Understanding consumption in social virtual worlds: A sensemaking perspective on the consumption of virtual goods

Virtual consumption involves consuming virtual goods in cyberspace. Virtual consumption activities are evolving into an essential activity in social virtual worlds. Despite the growing importance of this activity, little research examines this phenomenon. The current study investigates the fundamental question of how users understand the consumption of virtual goods. Using the theory of social representations and core-periphery analysis, this study elicits and analyzes the social representation of virtual consumption. Study participants are 154 Second Life users. Results identify 32 concepts and relationships representing the collective perceptions of virtual consumption in this social virtual world. Social representation map interpretations point to several key themes that provide a foundation for future investigations of virtual economy consumption behavior.     

How do stakeholder interactions influence national food security policy in the Caribbean? The case of Saint Lucia

Increasingly, multi-stakeholder processes have been recognized as being necessary to the development of public policies seeking to promote systemic innovation in response to complex and multidimensional challenges, such as household food security, rural development, and environmental change. Saint Lucia, a small island developing state located in the Caribbean, has been grappling with a wide range of agriculture, food and nutrition security challenges with varying degrees of policy success. Recognizing the significance of the challenge, this paper explores the nature of the stakeholder interactions surrounding the development of Saint Lucia’s 2009–2015 National Agricultural Policy and considers some of the implications for food and agriculture-related policy outcomes. Results reveal a general lack of supportive conditions for effective multi-stakeholder processes, including low stakeholder participation levels, conflicting roles of different forms of social capital in the interactions between stakeholders, and missing “boundary” organizations capable of facilitating a transition towards more flexible and adaptive institutions, enhanced knowledge exchange and learning, and greater trust among stakeholders in the policy network. Future avenues for research and development are subsequently identified.     

The impact of the social servicescape,density, and restaurant type on perceptions of interpersonal service quality

The purpose of this study was to investigate how density in the servicescape affects the three interpersonal dimensions of Stevens et al., (1995) DINESERV conceptualization of service quality (responsiveness, assurance, and empathy) across various restaurant types. Using the framework of information processing theory, it was predicted that when a customer uses density to evaluate anticipated service quality, the information processing style will vary depending on the restaurant context. For fine dining restaurants and sports bars, it was predicted that customers will use heuristic processing, but would use systematic processing when evaluating a family casual restaurant. A 3 (contextual service norms) × 2 (built density) × 2 (human density) between subjects factorial design was employed. The results identified a three-way interaction between human density, built density, and restaurant type, suggesting that the type of restaurant does indeed matter when considering how density impacts potential customers’ perceptions of a restaurant.     

Applying LSA text mining technique in envisioning social impacts of emerging technologies: The case of drone technology

This research proposes a novel method of identifying and understanding the holistic overview of emerging technologies’ unintended consequences. Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) text mining technique is employed to yield multiple groups of contextually similar terms from future-oriented data sources, comprising both experts’ and the public's concerns regarding future technologies. Resulting term clusters are considered as new abstractions, or so-called scenarios, of future social impacts. Furthermore, the study acquires greater depth and breadth in conceptualizing social impacts through considering condition- and value-related terms as key linking factors to previous social impact-related literature. Our proposed methodology seeks to gain insights into the utilization of future-oriented data sources for the foresight activity, hoping to mitigate public skepticism and pursue a better social acceptance of emerging technologies.     

Socio-economic and biophysical determinants of land degradation in Vietnam: An integrated causal analysis at the national level

Recognizing the socio-economic and biophysical causes of land degradation at the national level is important for cause-targeted strategies when designing policies for combating land degradation. This study aims to identify the biophysical and socio-economic factors that significantly affect land degradation across Vietnam and to interpret the causalities underlying the effects. The dependent variables considered in the study are spatial, the extent and intensity of degradation in three land-use zones (agriculture, forest and severely degraded abandonment). The hypothesized explanatory variables are common economic and demographic drivers and bio-physical factors such as soil, terrain constraints, and neighborhood land-use structures that are often neglected in many large-scale land degradation assessments. Instead of using a single inferential statistic technique, we used multi-linear regression and binary logistic regression in a complementary manner to increase the detectability and credibility of the degradation cause analyses. The results showed agricultural production growth had strong and consistent effects on land degradation extent and intensity. Population growth, especially in rural areas, had a strong effect on the extent of overall land degradation. The importance of a neighboring forest was revealed for its ability to reduce land degradation intensity in abandoned, unproductive lands. The concrete faceting of the causal analysis for each land-use zone as social–ecological stratum allowed us to combine the defined social–ecological contexts, contemporary theories, and hypotheses in the field to clarify the causal factors of a complex phenomenon like land degradation. The study demonstrates these contemporary inferential statistics can be complementarily used to sufficiently detect and understand land degradation causes at the national level. The results suggest implications for national land management policy: internalizing land degradation costs in the farming system evaluation for payment for ecosystem services policy, restricting forest conversion, and improving extension services and education in agrarian communities.     

