Search results

The overall aim of this study is to improve our understanding of the strength of attraction factors of professional football club brands with foreign fans, and of the influence of demographics and individual characteristics on the influence of these factors in the context of sport spectatorship services.

This research was based on a quantitative study surveying 1,160 Chinese fans of English Premier League clubs and its results were produced through exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. They identify the relative importance of 21 organisation– (e.g. star players, charismatic managers, team kits, partnerships and alliances, etc.), market and environment– (e.g. peer influence, TV coverage, etc.), and experience– (e.g. personal bonds, past attendance, etc.) induced service brand attraction points that were categorised into six main factors: star players, on-the-field performance, brand identity, marketing and merchandising, localism and experience.

Organisation-induced factors are the most important club brand attraction factors for Chinese fans. ANOVA analysis showed that demographic (i.e. gender, age, and education) and individual (i.e. brand identification and loyalty levels) characteristics influence the importance of attraction factors for fans. For instance, fans who had previously supported a different club brand rated the marketing and merchandising dimensions lower, localism higher, on-the-field performance lower and brand identity lower than those who had always supported the same club.

These results emphasise the importance of segmentation when considering consumer attraction to professional sport brands. They also provide specific practical knowledge that is useful when expanding into new foreign markets.

This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.

This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.

Identification of influential attraction points can help European soccer clubs to exploit soaring interest among football supporters in China. Such points can enable teams to differentiate themselves from rival brands and consider various demographic and individual factors in order to target different fan segments.

The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

The purpose of this paper is to review and synthesise 149 hospitality-related studies published in the past two decades pertaining to environmental management (EM). The review was divided into three main stages: 1993-1999, 2000-2009 and 2010-2014 and provided future research directions.

The study sample consisted of articles published between 1993 and 2014 in four leading hospitality journals. The four journals chosen were the International Journal of Hospitality Management, Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management and Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research. The title, abstract and the content, as needed, of all EM-related full-length articles from these four journals were content analysed. Editors’ notes, book reviews, industry news, conference papers and research notes were excluded from this paper.

EM research in the hospitality industry during the first two stages focused on the development of environmental policies and practices, green consumerism, managers’ environmental attitudes, indoor air quality and smoke-free environments, sustainable development, environmental performance, environmental cost control and environmental management systems (EMSs). During the third stage from 2010 to 2014, topics about environmental benchmarking and indicators have surfaced. Notwithstanding this, EM in the environmental reporting, and green marketing have been pursued less enthusiastically.

Compared with the mainstream management literature and considering the future development of EM, hospitality scholars are encouraged to extend their research to include green marketing, environmental technologies, environmental reporting, carbon footprint, employees’ green behaviour, the effects of EM on hospitality firms’ stakeholders and small- and medium-sized hospitality firms. In addition, more effort should be spent on developing hospitality-specific theories for EM.

Little has been done to determine the main research agendas in hospitality EM. A review of recent research on this topic provides an inventory of existing knowledge and points out areas requiring further knowledge exploration.

The extensive distribution of fake news on the internet (FNI) has significantly affected many lives. Although numerous studies have recently been conducted on this topic, few have helped us to systematically understand the antecedents and consequences of FNI. This study contributes to the understanding of FNI and guides future research.

Drawing on the input–process–output framework, this study reviews 202 relevant articles to examine the extent to which the antecedents and consequences of FNI have been investigated. It proposes a conceptual framework and poses future research questions.

First, it examines the “what”, “why”, “who”, “when”, “where” and “how” of creating FNI. Second, it analyses the spread features of FNI and the factors that affect the spread of FNI. Third, it investigates the consequences of FNI in the political, social, scientific, health, business, media and journalism fields.

The extant reviews on FNI mainly focus on the interventions or detection of FNI, and a few analyse the antecedents and consequences of FNI in specific fields. This study helps readers to synthetically understand the antecedents and consequences of FNI in all fields. This study is among the first to summarise the conceptual framework for FNI research, including the basic relevant theoretical foundations, research methodologies and public datasets.

This study intends to examine whether the reasons learners like or dislike a learning environment can help explain the differences in the characteristics of the learner and whether learner characteristics can influence a learner's preference for a learning environment.

This study adopted an exploratory sequential mixed methods research design. The study first conducted focus groups with university students to uncover their learner characteristics by examining the reasons they liked or disliked a learning environment. This was followed by a questionnaire survey to explore how these learner characteristics influenced learner inclination for a learning environment. The survey data were analysed using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis (partial least squares structural equation modelling).

