Ying-Feng Kuo, Cheng-Han Lin and Jian-Ren Hou
Crowdfunding allows enterprises or individuals to collect funds from numerous other individuals. This study applies the anchoring effect and range theory in reward-based…
Abstract
Purpose
Crowdfunding allows enterprises or individuals to collect funds from numerous other individuals. This study applies the anchoring effect and range theory in reward-based crowdfunding to explore how different pledge option designs affect the backers' final pledge amount. Moreover, this study examines whether showing the current average amount pledged in the fundraising process has an anchoring effect on the subsequent backers' pledge amount.
Design/methodology/approach
Online experiments were conducted, and data were analyzed using the Kruskal–Wallis test and Spearman rank correlation analysis.
Findings
Results show that among the three pledge option designs, employing the “bolstering range offer” has the highest backing amount. However, presenting the current average amount pledged in the fundraising process has a reversed anchoring effect on subsequent backers' pledge amount only in the case of a crowdfunding project in the physical goods category with a “point offer.”
Originality/value
To the best of authors’ knowledge, no reward-based crowdfunding platform has yet provided the pledge option design of a “bolstering range offer.” This study reveals that the “bolstering range offer” can significantly increase the amount pledged. This study extends the crowdfunding research area to crowdfunding success and suggests a novel way to set up pledges.
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Tiffany Cheng Han Leung and Rob Gray
This paper aims to explore the extent to which social responsibility and social and environmental reporting and disclosure have any relevance in the (so-called) controversial…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to explore the extent to which social responsibility and social and environmental reporting and disclosure have any relevance in the (so-called) controversial industries. The literature is ambivalent over the extent to which it is expected to see corporate social responsibility and social disclosure employed as active legitimation strategies. However, the apparent importance of “responsible gambling” in both the literature and in gambling industry initiatives suggests, at least a priori, that the international industry is active in some degree of legitimation.
Design/methodology/approach
This exploratory study examines the social and environmental disclosures of a sample of large companies in each of five countries over a three-year period using conventional content analysis.
Findings
The results are unexpected in that, although disclosure is dominated by employee- and director-related, other areas of social and environmental – and indeed economic – activity feature hardly at all. There is remarkably little disclosure around responsible gambling.
Research limitations/implications
The paper is a research note based on a range of samples across five countries and is, inevitably, tentative. The implications, albeit tentative, include the need to re-theorise corporate disclosure, especially in the controversial sectors.
Originality/value
The note adds to the accounting literature concerned with the controversial industries and contributes to the scarce social accounting research in the gambling sector. The authors hope that the research will be useful in guiding more focused and in-depth studies into this increasingly important and counter-intuitive area.
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Zhaozhao Tang, Wenyan Wu, Po Yang, Jingting Luo, Chen Fu, Jing-Cheng Han, Yang Zhou, Linlin Wang, Yingju Wu and Yuefei Huang
Surface acoustic wave (SAW) sensors have attracted great attention worldwide for a variety of applications in measuring physical, chemical and biological parameters. However…
Abstract
Purpose
Surface acoustic wave (SAW) sensors have attracted great attention worldwide for a variety of applications in measuring physical, chemical and biological parameters. However, stability has been one of the key issues which have limited their effective commercial applications. To fully understand this challenge of operation stability, this paper aims to systematically review mechanisms, stability issues and future challenges of SAW sensors for various applications.
Design/methodology/approach
This review paper starts with different types of SAWs, advantages and disadvantages of different types of SAW sensors and then the stability issues of SAW sensors. Subsequently, recent efforts made by researchers for improving working stability of SAW sensors are reviewed. Finally, it discusses the existing challenges and future prospects of SAW sensors in the rapidly growing Internet of Things-enabled application market.
Findings
A large number of scientific articles related to SAW technologies were found, and a number of opportunities for future researchers were identified. Over the past 20 years, SAW-related research has gained a growing interest of researchers. SAW sensors have attracted more and more researchers worldwide over the years, but the research topics of SAW sensor stability only own an extremely poor percentage in the total researc topics of SAWs or SAW sensors.
Originality/value
Although SAW sensors have been attracting researchers worldwide for decades, researchers mainly focused on the new materials and design strategies for SAW sensors to achieve good sensitivity and selectivity, and little work can be found on the stability issues of SAW sensors, which are so important for SAW sensor industries and one of the key factors to be mature products. Therefore, this paper systematically reviewed the SAW sensors from their fundamental mechanisms to stability issues and indicated their future challenges for various applications.
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– The paper aims to better understand why borrowers do not sanction one another in group-lending microfinance programmes.
