Abstract
Purpose
Prefabricated construction has been rapidly developing and intensifying the reliance on the supply chain. The pandemic of COVID-19 induced severe disruptions to the supply chain operation and thus attracted the research attention on the supply chain resilience (SCR) under various events. Assessing the resilience of the prefabricated construction supply chain (PCSC) is essential for surviving the shifting disruptive attacks and ensuring consistent, reliable operation. Based on the ripple effect and supply chain performance (SCP), this study aims to develop an assessment model for SCR of PCSC.
Design/methodology/approach
Having identified the roles and material flows among stakeholders, a PCSC network is established. Utilizing the ripple effect model, it develops an assessment framework tailored for PCSCs, which then evolves into a comprehensive assessment model for evaluating the SCR by integrating the disruptive influence and the pre-and post-disruption SCP. Case study is then applied to validate the model.
Findings
Using SCP metrics and disruptive influence assessment as basic dimensions, the SCR can be assessed and expressed through a vector formula. Operating costs and asset utilization can effectively reflect changes in resilience, paying attention to their real-time changes can provide a better judgment of the current stage of disruptions.
Originality/value
The assessment model of SCR accounts for the ripple effect within prefabricated construction, offering a thorough understanding of how disruptions impact the entire supply chain network. Additionally, this model introduces a novel approach to evaluating SCR in reverse by leveraging SCP metrics instead of direct measurement, thereby minimizing potential biases.
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Meng Ye, Fumin Deng, Li Yang and Xuedong Liang
This paper aims to build a scientific evaluation index system for regional low-carbon circular economic development. Taking Sichuan Province as the empirical research object, the…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to build a scientific evaluation index system for regional low-carbon circular economic development. Taking Sichuan Province as the empirical research object, the paper evaluates its low-carbon circular economy (LCCE) development level and proposes policy recommendations for climate change improvement based on the evaluation results.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper, first, built an evaluation index system with 30 indicators within six subsystems, namely, economic development, social progress, energy consumption, low-carbon emissions, carbon sink capacity and environmental carrying capacity. Second, develop an “entropy weight-grey correlation” evaluation method. Finally, from a practical point of view, measure the development level of LCCE in Sichuan Province, China, from 2008 to 2018.
Findings
It was found that Sichuan LCCE development had a general downward trend from 2008 to 2012 and a steady upward trend from 2012 to 2018; however, the overall level was low. The main factors affecting the LCCE development are lagging energy consumption and environmental carrying capacity subsystem developments.
Research limitations/implications
This paper puts forward relevant suggestions for improving the development of a low-carbon economy and climate change for the reference of policymakers.
Originality/value
This paper built an evaluation index system with 30 indicators for regional low carbon circular economic development. The evaluation method of “entropy weight-grey correlation” is used to measure the development level of regional LCCE in Sichuan Province, China.
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Xian Zheng, Jiawei Deng, Xiangnan Song, Meng Ye and Lan Luo
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) and innovation are the two main approaches firms utilize to promote sustainable development. However, as yet, scholars have reached no…
Abstract
Purpose
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) and innovation are the two main approaches firms utilize to promote sustainable development. However, as yet, scholars have reached no consensus regarding their precise impact on construction firm performance (CFP), hindering efforts to implement effective sustainable development strategies that improve CFP. In view that a simple linear relationship may not be sufficient to capture their precise pattern, this study aims to unveil the nonlinear impact of CSR and innovation on CFP, especially when construction firms take up a distinct competitive position.
Design/methodology/approach
This study first proposed four hypotheses to establish a new theoretical model by incorporating CSR, innovation, CFP and construction firms' competitive position (CFCP). Then the model was tested by using 292 annual observations collected from 75 construction firms in China. A multiple regression model analysis was carried out to analyze the survey data and validate the hypotheses.
