Board Diversity and Managerial Control as Predictors of Corporate Social Performance

While it is widely assumed that greater diversity in corporate governance will enhance a firms corporate social performance, this study considers an alternative thesis which relates managerial control to corporate philanthropy. The study empirically evaluates both board diversity and managerial control of the board as possible predictors of corporate philanthropy. The demonstration of a positive relationship between managerial control and corporate philanthropy contributes to our understanding that corporate social performance results from a complex set of economic and social motives. Possible future research and managerial implications are discussed.     

Board composition and corporate philanthropy

Using agency theory, this study empirically examined the relationship between board composition and corporate philanthropy. Generally, the ratio of insiders to outsiders, the percentage of insider stock ownership, and the proportion of female and minority board members were found to be positively and significantly associated with firms' charitable contributions.Jia Wang received his Ph.D. from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. He is an associate professor of management at California State University at Fresno. His current research interests include corporate governance and corporate social performance.Betty S. Coffey is an assistant professor of management at Appalachian State University. Her research interests are in the area of corporate social performance and functional level strategic management.     

An Instrument to Measure Level 5 Leadership

The objective of this research project was to develop a validated scale to measure Level 5 Leadership using the Collins ( 2005 ) Level 5 attributes. An expert panel reduced the 99 attributes from Collins to 74. The 349 participants evaluated their bosses on a 10‐point semantic differential scale for each attribute. A review of the literature suggested that Level 5 leadership and servant leadership represent the same concept; thus the study used a 10‐item servant leadership scale to check for concurrent validity. Additionally, Collins proposed eight untested questions to determine if individuals qualify as Level 5 leaders. Principal component analysis resulted in two factors that explained 55.2% of the variance; these factors matched Collins's proposed personal humility and professional will constructs. The final instrument contains five attributes of personal humility and five attributes of professional will that yield Cronbach alphas of .83 and .83, respectively. The analysis also revealed statistically significant positive relationships between the Level 5 attributes, servant leadership, and a single factor that represented Collins's eight questions.     

Violence,Aggression, and Ethics: The Link Between Exposure to Human Violence and Unethical Behavior

Can exposure to media portrayals of human violence impact an individual’s ethical decision making at work? Ethical business failures can result in enormous financial losses to individuals, businesses, and society. We study how exposure to human violence—especially through media—can cause individuals to make less ethical decisions. We present three experiments, each showing a causal link between exposure to human violence and unethical business behavior, and show this relationship is mediated by an increase in individual hostility levels as a result of exposure to violence. Using observational data, we then provide evidence suggesting that this relationship extends beyond the context of our experiments, showing that companies headquartered in locations marked by greater human violence are more likely to fraudulently misstate their financial statements and exhibit more aggressive financial reporting. Combined, our results suggest that exposure to human violence has significant and real effects on an individual’s ethical decision making.     

TBT and SPS impacts on Korean exports to China: empirical analysis using the PPML method

Since diplomatic relations were established between China and Korea, the two countries have expanded their relationships, especially in trading commodities and services. However, in recent years, as tariff levels have fallen, China has sought to implement other protectionist mechanisms. The use of non‐tariff measures has added another dimension to international trade activities that need to be better understood. The paper analyses the impacts that two forms of non‐tariff measures, technical barriers to trade (TBT) and sanitary and phytosanitary measures, have on Korean exports to China. To measure the impacts, we use an adapted version of the gravity model and the Poisson pseudo‐maximum likelihood method. The results show that Chinese sanitary and phytosanitary measures, estimated using both the coverage ratio and the frequency index, have positive correlations with Korean agricultural exports; however, Chinese TBT measures, when estimated by the coverage ratio, were found to depress Korean manufacturing exports and exports as a whole. However, using the frequency index, Chinese TBT measures were found to have a statistically insignificant negative impact on Korean exports to China.     

Are There Investor Clienteles in Rental Housing?

The possible existence of investor clientele groups has received little attention in the real estate finance literature. In this paper we develop a clientele model, which in equilibrium produces a clustering of investors by tax characteristics. Low-tax-bracket investors are concentrated in low-value rental housing that attracts rents which are high in relation to property values. On the other hand, only high-tax-bracket investors will be observed in high-value rental housing, and they charge rents that are low in relation to property values. An empirical model is specified and estimated using a cross section of investors in Australian private rental housing markets. Investor clienteles are detected among property investors, though there is a weak diversification effect indicating that clientele effects may be stronger among single property investors.     

Examining transformative processes in volunteer tourism

This study adopts a multidisciplinary perspective on the process of transformational change in volunteer tourism. Transformational change is understood as an individualized process which can lead to a critical awareness of the self, leading to a new self-definition. It involves four specific elements, a reflection upon the content of their knowledge, the process of knowing, the premise of what they know and the relational elements of their knowledge. Adopting a qualitative semi-structured interview approach, volunteer tourists provide an account of their volunteer tourism experiences in relation to these four transformational process elements. The results indicate that transformational change does occur through tourism, but that this is an individualized process, not an end outcome. Transformation may be strong at an internal level but it may or may not manifest in behaviour that the individual tourist him or herself is even aware of, let alone observable behaviour that researchers can quantify. It is therefore best understood as a process with distinct steps, of which a change in behaviour is just one element. Facilitators of change can be identified but only partially explain why transformation does and does not occur.     

The Sociological Foundations of Consumer Behavior: Their Implications for Economic Efficiency

A bstract . Neoclassical economic theory asserts that when the assumptions of perfect competition apply to a market economy , the allocation of inputs and/or outputs is such that by additional inputs or outputs no individual's welfare can be improved without diminishing some other individual's. That is, it is considered Pareto Efficient. When imperfect markets exist, however, externalities —influences from outside the economic process—in production and exchange, and indivisibilities—benefits or costs which cannot be allocated to or assessed against the individuals who enjoy or occasion them—appear and the market ceases to be an efficiently operated one. It is argued here that a fourth category of factors exists which may interfere with economic efficiency and that these factors are sociological in nature, factors arising from such considerations as class, status, role and power.     

THE MEASUREMENT OF CONSTANT PRICE AGGREGATES IN CANADA*

This paper is in part directed towards a partial examination of Canadian concepts and methods used in the deflation of constant price estimates of gross domestic product from both an expenditure and industry-of-origin point of view, and in part toward certain problems arising in the development of a conceptually balancing set of accounts in real terms. It also provides reference material to allow the reader to pursue the detailed methodology and data underlying the Canadian constant price accounts.