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1 – 6 of 6Nari Sivanandam Arunraj and Diane Ahrens
Weather is often referred as an uncontrollable factor, which influences customer’s buying decisions and causes the demand to move in any direction. Such a risk usually leads to…
Abstract
Purpose
Weather is often referred as an uncontrollable factor, which influences customer’s buying decisions and causes the demand to move in any direction. Such a risk usually leads to loss to industries. However, only few research studies about weather and retail shopping are available in literature. The purpose of this paper is to develop a model and to analyze the relationship between weather and retail shopping behavior (i.e. store traffic and sales).
Design/methodology/approach
The data set for this research study is obtained from two food retail stores and a fashion retail store located in Lower Bavaria, Germany. All these three retail stores are in same geographical location. The weather data set was provided by a German weather service agency and is from a weather station nearer to the retail stores under study. The analysis for the study was drawn using multiple linear regression with autoregressive elements (MLR-AR). The estimated coefficients of weather variables using MLR-AR model represent corresponding weather impacts on the store traffic and the sales.
Findings
The snowfall has a significant effect on the store traffic and the sales in both food and fashion retail stores. In food retail store, the risk due to snowfall varies depending on the location of stores. There are also significant lagging effects of snowfall in the fashion retail store. However, the rainfall has a significant effect only on the store traffic in the food retail stores. In addition to these effects, the sales in the fashion retail store are highly affected by the temperature deviation.
Research limitations/implications
Limitations in availability of data for the weather variables and other demand influencing factors (e.g. promotion, tourism, online shopping, demography of customers, etc.) may reduce efficiency of the proposed MLR-AR model. In spite of these limitations, this study can be able to quantify the effects of weather variables on the store traffic and the sales.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the field of retail distribution by providing significant evidence of relationship between weather and retail business. Unlike previous studies, the proposed model tries to consider autocorrelation property, main and interaction effects between weather variables, temperature deviation and lagging effects of snowfall on the store traffic or the sales. The estimated weather impacts from this model can act as a reliable tool for retailers to explain the importance of different non-catastrophic weather events.
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Ahmed Othman Rashwan Kholeif and Lisa Jack
This paper aims to use Stones’ strong structuration theory (SST) that combines Giddens’ duality and Archer’s analytical dualism to deal with the paradox of embedded agency…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to use Stones’ strong structuration theory (SST) that combines Giddens’ duality and Archer’s analytical dualism to deal with the paradox of embedded agency, focussing on resistance, in the budgeting literature. It also applies this framework to an illustrative case study that examines a failed attempt to implement performance-based budgeting (PBB) in the Egyptian Sales Tax Department (ESTD).
Design/methodology/approach
The authors have used SST as an analytical framework. Longitudinal case study data were collected from interviews, observations, discussions and documentary analysis and from publicly available reports and other media issued by the World Bank.
Findings
The SST framework identifies the circumstances in which middle managers as embedded agency have limited possibilities to change their dispositions to act and identify opportunities for emancipation in the wider social context in which they are embedded. The official explanation for the failure to implement PBB in Egypt was obstruction by middle managers. The findings of this study provide an alternative explanation to that published by the World Bank for the failure to institutionalise PBB in Egypt. It was found that the middle managers were the real supporters of PBB. Other parties and existing laws and regulations contributed to the failure of PBB.
Research limitations/implications
As a practical implication of the study, the analysis presented here offers an alternative interpretation of the failure of the Egyptian project for monitoring and evaluation to that published by the World Bank. This case and similar cases may enhance the understanding of how and when monitoring and evaluation technologies should be introduced at the global level to manage conflicts of interest between agencies and beneficiaries.
Originality/value
This paper contributes to the extant management accounting literature on the use of ST in addressing the paradox of embedded agency in making or resisting structural change. It uses SST to integrate Giddens’ ST with critical realist theory, incorporating duality and dualism in a stronger model of structuration. The SST framework offers a means of analysing case studies that result from interactions and conjunctures between different groups of actors at different ontological levels. The paper also examines the issue of embedded agency in budgeting research using an illustrative case study from a developing country, Egypt.
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Hannah Fawcett and Lalita Shrestha
– The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of blogging (writing online weblogs) in facilitating healing following sexual assault.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of blogging (writing online weblogs) in facilitating healing following sexual assault.
Design/methodology/approach
To explore how blog writing may facilitate healing and recovery, 30 blog posts written by survivors of sexual assault were analysed using thematic analysis.
Findings
The analysis revealed three themes: the aftermath of abuse, the need for support and helping others. In accordance with past research, bloggers frequently did not receive the supportive reaction to a face-to-face disclosure that they desired. Instead, blogging provided a safe environment in which victims could deal with the ongoing challenge of coping with, and recovering from the abuse. Moreover, blogging enabled victims to use their negative experience to educate and support others going through a similar experience, therefore allowing the bloggers to achieve some positive growth.