Abstract
Purpose
The paper aims to better understand why borrowers do not sanction one another in group-lending microfinance programmes.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper utilises interviews conducted in 16 villages in Western China. The data were complemented by ethnographic fieldwork of an NGO in the region.
Findings
The paper confirms the relevance to microfinance of existing literature showing that punishing others is costly, so people tend to wait for others to do it. It also reveals the existence of particularistic metanorms – norms of sanctioning that focus on whom one can and cannot punish. Additionally, it shows that people may punish according to whether they believe others are punishing.
Research limitations/implications
The results are not immediately generalisable to all group-lending programmes.
Originality/value
Fieldwork in rural China is difficult to conduct. Although cultural and social patterns are known to be important in development work, little is known about how it affects microfinance.
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Tiffany Cheng Han Leung, Robin Stanley Snell and Daisy Lee
We identify lessons from a project sponsored by a large charitable trust, which sought to build capability for end-of-life (EOL) care in Hong Kong through interdisciplinary and…
Abstract
Purpose
We identify lessons from a project sponsored by a large charitable trust, which sought to build capability for end-of-life (EOL) care in Hong Kong through interdisciplinary and multi-agency collaboration.
Design/methodology/approach
An in-depth case study drawing on 21 in-depth interviews with diverse stakeholders was conducted. Lyman et al.’s (2018) model of organisational learning (OL) in healthcare settings was applied to analyse the relative emphasis on particular contextual factors and mechanisms, and to identify outcomes perceived to have been achieved.
Findings
Infrastructure such as materials for assessment and education received the most emphasis among the contextual factors and deliberate learning such as training sessions received the greatest attention among the mechanisms. While perceptions indicated that desired outcomes were being achieved in terms of social impact, there were relatively few mentions of “soft” factors such as enhanced motivation, leadership or OL skills among staff.
Originality/value
This study extends the literature on how to create valuable social impact through OL. While prior studies have examined social impact in terms of solutions for social and environmental problems, ours is one of the few that examines how improvements are made to organisations’ capability to deliver such impacts in the context of healthcare.
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Jianlan Zhong, Han Cheng and Fu Jia
Despite its crucial role in ensuring food safety, traceability remains underutilized by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), a vital component of China’s agricultural supply…
Abstract
Purpose
Despite its crucial role in ensuring food safety, traceability remains underutilized by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), a vital component of China’s agricultural supply chain, thereby compromising the integrity of the supply chain traceability system. Therefore, this study sets out to explore the factors influencing SMEs’ adoption of traceability systems and the impact of these factors on SMEs’ intent to adopt such systems. Furthermore, the study presents a model to deepen understanding of system adoption in SMEs and provides a simulation demonstrating the evolutionary trajectory of adoption behavior.
Design/methodology/approach
This study considers the pivotal aspects of system adoption in SMEs, aiming to identify the influential factors through a grounded theory-based case study. Concurrently, it seeks to develop a mathematical model for SMEs’ adoption patterns and simulate the evolution of SMEs’ adoption behaviors using the Q-learning algorithm.
Findings
The adoption of traceability among SMEs is significantly influenced by factors such as system attributes, SMEs’ capability endowment, environmental factors and policy support and control. However, aspects of the SMEs’ capability endowment, specifically their learning rate and decay rate, have minimal impact on the adoption process. Furthermore, group pressure can expedite the attainment of an equilibrium state, wherein all SMEs adopt the system.
Originality/value
This study fills the existing knowledge gap about the adoption of traceability by SMEs in China’s agricultural supply chain. This study represents the pioneer study that identifies the factors influencing SMEs’ adoption and examines the effects of these factors on their traceability adoption, employing a multi-methodological approach that incorporates grounded theory, mathematical modeling and the Q-learning algorithm.
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Jianlan Zhong, Han Cheng, Hamed Gholami, L. Thiruvarasu Letchumanan and Şura Toptancı
Knowledge management (KM) significantly affects supply chain management (SCM) and its performance in today's highly competitive corporate climate. It is crucial to consider this…
Abstract
Purpose
Knowledge management (KM) significantly affects supply chain management (SCM) and its performance in today's highly competitive corporate climate. It is crucial to consider this relationship to achieve optimal supply chain performance (SCP). This study aims to assess this impact by defining and examining the multi-dimensional relationships between KM Process Elements (KMPEs) and SCP Evaluation Criteria (SCPEC) within a comprehensive theoretical framework.
