A SIMULATION ANALYSIS OF HERDING AND UNIFRACTAL SCALING BEHAVIOUR

We model the financial market using a class of agent‐based models in which agents’ expectations are driven by heuristic forecasting rules (in contrast to the rational expectations models used in traditional theories of financial markets). We show that, within this framework, we can reproduce unifractal scaling with respect to three well‐known power laws relating (i) moments of the absolute price change to the time‐scale over which they are measured, (ii) magnitude of returns with respect to their probability and (iii) the autocorrelation of absolute returns with respect to lag. In contrast to previous studies, we systematically analyse all three power laws simultaneously using the same underlying model by making observations at different time‐scales and higher moments. We show that the first two scaling laws are remarkably robust to the time‐scale over which observations are made, irrespective of the model configuration. However, in contrast to previous studies, we show that herding may explain why long memory is observed at all frequencies. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Why Do Local South Korean Market Leaders Supply Retailer Grocery Brands?

This article examines why many of the leading South Korean brand manufacturers produce retailer brand products within their major product categories. The reasons identified include pressure from retailers, protection of other national brand product ranges, maintenance or improvements in working relationships, protection of other distribution channels, savings in marketing budgets, diversification of product lines, and changing competitive structures. Evidence is also provided of the dynamic nature of decision making relating to retail brand supply across the whole portfolio of brands which the manufacturer offers, rather than in respect of individual product brands or markets, the focus of much existing work.     

Healthcare costs and resource utilization in patients with severe aplastic anemia in the US

Abstract

Purpose: This study aimed to evaluate the healthcare resource utilization (HCRU) and costs for patients with severe aplastic anemia (SAA) using US claims data.

Methods: This retrospective, observational database study analyzed claims data from the Truven MarketScan databases. SAA patients aged ≥2?years identified between 2014 and 2017 who were continuously enrolled for 6?months before their first SAA treatment or blood transfusion, with a ≥6-month follow-up, were included. Baseline demographics and comorbidities were evaluated. Monthly all-cause and SAA-related HCRU and direct costs in the follow-up period were analyzed and differences were presented for all patients and across age groups.

Results: With an average follow-up period of 21.5?months, 939 patients were included in the study. Monthly all-cause and SAA-related HCRU [mean (SD)] were 1.65 days (2.61 days) and 0.18 days (0.70 days) for length of stay, 0.18 (0.23) and 0.01 (0.04) for hospital admissions, 0.25 (0.30) and 0.02 (0.07) for ER visits, 2.24 (1.40) and 0.46 (0.99) for office visits, and 2.90 (2.64) and 0.55 (1.31) for outpatient visits, respectively. On average, SAA patients received 0.15 (0.57) blood transfusions per month. Mean monthly all-cause direct costs were $28,280 USD ($36,127) [US dollars, mean (SD)]. Direct costs related to admissions were $11,433 USD (SD $25,040), followed by $624 USD ($1,703) for ER visits, $528 USD ($694) for office visits, $7,615 USD ($13,273) for outpatient visits, and $5,998 USD ($11,461) for pharmacy expenses. Monthly SAA-related direct costs averaged $7,884 USD (SD $16,254); of these costs, $1,608 USD ($7,774) were from admissions, $47 USD ($257) from ER visits, $127 USD ($374) from office visits, $1,462 USD ($4,994) from outpatient visits, and $4,451 USD ($10,552) from pharmacy expenses.

Conclusion: SAA is associated with high economic burden, with costs comparable to blood malignancies, implying that US health plans should consider appropriately managing SAA while constraining the total healthcare costs when making formulary decisions.     

The urban–rural divide,regional disaggregation and the convergence of crime

Potential regional variation in crime rates has been recognized as an issue of clear importance given its implications for the development and evaluation of theories of criminal activity, determining the appropriate level of disaggregation at which to undertake empirical analyses of crime and whether crime fighting policies should be constructed at a national or local level. Consequently, a literature has evolved examining the similarities in US regional crime rates and whether a national trend exists or is emerging. The present article extends the recent research into the emergence of a national trend by considering convergence in alternative classifications of crime using a data set subject to a higher degree of disaggregation than considered hitherto. The results obtained overturn previous findings obtained using more highly aggregated data, indicating the detection of convergence to be dependent upon the level of disaggregation considered. In addition, the extent of convergence detected is shown to vary across classifications of criminal activity and reflect anecdotally noted changes in the evolution of crime at a national level. The implications of the observed regional variation in crime for the urban–rural divide and theoretical, empirical and policy analyses are noted.     

