Looking back and going forward: what should the new European Commission do in order to promote evidence-based policy-making?

In this paper, we first give an overview of what has happened in Europe within the area of regulation over the past 5 years or so. We then examine where the new European Commission and the Parliament are with regard to evidence-based and risk-informed policy-making taking a specific look at the importance of transparency among European regulatory agencies, the calls for better regulation that were initiated by First Vice President Timmermans, and the continued mis-use of the precautionary principle. In the final section, we provide a number of recommendations on what the Commission and the Parliament should do going forward including moving away from fish bowl to science-based transparency, making the member states more receptive to science-based policy-making and strengthening the capacity of the European Commission to further promote evidence-based and risk-informed policy-making.     

Do closed survey questions overestimate public perceptions of food risks?

In this paper, we show that the widely accepted methodology for the assessment of risk perception – Likert-type survey questions featuring a set of risks with fixed response alternatives measuring the extent of worry or concern – may overestimate food risk perception. Using a European representative sample survey (n = 26,961) that included an open-ended question asking about problems and risks with food and eating, followed by a battery of closed questions (CQs) assessing food risk perception, we find a similar ranking of perceived food risks across the two methods. Across Europe, the five priority concerns are chronic food-related illness; food origins and quality; acute food-related illness; chemical contamination; and adulteration of food. However, the discrepancies between mentioning a risk in the open-ended question and the expression of worry about risks in the CQ are substantial. Of those who did not mention a specific risk category in the open question, between 60 and 83% (depending on risk category) expressed worry in the CQ. This parallels previous research on the fear of crime, showing that survey responses lead to greatly inflated estimates of the public’s fear of crime than is evidenced by qualitative questioning. It is also consistent with evidence from research on cognitive aspects of survey methodology, suggesting that survey questions may frame the respondent’s thinking about an issue. We conclude with recommendations for the use of branched questions in the quantitative elicitation of public perceptions of risk.     

The character of demand in mature organic food markets: Great Britain and Denmark compared

We investigate the organic food market in two selected European countries, Great Britain and Denmark, identifying main differences and similarities. We focus particularly on consumer perceptions and priorities, labelling schemes, and sales channels as a basis for assessing market stability and prospects for future growth. We employ a unique set of household panel data that includes information on stated values and concerns as well as registered purchasing behaviour. Most organic food on both markets is produced and processed by large-scale industrialised units and distributed through mainstream sales channels, consumer confidence being sustained at present by organic labelling schemes that appear to function well. However, a parallel market, based on the supply of goods through various direct sales channels to heavy users, prevails. We find that organic food purchase decisions are primarily motivated by ‘private good’ attributes such as freshness, taste and health benefits, attributes that may be perceived as being compatible with modern production and sales structure. Mature markets for organic foods nevertheless appear to be vulnerable to consumer dissatisfaction, particularly among heavy users of organic food products.     

Rational Versus Intuitive Gatekeeping: Escalation of Commitment in the Front End of NPD

The unwillingness of a gatekeeper to let go of a fruitless new product development (NPD) project wastes valuable resources and hampers NPD performance. The onset of such escalation of commitment is likely to occur already in the front end of NPD, where high ambiguity and complexity make it hard to distinguish fruitless from potentially successful projects. This study investigates if a gatekeeper’s thinking style—whether they think rationally or whether they follow their intuition—can prevent escalation of commitment in the front end. Theory on cognition provides arguments for and against either thinking style’s influence on escalation of commitment, but empirical evidence on this matter is lacking. Our study demonstrates that gatekeepers who think rationally are less likely to escalate their commitment than those who follow their intuition. This result holds both in a correlational study of dispositional thinking styles, as well as in an individual‐level randomized experiment in which the thinking style of experienced practitioners before they take gate decisions is induced. Our findings provide ample opportunities for improving existing front end gate review practices, such as allocating candidates for gatekeeper positions based on their thinking style, training gatekeepers to think rationally, and increasing the use of gate‐decision rules and templates.     

