The effect of activity identity fusion on negative consumer behavior

Negative consumer behavior is an important research topic as it explores consumer behaviors that threaten a brand's image and financial stability. However, prior research offers conflicting findings on whether a strong consumer‐brand relationship hurts or protects a brand after a market disruption or a brand transgression. To provide clarity on this issue, this work argues that disrupting the consumer‐activity relationship motivates consumers to reaffirm and protect their identity, thereby leading to negative consumer behavior. The data reveal that, after a brand‐initiated market disruption, consumers with high activity identity fusion are more likely to spread negative word‐of‐mouth, boycott the brand, and avoid repurchasing the brand in the future. Moreover, the data suggest that high brand identity fusion protects the brand during market disruptions; therefore, prior conflicting results may be due to the fact that the consumer‐activity relationship was not accounted for. Theoretically, this work establishes that consumers' relationship with their consumption activities has significant impacts on consumer behavior. Brand managers and marketers are urged to develop strategies that focus on strengthening the consumer‐brand relationship and not the consumer‐activity relationship.     

Persistence and cyclical dependence in the monthly euribor rate

This paper analyses two well-known features of interest rates, namely their time dependence and their cyclical structure. Specifically, it focuses on the Euribor rate, using monthly data from January 1994 to May 2011. Two models are considered, one with fractional integration at the long run or zero frequency, and the other replacing the zero frequency with a cyclical one. The results indicate that the latter outperforms the former as well as other standard specifications. Future directions for research (such as nonlinearities, volatility behaviour, and multivariate models) are also discussed.     

The double EMG distribution and trade elasticities

Using Brazilian export data that, unlike many trade data sets, have a full record of small export sales, this paper reconsiders trade elasticities and the welfare gains from trade. Using the Brazilian data, this paper provides novel evidence on the properties of the distributions of log‐export sales and shows that the double exponentially modified Gaussian (EMG) distribution parsimoniously captures these properties. Using the double EMG distribution in a standard monopolistic competition model of trade, this paper demonstrates that data truncation, which is prevalent in many data sets, leads to an upward bias in measuring the partial elasticity of trade with respect to variable trade costs. This bias subsequently leads to the underestimation of the gains from trade by 1% to 9% depending on the extent of data truncation, a range that is commensurate with typical economic growth and large booms.     

Should Cookie Monster adopt a healthy lifestyle or continue to indulge? Insights into brand icons

Developing a brand icon has been a way for marketers to humanize and forge relationships with consumers. Icon development takes time. During this time, marketers have to face how much they stay true and consistent with their icons and how much they allow their icons to adapt to cultural changes in the marketplace. Little is known about how consumers respond to changing icons, and even less is known about whether there may be certain consumer groups that are more or less receptive to such changes. Four experiments and qualitative interviews were undertaken to gain insights into these issues. People who have a low need to belong were most impacted by changes in the icon, with effects most evident among consumers with a fearful attachment style. Feelings of rejection were found to amplify these effects. These findings have implications both for theory and practice.     

Customer and Supplier Portfolios: Can Credit Risks be Managed Through Supply Chain Relationships?

While supply chain risk has been the subject of an ever‐increasing amount of research attention, the importance of credit risk has been less studied, at least by supply chain researchers. Yet, there may be risks inherent within a firm's portfolios of supply chain relationships that are manifested in the credit risk of a firm. Moreover, portfolio characteristics may serve as a signal to the external market regarding these risks. While customer and supplier portfolio characteristics may impact the firm's exposure to risks, the specific issue of how portfolio characteristics relate to credit risk has rarely been examined by supply chain scholars. This research bridges extant works in supply chain management and finance to relate supply chain characteristics to a critical reputational outcome, namely credit ratings. In this research, we utilize a sample of firms that recently underwent an initial public offering to empirically examine the theoretical predictions of Resource Dependence Theory regarding the relationships between different supply chain portfolio characteristics and credit risk.     

Systemic justice and burnout: A multilevel model

With the aim of extending organisational justice research to embrace significant and enduring aspects of the workplace context, this study examines organisational culture and human resource management (HRM) as constitutive dimensions of systemic justice and relates them to employee health. Bridging organisational justice, HRM, organisational culture, and occupational health research, we advance and test a multilevel model relating systemic justice to burnout. Data collected from 60 organisations; 89 employee groups; and 1,976 employees provide support for the hypothesised relationships between justice‐oriented culture, in terms of organisational values and group culture, and justice‐oriented HRM. In turn, justice‐oriented HRM related directly to employee burnout and indirectly through employee perceived job control and supervisor social support.     

Persistence,mean reversion and non-linearities in the US housing prices over 1830–2013

The objective of this study is to provide a direct estimate of the degree of persistence of measures of nominal and real house prices for the US economy, covering the longest possible annual sample of data, namely 1830–2013. The estimation of the degree of persistence accommodates for non-linear (deterministic) trends using Chebyshev polynomials in time. In general, the results show a high degree of persistence in the series along with a component of non-linear behaviour. In general, if we assume uncorrelated errors, non-linearities are observed in both nominal and real prices, but this hypothesis is rejected in favour of linear models for the log-transformation of the data. However, if autocorrelated errors are permitted, non-linearities are observed in all cases, and mean reversion is found in the case of logged prices, though given the wide confidence intervals, the unit root null hypothesis cannot be rejected in these cases.     

The Multiplicity of Performance Management Systems: Heterogeneity in Multinational Corporations and Management Sense‐Making

This field study examines the workings of multiple performance measurement systems (PMSs) used within and between a division and Headquarters (HQ) of a large European corporation. We explore how multiple PMSs arose within the multinational corporation. We first provide a first‐order analysis which explains how managers make sense of the multiplicity and show how an organization's PMSs may be subject to competing processes for control that result in varied systems, all seemingly functioning, but with different rationales and effects. We then provide a second‐order analysis based on a sense‐making perspective that highlights the importance of retrospective understandings of the organization's history and the importance of various legitimacy expectations to different parts of the multinational. Finally, we emphasize the role of social skill in sense‐making that enables the persistence of multiple systems and the absence of overt tensions and conflict within organizations.     

Research note: religious doctrine and its influence on the choice to gamble as a leisure pastime among African American Methodists

This research note examines the relationship between adherence to religious doctrine and participation in gambling as a leisure pastime. In the United States, recreational gambling is a common leisure pastime for many African Americans. Our ideals about the value of gambling are often shaped within families, based on their lived experience with recreational gambling and also within religious communities. Two doctrinal statements from the Methodist strand of Protestantism provide critical assessment of gambling as a leisure pastime. This case study examined African American Methodists’ perceptions about religious doctrine that addresses gambling; their choice to gamble despite their familiarity with the doctrinal position of the Church; and the perception of gambling as a sinful leisure pursuit. Religious doctrine may deter some adherents from participating in gambling as a leisure pursuit but not everyone. Many can be familiar with religious doctrine, may not agree with it and will proceed to gamble. Finally, even if gambling is perceived as a sinful leisure activity, it concurrently can be viewed as a ‘harmless’ vice.