The findings showed that two types of learner characteristics, i.e. online learner characteristics and classroom learner characteristics, significantly affected learner inclination for a learning environment. Analyses also indicated that learner demographics had no major moderating effect between learner characteristics and learner inclination for a learning environment.

The findings can be useful for education institutions, learning designers and academics to design engaging learning activities to better support different learning needs.

This study makes a novel attempt to distinguish learner characteristics based on the reasons learners like or dislike a learning environment and establishes that individual learners' characteristics play a role in influencing their preference for a specific learning environment.

Organizations increasingly promote the health and well-being of their employees. There is a growing need for organizations to develop a long-term humanistic approach towards their workforce. This study aims to examine how self-esteem influences the organization, the employee and society within the context of higher education institutions.

The research has been carried out among the teaching and research staff of a higher education institution in Spain. For this, a structured questionnaire was used. Data analysis was conducted using 272 valid questionnaires. A linear regression analysis was used to examine the relationship between self-esteem and the variables of the model.

We identified a positive correlation between self-esteem and productivity, job satisfaction and altruism, where significant differences were observed according to gender, age, seniority and professional category of the teaching staff. The results revealed that teachers with high self-esteem are more productive, satisfied and participate in more altruistic activities than their counterparts with low self-esteem.

This study reveals the importance that worker self-esteem has on their behavior in the work environment and in society as a whole, to improve the overall results of the organization. We identified self-esteem as an attribute that improves productivity, job satisfaction and altruism, that can be used to reduce job turnover intention and improve job retention levels, positively affecting the organization. We also contribute to the achievement of some Sustainable Development Goals. This study offers a theoretical contribution by extending the application of social learning theory to the context of self-esteem within higher education institutions.

The popularity of massive open online courses (MOOCs) has attracted worldwide research interest. This study aims to identify and summarize the research foci (e.g. themes, methods, contexts, etc.) and discuss the new directions and trends of MOOC research in the context of Mainland China.

A systematic review of the published MOOC research papers in Mainland China was conducted with the following inclusion criteria: (1) papers written in English; (2) context focused on Mainland China; and (3) empirical studies. Three main issues were explored with the selected 70 papers: (1) research methods (data collection and analysis); (2) the research foci; and (3) research objects.

The results found that the major MOOC research in China was quantitative, mostly using one method to collect data. Most studies collected data through the databases of MOOC platforms and survey techniques, which was consistent with the widely used descriptive statistics for data analysis. Learner-focused themes were investigated the most, aligning with the result that learners were the most popular research objects.

The findings suggest that using new technology tools, such as the Big Data approach for learning analytics, may transform traditional MOOC research into new practices. Transdisciplinary research concepts may also provide an alternative evolving model for constructing collaboratively dynamic research frameworks under the changing technologies and paradigms. Meanwhile, educational research traditions, such as qualitative methods, contribute to scaffolding MOOC research for more pragmatic applications.

Most systematic reviews on MOOCs focus on general or regional contexts other than Mainland China, and scant MOOC review is based on published English papers about Mainland China.

A building's Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) has a direct impact on the health and productivity on its occupants. Understanding the effects of IAQ in educational buildings is essential in both the design and construction phases for decision-makers. The purpose of this paper is to outline the impact air quality has on occupants' performance, especially teachers and students in educational settings.

This study aims to evaluate the effects of IAQ on teachers' performances and to deliver air quality requirements to building information modelling-led school projects. The methodology of the research approach used a quasi-experiment through questionnaire surveys and physical measurements of indoor air parameters to associate correlation and deduction. A technical college building in Saudi Arabia was used for the case study. The study developed an artificial neural network (ANN) model to define and predict relationships between teachers' performance and IAQ.

This paper contains a detailed investigation into the impact of IAQ via direct parameters (relative humidity, ventilation rates and carbon dioxide) on teacher performance. Research findings indicated an optimal relative humidity with 65%, ranging between 650 to 750 ppm of CO₂, and 0.4 m/s ventilation rate. This ratio is considered optimum for both comfort and performance

This paper focuses on teacher performance in Saudi Arabia and used ANN to define and predict the relationship between performance and IAQ. There are few studies that focus on teacher performance in Saudi Arabia and very few that use ANN in data analysis.