Effort reduction of employer‐to‐employer changers: Empirical evidence from football

We investigate changes in effort investment of employees who still fulfill a contract with their current employer but already signed a follow‐up contract with a new employer (employer‐to‐employer change). Because effort and outside contract assignments are hard to measure in firms, we use running data from professional football (n = 26,577) to proxy effort decisions. Fixed effect regressions reveal a statistically significant but weak reduction in a player's effort after signing a follow‐up contract with a new club. Because we find a statistically significant effort reduction in public sports, this effect might be even larger in less transparent labor markets.     

“I know I can,but I don't fit”: Perceived fit,self-efficacy,and entrepreneurial intention

While extant literature generally suggests a positive relationship between entrepreneurial self-efficacy and entrepreneurial intention, several moderators have been identified – suggesting possible boundary conditions on that relationship. This paper introduces perceived person-entrepreneurship fit to entrepreneurship and shows that it moderates the relationship between entrepreneurial self-efficacy and entrepreneurial intention. Three studies are conducted which illuminate the utility of randomized experiments and methodological approaches to address limitations in the interpretation of empirical results. Studies 1 and 2 are randomized experiments to examine causality; Study 3 contains two correlational surveys to triangulate the results by examining whether the proposed effects withstand the influence of confounding variables in real-life. The findings indicate that when a strong perception of fit with entrepreneurship is achieved, entrepreneurial intention is strongly predicted by entrepreneurial self-efficacy. In contrast, if one perceives a low level of fit or no fit, entrepreneurial intention will be low, regardless of entrepreneurial self-efficacy.     

Consistency Matters in Formally Selecting Incremental and Radical New Product Ideas for Advancement

Several new product development (NPD) scholars have argued that formal processes should be used when selecting incremental new product ideas for advancement at the very beginning of the fuzzy front end (FFE), but that such formal processes may be less beneficial when selecting radical new product ideas. However, arguments also exist for using formal idea selection processes for both types of new product ideas. In practice, informal processes are used for selecting both idea types and more formal processes are used for selecting radical ideas. Unequivocal empirical evidence for either of the opposing views or practices is lacking. This study sheds light on this matter using data from 161 of the firms that participated in the Product Development and Management Association's latest (2012) Comparative Performance Assessment Study. The results reveal that the highest idea success rate (i.e., the proportion of selected ideas that are eventually launched as new products and are successful in the marketplace) is associated with firms’ use of formal processes to select the vast majority of both incremental and radical new product ideas for advancement. This finding supports earlier claims that even for (raw) idea selection processes that take place at the very beginning of the FFE, managers need to adopt a portfolio perspective and consistently use formal idea advancement selection processes to ensure attaining the right balance between radical and incremental projects in later stages of the NPD pipeline to enhance overall NPD success. Notably, this finding shows that common managerial practices of using inconsistent approaches for selecting radical and incremental ideas for advancement need to be reconsidered.     

Are entrepreneurs influenced by risk attitude,regulatory focus or both? An experiment on entrepreneurs' time allocation

“Hybrid entrepreneurs” — those who maintain a wage job while starting a new enterprise — outnumber pure entrepreneurs in many countries. Yet, how hybrid entrepreneurs allocate their working hours between these two activities is not well understood. To better understand the relationship between hybrid entrepreneurs' division of time between their wage jobs and new enterprises we develop a model that captures hybrid entrepreneurs' decisions on the tradeoffs between financial risk and return as it relates to time allocation. We test two hypotheses based on utility theory, and challenge them with two hypotheses based on regulatory focus theory in a controlled experiment with 25 early stage entrepreneurs and 29 undergraduate students. In the computer-based experiment, entrepreneurs' and students' time allocation decisions (tied to monetary incentives) are used to test what would motivate them to work more or less hours in their entrepreneurial startups. We find that the actual time allocation decisions of the student group are somewhat in tune with utility theory, but that the entrepreneurs' time allocation decisions are better explained by regulatory focus theory.