Findings
The results reveal that both CSR and innovation have a U-shaped impact on the price-to-book ratio of a construction firm, a specific CFP measure. CFCP negatively moderates the U-shaped relationship between CSR and CFP, but positively moderates the U-shaped relationship between innovation and CFP.
Originality/value
This study goes beyond a simple linear view, instead of unveiling the nonlinear U-shaped effects of CSR and innovation on CFP that deepen the understanding of their complex relationships in the construction industry and makes construction firms aware that CSR and innovation can only improve performance if they reach a certain level. The moderating role of CFCP provides important implications for construction firms seeking to adopt appropriate competitive strategies related to social responsibility and innovation that both promote CFP and achieve sustainable development.
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Lu Yang, Meng Ye, Hongdi Wang and Weisheng Lu
This study explores the influence of female executives on the misalignment between corporate ESG commitments and practices, a phenomenon known as ESG decoupling. It also enhances…
Abstract
Purpose
This study explores the influence of female executives on the misalignment between corporate ESG commitments and practices, a phenomenon known as ESG decoupling. It also enhances the understanding of female power on affecting ESG decoupling under different ownership settings.
Design/methodology/approach
This study uses a quantitative research design to explore the impact mechanism of female executives’ proportion on corporate ESG decoupling under different ownership contexts based on a sample of 2,585 firm-year observations from publicly traded Chinese companies between 2011 and 2021.
Findings
Based on agency theory, upper echelons theory and gender socialization theory, our findings indicate that (1) female executives are significantly effective in reducing ESG decoupling, and (2) this effect is more pronounced in non-state-owned enterprises (non-SOEs) compared to state-owned enterprises (SOEs).
Originality/value
This study contributes original insights into the ESG decoupling literature by demonstrating the external influences of corporate governance structure, particularly in the context of China’s unique corporate ownership environment. It also provides strong social implications by highlighting the role of gender dynamics in corporate governance, corporate social responsibility (CSR) behaviors and ESG alignment.
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Lin Meng and Yongqiang Ye
This paper aims to study the short take-off characteristics and longitudinal controllability of FanWing. As a new structural plane, it has achieved great success at the air shows…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to study the short take-off characteristics and longitudinal controllability of FanWing. As a new structural plane, it has achieved great success at the air shows, but the existing literature is mostly on feasibility and prototype study while little on short take-off performance analysis and controllability. Thus, the paper will do some research on those two aspects.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper focuses on a certain type of a 3.5 kg FanWing and builds the longitudinal model based on its structure characteristics and operation principle. Its take-off process is simulated and the longitudinal control law is designed.
Findings
The short take-off performance and the large load characteristic are verified. To attain a better short take-off performance, several factors that influence the take-off distance are researched, and the optimal no-load take-off distance 5 m is obtained when the elevator deflection angle is −30°, the center of gravity is 0.42 m and the cross-flow fan rotation speed is 2500 r/min. The longitudinal controllability is verified through simulation. And without variable cross-flow fan rotation speed control, the longitudinal control of FanWing is the same to that of the conventional aircraft.
Practical implications
The presented efforts provide markers for designing the fan wing aircraft that would have better performances. And the control of FanWing is similar to that of a conventional airplane.
Originality/value
It is proved that FanWing can offer a better take-off performance through reasonable configuration. The paper also offers a useful reference on the control of FanWing.
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Lin Meng, Yang Gao, Yangyang Liu and Shengfang Lu
As a short take-off and landing aircraft, FanWing has the capability of being driven under power a short distance from a parking space to the take-off area. The purpose of this…
Abstract
Purpose
As a short take-off and landing aircraft, FanWing has the capability of being driven under power a short distance from a parking space to the take-off area. The purpose of this paper is to design the take-off control system of FanWing and study the factors that influence the short take-off performance under control.
Design/methodology/approach
The force analysis of FanWing is studied in the take-off phase. Two take-off control methods are researched, and several factors that influence the short take-off performance are studied under control.