TOURISM SENSE‐MAKING: THE ROLE OF THE SENSES AND TRAVEL JOURNALISM

The tourist experience is corporeal and multisensory. Tourism organizations, therefore, need to pay attention to the sensual content of promotional messages conveyed to potential tourists to provide incentives for seeking enriched experiences of place. Together with other image formation agents, travelogues (travel articles published in newspapers and magazines) offer information on and prompt imagination about destinations that help frame visitors' expectations and influence their subsequent travel decisions and behaviors. This article content‐analyzed 199 travelogues about New Zealand to identify relationships between regions and perceptions based on sensory allusions. It was found that the reporting of New Zealand as a whole by visiting journalists tended to utilize an appeal to all senses, but this was not true of individual destinations. It is suggested that urban destinations such as Auckland and Wellington possess potential for a wider sense appeal than is currently used through products based on urban adventure tourism and culinary tourism. An “ideal” itinerary is proposed that would permit journalists to capture a sensory experience of New Zealand.     

Inducible or Not—A Telltale from Two Movies

By content analyzing two movies, Crocodile Dundee (1986) and Australia (2008), this paper empirically examined some arguments found in the extant literature that are related to film-induced tourism. Crocodile Dundee usually received the accolade of inducing tourism, while Australia was copromoted by Tourism Australia to help revive the dwindling tourist arrivals. This paper does not suggest which movie induces more tourism to Australia. Rather, through comparison and identification of differences, it tries to explore the factors that might be associated with tourism-inducible film. After decomposing two films into individual temporal segments, 583 shots of Crocodile Dundee and 2,604 shots from Australia were extracted and analyzed respectively. The findings indicate that Crocodile Dundee had relatively more landscape scenes and longer duration per shot by including less cuts (visual information) than Australia. Suggestions for future research in this area and marketing potential are also briefly examined.     

Perceptions of Taipei as Revealed in Travel Blogs: A Tale from Two Sides

This paper analyzed 200 travel blog entries posted by 100 Mainland Chinese visitors and 100 local Taiwanese visitors to Taipei, the capital city of The Republic of China. The paper is unique in three ways. First, it provides external and internal perceptions toward a destination; secondly, it combines a Chinese coding system to segment texts and computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software to count keywords frequency; and finally, it visually presents the differences between two groups of bloggers in terms of the importance and affections visitors attached to Taipei in six image dimensions. Managerial implication is further enhanced when visitors' perception is compared with those messages promoted by destination marketing organizations. Overall, both groups of bloggers expressed more positive perceptions toward frequently mentioned image dimensions such as meals, sightseeing, and transportation. Mainland Chinese bloggers mainly saw Taipei through certain frames of reference that were manifested in promotional messages, thus creating a “circle” of representation in blogosphere.     

The Relationships Between Casino Quality,Image, Value,and Loyalty

This research builds on the idea that casino customers’ subjective, global judgments of service quality are shaped by experience of its specific attributes, and examines how casino customers form their evaluative attitudes toward the casino experience in the Macau context. Using the data collected from 525 Macau casino customers, we first identify four casino quality dimensions; namely, supporting facilities, staff service, diversity, and equitableness. We then test and validate a proposed model for the structural relationships between casino image (as a consequence of the four quality dimensions), value, and loyalty. In particular, value is shown to be a mediator of the relationship between image and loyalty from the perspective of casino customers. The results of our study can show Macau casino operators what constitutes customers’ casino experiences and aid them in enhancing their image, perceived value, and customer loyalty toward casinos.     

Organisational rigidities and marketing theory: examining the US department store c.1910–1965

By analysing the US department store during the period c.1910–1965, this article deepens our understanding of the nature of the transition to phases of ‘maturity’ and ‘decline’ that are fundamental to models of retail change (retail wheel, retail life cycle). By employing a close reading of key marketing and management writing of the period, it finds that ‘lock-in’ to an organisational structure associated with a single downtown store posed significant obstacles to suburban branched expansion. Only partial organisational centralisation occurred with the formation of holding companies in the 1920s, which contrasted with chains of general-merchandise and some department store retailers that were efficiently structured and better able to exploit suburban growth. When major department store companies finally embraced branched expansion, they were forced to significantly revise their operational structures.