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For corporations engaged in e‐commerce, the Web serves as their primary interface with customers. Consequently, quality Web site design is a critical success factor for corporations with an e‐commerce strategy. However, no comprehensive and coherent set of evaluation criteria exists that corporations and researchers can use to examine Web sites. This paper fills this gap by proposing Web site evaluation criteria and applying these criteria to different industry groups within Korea. Based on the literature survey, six categories of Web site evaluation criteria are defined: business function; corporation credibility; contents reliability; Web site attractiveness; systematic structure; and navigation. Using these criteria, Web sites in 12 industries were evaluated to determine if there are differences in Web site design between industries. The objective was to determine differences between industries which may provide information for benchmarking purposes. The results show significant differences in the design of Web sites across these different industry groups.

The purpose of this project was to compare the cost of transportation engineering design services provided by private contractors versus services provided by state transportation agency staff for the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (LaDOTD). Due to shrinking budgets, staff cuts, and a trend toward privatization, state transportation agencies now outsource the majority of the services they provide. The merits of doing so, however, have been difficult to discern for lack of “apples-to-apples” comparisons. For engineering design services, this problem is particularly acute due to the uniqueness of many projects (e.g., a bridge over the Mississippi river). A simulation approach was used in this study to make “apples-to-apples” comparisons for 39 design projects, 22 in-house projects and 17 consultant projects. For each in-house design project, the cost was estimated had the work been done by a consulting firm. Similarly, for each consultant design project, the cost was estimated had the work been done by in-house staff. The result of the study was that in-house design costs were cheaper by an average of 17 to 19 percent.

Attempts a contribution to the area of health care quality by presenting a framework for thinking about, and improving our understanding of, measuring quality in health care. To achieve this object, addresses the multidimensionality of quality management in health care. Delineates the dimensions of quality measurements in health care, focusing on both output and process issues. Stresses the need for the measures to relate to patient requirements and shows how these measurements can be driven back into care services as a means of facilitating quality improvement in the health care environment. Concludes by discussing the implications of the framework for managers and by providing direction for future research within the context of the framework.

The first objective of the paper is to determine whether the national currency changeover in Turkey has altered the level of consumer price knowledge. The second objective is to investigate the level of consumer price knowledge in an emerging economy, quite apart from the currency changeover.

The paper looks at price knowledge by comparing consumers' price estimations with actual market prices. Data was collected, designed as a panel interview, at two points of time. The price data contains the actual prices of six selected products, from 27 retail stores in Istanbul. The choice of retail outlets was conducted in such a manner, that they provide a highly representative image of prices in Istanbul. The price estimation was obtained at personal interviews (599 individuals) outside a shopping situation in different parts of Istanbul.

The analysis suggests that the price knowledge of Turkish consumers has not deteriorated since the currency changeover. On the contrary, it has slightly improved. According to the second objective, the price knowledge of consumers in an emerging economy turned out to be relatively poor, although the level of price differentiation is rather low in the market.

The first limitation is the context of price data, due to the specific economic infrastructure of an emerging country such as Turkey. The second limitation relates to the investigated product categories and refers to all of the results on the relatively poor price knowledge of Turkish consumers. Regarding further research, it would be useful to establish whether the price knowledge of Turkish consumers will improve in the future on account of the inflation rate, which has been declining noticeably during the past few months. In addition, other methods of measuring price knowledge can be used to determine whether the results for Turkish consumers are stable. Finally, including informal traders could raise the explanatory power of data about the price knowledge of Turkish consumers.

Price knowledge in an emerging economy is poor. The effect of a currency changeover on price knowledge depends on the conversion arithmetic.

This paper aims to add insights on consumers' price knowledge in food retailing using a theory‐based multi‐method approach.

The paper provides data from one questionnaire and two experimental studies. The aim of the first study was to address price recall. To do so, data were collected on the accuracy of grocery‐shopper price knowledge for 20 carefully selected products. Using the mall intercept method, three trained interviewers queried 300 randomly selected people in the store, but prior to shopping. After a period of four weeks the subjects were contacted by phone and asked whether they would like to participate in a second two‐step experiment. A total of 105 of the original 300 shoppers agreed to take part in the second study, in which a recognition task in terms of a computer experiment was accomplished with and without financial incentives.

The results of these studies confirmed the authors' expectations, based on theoretical considerations that: the level of price recall is lower than the level of price recognition; incentives have no influence on price‐knowledge in the recognition task; and price‐knowledge for private labels is significantly higher in the recall, as well as in the recognition task. Moreover, in regression analyses it was found that there was no significant influence of age, gender, price‐consciousness, duration of customership, and shopping transactions per week on price recall and/or price recognition.

The findings are limited with respect to branch, time period, and culture.

This paper is the first using a multi‐method approach to measure price‐recall and price‐recognition in food retailing. Moreover, it adds evidence concerning the differences of price‐knowledge due to the nature of the brand. Finally, it is shown that incentives and certain demographics have no influence on price‐knowledge.

Although the subject matter of this book is rather remote, it should prove of value to aeronautical engineers who are interested in the development of metals. The authors open with a description of the periodic table, giving some views on modern atomic theory, and then pass on to the subject of chemical equilibrium and the various methods employed in analysis. Thereafter they give a complete description of the means employed for the separation of the elements in ferrous and non‐ferrous alloys.

The expansion of Bayer's new production site at Bitterfeld is continuing apace. Just three months after federal chancellor Dr Helmut Kohl and the chairman of the Board of Management of Bayer AG Dr Manfred Schneider started up the first production plant with the symbolic press of a button, the new coating resins plant of Bayer Bitterfeld GmbH was the second project to come on stream at a recent opening ceremony. Wilhelm Held, general manager of the Coating Raw Materials and Speciality Products Business Group, explained the choice of location for the new plant in his opening address: “We chose Bitterfeld for political reasons. We want this project to be a positive symbol for eastern Germany, a symbol of reconstruction — especially in this traditional chemical manufacturing area — through the creation of modern jobs for skilled personnel. The expectation is that other investors will follow suit.”

Charitable Choice Policy, the heart of President Bush’s Faith‐Based Initiative, is the direct government funding of religious organizations for the purpose of carrying out government programs. The Bush presidential administration has called for the application of Charitable Choice Policy to all kinds of social services. Advocates for child‐abuse victims contend that the Bush Charitable Choice Policy would further dismantle essential social services provided to abused children. Others have argued Charitable Choice Policy is unconstitutional because it crosses the boundary separating church and state. Rather than drastically altering the US social‐policy landscape, this paper demonstrates that the Bush Charitable Choice Policy already is in place for childabuse services across many of the fifty states. One reason this phenomenon is ignored is due to the reliance on the public‐private dichotomy for studying social policies and services. This paper contends that relying on the public‐private dichotomy leads researchers to overlook important configurations of actors and institutions that provide services to abused children. It offers an alternate framework to the public‐private dichotomy useful for the analysis of social policy in general and, in particular, Charitable Choice Policy affecting services to abused children. Employing a new methodological approach, fuzzy‐sets analysis, demonstrates the degree to which social services for abused children match ideal types. It suggests relationships between religious organizations and governments are essential to the provision of services to abused children in the United States. Given the direction in which the Bush Charitable Choice Policy will push social‐policy programs, scholars should ask whether abused children will be placed in circumstances that other social groups will not and why.