The Dynamics of Agricultural Biotechnology Adoption: Lessons from series rBST Use in Wisconsin, 1994–2001

This article exploits panel data from Wisconsin dairy farmers to examine the dynamics of recombinant bovine somatotropin (rBST) adoption and to identify the characteristics that distinguish among nonadopters, disadopters, and early and late adopters. Panel methods are used to control for omitted variables and endogenous regressors that call into question coefficient estimates derived from cross-section adoption models. The results, however, confirm previous findings that larger farms with complementary feeding technologies are more likely to adopt rBST, nonadopters appear quite unlikely to become adopters, and rBST adoption will remain at rather moderate levels in Wisconsin.     

Growth,speculation and sprawl in a monocentric city

An economic theory of sprawl in a growing, monocentric city is presented. Where decision-makers have perfect foresight, leapfrog development and discontinuous land-rent functions may occur and be efficient in both an ex post and ex ante sense. Where the extent of future growth is uncertain, decision-makers become speculators and the spatial pattern of development is more complicated. Ex post inefficiency generally occurs.     

Issues management and organizational accounts: An analysis of corporate responses to accusations of unethical business practices

When external groups accuse a business organization of unethical practices, managers of the accused organization usually offer a communicative response to attempt to protect their organization's public image. Even though many researchers readily concur that analysis of these communicative responses is important to our understanding of business and society conflict, few investigations have focused on developing a theoretical framework for analyzing these communicative strategies used by managers. In addition, research in this area has suffered from a lack of empirical investigation. In this paper we address both of these weaknesses in the existing literature. First, we explicate Impression Management Theory as an appropriate framework for studying organizational communicative responses, paying particular attention to the concept of accounts. Second, we critique previous investigations of organizational accounts and discuss the major contributions of our study. Third, we propose a coding system and content analyze the accounts offered by managers from 21 organizations that were recently the targets of consumer boycotts. Finally, we report the results of our empirical investigation and discuss ethical issues related to organizational accounts. Dennis E. Garrett (Assistant Professor, Division of Marketing, University of Oklahoma) is a co-author of Marketing Theory: Evolution and Evaluation (John Wiley and Sons, 1988). His articles have appeared in Journal of Marketing, Journal of Business Strategies, Business and Society Review, Journal of Marketing Education, and Communication Monographs. In 1987, he was selected as the Outstanding Professor on Campus by the University of Oklahoma Student Association.Jeffrey L. Bradford (Graduate Student, Division of Marketing, University of Oklahoma) is completing his Ph.D. in Marketing in the College of Business Administration. Renee A. Meyers (Assistant Professor, Department of Communication, University of Oklahoma) has published articles in Human Communication Research, Communication Yearbook, Communication Monographs, and Journal of Applied Communication. Her doctoral dissertation from the University of Illinois was selected as the 1987 Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation by the Speech Communication Association.Joy Becker (Graduate Student, Division of Marketing, University of Oklahoma) is completing her M.B.A. degree in the College of Business Administration.     

The California Nurse Mentor Project: every nurse deserves a mentor

In the rush to fill positions, newly hired and transitioning RNs are increasingly put into demanding roles without adequate clinical or organizational preparation. One approach that has shown promising preliminary success in enhancing nursing job satisfaction and increasing long-term retention is the use of trained nurse mentors who are paired with newly hired or new graduate nurses to provide ongoing support, guidance, and assistance. The California Nurse Mentor Project was a 3-year pilot project whose goal was to create a replicable program designed to improve the quality, sensitivity, and effectiveness of patient care through enhanced retention of nurses, including multicultural, multilingual, and male nurses. The pilot implementation of the California Nurse Mentor project has been extremely successful. Attrition rates are lower for nurses who are enrolled in the program than those who did not. Both mentors and mentees report that the program has impacted several areas, including their job satisfaction and professional confidence. Preceptor training, according to participant feedback, shows lasting effects on their pedagogy even a year after attending the training.     

What is business ethics? A reply to peter drucker

In his What is Business Ethics? Peter Drucker accuses business ethics of singling out business unfairly for special ethical treatment, of subordinating ethical to political concerns, and of being, not ethics at all, but ethical chic. We contend that Drucker's denunciation of business ethics rests upon a fundamental misunderstanding of the field. This article is a response to his charges and an effort to clarify the nature, scope and purpose of business ethics.     

Modelling trends and cycles in economic time series: historical perspective and future developments

This paper provides a retrospective on the modelling of trends and cycles in economic time series and considers where the research agenda currently stands and where future developments might lie. A brief survey of the early empirical research on trends and cycles is first provided before attention is focused on four papers published in 1961—our ‘annus mirabilis’ of trend and cycle modelling—which we argue have been ‘prime movers’ in various aspects of research in this area. The links from these papers to current research issues are then teased out before the likely future directions of research in both theoretical and applied aspects of the modelling of trends and cycles are considered.

Real Estate and the Arbitrage Pricing Theory: Macrovariables vs. Derived Factors

Two empirical models are used to implement the arbitrage pricing theory: the factor loading model (FLM) and the macrovariable model (MVM). This study compares the ability of these two models to explain real estate returns using equity REIT returns as a proxy. Two tests are performed: a comparison of crosssectional adjusted-R2's and the Davidson and Mackinnon test. The results show that while the two models perform equally well during the period 1974–1979, the MVM outperforms the FLM over the periods 1980–1985 and 1986–1991. In addition, both models suggest superior financial performance for EREITs relative to other investments in the market during the period 1980–1985.