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Article
Publication date: 24 March 2011

Mark Bagley, Terence Davis, Joanna Latimer and David Kipling

Increased longevity is the success story of 20th‐century biomedicine, together with improvements in general living conditions, but it brings great challenges. Although many…

181

Abstract

Increased longevity is the success story of 20th‐century biomedicine, together with improvements in general living conditions, but it brings great challenges. Although many individuals do undergo what might be termed ‘successful ageing’, this is not a universal experience, for with older age comes a range of age‐related diseases and degenerations that can diminish, if not destroy, quality of life for some older individuals. Biogerontology is the study of the biology of ageing, a normal process but one that has the potential to contribute to age‐related disease. Its goal is to extend the proportion of a life that is healthy, an outcome that is desirable both at an individual and a societal level. One of the great insights from the last decade or more of biogerontology is the realisation that the ageing process is not a fixed, unchangeable process. Rather, it is controlled by genes and is open to experimental interventions that extend healthy lifespan, in species from microbes to mice. These findings have produced a sea change in the way the biogerontological community views ageing: not as a fixed, ‘inevitable’ process, but one where rates of ageing vary enormously according to genotype, and can be readily changed by interventions. This makes the biological process of ageing an attractive target both to understand, and target, age‐related conditions.

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Quality in Ageing and Older Adults, vol. 12 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1471-7794

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Article
Publication date: 24 March 2011

Joanna Latimer, Terence Davis, Mark Bagley and David Kipling

In this paper we present preliminary findings from a study of the social, ethical and cultural aspects of ageing science and medicine. The paper draws on a collaborative, ongoing…

802

Abstract

In this paper we present preliminary findings from a study of the social, ethical and cultural aspects of ageing science and medicine. The paper draws on a collaborative, ongoing project between life scientists and sociologists, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council's (ESRC) New Dynamics of Ageing Programme1 and the ESRC Centre for the Economic and Social Aspects of Genomics2. The sociological element of this project involves participant observation and interviews with expert scientists who specialise in ageing and age‐related diseases, both in the UK and the US, as well as interviews with sceptics of ageing science and medicine. There has been much critique of how ageing science is anti‐ageing, reinforcing the ageism prevalent in Western culture. Our specific objective in this paper is to suggest how biogerontology can contribute to the social inclusion of older people, particularly in relation to health care. We discuss how agesim is endemic to some aspects of health care, and go on to show how the ways that biogerontology is reconceptualising what it is to age, and to be old, can help reinclude ageing and the aged in health‐care education, policy and practice.

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Quality in Ageing and Older Adults, vol. 12 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1471-7794

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Publication date: 10 December 2015

Chun Kit Lok

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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E-services Adoption: Processes by Firms in Developing Nations
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78560-709-7

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Article
Publication date: 1 March 1997

Rodney Wilson

Economists usually try to avoid making moral judgements, at least in their professional capacity. Positive economics is seen as a way of analysing economic problems, in as…

616

Abstract

Economists usually try to avoid making moral judgements, at least in their professional capacity. Positive economics is seen as a way of analysing economic problems, in as scientific a manner as is possible in human sciences. Economists are often reluctant to be prescriptive, most seeing their task as presenting information on the various options, but leaving the final choice, to the political decision taker. The view of many economists is that politicians can be held responsible for the morality of their actions when making decisions on economic matters, unlike unelected economic advisors, and therefore the latter should limit their role.

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Humanomics, vol. 13 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0828-8666

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Article
Publication date: 16 June 2021

Robert James Thomas, Gareth Reginald Terence White and Anthony Samuel

The purpose of this research is to understand what motivates 7–11-year-old children to participate in online brand communities (OBCs). Prior research has concentrated on…

804

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this research is to understand what motivates 7–11-year-old children to participate in online brand communities (OBCs). Prior research has concentrated on prescriptive product categories (games and gaming), predominantly adolescent groups and the social aspects of community engagement and actual behaviour within communities, rather than the motivations to participate with the OBC. This has ultimately limited what has been gleaned, both theoretically and managerially, from this important segment.

Design/methodology/approach

An interpretive, longitudinal position is adopted, using a sample of 261 children (113 male and 148 female) from across the UK, using event-based diaries over a 12-month period, generating 2,224 entries.

Findings

Data indicate that children are motivated to participate in a brand community for four reasons: to support and ameliorate pre-purchase anxieties, resolve interpersonal conflicts, exact social dominance in terms of product ownership and perceptions of product knowledge and to actively engage in digitalised pester power. The study also reveals that certain motivational aspects such as conflict resolution and exacting dominance, are gender-specific.

Research limitations/implications

Knowledge of children’s motivation to engage with OBCs is important for marketers and brand managers alike as the data reveal markedly different stimuli when compared to known adult behaviours in the field. Given the nature of the study, scope exists for significant future research.

Practical implications

The study reveals behaviours that will assist brand managers in further understanding the complex and untraditional relationships that children have with brands and OBCs.