Findings
The elevator and fan wing control systems are designed. Although the vehicle load increases under the fan wing control, the fan wing control is not a recommended practice in the take-off phase for its sensitivity to the pitch angle command. The additional pitch-down moment has a significant influence on the control system and the short take-off performance that the barycenter variation of FanWing should be considered carefully.
Practical implications
The presented efforts provide a reference for the location of the center of gravity in designing FanWing. The traditional elevator control is more recommended than the fan wing control in the take-off phase.
Originality/value
This paper offers a valuable reference on the control system design of FanWing. It also proves that there is an additional pith-down moment that needs to be paid close attention to. Four factors that influence the short take-off performance are compared under control.
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Gabriele Suder, Bo Meng and Gao Yuning
In international business (IB), the discussion of COVID-19-related global value chain (GVC) models driving resilience has taken momentum since May 2020. The purpose of this study…
Abstract
Purpose
In international business (IB), the discussion of COVID-19-related global value chain (GVC) models driving resilience has taken momentum since May 2020. The purpose of this study is to uncover insights that the pandemic provided as a unique research opportunity, holistically, revealing the significant role of non-lead firms in GVC outcomes and resilience. This allows to extend theory as the authors critically identify impact criteria and assess interdependence and valence, thus progressing the traditional (pre-pandemic) IB view of GVC governance and orchestration.
Design/methodology/approach
This study opts for an integrative review to help create a much-needed extension of IB theory by means of a critical perspective on GVC theory. The authors examine the extant body of IB literature as the relevant stock of collective IB knowledge prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic, uncovering contributions – with a focus on the role of non-lead firms in orchestration and resilience – that allows to clarify what was not evident pre-pandemic. With this, the authors move the theory from its efficiency focus to a better recognition of the interdependencies of power and profit outcomes stemming from asymmetries of interrelationships. By design, the authors focus on the unique research period of the pandemic and orchestration complexities along the development of configurational arguments beyond simple correlations (Fiss, 2011), revealing key dependencies as key themes. The authors highlight further research avenues following Snyder (2019) that are called upon to strengthen that understanding and that helps extend theory.
Findings
This research provides a critical perspective on the application of the traditional IB views for GVC governance (designed for efficiency, cost and proximity to markets with pre-dominance for just in time), which has shifted during the pandemic to accommodate for adaptation and adjustment to resilience and just in case considerations. The holistic review reveals not only the key country- and multinational enterprise (MNE)-dependencies with residual impact determining the balance between just-in-time and just-in-case. Also, the authors advance the understanding of the (un)balance of the traditional GVC – focused on just-in-case rather than just-in-time through a lead and non-lead GVC participation and power lens yet rarely observed. The authors find that governance should not be construed as “management” such that it resolves into decisions undertaken in lead firms for execution in subordinate GVC participants. Autonomy allows to subsidiary units by MNE lead firms and/or exercised by (mainly, innovative) non-subsidiary GVC participant firms, is uncovered as a key driver in this. Greater delegation capacity appears to help provide resilience to loss in profit, with a recognition that there may be a dynamic trade-off between power and profit. In addition, the authors are able to identify correlations with innovation, demand elasticity, digital uptake, investment and other, that the authors trust will set the scene for additional research deepening and extending the findings.
Research limitations/implications
Integrative literature reviews include a problem formulation (i.e. that is limited to published topics around an emerging theme) and are hence very focused in nature and approach. This applies to this paper. Data analysis in this method is not typically using statistical methods in contrast to meta-analyses. Also, the authors limit the sample to a relatively short time period with 33 publications analysed, purposefully focusing on the most prompt and “acute” insights into GVCs during the pandemic.