Does higher government debt link to higher social expenditure? New method,new evidence

Scholars believe that higher social expenditures are usually linked with higher government debts, whereas higher debts reduce social expenditures. However, it is reasonable to speculate that higher government debt may contribute to higher social spending, while fiscal deficits occur during a recession, which commonly creates greater demand for social expenditure. For a deeper investigation, this paper revisits the dynamic relationship between social spending and public debts in the time-frequency domain, using the novel wavelet-coherency analysis as well as the phase-difference technique to derive the co-moved and causal relationships between social spending and public debts in 13 OECD countries. The evidence identifies a dynamic relationship between variables. While higher social expenditures increase government debts, the shocks from government debts to social expenditures are conversely uncertain. We discover that higher government debt does reduce social expenditures, but it may be linked to higher social spending. The robustness of partial coherency and phase-difference discovers the role of a political party in the decision over social welfare programmes in the sample countries.     

TPP语境下版权保护期限的经济分析

在TPP影响日益扩大的情况下,中国据其采取相应的对策已经不可避免。由于美国主导下的TPP对知识产权领域的重视以及美国和中国在版权保护期限上的明显差异,中国在TPP语境下面临着是否延长版权保护期限的困境。文章基于预期效用函数理论,建立了版权保护期限对社会总体福利产生影响的线性模型,并据此对不同的版权保护期限产生的经济影响进行相应的分析。根据分析结果和现实的版权保护期限互相印证,可以发现过长和过短的版权保护期限均会损害社会总体福利,而且欠发达社会的最佳版权保护期限要短于发达社会。因此,中国作为发展中国家的一员,虽然在经济建设上已经取得了相当的成就,但在创意产业方面仍然落后于欧美日等创意产业发达的国家,应当采取的最佳版权保护期限肯定要低于欧美日等发达国家。中国不能为了加入WTO而盲目迎合美国的版权保护期限标准,而必须根据自身的经济利益确定是最适当的版权保护期限。     

Dynamic decision and coordination in a low-carbon supply chain considering the retailer's social preference

We establish dynamic game models in a low-carbon supply chain consisting of a single manufacturer and a single retailer with social preference. This study investigates the complex dynamic characteristics of pricing decision and carbon abatement strategy in the supply chain and focuses on the impact of the retailer's social preference on pricing decision, carbon emission abatement strategy, profits, supply chain coordination, and complexity of dynamic models. We find that adjustment parameters of pricing and carbon emission abatement should be maintained in a certain range; otherwise, the system will be unstable and even chaotic through period double bifurcation or wave shape chaos. A higher social preference of the retailer is always beneficial to carbon abatement and the manufacturer and helps maintain the stability of the supply chain system. However, the impact on the long-term profitability of the supply chain is related to the state of the system. Compared with the setting of a centralized decision, the optimal carbon abatement strategy and supply chain profit in a decentralized decision are always less than those in a centralized setting, regardless of whether the retailer has social preference. Therefore, a side-payment self-executing contract is designed to coordinate the supply chain and achieve Pareto improvement. The coordination mechanism proposed in this study not only leads to Pareto improvement but also increases the stability of the supply chain system. Finally, this study enlightens management in operating a low-carbon supply chain.     

CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY: A MICROECONOMIC REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

This paper provides a review of the theoretical and empirical literature on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). Depending on whether an individual can be considered as selfish, or whether she has also social preferences, motives for CSR, can be explained in different ways. Furthermore, we explicitly highlight the influence of different Corporate Governance System on CSR as well as the relationship between firms' size and social commitment. Because it is difficult to distinguish between different theories in empirical studies, we argue that an experimental approach might be suitable to test theories of CSR.     

企业家社会责任行为方式创新对其形象评价的影响机制研究

运用扎根理论探究了企业家创新性社会责任行为的特征及作用机制。基于扎根理论，就企业家微公益行为对其形象评价的影响机制进行了探索性研究。通过深度访谈与二手数据的扎根分析，提出了企业家微公益行为对其形象评价影响的理论框架：企业家微公益行为具有权威性、互动性与多样性，会通过情感和认知两大层面来获取消费者认同感，并影响消费者对企业家微公益行为动机的感知，进而影响其形象评价。该研究是对企业家社会责任理论的有益拓展，同时为希望通过社交网络进行公益活动的企业家提供了实践参考。