Business Commons^™

Social Media Firestorms: How Does Observing Customer-To-Customer Incivility Affect Consumers’ Brand Evaluation And Behavioral Intentions?, Tyson Ang

Faculty Research Day

Project Description: Brands increasingly engage customers through social media platforms. However, just like human, brands too can make mistake when interacting with customers. The higher the engagement, the higher the chance of brands committing mistakes. These mistakes tend to be amplified in the context of social media, which may eventually lead to a firestorm against the brand. Social media firestorm refers to a sudden, rapid discharge of large quantities of intensely negative messages against a brand. Even more concerning is that these firestorms are usually accompanied by uncivil interactions between customers who have opposing views on the issue at …

Impact Of Changes In State Merit-Aid Programs On College Attendance, Nabaneeta Biswas, Poulomi Dasgupta

Faculty Research Day

Between 1990 and 2010 a total of 25 states adopted merit aid programs. Merit-aid programs increase college enrollment. West Virginia's PROMISE had a statistically significant impact on college enrollment in the state.

Telehealth In Critical Care: Quality And Cost Outcomes, Michael Robbie, Stephanie Cole, Bukola Abodunde, Alberto Coustasse

Faculty Research Day

The purpose of this study was to assess the potential for the implementation of telehealth in the ICU to determine its impact on quality of care and overall healthcare costs. The primary hypothesis of this study was that telehealth would be linked with lower ICU LOS and hospital mortality rates among critically ill patients.

Post-Implementation Analysis Of The Impact Of Intravenous Automation Systems On Health-System Pharmacy Operations, Craig Kimble, Ken Maxik, Chris Booth, Michael Rudolph, Kim Broedel-Zaugg

Faculty Research Day

We have all seen the reports on the news about issues related to IV rooms and IV room compounding. Many health-system pharmacies have implemented, or are considering some form of intravenous (IV) automation and/ or compounding system in their clean rooms to reduce pharmacy errors and improve accuracy, productivity, and workflow. Manufacturers tout that automated systems, used appropriately, aid in reducing errors from reaching patients. Additionally, IV admixture automation is one of the most recent areas where technology has been added to pharmacy workflow.

Fdi Inflows And Educational Attainment: Evidence From China, Yi Duan, Lei Li

Faculty Research Day

This study investigates the impact of FDI on education attainment through labor market conditions in China using micro data. China has attracted a substantial amount of FDI in the past years and has made education advancement its priority. However, attracting FDI can have unintended consequences to depress educational attainment and human capital formation.

Patient Communication With Their General Practice Physicians: Does Age Matter?, William K. Willis, Marcy Butler, Ashish Chandra

Faculty Research Day

We examine the difference in outcomes between various age groups and their communication with their General Practitioner.

Does Global Vs. Local Scope Matter? Contingencies Of Cause-Related Marketing In A Developed Market, Monica Wei

Faculty Research Day

Project Description: Cause-related marketing refers to a company’s social initiative in which the company donates a specified amount to a chosen cause in response to every purchase the consumers made. Many multinational corporations (MNCs) have used cause-related marketing as a strategy to improve their brand image and positioning in the global market. However, what makes cause-related marketing effective in the international market is not well understood. Drawing on social impact theory, this project uncovers the factors that affect the effectiveness of cause-related marketing strategy in the global market context. Specifically, across two studies, this research has found that the …

Tax Law And 100 Years Of New York Giants Season Tickets: A Multifaceted Analysis Of One Fan’S Fortune, Casey W. Baker

Faculty Research Day

Sports and tax Law? The confluence of money and unique factual situations create issues that the regulatory structure may not contemplate.

Attorney-Client Sexual Relationships In The #Metoo Era, Casey Baker

Faculty Research Day

Attorneys play a critical role in remedying the problem of sexual assault in American industry, but the legal profession does not consistently police itself regarding such issues.

In 2002, the American Bar Association established a model ethical rule prohibiting attorneys from entering into sexual relationships with a client unless the sexual relationship existed at the time the attorney-client relationship began. As of 2019, twenty states plus the District of Columbia have failed to adopt the model rule or substantially similar prohibitions. Furthermore, only eight states by rule address sexual relationships between attorneys and constituents of organizational clients. State ethics rules …

An Examination And Survey Of The Current State Of Charter Schools In The United States, Raymond Keener Iii

Faculty Research Day

Charter Schools were introduced in the United States nearly thirty (30) years ago as an alternative to the traditional model of public schools. The current analysis examines the underlying structure and nature of charter schools, their perceived advantages and disadvantages, and whether the system is working effectively.