Originality/value

This study makes a novel examination of a hitherto little-explored segment of consumers. In doing so, it uncovers the theoretical and practical characteristics of child consumers that contemporary, adult-focussed literature does not recognise. The paper makes an additional contribution to theory by positing four new behavioural categories relating to community engagement – dependers, defusers, demanders and dominators – and four new motivational factors which are fundamentally different from adult taxonomies – social hegemony, parental persuasion, dilemma solving and conflict resolution.

Details

European Journal of Marketing, vol. 55 no. 8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0309-0566

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Available. Open Access. Open Access
Article
Publication date: 8 October 2018

Ailton Conde Jussani, Eduardo Pinheiro Gondim de Vasconcellos, James Terence Coulter Wright and Celso Cláudio de Hildebrand e Grisi

Studies about product customization decision are especially relevant for organizations that decide opening a subsidiary overseas. This scenario requires the company to decide…

10941

Abstract

Purpose

Studies about product customization decision are especially relevant for organizations that decide opening a subsidiary overseas. This scenario requires the company to decide which products should be customized and which products should be standardized when selling products in international markets. The main purpose of this paper is to identify which factors influence the decisions on the customization of industrial products and consumer products to a particular country in the marketing function of a global company.

Design/methodology/approach

To do so, a literature review was conducted addressing the following topics: internationalization, international marketing and product customization factors. With regard to methodological aspects, an initial qualitative phase was conducted with four exploratory case studies. In the quantitative phase, an online survey was developed, obtaining 123 records of an intentional non-probabilistic sample.

Findings

As a result, six factors were deemed essential to the product customization decision: customers’ characteristics, sustainable return on investment, sustainable profit, legal requirements, sales of other products in the portfolio and weather differences.

Originality/value

The authors expect that the results of this research contribute academically for the management knowledge about the meanings that product customization can assume in internationalized companies, and, additionally, in a business way, the authors expect that they help companies make strategic decisions on the appropriate measure to take regarding product customization in international markets, whether industrial products or consumer products. With these findings, the authors expect to make a valid contribution about product customization decision and suggesting future studies from other perspectives.

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RAUSP Management Journal, vol. 53 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2531-0488

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Article
Publication date: 1 August 2005

Rachel Wakefield, Noel McGrath and Terence Holliday

Standard one of the national service framework for mental health (DH, 1999) requires health and social services to promote social inclusion for all. Users of secure services are…

85

Abstract

Standard one of the national service framework for mental health (DH, 1999) requires health and social services to promote social inclusion for all. Users of secure services are, arguably, the most excluded of all those in the care of mental health services and thus the most in need of active social inclusion. Yet they are the least able to participate in the community‐based programmes that would help them re‐engage with ordinary living following discharge. In this article Rachel Wakefield and colleagues describe the obstacles they had to overcome to introduce a socially inclusive resettlement programme for service users in the low secure unit where they work.

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A Life in the Day, vol. 9 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1366-6282

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Article
Publication date: 1 January 1986

Terence Ashforth

Like other developed countries Australia has seen intensifying competition between financial institutions as a result of the combined pressures of economic and social change…

417

Abstract

Like other developed countries Australia has seen intensifying competition between financial institutions as a result of the combined pressures of economic and social change, deregulation of financial systems and the introduction of new technology. Increased competition has led to a blurring of the traditional boundaries between institutions, changes in market structures and a proliferation of new services and products. A new awareness of the role and importance of marketing in the services as something more than advertising and selling has arisen. The Final Report of the Committee of Enquiry into the Australian Financial System (the Campbell Committee) in 1981 recommended almost total deregulation. Any necessary government intervention in the system should be by market methods, not direct controls. The effect has been most noticeable on banks and life assurance. The consumer will benefit from deregulation with a wider range of choice, but it may bring about job losses through new technology and poorer standards of service may arise. Its economic effects are feared. Eventually the need for legislation may arise again.

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International Journal of Bank Marketing, vol. 4 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0265-2323

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Article
Publication date: 1 February 1989

Roger Cox

Will Storehouse see the light of day? Group Chief Executive Michael Julien has made a number of cost‐cutting moves, including the rationalisation of distribution and the…

52

Abstract

Will Storehouse see the light of day? Group Chief Executive Michael Julien has made a number of cost‐cutting moves, including the rationalisation of distribution and the development of compatible IT systems which includes reducing the number of databases. Will these moves work? Our contributor also discusses the changed fortunes of Boots, now “something of a stunner”; and the problems of Woolworth.

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Retail and Distribution Management, vol. 17 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-2363

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Book part
Publication date: 20 January 2021

Vincent K. Chong, Michele K. C. Leong and David R. Woodliff

This paper uses a laboratory experiment to examine the effect of accountability pressure as a monitoring control tool to mitigate subordinates' propensity to create budgetary…

Abstract

This paper uses a laboratory experiment to examine the effect of accountability pressure as a monitoring control tool to mitigate subordinates' propensity to create budgetary slack. The results suggest that budgetary slack is (lowest) highest when accountability pressure is (present) absent under a private information situation. The results further reveal that accountability pressure is positively associated with subordinates' perceived levels of honesty, which in turn is negatively associated with budgetary slack creation. The findings of this paper have important theoretical and practical implications for budgetary control systems design.

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