Family structure,materialism, and compulsive buying: A reinquiry and extension

The present study represents a reinquiry and extension of Rindfleisch, Burroughs, and Denton's (1997) foundational study concerning the impact of family structure on materialism and compulsive buying in young adults. In addition to reexamining the relationships specified in the Rindfleisch et al. study, the authors of this study also examine additional and/or different relationships. The findings of their reinquiry include the following: (1) family structure is positively related to the happiness dimension of materialism; (2) the predicted direct effect of family structure on compulsive buying was not supported, suggesting that divorce may not affect compulsive buying until early adulthood; and (3) the mediating roles of family stressors and family resources, and the moderating role of socioeconomic status may require additional investigation. Directions for future research in this nascent area of inquiry are offered. James A. Roberts (jim_Roberts@baylor.edu) (Ph.D., University of Nebraska-Lincoln) is the W. A. Mays Professor of Entrepreneurship and associate professor of marketing at Baylor University. He has had articles published in numerous journals including theJournal of Consumer Affairs, theJournal of Business Research, theJournal of Public Policy and Marketing, Business Horizons, Psychological Reports, theJournal of Marketing Theory and Practice, theJournal of International Consumer Marketing, theJournal of Social Behavior and Personality, theJournal of Personal Selling and Sales Management, Industrial Marketing Management, theJournal of Managerial Issues, theEducation Review, theJournal of Marketing Management, and various conference proceedings. Areas of research include selling and sales force management, compulsive buying, socially and ecologically conscious consumer behavior, and advertising-related issues. Current research efforts focus on the marketing/entrepreneurship interface. Chris Manolis (manolis@xavier.edu) is an associate professor of marketing at Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Kentucky, and his research interests include the study of psychological and behavioral processes of exchange participants and various methodological/empirical research issues. His research has appeared in a number of journals, including theJournal of Business Research, theJournal of Consumer Psychology, theJournal of Consumer Marketing, theJournal of Services Marketing, Basic and Applied Social Psychology, andStructural Equation Modeling. Joh F.(Jeff) Tanner Jr. (jeff_tanner@baylor.edu) (Ph.D.,University of Georgia) serves as associate dean at Baylor University. His research interests are the use of marketing technology to promote responsible behavior and customer relationship management. He has published research in theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of Business Research, theJournal of Public Policy & Marketing, and others.     

Organizational Prospects, Influence Costs, and Ownership Changes

We augment efficiency-based theories of ownership by including influence costs. Our principal conclusion is that the prospect of organizational decline and layoffs creates additional influence costs in multiunit organizations that would be absent if there was no prospect of layoffs and would be lessened or eliminated in focused organizations. This helps explain the tendency of firms to divest poorly performing units, as well as the pattern of sales of such units to firms already in businesses related to that of the divested unit.     

Short-cuts in issuance decisions and subsequent small firm performance

This paper examines the subsequent change in performance characteristics of companies that make security issuance choices consistent with “following the herd.” It extends the literature on decision heuristics (i.e., decision short-cuts) by exploring the outcome of mimicking behavior. Results suggest that firms that issue equity in an environment consistent with mimicking are associated with subsequent increased risk of bankruptcy relative to their non-mimicking counterparts. Moreover, the results also suggest that these mimicking actions are not associated with subsequent changes in profitability. This gives support to the argument that decision short-cuts produce suboptimal results. Moreover, the effect is concentrated in very small (i.e., micro-cap) companies, but not present for companies in larger size categories. Similar patterns for debt issuers who mimic competitors are not observed, which may reflect the greater scrutiny imposed by lenders and debt under-writers with regard to debt issuances.

Technology Vision for Radical Innovation and Its Impact on Early Success

For firms involved with the very early stages of emergent radical innovation, technical goals are often held in the mind(s) of only one or a few individuals. The way these individuals mentally imagine or visualize such goals, or “technology visions,” provides an important looking glass for understanding a firm's progression along the path of involvement from a technical discontinuity toward project‐level and organizational‐level involvement with a given technology. Utilizing a large sample of firms engaged in radical innovation in North America and the United Kingdom, this empirical study examines the impact of five dimensions of technology vision on early success: benefits goals, efficiency goals, magnetism, specificity, and infrastructure clarity. Technology vision is found to have a significant positive impact on technical competitive advantage, early success with customers, and ability to attract capital, as measures of early success.     

Money,politics, and the regulation of public accounting services: Evidence from the Sarbanes–Oxley Act of 2002

Because public accounting is a regulated practice, the profession actively manages its relationship with the state. While prior studies have analyzed the profession’s efforts to shape its regulatory environment, few studies have examined the profession’s pointed attempts to influence a specific regulatory policy that affects the practice of auditing in the United States. Drawing on extant theories of regulation and political economy, this study investigates the rationality and effectiveness of political action committee (PAC) contributions paid to members of the US Congress by the US public accounting profession during the policy formulation period of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act of 2002. Based on the results of empirical tests, we conclude that the US profession strategically manages its relationship with the federal government, in part, through direct involvement in the financing of political campaigns. Furthermore, the profession’s pattern of contributions implies an ideologically conservative as well as a professional regulatory motivation for providing financial support to federal legislators. Thus, although the US profession continues to proclaim the primacy of its public interest orientation, it does not appear to be politically neutral when attempting to influence public policy.     

A typology of graziers to inform a more targeted approach for developing natural resource management policies and agricultural extension programs

The use of landholder typologies to assist in the development of natural resource management (NRM) policies and agricultural extension programs has increased considerably in the past decade. In this paper we explore the potential of developing a typology of graziers to more effectively tailor policies and programs with the aim of improving land management outcomes. This is of particular importance since growing public concern about the environmental performance of the beef industry has led to increasing pressures on graziers to change their land management practices to decrease off-property impacts. To gain a better understanding of graziers’ land management practices and the factors that inform their decisions on how they manage their land we first developed a conceptual model of the relationship between grazier and grazing land where both can, ideally, thrive through conscious and timely land management decisions made and implemented by the grazier. A successful grazier land relationship is likely to be consistent with value systems and social and economic factors, although the particulars of any individual approach may vary spatially and temporally. These factors, in particular graziers’ values and motivations to follow a particular management strategy, guided the development of our typology of graziers. Australia's Bowen-Broken basin, which has been identified as a major contributor of sediment and nutrients that enter the Great Barrier Reef lagoon, served as a case study for this research. Three broad types of graziers emerged: (1) traditionalists, (2) diversifiers, and (3) innovators. The authors argue that by understanding graziers’ values and motivations underlying each of the grazier types, government agencies and NRM organisations can more effectively tailor their policy and extension programs towards specific types of graziers and can work with specific groups to achieve reductions in sediment and nutrient runoff from grazing properties.