Practical implications
The results suggest that blogging and reading blogs may be beneficial to victims of sexual assault. Therefore, the findings support the recommendation of blogging by professionals working with victims of sexual assault.
Originality/value
The study presents the first analysis of blogs written by victims of sexual assault to facilitate their healing.
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Stefan Mann, Ali Ferjani and Linda Reissig
The purpose of this paper is to determine the importance of the “organic” attribute for wine in relation to other attributes and to identify the most important determinants as far…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to determine the importance of the “organic” attribute for wine in relation to other attributes and to identify the most important determinants as far as the consumption of organic wine is concerned.
Design/methodology/approach
A survey based on interviews with 404 Swiss wine drinkers was conducted. The data were evaluated by means of conjoint and regression analyses.
Findings
The “organic” attribute was more important than the colour of the wine but less important than the price and the country of origin, foreign French wine being preferred to local Swiss wine. Urban and female consumers were relatively likely to consume organic wine, as were consumers who perceive organic wine as being healthy.
Practical implications
Marketing for organic wine in well‐developed markets should focus on the argument of image and health. Urban female consumers are the most important target group.
Originality/value
The paper presents the first results on the important attributes for marketing organic wine in developed organic food markets.
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Kris Hardies and Rihab Khalifa
The purpose of this paper is to reflect on the corpus of gender research in accounting journals, with the overall aim of evaluating the extent to which it has contributed to the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to reflect on the corpus of gender research in accounting journals, with the overall aim of evaluating the extent to which it has contributed to the understanding of the organization of accounting and its social and organizational functions.
Design/methodology/approach
Gender articles have been critically analyzed. The selection included all gender papers published between the years 2000 and 2014, in 58 journals ranked A*, A and B from the Australian Business Deans Council (ABDC) journal ranking list. Patterns within the publishing norms of those journals were identified and critically reflected upon.
Findings
Gender research has been grouped into three categories, namely, gender as a dummy (or control) variable, gender as giving voice and gender as a process and organizing principle. Of these three categories, it can be contended that using gender as a dummy variable is very common, and it proved to be the least fruitful in explicating the roles of gender in accounting. Moreover, many published papers confuse sex with gender.
Research limitations/implications
This paper discusses future avenues and approaches for research gender in accounting without, however, expanding on recent changes in gender research.
Originality/value
This paper is the first to systematically review gender research in the accounting field over the past three decades. Its key insight is to identify two persistent pitfalls within the current gender research practice, namely, the use of gender as a control variable only and the confusion of sex with gender. These pitfalls diminish the value of gender research overall and render it less relevant to the broader accounting literature. By using the term gender either as an add-on or, mistakenly, as a biological rather than cultural marker, the totality of those articles helps marginalize gender as an accounting research area because they fail to bring about the reconceptualization of accounting as a discipline. This stands in marked contrast to the achievements of gender approaches in other disciplines, such as sociology, history or work and employment. Articles that frequently decry the status of gender in accounting research turn out to be also reinforcing the marginalization of gender in accounting.
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Ethnographers, as tools of data collection, are uniquely positioned in a paradoxical relationship between intense immersion and objective distance from research and participants…
Abstract
Purpose
Ethnographers, as tools of data collection, are uniquely positioned in a paradoxical relationship between intense immersion and objective distance from research and participants. This relationship can be particularly intense when researching hidden or marginalized communities in violent contexts. Yet, the emotional consequences of research on the researcher are rarely discussed and little literature exists. When emotions in research are revealed, researchers can be confronted with stigma surrounding issues of subjectivity, “going native” and implications of failed research. This paper seeks to address these issues.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on research from Lee, Hume, and Nordstrom and Robben, this article presents a reflexive analysis of the author's ethnographic PhD experience. It examines the transformation undertaken to adapt and cope with in‐depth research with vulnerable groups in dangerous environments. It also explores the post‐fieldwork transition and consequences of post‐traumatic stress syndrome which were viewed as the author's feet of clay, or possible weakness which could derail or even invalidate the research.
Findings
This article delineates the risks of emotional trauma in ethnographic research, and outlines the symptoms of post‐traumatic stress syndrome and secondary trauma in order to facilitate their identification in future researchers.
Practical implications
The practical implications of this paper are to raise awareness about the emotional consequences of research and revealing how essential it is that awareness be included in the training of future researchers.
Originality/value
The paper aims to raise awareness about the acute emotional consequences of conducting research with marginalized populations in violent contexts. It specifically looks at the insider/outsider position, highlighting those isolating affects which can lead to post‐traumatic stress syndrome. It aims to reveal the attitudes within academia which tend to hide emotional struggles in research.
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