaction effects between international experience and growth aspirations. We thereby add to the knowledge by illustrating that some types of human capital are only utilised when accompanied by growth aspirations.