Practical implications
The traditional GVC governance model is designed for efficiency, cost and proximity to markets with pre-dominance for just in time. The authors reveal dependencies that are instrumental to better understand lead and non-lead interaction and relative autonomy, with a focus on residual impact determining the balance between just-in-time and just-in-case that, if in the sought equilibrium and agile, can allow alignment with context and this resilience. This paper specifically provides practical insights and visualization that highlights stages/“ripple” effects and their impact and the questions to ask as stakeholders look for GVC resilience. This includes, int.al., firms and their role as strategic agents, prompting participants through the learnings from exogenous shock to realign their strategies, redistributed manufacturing of production across subsidiary and non-subsidiary non-lead firms, greater competition and hence power for suppliers leveraging resilience and innovation, greater understanding of localization and regionalization of production of essential supplies, interaction with governments, and of investment impacts abroad especially to secure GVC participation.
Social implications
The insights provided through this extension of theory with its literature review reveal the importance of aligning IB research into GVCs to factors that became visible through alternative or unusual settings, as they have the power to reveal the limitations of traditional views. In this case, a mainly efficiency-led, just-in-time focused GVC governance model is reviewed through the literature that emanated during the pandemic, with a critical perspective, which helped uncover and underline the complexities and evolution of GVC governance, providing fundamental support to solutioning the continuing global supply chain challenges that started as a result of the pandemic and are yet again accelerated by the Ukraine and Middle Eastern wars and its impact with, int.al., concerns over possible severe global food, labour/migration and resources crises. IB holds a social responsibility to help identify critical challenges from the disciplinary perspective and help advance resilience for social benefit.
Originality/value
This paper supports the original IB theory development by extending GVC theory into the lead – non-lead dynamics that may, under certain conditions, provide a “Resilience wall” for GVCs. The value created through insights stemming from a unique period of time for GVC is significant. It allows us thus also to pave the way to an emerging and critical research adaption looking into equilibrium, nuancing demand elasticity, better understanding trade and investment impacts along GVCs and more. By examining views on the sources of pandemic risks in a possibly unique setting, the authors offer added value from extant IB research insights by combining them, revealing the importance for GVCs to investigate not only key dependencies between the exogenous shock, i.e. context, and the impacts assessed through this literature but to further use their inherent value to create a framework for further conceptualization and extension of the traditional IB view on GVC governance. This work illustrates the urgency and importance for IB to take a timely and possibly more critical approach to the investigation of governance models that have, to date, shown some significant limitations.
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Smart card-based E-payment systems are receiving increasing attention as the number of implementations is witnessed on the rise globally. Understanding of user adoption behavior…
Abstract
Smart card-based E-payment systems are receiving increasing attention as the number of implementations is witnessed on the rise globally. Understanding of user adoption behavior of E-payment systems that employ smart card technology becomes a research area that is of particular value and interest to both IS researchers and professionals. However, research interest focuses mostly on why a smart card-based E-payment system results in a failure or how the system could have grown into a success. This signals the fact that researchers have not had much opportunity to critically review a smart card-based E-payment system that has gained wide support and overcome the hurdle of critical mass adoption. The Octopus in Hong Kong has provided a rare opportunity for investigating smart card-based E-payment system because of its unprecedented success. This research seeks to thoroughly analyze the Octopus from technology adoption behavior perspectives.
Cultural impacts on adoption behavior are one of the key areas that this research posits to investigate. Since the present research is conducted in Hong Kong where a majority of population is Chinese ethnicity and yet is westernized in a number of aspects, assuming that users in Hong Kong are characterized by eastern or western culture is less useful. Explicit cultural characteristics at individual level are tapped into here instead of applying generalization of cultural beliefs to users to more accurately reflect cultural bias. In this vein, the technology acceptance model (TAM) is adapted, extended, and tested for its applicability cross-culturally in Hong Kong on the Octopus. Four cultural dimensions developed by Hofstede are included in this study, namely uncertainty avoidance, masculinity, individualism, and Confucian Dynamism (long-term orientation), to explore their influence on usage behavior through the mediation of perceived usefulness.
