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The purpose of this paper is to review the pitfalls and potentials of segmentation decisions based on the visible demographic variable of race.

The paper takes as its approach a review of assumptions and values of use of race as a marketing segmentation strategy, but places them against the inherent dangers that could be overlooked in a retail environment. The paper's purpose is to note the misuse of the planning tool of segmentation.

Dealing with race‐driven decisions could create an unwelcome or even segregating situation with potential for customer loss or even discrimination. The business needs to understand how to attract and retain customers of all types.

It is easy to forget that people of any type could be valued customers, and no store should, intentionally or otherwise, desire to discourage some customers at the expense of gaining others.

THIS number will appear at the beginning of the Leeds Conference. Although there is no evidence that the attendance will surpass the record attendance registered at the Birmingham Conference, there is every reason to believe that the attendance at Leeds will be very large. The year is one of importance in the history of the city, for it has marked the 300th anniversary of its charter. We hope that some of the festival spirit will survive into the week of the Conference. As a contributor has suggested on another page, we hope that all librarians who attend will do so with the determination to make the Conference one of the friendliest possible character. It has occasionally been pointed out that as the Association grows older it is liable to become more stilted and formal; that institutions and people become standardized and less dynamic. This, if it were true, would be a great pity.

This study argues that existing constructs of psychological resilience of employees focus too narrowly on recovery from adverse events. Therefore, this paper aims to present an alternative construct in which resilience reflects an intention to grow as a person when facing both opportunities and difficulties. Initial evidence for a measure of growth-based resilience is presented.

In Study 1, a six-step scale development procedure was used. Items were generated deductively, and an exploratory factor analysis on data from a sample of 167 Indonesian managers was used to refine the scale structure. Study 2 validated the Study 1 results using a two-step confirmatory factor analysis, including structural equation modelling, involving a second sample of 241 Indonesian managers.

Study 1 suggested a scale using 16 items reflecting two dimensions, Developmental Persistency, involving perseverance and commitment to growth, and Positive Emotion. Study 2 generally confirmed the structure of this measure and produced expected correlations with other theoretically related constructs. Overall, the findings support the reconceptualisation of resilience as a response to life challenges and opportunities focussed on growing as a person.

Further testing of the validity of this construct is recommended, and its nomological network should be examined to clarify its relationship to related concepts such as hardiness, coping, thriving and similar qualities.

The growth-based perspective allows organisations to better assess and improve employee resilience as it more accurately reflects the nature of resilience as a fundamental “positive” dimension of human personality, where existing approaches focus merely on recovering from workplace adversities. An implication is that employee development efforts focussed more on personal development than specific work skills, or at least contextualising the latter in the person’s life context, will be more successful.

A more holistic view of resilience as the capacity for responding to life’s challenges and opportunities through personal growth resolves a number of issues created by existing recovery-based constructs.

In 1899 the medical practitioners of Dublin were confronted with an outbreak of a peculiar and obscure illness, characterised by symptoms which were very unusual. For want of a better explanation, the disorder, which seemed to be epidemic, was explained by the simple expedient of finding a name for it. It was labelled as “beri‐beri,” a tropical disease with very much the same clinical and pathological features as those observed at Dublin. Papers were read before certain societies, and then as the cases gradually diminished in number, the subject lost interest and was dropped.

BOURNEMOUTH fulfilled some of the high expectations of those who attended it. The welcome was cordial, the local arrangements good, as we were entitled to expect from so proved an organizer as Mr. Charles Riddle and from his committee and staff, and, when fine, the town was most attractive. The weather, however, was bad, and too warm at the same time for most of us. One thing that certainly emerged from this experience was the real need to change the time of the conference. Only librarians among similar bodies appear to meet in the summer season. The accountants, engineers and other professional people confer in late May or in June, when they do not compete with holiday‐makers for accommodation and attention. The Council might well consider the re‐arrangement of its year with such a change in view.

The purpose of this study is to increase the understanding of the online brand advocacy (OBA) and brand loyalty relationship through a social identity theory lens.

An online survey was used to obtain the needed data and the relationships of interest were examined using a partial least squares structural equation modelling approach.

Brand loyalty and consumer-brand identification were found to be predictors of OBA, while OBA impacted on purchase intent. In addition, a strong reciprocal relationship was found between OBA and brand loyalty, which has not been reported in prior studies.

This study highlighted OBA's complexity. It suggested OBA is not only an outcome of a consumer-brand relationship but also that OBA plays a key role in the development of such relationships. A consumer's identification with a brand fosters brand loyalty and purchase intent through the giving of OBA.

The more consumers vocalise their brand relationships through OBA, the more they strengthen their relationship with brands. The inclusion of OBA management in brand and marketing strategies should enable organisations to foster opportunities for online consumer-brand interactions that strengthen consumer-brand relationships.

First, unlike previous studies that have used makeshift scales to measure OBA, the authors used a recently developed OBA scale. Second, the important reciprocal relationship between OBA and brand loyalty, which has significant implications, has not been reported in prior research.

Aarhus Kommunes Biblioteker (Teknisk Bibliotek), Ingerslevs Plads 7, Aarhus, Denmark. Representative: V. NEDERGAARD PEDERSEN (Librarian).