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This study aims to assess the social network and perceived social support among community corrections offenders in China and compare the relationship between different sub-dimensions of social support and offenders’ social adaptation.

A descriptive design combined with self-administered questionnaires was used. A total of 54 valid responses were analysed, with participants displaying the following demographic characteristics: male offenders outnumbered female offenders, probationers constituted the highest proportion among all community corrections offenders and educational levels were generally low. Descriptive statistics and correlation analysis were conducted. The Lubben Social Network Scale, Interpersonal Support Evaluation List Scale and Person at Re-education-centre Social Adaptation Scale were used to measure the variables.

Participants exhibited generally good levels of social support, with moderately extensive social networks and perceived support. All sub-dimensions showed significant positive correlations with social adaptation, with the highest correlation for appraisal support (r = 0.743, p < 0.01), followed by instrumental support (r = 0.714, p < 0.01), emotional support (r = 0.687, p < 0.01), informational support (r = 0.685, P < 0.01) and social networks (r = 0.426, p < 0.01).

This study expands the understanding of community corrections offenders in China by focusing on the underexplored Sichuan Province, using empirical methods for data collection. It addresses a gap in previous research by examining both structural and functional support for offenders rather than focusing solely on one aspect. The study uses two scales, rarely used in Chinese research, to measure structural and functional support, thereby enhancing research on social support for offenders. Practically, it explores the correlation between social support and re-entry, offering valuable insights for improving offenders’ reintegration into society.

These results underscore the critical role of social networks and perceived social support in reintegrating Chinese community corrections offenders. Distinct from prior research, this study used a more comprehensive scale, less commonly used by Chinese scholars, to enable detailed measurement and analysis, highlighting the significance of both structural and functional support in informing practice in related fields.

Frontline employees (FLEs) play a pivotal role in service delivery. Beyond their expected in-role behaviors, FLEs often have to perform extra-role behaviors such as providing additional help to customers. The purpose of this study is to investigate how customers’ power distance belief (PDB) influences their perceptions of FLEs’ warmth and competence when FLEs perform extra-role helping behaviors.

Four experiments were conducted to test the hypotheses. The first three experiments used a one factor two-level (PDB: low vs high) between-participants design. The fourth one used a 2 (PDB: low vs high) × 2 (firm reputation: low vs high) between-participants design.

The results indicate that, compared to high-PDB customers, low-PDB customers perceive greater warmth in FLEs’ extra-role helping behaviors but no significant difference in FLEs’ perceived competence. Importantly, these effects are mediated by customer gratitude. Moreover, these effects are moderated by firm reputation such that customers’ perceptions of FLEs’ warmth and competence are both enhanced when the firm has a favorable reputation.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the study is the first to identify the differential effects of PDB on customer perceptions of FLEs’ warmth and competence in the context of FLEs’ extra-role helping behaviors and to reveal the mediating role of gratitude. These findings contribute to the literatures on FLEs’ extra-role behaviors and social perceptions of both warmth and competence.

This paper aims to design a vision-based non-contact real-time accurate heart rate (HR) measurement framework for home nursing assistant.

The study applied Second-Order Blind Signal Identification (SOBI) algorithm to extract remote HR signal and analyzed it with Fast Fourier Transform (FFT). Multiple regions of interest are chosen and analyzed to obtain a more accurate result.

An accurate non-contact hear rate (HR) measurement framework is proposed and proved to be efficient.

The contributions of this HR measurement framework are as follows: accurate measurement of HR, real-time performance, robust under various scenes such as conversation, lightweight computation which is suitable and necessary for home nursing assistance. This framework is designed to be flexibly used in various real-life scenes such as domestic health assistance and affectively intelligent agents and is proved to be robust under such scenes.

The purpose of this study is to explore what is synergistic innovation in the logistics service outsourcing context and how this strategy can potentially benefit an organization by improving performance outcomes.

A total of 21 in-depth interviews were conducted to conceptualize the construct of synergistic innovation. In addition, a theory-based model is tested using data collected from 282 Chinese manufacturing firms that are currently engaged in logistics service outsourcing.

