Introduction to designing information and organizations with a positive lens

The role and potential contribution of a positive lens to the design of systems and organizations is the focus of this introductory essay. The positive lens refers to a perspective in the social sciences that emphasizes the capacity of people and organizations to construct better work environments, customer experiences and socio-technical systems through a positive discourse. Joining a positive lens on organizing with the transformative power of design thinking opens new horizons and uncovers previously overlooked possibilities for creating organizational and social well-being. This volume aims to introduce design with a positive lens into the research on information systems and organizations and to explore its potential value.     

Economical evaluation of greenhouse layout design

This paper offers mutual exchange of knowledge and expertise between agriculture and production-economy by economical evaluation of greenhouses. Greenhouses are Hi-Tech horticulture farms, in which advanced technological infrastructure increase production efficiency by providing optimal growing conditions. However, this infrastructure involves high capital investments. There are other cost sources, of which labor is dominant, generally in horticulture and in greenhouses in particular. Efficient use of space and labor are often conflicting goals in greenhouse layout design. In this paper, these conflicts are presented and illustrated, and tools are developed to evaluate layout design by the resultant annual operational profit, thus enable comparison of alternative layouts. To increase accessibility, spreadsheet software is used for the calculations. Further, the spreadsheet is designed to support WHAT-IF analyses. The applicability of the proposed approach is demonstrated via numerical analyses of layout design of an actual greenhouse for pepper growing using the Holland method. Evidently, the layout design can have significant effect on the economical efficiency of the greenhouse—annual profit increases by, at least 12%, and up to 40%! The tradeoff between space utilization and resource utilization; e.g., labor, is common to all greenhouses, whether vegetables, flowers or other plants are grown in them and the tools presented herein can be easily modified to any desired case.     

Core-stable rings in auctions with independent private values

We propose a semi-cooperative game theoretic approach to check whether a given coalition is stable in a Bayesian game with independent private values. The ex ante expected utilities of coalitions, at an incentive compatible (noncooperative) coalitional equilibrium, describe a (cooperative) partition form game. A coalition is core-stable if the core of a suitable characteristic function, derived from the partition form game, is not empty. As an application, we study collusion in auctions in which the bidders? final utility possibly depends on the winner?s identity. We show that such direct externalities offer a possible explanation for cartels? structures (not) observed in practice.     

Negative emotions in tourism: a meaningful analysis

ABSTRACT

In this paper, we critically examine the use of (negative) emotions in psychology, consumer behaviour and tourism. We find that (1) negative emotions form an integral part of the tourist experience in certain tourism contexts, particularly in dark tourism and types of travel that involve transformation of the self, (2) negative emotions can have multiple positive outcomes and (3) these positive outcomes are present in hedonic and non-hedonic tourism contexts, yet they occur occasionally in hedonic and more systematically in non-hedonic tourism contexts. We conclude that negative emotions contribute to eudaimonic experiences by affecting different types of meaning in life.     

美国、日本金融支持循环海洋经济发展的成功经验和借鉴

海洋是我国实现经济可持续发展的重要战略资源,将循环经济理念运用到海洋经济发展中形成的海洋循环经济理念,势必成为我国海洋经济发展模式的必然选择.金融作为经济系统中的重要组成部分,对经济发展的作用已经形成共识,循环海洋经济的发展同样离不开金融支持.文章介绍了美国、日本金融支持循环海洋经济的成功经验以及对于我国的借鉴意义.     

Residents’ place image: a meaningful psychographic variable for tourism segmentation?

ABSTRACT

While there has been a considerable body of research on tourists’ place image, there remains limited attention on residents’ place image, specifically, in relation to its segmentation utility. This study seeks to address this oversight by a) clustering the local residents based on the image held of a tourism place, and b) exploring the extent to which the identified image-based resident clusters share similar (dissimilar) demographic characteristics and attitude towards tourism development. Empirical analysis was based on a sample of 481 residents of a Greek city. The findings support the utility of residents’ place image as a psychographic segmentation variable revealing the existence of three distinct resident groups – termed “Nature Loving”, “Apathetic” and “Advocate.” Results also suggest that these resident groups exhibit dissimilar demographic characteristics and dissimilar attitude towards tourism. In comparison with other segments, the Apathetic exhibits the least favourable image and the least supportive attitude towards tourism.     

全球半导体工业新阶段即将来临

十多年前．全球半导体工业似乎面临着一个不可逾越的挑战。不断变窄的工艺技术带来的开发和制造成本的快速提升威胁着全球半导体工业的继续增长。由于这些新工艺的复杂性带来了内在的不可避