Barriers To Employment: A Substance Abuse Story, Ralph E. Mckinney

Faculty Research Day

Whilst prior research is available on substance abuse and resources have been allocated from various governmental agencies and private organizations, the effects of substance abuse issues continue to persist within Appalachia. A constant variable in mitigating recidivism in substance abuse is employment. Moreover, the economy and culture of Appalachia is distinctly different with limited research in the field having focused on these issues. The purpose of this study is to identify barriers (e.g., criminal convictions, financial resources, and jobseeker KSAO (Knowledge, Skills, Abilities and Other Characteristics)) in obtaining sustainable employment that individuals may experience as a result of an association …

Monetary Policy In China: A Factor Augmented Var Approach, Boniface Yemba, Biyan Tang, Erick Kitenge

Faculty Research Day

We use a Factor-Augmented VAR (FAVAR) model to investigate the effectiveness of monetary policy in China. As the Chinese economy is an open economy, our FAVAR model divides the macroeconomic variables into three groups. The first group contains measures of external shock to Chinese economy while others groups contain the measure of output and price. This approach allows factors to have an economic interpretation. We estimate our model with the maximum likelihood technique and that an increase in the change of money supply "Divisia M2"has substantial and direct impact on Chinese economic activity and inflation. Our results also find that …

Benefits And Constraints Of Telepsychiatry And Rural Healthcare In The United States And West Virginia, Alberto Coustasse

Faculty Research Day

About 60 million individuals, or 19.3% of the U.S population, lived in rural areas. Rural areas have encountered a higher than average shortage of mental health services, transportation, number of providers, poverty, and lack of insurance. The purpose of this research was to analyze the quality of care with the utilization of telemedicine in psychiatric care as well as its potential cost-saving benefits to both the payers and patients in the US and West Virginia. Tele psychiatric has been a successfully integrated program into psychiatric facilities reaching rural, prisons or city facilities based on that it has increased the volume …

A Promise-Ing Change? West Virginia’S Merit Aid Program And College Enrollment, Nabaneeta Biswas

Faculty Research Day

Merit-based aid is known to increase college attendance and completion. By altering the economic costs of higher education and providing incentives for academic excellence such programs increase the educational attainment of student populations. In a similar vein, West Virginia’s college scholarship program, PROMISE has been found to improve educational outcomes of college attendees and facilitate on-time degree completion among scholarship recipients. However, little is known about the scholarship’s impact on college-going rates. For a state with historically low rates of college attendance this is a pertinent question. This paper examines the effects of PROMISE on enrollments at post-secondary institutes. Using …

An Analysis Of Job Application Method Preference: Comparing Online And Traditional Recruitment Systems, Uyi Lawani

Faculty Research Day

The use of the internet has become pervasive in the recruitment process involving both hirers and job seekers. Prior to this era, firms relied on traditional methods for recruitment. Presently, organizations try to balance the combination of electronic hiring tools and various other traditional methods for recruitment but they differ in the extent to which they adopt a mix of these systems. While some can be found at the extremes, others situated in between have adopted hybrid forms that combine both methods in varying proportions. Candidates who are mainly the targets of these recruitment approaches are the consumers of what …

Foreign Aid Allocation And Conflict In Sub-Saharan Africa: A Spatial Analytical Approach, Yi Duan

Faculty Research Day

This project uses geographic information systems (GIS) skills to test the effect of foreign aid on conflict occurrences and fatalities at local level in Sub-Saharan Africa. Using lagged aid variables as the instruments for current aid, negative relationship between current aid and future conflict is detected. Aid is effective to deter conflict when conflict events happening in short period or particular types of conflict events are under way. Income per capita, with night lights per capita as proxy, has non-linear impacts on conflict occurrences. Foreign aid can alleviate conflict and help Sub-Saharan countries to jump out of the low-income-conflict trap.

Personal Health Records Interoperability, W. Kent Willis, Alberto Coustasse

Faculty Research Day

Implementation of Personal Health Record interoperability requires the adoption of national standards. These standards have been driven by regulation. The Center for Information Technology Leadership (CITL) estimates PHRs could result in an annual net value of nineteen-billion dollars. This is based on cost savings to healthcare providers and payers over a ten-year implementation period with an 80% U.S. adoption rate.

Paying It Forward: Who Does This?, Elizabeth C. Alexander, Charles Braun

Faculty Research Day

Paying it forward experiences sometimes make the news when an exceptionally long line of drive through customers decide to utilize upstream reciprocity, aka Pay It Forward (PIF), as in an example from December of 2012 at the Tim Horton’s in Winnipeg when 226 customers each individually paid for the order of the customer behind them in line (Tsvetkova and Macy 2014). But in most cases, the experience involves far fewer customers and is much less newsworthy. Nevertheless, paying it forward is a phenomenon that warrants investigating to understand the moti vations and attributes that contribute to the activity, possibly to …

Sustainability & Entrepreneurship Manufacturing In Distressed West Virginia Counties, Margie J. Phillips

Faculty Research Day

This project will identify and define the economic challenges faced by distressed counties in West Virginia regarding sustainable and entrepreneurship manufacturing. In addition, one historic model will be examined as to their successes and past challenges.Large scale manufacturing, once a mainstay in the state’s economy has been and is on a steady decline in West Virginia. Even when manufacturing was a viable component of the state’s economy, it was concentrated, for the most part in populated areas. Rural areas, lacking the necessary infrastructure for robust manufacturing, was stuck in a perpetual distressed condition with only the production of coal as …

Real-Time Nowcasting Of Short-Run Of The Euro-Dollar Exchange Rate With Economic Fundamentals: Does The Measure Of Money Supply Matter?, Boniface Yemba, Michael Otunuga

