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The exchange rate is an important driver of a country’s economic growth, influencing trade, investment, inflation, and employment. This study’s main objective was to investigate the threshold effects of exchange rates on economic growth.

In this research, innovative endogenous threshold autoregressive (TAR) models introduced by Hansen (2000) are employed for estimation and inference. The dataset comprises secondary annual time series data from Ghana, covering thirty-one years from 1990 to 2021. Economic growth is represented by GDPPC, with the growth exchange rate serving as the crucial threshold variable.

The finding suggests a single exchange rate threshold for Ghana, indicating a nonlinear relationship with economic growth. However, above 8.97%, the exchange rate considerably slows growth, harming the economy. The exchange rate negatively influences growth in both low and high-exchange-rate regimes, but it is insignificant in the high regime. In addition, inflation has a significant negative influence on growth in the low regime but a positive impact on the high regime. In contrast, interest rates positively impact growth in both regimes, though not as significantly in the high regime.

The findings from this study offer valuable insights to the Ghanaian government and policymakers as they consider choosing an exchange rate target that helps minimise the negative impact of a high exchange rate to promote economic growth.

This paper is remarkable for being one of the few studies that have explored the relationship between exchange rates and economic growth, exploring the threshold effect.

This study aims to investigate the effects of serif and sans serif typefaces in brand logos on consumers’ activity and potency perceptions of brands. It further examines the moderating roles of design freedom and brand value on these effects and their impact on consumers’ brand attitudes.

Five studies were conducted to address the research objectives. Studies 1a and 1b compared the consumer perceptions of a brand with either a serif or a sans serif logo, revealing that consumers perceive serif logos as more active but less potent. Studies 2a, 2b and 3 verify the moderating roles of design freedom and brand value on the effects of typefaces in brand logos on consumers’ perceptions and their overall effects on brand attitudes.

The results indicate that a serif brand logo enhances consumers’ activity perceptions of the brand, whereas a sans serif brand logo enhances consumers’ potency perceptions. The research further establishes that design freedom significantly impacts consumers’ perceptions of logos with varying typefaces and subsequently influences their brand attitudes. In addition, brand value moderates the effects of typefaces in brand logos on consumer perceptions and brand attitudes.

This research exclusively focuses on serif and sans serif typefaces within brand logos and also considers the use of uppercase, lowercase, mixed case and black logo designs. However, brand logo design encompasses broader visual design considerations and aesthetic diversification.

The practical implications of this research mainly include three points. First, brands should invest more effort in designing brand logos, choosing serif for activity and sans serif for potency, to align with desired brand perceptions. Second, the typeface selection should match the brand’s approach to design freedom, with serif typefaces fostering activity in open brands and sans serif enhancing potency in more controlled brands. Finally, aligning the typeface choice with the brand values – serif for hedonic and sans serif for utilitarian—can significantly influence brand attitudes. Accordingly, they can guide market segmentation and target consumer selection.

This study contributes to the field of brand logo design by shedding light on the effects of serif and sans serif typefaces on consumers’ perceptions and brand attitudes. In addition, it explores the moderating influence of design freedom and brand value, offering insights into the conditions under which these effects manifest.

The purpose of this special issue (SI) lead paper is to examine the role of digital technologies in sustainability accounting, reporting and assurance; review the articles in this SI; and identify future research directions.

This paper draws on academic literature to explore the role of digital technologies in sustainability accounting, reporting and assurance.

Digital technologies can assist in setting disclosure scope and objectives (e-taxonomies); undertaking materiality assessments (digital communication, artificial intelligence and big data analytics); collecting and analysing data (Internet of Things and radio frequency identification); potentially revolutionizing sustainability assurance practices; and disseminating disclosures (interactive reports). Papers in this SI examine a range of digital technologies and issues. Future research can examine the impact of Industry 4.0, barriers to adoption (and overcoming these), use of alternative theories and methodologies, critical examination of the benefits of digitalization and impact of digital technologies on the sustainability reporting and sustainability assurance processes.

This paper seeks to set the agenda for contemporary and future research on sustainability accounting, reporting and assurance and digital technologies.

