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The hypothesis that broadly defined managerial functions can be subdivided on the basis of their members′ internal and external task orientations, and that the resulting subfunctions are, respectively, predominantly “adaptive” or “innovative” in terms of Kirton′s adaption‐innovation theory, was tested. Data from samples of British (N = 115), Australian (N = 123) and American (N = 131) mid‐career managers undertaking MBA programmes who completed the Kirton Adaption‐Innovation Inventory (KAI) and provided employment histories displayed the expected patterns of task orientation and cognitive style. Implications for adaption‐innovation theory and the management of organisational change are briefly discussed.

Recent research has shown that personality traits such as sensation seeking, and product‐induced effects such as evocation of involvement, influence variety seeking by food consumers. Considers the additional factor of consumers′ early purchasing of new food brands/products. Three studies highlight the relationships between patterns of initial consumers′ purchasing both of general and “healthy” food innovations and their consumers′ cognitive styles. The findings generally corroborate other research but show that sensation seeking and other traits often associated with early adoption are not, in fact, linearly related to variety seeking. In particular, consumers who show the greatest level of variety seeking are those who score low on these “innovative” traits but are highly involved with the product field, i.e. personally interested in and likely to think a great deal about it.

In the last four years, since Volume I of this Bibliography first appeared, there has been an explosion of literature in all the main functional areas of business. This wealth of material poses problems for the researcher in management studies — and, of course, for the librarian: uncovering what has been written in any one area is not an easy task. This volume aims to help the librarian and the researcher overcome some of the immediate problems of identification of material. It is an annotated bibliography of management, drawing on the wide variety of literature produced by MCB University Press. Over the last four years, MCB University Press has produced an extensive range of books and serial publications covering most of the established and many of the developing areas of management. This volume, in conjunction with Volume I, provides a guide to all the material published so far.

Reported are three experimental studies which assess the consensual availability of the interpretive variables of the behavioural perspective model (BPM) of consumer choice. In Study 1, students (N = 39) acting as judges rated 18 consumer behaviour settings according to their relative scope; in Study 2, students (N = 18) acting as judges rated 18 consumer situations according to their respective contingency categories predicted by the model. Study 3 involved a simplification of the procedure tested in the second experiment: two market research executives used simplified descriptions of the consumer situations to allocate them within the BPM contingency matrix. The studies confirm the consensual availability of the variables employed in the model, confirming the relevance of its variables to the interpretation of consumer behaviour in situ. They also permit the comparison of the performances of student and non‐student participants as expert judges for experiments of this kind.

The identification of consumer innovators offers marketing managers the opportunity to tailor new products to the buyers who initiate the diffusion of innovations. Progress has been made in identifying such consumers in economic and social terms, but there are advantages of cost and convenience in isolating the personality profiles of innovators, especially during pre‐launch product testing. But innovative consumers' distinctive personality traits have proved elusive. This article reports an investigation of innovative brand choice in the context of new food product purchasing which employed the Kirton Adaption‐Innovation Inventory (KAI). This highly reliable test of cognitive style correlates with several personality traits known to be associated with innovativeness; it also has high validity in the prediction of behaviour over a wide range of contexts. The research reported went beyond the common expectation of a simple, direct relationship between personality and brand choice to investigate the predictive validity of the KAI over a range of product continuity/discontinuity. The results are considerably more encouraging than those of earlier research for the identification of personality/consumer choice links. They suggest an operational measure of product continuity/ discontinuity and support the use of the KAI as a viable marketing tool.

Adaptors and innovators exhibit distinct approaches to problem solving and derision making: a finding which has far‐reaching implications for managerial psychologists who intervene in business and other organisations.

Store layouts are important determinants of behaviour. A review of the academic and commercial literature suggests that the methodological and theoretical approaches have provided methods and approaches that are difficult for practitioners to adopt. This paper offers a robust theoretical approach (the behavioural perspective model) and new innovative methodology that significantly advances the way retailers can plan and measure store layouts, with a view to optimising store performance. Using computer‐aided observation, customers may be tracked and their behaviour analysed in the context of consumer situations and contingencies. Implications for retail management, theory and practice are discussed within the context of fashion shopper situations.

The nature of interpretive consumer research is examined within the context of the contribution to the growth of knowledge played by the proliferation of tenaciously‐held rival theories. Dennett’s intentional stance is contrasted with a contextual stance in which behaviour is controlled by a learning history composed of reinforcing and punishing consequences of similar behaviour previously enacted in similar circumstances. The benefits of this stance are the encouragement of counter hypotheses to intentionality, and the generation of novel data which would otherwise not be available.

This study aims to examine functional foods, a relatively recent development in the food industry, from the perspective of consumer decision-making. It deals specifically with consumers’ attitudinal dispositions towards such products and seeks an overall comprehension of the elements of decision-making factors that precede their purchase.

This exploratory work methodologically uses several elements of a grounded theoretical approach, in-depth interviews with consumers (and food industry experts) and, more importantly, the constant comparative method of analysis.

The analysis indicates that three levels of decision-making processing form consumers’ final functional food choices in either affirmative or negative ways. At the abstract level, consumers position functional foods within their food system. A “benefit negotiation” process acts as the central route of decision-making. Finally, during the “appraising” stage, a representation of each functional food is built. This representation should not be perceived as a rigid one as it can be influenced by personal characteristics, marketing activities and, more importantly, monetary considerations.

The paper proposes a decision-making framework that takes choice issues into consideration. It builds on (connecting and challenging) some of the existing consumer literature on functional foods. The findings indicate the dynamic nature of consumers’ decision-making which is shaped by motivational and other personal factors. The study identifies the concept of perceived efficacy of such foods, a concept discussed widely in previous literature, as a subordinate aspect when compared to consumers’ consumption motivation, perceived importance and perceptions of pricing. The paper discusses the implications for theory, research and practice.

Introduction Contemporary marketing thought stresses that pricing decisions ought to be made within the context of the firm's entire marketing mix. Price is but one facet of a company's appeal to consumers and needs to be fully integrated with the physical product, its package, advertising, promotion, distribution and so on, in such a way as to enable it to complement, support and enhance every other component of the marketing mix. This means, among other things, that prices should be determined by reference to the market, set at levels which consumers are able, willing or can be persuaded to pay. In addition, the price he pays for a product should reinforce the consumer's judgement of its image and quality. Just as, according to the marketing concept, it is the buyer rather than the manager who defines the product and, thereby, the firm's business, so the meaning and level of the price at which the product changes hands should be decided ultimately by the attitudes and behaviour of consumers.