Faculty Research Day

This paper proposes a fundamental-monetary-based econometric model with mixed frequency data to now caste the Euro-Dollar short run exchange rate. We use the exact amount of information that are available to researchers or police makers at the time of prediction of exchange rate. The spot exchange rate information are available at week basis while other macroeconomic data like money supply, in action, industrial production, and interest rate are available at monthly basis. Since the monetary model consists of stable money demand functions (Bianco, 2012), not all the measure of money supply guaranties a stable money demand. Barnett (1978, 1980) has …

An Analysis Of The Sale Of Contracts By The Athletics After The 1914 Season, Jeffrey Archambault, Marie E. Archambault

Faculty Research Day

The Philadelphia Athletics lost the 1914 World Series to the Boston Braves, being swept in four games. The Athletics had been favored to win the Series over the Braves, who had been in last place as late as the Fourth of July. After the season, Connie Mack, the owner/manager, sold many of the best players for the Athletics. The sale of athletes is often attributed to financial pressures caused by the Federal League, which hired several star players at relatively high salaries and began play in 1914. Perhaps the sales were part of an effort to rebuild the team after …

Conditional Cash Transfer And Girl Child Survival In India, Nabaneeta Biswas

Faculty Research Day

This paper examines the impact of a conditional cash transfer (CCT) program on girls’ early childhood survival in India. With a view to improve sex ratios and alleviate the status of girls, the Government of India launched the Dhan Lakshmi financial incentive scheme in 2008 in select districts of seven states. The program offers financial benefits to parents for raising daughters. Using district-level data from a large household survey, we analyze the program’s effect on sex ratios in the state of Punjab, which reports one of the most skewed sex ratios in the country. Results indicate a positive impact of …

Gis Application In Economic Analyses: Using Aid Effectiveness In Sub-Saharan Africa As An Example, Yi Duan

Faculty Research Day

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) techniques provide invaluable tools in analyzing spatial patterns in economics. Different selections of spatial data layers enable spatial analyses for specific projects or tasks. Using a project on foreign aid effectiveness in sub-Saharan Africa as an example, this presentation shows that detailed aid effectiveness patterns at local level can be revealed using the cutting-edge GIS techniques and spatial analytic skills, which were largely neglected by the previous literature of aid effectiveness at country level. Overcoming the “aggregation bias”, this project finds that aid targeted at local level tends to promote local economic growth, while aid targeted …

Using Omnichannel Sales Data Analytics To Decide Between Store And Distribution Center Fulfillment Options, Jingran Zhang, Sanchoy Das

Faculty Research Day

A brick-and-mortar retailer can fulfill online customer orders in two ways (i) Buy Online Fulfill from Store (BOFS) - Picked from store inventory, and (ii) Fulfill from Distribution Center (FDC) - Picked from DC or warehouse inventory. The fulfillment decision is made in real time for each order, with the primary goal of maximizing the revenue value of the store inventory. Analysis of sales data in both online and store channels is used to forecast the value of the dispersed inventory, and then develop a prescriptive model for making a fulfillment decision.

Changes In Business Core & Accounting Course Requirements: Aacsb Influences, Marie Archambault, Jeffrey Archambault, Jean Price

Faculty Research Day

This study explores the business core requirements and accounting program requirements of universities accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business International (AACSB) and those without such accreditation during both 1996/97 and 2012/13 academic years. The sample of 50 universities consists of 25 with AACSB accreditation and 25 without AACSB accreditation during the 1996/97 academic year. Differences are examined in the courses and credit hours required in various courses between the two types of universities as well as changes in these programs between the two time periods. The changes that have occurred between 1996/97 and 2012/13 are compared …

Does An Information Technology Investment Contribute To Company Performance: A Further Examination Of The Productivity Paradox, Marc Sollosy, Rick Weible

Faculty Research Day

This article continues the discussion examining IT’s contribution on firm performance. Byrnjolfsson (1993) identified what is known as the “productivity paradox” and posited a number of reasons for it. Carr (2003) added fuel by suggesting IT is ubiquitous and provides no significant firm advantage. This study does identify that industry type and size matters. Utilizing the position of CIO, or similar, as a proxy for IT emphasis, the study finds that non-IT intensive organizations, with annual sales less than $101 million do achieve performance advantages over firms without an IT emphasis. The implication being that the debate is far from …

Implications Of Upcoding On Medicare Fraud, Alberto Coustasse, Katrina Cremeans, Carli Followay, Jessica Oldaker

Faculty Research Day

The complexity of and quantity of funds involved in Medicare reimbursements have led to a significant increase in the number of Medicare fraud. A particular kind of Medicare fraud, upcoding, has contributed to excessive and avoidable health care spending. Upcoding has been an illegal tactic that some providers have used to increase their Medicare reimbursement for specific medical conditions. This is accomplished by coding a provided service as a more expensive service than what was performed. With the proliferation of upcoding, there has been an unprecedented $12.5 billion in fraudulent Medicare charges. While solving the problem of upcoding will not …