The findings from this study have implications for regulators, standard setters and practitioners (including sustainability reporting managers and sustainability assurance providers), highlighting the impact of digital technologies on sustainability accounting, reporting and assurance.

Sustainability accounting, reporting and assurance concepts, techniques and practices play a key role in promoting transparency and organizational accountability to stakeholders on sustainability. Understanding how digital technologies can be leveraged to enhance sustainability accounting, reporting and assurance offers benefits to stakeholders and society.

This research offers a holistic view of the entire spectrum of sustainability accounting, reporting and assurance concepts, technologies and practices and the potential role digital technologies can play in them. It also offers insights for future research in a contemporary area.

This study aims to reveal the mechanism of CEO overconfidence in the digital transformation of specialized, refined, distinctive and innovative (SRDI) enterprises, thereby enriching research related to upper echelons theory and corporate digital transformation.

This study uses listed SRDI companies in China from 2017 to 2022 as a sample and adopts a fixed-effects regression model to analyze the direct, mediating, and moderating effects of CEO overconfidence on corporate digital transformation.

First, CEO overconfidence significantly promotes SRDI enterprises' digital transformation. Second, according to the “cognition-behavior-outcome” model, we found that entrepreneurial orientation plays a mediating role. Third, based on the principle of procedural rationality and the interaction perspective between the CEO and the executive team, we introduce the heterogeneity of the executive team as a moderating variable. Our findings indicate that age heterogeneity within the executive team has a negative moderating effect, whereas educational and occupational heterogeneities have positive moderating effects.

This study expands on earlier research that focuses primarily on CEO demographic characteristics. It enriches the analytical perspective of upper echelons theory on corporate digital transformation by analyzing the psychological characteristics of CEOs, that is, overconfidence and its mediating pathways. Moreover, this study goes beyond the previous literature that does not differentiate between CEOs and executive teams by introducing the concept of CEOs' interactions with the executive team and including the heterogeneity of the executive team as a moderating variable in the literature. Thus, continuing to deepen the application of upper echelons theory to corporate digital transformation. Additionally, this study contributes to the literature on the positive consequences of overconfidence.

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) practices on both competitive advantage (CA) and organizational performance (OP) in the manufacturing sector in Ethiopia.

Data for the study were collected from a sample of 221 manufacturing companies operating in the four manufacturing groups/sectors in Ethiopia. In addition, data analysis was performed using the partial least squares method, which is a variance-based Structural Equation Modeling approach in the Smart-PLS software version (SmartPLS 4.0).

Based on the statistical analysis of the collected data, it demonstrates that SSCM has a significant and positive impact on both competitive advantage and organizational performance. Furthermore, statistical findings offer proof of the clear connection between competitive advantage and organizational performance. Moreover, competitive advantage indirectly mediates the relationship between SSCM and OP.

The primary limitation of this research is its reliance on a cross-sectional design. The generalizability of the findings obtained from the present study may be hindered. The variable under investigation in this research assessed organizational performance, a concept that is widely acknowledged to be extremely dynamic.

The study provides managers and researchers with valuable information on Sustainable Supply Chain Management strategies and how they influence competitive advantage and organizational performance in commercial and industrial environments.

This paper adds to the body of knowledge by providing new data and empirical insights into the relationship between SSCM practices and the performance of manufacturing companies in Ethiopia.

Given the importance of the growing segmentation of ageing consumers and their increasing interaction with the Internet, digital marketing scholars are becoming more interested in this market. Prior research needs to pay more attention to this market in many contexts of digital marketing. This study aims to provide insights into ageing consumers’ content usage, content typology choices, and online brand advocacy (OBA).

Semi-structured interviews were applied, and 16 consumers from Southern Europe aged 55+ were included. The interviews were transcribed and examined following the principles of content analysis.

According to the research, older consumers display their usage and concerns regarding online content. They have different decision-making processes depending on whether they are purchasing products or services. Likewise, their choices of content typology vary based on the utilitarian or hedonic product category.

This study contributes to the literature by providing insights into this growing segmentation and proposing an OBA framework for older consumers related to content marketing. Finally, the study suggests that older consumers are passive online and active offline brand advocates.