The results from the in-depth interviews reveal that synergistic innovation goes beyond just interactions on innovation but requires both parties to achieve synergies that otherwise cannot be achieved by individual party alone. In addition, the empirical analysis suggests that synergistic innovation can help firms improve both logistics service performance and market performance. This process is dynamic as knowledge integration capability influences the outcomes of synergistic innovation.

This study is among the first to conceptualize synergistic innovation. It also offers a practical scale that helps future studies effectively measure this construct. Moreover, the results of this study provide compelling insights into how managers can use logistics service outsourcing as an important source for improving innovation outcomes.

Theory is a kind of condensed human knowledge. This paper is to examine the mechanism of interdisciplinary diffusion of theoretical knowledge by tracing the diffusion of a representative theory, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM).

Based on the full-scale dataset of Web of Science (WoS), the citations of Davis's original work about TAM were analysed and the interdisciplinary diffusion paths of TAM were delineated, a supervised machine learning method was used to extract theory incidents, and a content analysis was used to categorize the patterns of theory evolution.

It is found that the diffusion of a theory is intertwined with its evolution. In the process, the role that a participating discipline play is related to its knowledge distance from the original disciplines of TAM. With the distance increases, the capacity to support theory development and innovation weakens, while that to assume analytical tools for practical problems increases. During the diffusion, a theory evolves into new extensions in four theoretical construction patterns, elaboration, proliferation, competition and integration.

The study does not only deepen the understanding of the trajectory of a theory but also enriches the research of knowledge diffusion and innovation.

The study elaborates the relationship between theory diffusion and theory development, reveals the roles of the participating disciplines played in theory diffusion and vice versa, interprets four patterns of theory evolution and uses text mining technique to extract theory incidents, which makes up for the shortcomings of citation analysis and content analysis used in previous studies.

This study aims to investigate the affordances of service robots (SRs) in hotels and their effects on frontline employees (FLEs).

Purposive and referral samplings methods were used to conduct 28 semistructured interviews with hotel FLEs, and the transcribed manuscript was analyzed based on grounded theory.

The study identifies six dimensions of SR affordances: physical, sensory, task, safety, social and emotional affordances. The main effects of SR affordances on FLEs involve reducing work stress and mental fatigue and increasing positive emotions in the psychological aspects of FLEs. In terms of behavioral aspects, shifts in task priorities and enhancements in SR usage behaviors were observed. Accordingly, a mechanistic framework was revealed through which SR affordances influence FLEs via direct and indirect interactions between FLEs and SRs.

This paper expands robotics research from a supply-side perspective and is one of the few studies to investigate SR affordances in the field of hospitality research. Findings of this study provide practical guidelines for designing and implementing SRs to support hotel FLEs in their daily work.

本研究旨在调查酒店中服务机器人（SR）的可供性及其对一线员工（FLEs）的影响。

本研究采用目的性和推荐抽样方法, 对酒店一线员工进行了28次半结构化访谈, 并根据扎根理论对转录的手稿进行了分析。

本研究确定了服务机器人的六个可供性维度：物理、感官、任务、安全、社会和情感可供性。服务机器人可供性对一线员工的主要影响包括减少工作压力和心理疲劳, 以及在心理方面增加积极情绪。在行为方面, 观察到任务优先级的变化和服务机器人使用行为的增强。因此, 研究揭示了一种机制框架, 通过一线员工与服务机器人的直接和间接互动, 服务机器人可供性影响一线员工。

本文从供给侧视角扩展了机器人研究, 是少数几篇研究酒店业中服务机器人可供性的研究之一。本研究结果为设计和实施服务机器人以支持酒店一线员工的日常工作提供了实践指南。

Country of origin (COO) effect refers to the influence of COO on consumers' perception and evaluation of a product. This research explores the impact of consumers' power distance on COO effect.

We conducted two experiments to test the relevant hypotheses.