TAM is also integrated with the innovation diffusion theory (IDT) to borrow two constructs in relation to innovative characteristics, namely relative advantage and compatibility, in order to enhance the explanatory power of the proposed research model. Besides, the normative accountability of the research model is strengthened by embracing two social influences, namely subjective norm and image. As the last antecedent to perceived usefulness, prior experience serves to bring in the time variation factor to allow level of prior experience to exert both direct and moderating effects on perceived usefulness.
The resulting research model is analyzed by partial least squares (PLS)-based Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) approach. The research findings reveal that all cultural dimensions demonstrate direct effect on perceived usefulness though the influence of uncertainty avoidance is found marginally significant. Other constructs on innovative characteristics and social influences are validated to be significant as hypothesized. Prior experience does indeed significantly moderate the two influences that perceived usefulness receives from relative advantage and compatibility, respectively. The research model has demonstrated convincing explanatory power and so may be employed for further studies in other contexts. In particular, cultural effects play a key role in contributing to the uniqueness of the model, enabling it to be an effective tool to help critically understand increasingly internationalized IS system development and implementation efforts. This research also suggests several practical implications in view of the findings that could better inform managerial decisions for designing, implementing, or promoting smart card-based E-payment system.
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Qingdan Jia, Xiaoyu Xu, Minhong Zhou, Haodong Liu and Fangkai Chang
This study embraces the call for exploring the determinants of continuous intention in TikTok. Taking the perspective of social influence, this study not only tries to explore the…
Abstract
Purpose
This study embraces the call for exploring the determinants of continuous intention in TikTok. Taking the perspective of social influence, this study not only tries to explore the contextual sources of two types of social influence but also aims to unveil the influence mechanism of how social influence affects TikTok viewers’ continuous intention.
Design/methodology/approach
This study empirically analyzes how TikToker attractiveness, co-viewer participation, platform reputation and content appeal affect informative and normative social influence and then lead to the continuous intention of TikTok. Based on 547 valid survey data, this study adopts a mixed analytical approach for data analysis by integrating structural equation modeling (SEM) and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA).
Findings
SEM results unveil that content appeal is the most critical antecedent of informational social influence, while the TikToker attractiveness and platform reputation have no effect on it. Differently, all four external sources positively lead to normative social influence. Among them, content appeal and co-viewer participation influence the most. The influences of both two types of social influence on continuous intention are demonstrated. FsQCA results reveal seven alternative configurations that are sufficient for influencing continuance intention and further complement and reinforce the SEM findings.
Originality/value
Addressing the critical contextual elements of TikTok, this study explores and confirms the sources which may engender social influence. The authors also demonstrate the critical role of social influence in affecting TikTok viewers’ continuous intentions by the hybrid analytical approach, which contributes to existing academic literature and practitioners.
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This paper aims that mobile health (mHealth) applications have emerged as a key tool to support public health. However, there are only a few studies examining the influences of…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims that mobile health (mHealth) applications have emerged as a key tool to support public health. However, there are only a few studies examining the influences of health-related ascribes on continuance intention to use mHealth apps and how these influences are contingent on gender in the mHealth app using context.
Design/methodology/approach
This study takes the protection motivation theory as a theoretical framework to examine the ordered relationship between threat and coping appraisals and their impacts on continuance intention to use mHealth apps. In addition, this study further extends the literature on gender differences into the mHealth app's context to investigate the moderating role of gender. The suggested hypotheses are confirmed by a structural equation modeling approach and multigroup investigation employing survey data of 345 users of Spring Rain Doctor in China, a typical mHealth app.
Findings
The findings suggest that the impact of perceived disease threat on user's continuance intention is mediated entirely by coping appraisals. Furthermore, the three coping appraisals' impacts are contingent upon gender. Specifically, response efficacy is more crucial for male users in forecasting continuance intention, whereas self-efficacy and response cost have a more salient influence on continuance intention for female users.
Originality/value
This study examines the ordered influences of threat and coping appraisal, moderated by gender, on continuance intention on use mHealth apps. These findings could contribute to relevant theoretical and practical implications.