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This paper aims to develop and test a method of automating, for online retailers, the practice of adaptive selling, which is typically used by salespeople in face-to-face interactions. This method customizes persuasive messages for individual customers as they navigate a retailer’s website.

This paper demonstrates a method for the online implementation of automated adaptive selling using sales influence tactics. Automated adaptive selling is compared to nonadaptive selling in three e-commerce field studies.

The results reveal that adaptive selling is more effective than nonadaptive selling. The click-through rates increased significantly when adaptive selling was used.

This paper highlights the effectiveness of existing theories concerning adaptive human-to-human selling and their utility to online selling. The authors demonstrate the added value of adaptive selling in e-commerce, thereby opening up a novel area of research into adaptive selling online. While the paper focuses on the adjustment of sales influence tactics, other factors could be investigated for adjustment in future research (e.g. prices).

The methods, described in detail, are readily available for implementation by online retailers. The implementations are timely and increasingly valuable as e-commerce expands into interpersonal channels (e.g. instant messengers and social media).

To the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first to formally implement automated adaptive selling as described in the ISTEA model in an e-commerce setting.

Technological innovation has made it possible to review how a film cues particular reactions on the part of the viewers. The purpose of this paper is to capture and interpret visual perception and attention by the simultaneous use of eye tracking and electroencephalography (EEG) technologies.

The authors have developed a method for joint analysis of EEG and eye tracking. To achieve this goal, an algorithm was implemented to capture and interpret visual perception and attention by the simultaneous use of eye tracking and EEG technologies. All parameters have been measured as a function of the relationship between the tested signals, which, in turn, allowed for a more accurate validation of hypotheses by appropriately selected calculations.

The results of this study revealed a coherence between EEG and eye tracking that are of particular relevance for human perception.

This paper endeavors both to capture and interpret visual perception and attention by the simultaneous use of eye tracking and EEG technologies. Eye tracking provides a powerful real-time measure of viewer region of interest. EEG technologies provides data regarding the viewer’s emotional states while watching the movie.

The approach in this paper is distinct from similar studies because it takes into account the integration of the eye tracking and EEG technologies. This paper provides a method for determining a fully functional video introspection system.

Many individuals experience a sense of déjà vu when smelling a particular scent in the air or on hearing a name or words from the past. At times even the faintest scent or sound may evoke old memories and stir the senses. This is particularly true when the names of long‐ago television and radio programs are heard. Depending on one's age and the part of the country in which one lived, people born before the “baby boom” years (1946–1964) often feel a profound sense of nostalgia about such radio programs as Mr. District Attorney and Fibber McGee and Molly or the television shows Howdy Doody and Toast of the Town/Ed Sullivan Show. These early programs are considered part of the “golden age” of radio and television broadcasting.

Tribalism is at the forefront of public discussion across the political spectrum in America today. Zombie stories have also risen to unprecedented popularity. Amid present-day racial, political, and otherwise tribal tensions, the story I Am Legend has particular resonance. As the original inspiration behind the modern zombie trope, it was published as a novella in 1954 and has been remade as a film multiple times, in 1964, 1971, and 2007. Using grounded theory, I explore each film regarding what moral attitudes are portrayed concerning confrontation between rival milieus. My findings center on four themes: identification, compassion, ambivalence, and condemnation. Overall, in chronological order, the different renditions of the story exhibit decreasing compassion for the other and decreasing ambivalence about relations with the other. The most dramatic change is between the 1971 and 2007 remakes. Implications for what the changes in the morals presented in the story might reflect in terms of social changes in America are discussed.

Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Term. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.

This chapter introduces the concept of “competency labor” and illustrates its important role in organizational life for both researchers and practitioners. In the contemporary workplace environment individuals face increasing expectations of competence. However, demonstrating competence is no simple task – rather, to demonstrate competence requires a concerted effort in terms of individuals’ affect, cognition, and behavior. Accordingly, new models are needed that can explain these emergent processes. The present work integrates the literatures related to emotional labor and impression management, and builds a theory-based framework for investigating the processes (affective, cognitive, and behavioral) of making desired impressions of competency at work and how these processes impact critical individual and organizational outcomes. Our conceptual model proposes how growing demands in the workplace for individuals to display competence affect how they think, feel, as well as act. In sum, our work advocates that a new research stream is needed to better understand the “competency labor” phenomenon and its theoretical as well as practical implications.

In a diverse society, empathy would intuitively seem to represent a powerful force for social good. In particular, we expect empathic people to tolerate (rather than reject) attitudes that might be different from their own, and to resolve and/or avoid (rather than escalate) potential disagreements with others. Some research supports this benign view of empathy, but somewhat surprisingly, there is a “dark” side to empathy, one that can sometimes exacerbate attitudinal conflict. That is, empathy can often be parochial, in the sense that people are inclined to reserve their compassion for others only when they are deemed to be worthy of such support. In this chapter we review classic and contemporary research on the light and dark side of empathy, and consider its implications for the kinds of dynamics that could potentially emerge when people encounter people and ideas that are different from their own.

Using data from 184 employed Hispanic‐American and Anglo‐American participants in the United States, the present study examined the relations between four cultural values (i.e., collectivism, power distance, familism, present time orientation) and job choice preferences. Results revealed that (1) collectivism was positively related to the importance of coworkers and working in a diverse organization, (2) familism was related to preferences for jobs with personal time off, and (3) power distance was related to the importance of organizational reputation and promotion opportunities. In addition, the findings revealed that, relative to Anglo‐Americans, Hispanic Americans felt that organizational reputation, flexible work hours, bonuses, and diversity were more important job choice factors. Implications are offered for conducting future research on job choice and developing recruitment practices in multicultural organizations in the United States.

The winter 1991 issue of Reference Services Review featured an annotated bibliography of literature on Christopher Columbus from 1970 to 1989. That literature covered such topics as Columbus' ancestry, heraldry, and the locations of both his American landfall and burial site. This annotated checklist focuses mainly on Columbus' legacy, on works that offer a dissenting point of view from most previous writings about Columbus (and on works that react to the dissenters), on material written by Native American and other non‐European authors, and on materials published by small and noncommercial presses.