The results indicate that power distance has a polarizing influence on COO effect. That means, for products from countries with good images, the higher the consumers' power distance, the better their evaluation of the products; while for products from countries with poor images, the higher the power distance, the worse their evaluation of the products. The research also finds the moderating effect of consumers' competence–related country-related affect (CRA). When holding positive competence–related CRA, for products from countries with good images, the higher the consumers' power distance, the better their evaluation of the products; for products from countries with poor images, consumers' power distance has no effect. When having negative competence–related CRA, for products from countries with poor images, the higher the consumers' power distance, the worse their evaluation of the products; for products from countries with good images, power distance has no effect.

This study finds that depending on the perception of COO image, power distance not only improves the evaluation of products but also lows such evaluation, reflecting a two-way polarizing feature.

This paper takes the gig workers in Chinese delivery platform as the research object and adopts a questionnaire survey to explore the complex influence of job gamification perception on the job involvement of gig workers, via the mediating role of cognitive assessment and moderating role of overwork, in order to provide research and data support for the development of platform gamification.

The study conducted a three-wave online questionnaire survey to obtain 300 final samples from Chinese delivery platforms. Hypotheses were tested hierarchical regression and bootstrap methods.

Drawing on cognitive appraisal theory, we observed an inverted U-shaped relationship of gig workers between job gamification perception and job involvement. The mediating role of cognitive assessment and moderating role of overwork were also considered. Both challenge and threat assessment mediate the relationship between job gamification perception and job involvement. Direct effect of job gamification perception on job involvement and indirect effect of job gamification perception on cognitive assessment are moderated by overwork.

In the past, the research on job gamification mostly focused on the traditional forms of employment, but this study focuses on the new forms of employment and from the perspective of individual self-perception, explores the influence of job gamification perception on the job involvement of gig workers in Chinese delivery platform and investigated the dialectical role of job gamification perception. The findings enrich the literature and theoretical research on job gamification perception and job involvement and provide new references and perspectives for management practice.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of cross-border acquisitions on brand image dimensions (functional, symbolic and global image) of the acquirer brand from a consumer’s perspective.

The authors measured Chinese consumers’ perceptions of eight fictitious cross-border acquisition scenarios and tested the hypotheses by using multiple hierarchical regression.

First, the acquisition significantly improves functional, symbolic and global image of the acquirer brand. Second, both image perceptions of the acquirer and the acquired brands before acquisition significantly impact post-image of the acquirer. The effect is greater for pre-image of the acquirer (dominance effect). Finally, brand fit, product fit and country-of-origin fit influence attitude toward the acquisition significantly.

There are limitations in the generalizations of the findings due to its reliance on a single country (China) and one industry (home appliances).

First, engaging in cross-border acquisitions significantly enhances the brand image of the acquirer brand. The global image has the largest improvement. Second, practitioners should carefully consider different levels of fit before the acquisition.

This study contributes to the extant literature by investigating brand acquisitions from the perspective of home country consumers (acquirer) and integrating multiple brand image dimensions and various levels of fit simultaneously.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meetings and the changes of the target rates on stock market uncertainty.

Multivariate regression analysis is applied to the historical data of VIX, FOMC meetings and target rates. Subtle relations are revealed by further categorizing the FOMC meetings into being scheduled and unscheduled and distinguishing the signs of the changes in VIX and target rates. CPI and the prime rate are used for robustness test.

The authors first examine the relation between FOMC meetings and target surprises; the results indicate that unscheduled FOMC meetings heavily impact the target surprises. Then, the authors investigate the relation between FOMC meetings and VIX changes; the results show that both unscheduled and scheduled FOMC meetings impact VIX, where the impacts of scheduled FOMC meetings are more substantial. The authors also analyze the responses of VIX to the target surprises, and the results reveal that there is an asymmetric effect of target surprises on VIX, where the influences of the scheduled positive target surprises are more significant. Finally, by examining the relation between the FOMC meeting and the risk-neutral density of the VIX option, the authors conclude that both KURT and SKEW are more affected by unscheduled FOMC meetings.

Deeper dimensions of the relations between VIX, FOMC meetings and target rates are analyzed and more insightful understandings of such relations are gained.