Design/methodology/approach
Integrating KMPEs and SCPEC becomes an uncertain decision-making problem due to data deficiency and the vagueness of decision-makers’ judgments. To address uncertainties, this study uses interval-valued neutrosophic (IVN) sets and proposes an IVN model consisting of SWARA, which is one of the effective multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) approaches, and house of quality (HOQ) methods. IVN-SWARA is used to weight the SCPEC while IVN-HOQ establishes relationships and prioritizes the KMPEs and SCPEC.
Findings
The results show that reliability is the most significant SCP evaluation criterion. Among the KMPEs, capitalization, sharing, and transfer exhibit stronger associations with the SCPEC compared to the other elements. Capitalization as one of the KMPEs was found to be the most critical one, and efficiency is the criterion most affected by all elements of the KM process.
Originality/value
This study uses innovative methodologies to evaluate the adoption of KM processes on SCP under uncertain environments and involving multi-decision-makers. The proposed integrated model demonstrates flexibility and practicality in combining KM and SCM, leading to improved SCP. Notably, this study presents the development of IVN-SWARA and the use of the integrated IVN-SWARA - IVN-HOQ decision tool, which are novel contributions to the existing literature.
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Jian Wei Cheong, Siva Muthaly, Mudiarasan Kuppusamy and Cheng Han
The purpose of this research is to examine the type of online reviews (review timeliness, review quantity, and review valence) and its relationship toward online purchase…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this research is to examine the type of online reviews (review timeliness, review quantity, and review valence) and its relationship toward online purchase intention for electronic products among millennials in Malaysia.
Design/methodology/approch
The quantitative approach and simple random sampling methodology were used in this research. Data were gathered through a survey instrument, and the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) technique was subsequently applied to 215 responses. The model explained 36.3 percent variation of the major constructs in relation to online purchase intention of electronic products amongst Malaysian millennials.
Findings
Review timeliness is the most influential online reviews element towards Malaysian millennials' online purchase intention for electronic products.
Originality/value
This research project has provided the researcher and marketers with more clarity into the area of online purchase intention for electronic products, which is a volatile and dynamic area with continuous uncertainty.
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Han-Cheng Dan, Zhuo-Min Zou, Jia-Qi Chen and An-Ping Peng
The soil water retention curve (SWRC) and unsaturated hydraulic conductivity (UHC) are crucial indices to assess hydraulic properties of porous media that primarily depend on the…
Abstract
Purpose
The soil water retention curve (SWRC) and unsaturated hydraulic conductivity (UHC) are crucial indices to assess hydraulic properties of porous media that primarily depend on the particle and pore size distributions. This study aims to present a method based on the discrete element model (DEM) and the typical Arya and Paris model (AP model) to numerically predict SWRC and UHC.
Design/methodology/approach
First, the DEM (PFC3D software) is used to construct the pore and particle size distributions in porous media. The number of particles is calculated according to the AP model, which can be applied to evaluate the relationship between the suction head and the moisture of porous media. Subsequently, combining critical path analysis (CPA) and fractal theory, the air entry value is applied to calculate the critical pore radius (CPR) and the critical volume fraction (CVF) for evaluating the unsaturated hydraulic conductivity.
Findings
This method is validated against the experimental results of 11 soils from the clay loam to the sand, and then the scaling parameter in the AP model and critical volume fraction value for many types of soils are presented for reference; subsequently, the gradation effect on hydraulic property of soils is analyzed. Furthermore, the calculation for unbound graded aggregate (UGA) material as a special case and a theoretical extension are provided.
Originality/value
The presented study provides an important insight into the relationship between the heterogeneous particle and hydraulic properties by the DEM and sheds light on the directions for future study of a method to investigate the hydraulic properties of porous media.
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Han-Cheng Chiu and Pin-Hua Chiang
The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships between managers’ and supervisors’ trust in subordinates and team cooperation and to suggest that the downward flow of…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships between managers’ and supervisors’ trust in subordinates and team cooperation and to suggest that the downward flow of trust affects team employees.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected from supervisor-employee dyads from a multisource field study.
Findings
Feeling trusted by managers has an indirect effect on team cooperation through feeling trusted by supervisors. In addition, there was a strong positive relation between feeling trusted by supervisors and team cooperation when team size was smaller, but a weak positive relation when team size was larger.
Practical implications
In order for subordinates to feel trusted, management leaders must implement actions that include: delegation and empowerment, participative decision-making and listening with respect and full attention. It is also suggested that the team size should not be too large.
Originality/value
We integrate theories of social exchange, social information processing, social learning and attraction-selection-attrition to test a trickle-down model of how trust in subordinates cascades down through management levels and ultimately affects team cooperation.