Constructive deviance as a driver for performance in retail

A growing body of research is concerned with deviance in the workplace. While much research has explored negative forms of deviance, we examine constructive deviance: behaviour that deviates from salient norms and benefits the reference group. We empirically explore manifestations, determinants and performance outcomes of constructive deviance in standardised work processes. We do this through a mixed-methods study in bakery trading departments of an Australian retailer. We illustrate that constructive deviance occurs in these settings and show that some manifestations of constructive deviance improve organisational performance and pave the way for applying constructive deviance as a strategic tool in retail.     

The Relationships Amongst Emotional Experience,Cognition, and Behavioural Intention in Battlefield Tourism

The objective of this study was to identify the hypothesized relationships amongst emotional experience, cognition, and behavioural intention in battlefield tourism. A face-to-face questionnaire survey was administered and 655 valid questionnaires were collected at heritage site related to the Sino-French War in Keelung, Taiwan. The results revealed significant positive relationships between emotional experience and cognition as well as between cognition and behavioural intention. Structural equation modelling verified that cognition fully mediated the effects of emotional experience on behavioural intention. Moreover, this study suggests that cognition may be an accurate predictor of behavioural intention, particularly in regard to battlefield tourism.     

Asset prices in affine real business cycle models

I describe a tractable way to study macroeconomic quantities and asset prices in a large class of dynamic stochastic general equilibrium models. The proposed approximate solution is analytical, log-linear, and adjusted for risk. Therefore, it is well suited to investigate economic mechanisms, describe the time series properties or estimate the model, and deal with stochastic volatility. I explain the pitfalls encountered by previous attempts to use simple approximation techniques, in particular with models featuring recursive preferences. Finally, I show the theoretical relationship between my solution and higher-order perturbation methods.     

Capital Market Integration in the Middle East and North Africa

This paper studies capital market integration in Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) countries and its implications for international portfolio investment allocation. Starting with four cointegration methodologies, we significantly reject the hypothesis of a stable, long-run bivariate relationship between each of these markets and the European Monetary Union (EMU), the United States, and a regional benchmark. This indicates the existence of significant diversification opportunities for three categories of investors (EMU, world, and regional investors). A recursive analysis based on Barari (2004) suggests that recently, the MENA markets have started to move toward international financial integration. Investigating the effect of selected financial, economic, and political events on such a process, we extend the methodology and find that the markets react heterogeneously to the different categories of shocks. They should therefore not be treated as a bloc for global allocation purposes. Finally, after adjusting the integration levels by relative market capitalization, Israel and Turkey are the most promising markets in the region, followed by Egypt, Jordan, and Morocco. Tunisia and Lebanon seem to be lagging behind.     

高职院校职业道德教育方式研究

中国的职业道德教育方式与西方发达国家相比较为滞后。为培养高素质的劳动者,高职院校应该本着以人为本,讲求实用的原则,努力深化对职业道德教育的理解,不断探索内化的,系统的职业道德教育方式。     

“省直管县”财政体制如何促进经济增长——基于江苏省2004-2009年数据的实证分析

近几年来,"省直管县"财政体制在各省陆续实施,其主要目的在于克服既有的市管县体制存在的各种弊端。可以预期,这项改革措施有减少行政管理成本、解决县乡财政困难、促进县域经济增长等多种潜在作用。但可能存在的问题是,该财政体制如何促进经济增长?文章利用江苏省51个县(市)2004-2009年的空间面板数据进行分析发现,"省直管县"财政体制对经济增长的作用主要是通过县(市)扩权而产生的"政府竞争效应"实现的。     

Quantitative Analysis of Foreign Trade and Environmental Efficiency in China

This article analyzes the relationships among trade, the economy, and environmental quality in China. First, in the context of these relationships, the Super-SBM model is used to calculate the environmental efficiencies of thirty Chinese provinces and cities to obtain the degrees of regional disparity. Second, China’s provincial panel data from 2003 and 2012 are used to establish an influential factor indicator system of environmental efficiency. A section-weighted fixed effect model then provides insights about influential factors such as spatial heterogeneity. Third, the article establishes a variable coefficient model to identify the relationships among the objects of the study and divides the Chinese regions into four types. The suggestions include enhancing environmental and business regulations to ensure equilibrium between trade, the environment, and local economies.     

Raising the bar (4)

This editorial summarizes and comments on the papers published in issue 11(4) so as to raise the bar in applied spatial economic research and highlight new trends. The first paper deals with common factors and spatial dependence in the error term specification of a production function model. The second paper sets forth a New Economic Geography (NEG) model with production activities that vary in their complexity, so as to analyse the impact on specialization patterns across different regions. The third paper measures the efficiency of local public investments using a relatively unknown econometric technique in which the time span over which the variables in the regression equation are measured is increased by one time period every run. The fourth paper adopts a conditional quantile regression approach to determine the impact of people employed in informal jobs on the wage distribution in Colombia and five of its regions. Finally, the last paper proposes and tests two new Bayesian variable selection approaches for spatial econometric models.     

利用FDI促进我国自主创新的思路探讨

改革开放以来的30年时间里，外资经济已成为我国经济的一个重要组成部分，它为推动我国的经济发展做出了十分重要的贡献。然而。“利用FDI”与“自主创新”之间究竞存在怎样的关系，一直是学术界争论的焦点。文章从我国利用FDI的现状入手，分析了利用FDI对我国自主创新的影响，得出事实上利用FDI与自主创新之间并不矛盾的结论，并剖析出当前制约我国利用FDI提高自主创新能力的因素，进而提出我国应当如何提高FDI利用率来促进自主创新的思路。     

高职院校计算机专业教学中学生创新能力的培养

在高职教学过程中,特别是计算机这门实践性、操作性很强的学科的教学中,如何加强对学生创新能力的培养,该文从激发学生兴趣,改变教学观念,优化教学方法,科学授课模式等方面来谈一谈。