Business Commons^™

The Camera Eats First: What Foodstagramming Reveals About Personal Behavior, Xiaoxiao Fu

Rosen Research Review

Some chefs may try to ban it, but 'foodstagramming'—diners taking photographs of food to post on social media—is a valuable tool that can boost both restaurants' and diners' public image. That's the conclusion of new research led by UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management's Associate Professor Xiaoxiao Fu. The study takes a psychological perspective and finds that foodstagramming helps both individuals' self-efficacy—the belief that if individuals act in specific ways they can achieve certain goals—and provides opportunities for restaurants to promote their businesses in new and exciting ways.

Retaining Staff: Is It A Matter Of Instilling Pride?, Murat Hancer, Suja Chaulagain

Rosen Research Review

Hotels struggle to attract staff; you can partly blame the public perception of hotel jobs for that. But, why is it difficult to retain staff once they start? Perhaps an answer lies in whether they feel pride in what they do. Professors Murat Hancer and Suja Chaulagain at UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management led a team of researchers to unpack the notion of pride among hotel staff in the United States and Vietnam. What they learned has significant importance for a sector that crosses cultures.

Whats On The Menu, Exhibit Brochure, Judy Kuhns

Rosen Library Exhibits

On display: August - December 2023
Featured items: Menus and books from the Rosen Library Collection. Primary Curator: Judy Kuhns

See more items from this exhibit

Beyond Local Food Consumption: The Impact Of Local Food Consumption Experience On Cultural Competence, Eudaimonia And Behavioral Intention, Bingna Lin, Saerom Wang, Xiaoxiao Fu, Xiaoli Yi

Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Purpose: This paper aims to explore the relationships among local food consumption experience, cultural competence, eudaimonia, and behavioral intention. Building upon acculturation theory, need hierarchy theory and self-determination theory, the current study develops a conceptual model of local food consumption as international tourists' acculturation process.

Design/methodology/approach: This study collects data from 305 Chinese outbound tourists and uses partial least squares-structural equation modeling to examine the developed model.

Findings: The findings reveal a significant effect of the local food consumption experience, consisting of novel, authentic, sensory and social dimensions, on cultural competence, which subsequently evokes eudaimonia and behavioral response toward local …

Hungry For Food And Community: A Study Of Visitors To Food And Wine Festivals, Mohammed Lefrid, Edwin N. Torres

Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

The present study explored the effects of various food and wine festival experience elements (e.g. authenticity, entertainment, and spending time with others) on visitors' sense of community, identification, and place attachment. The authors conducted survey research with 304 former visitors to food festivals. Data were analyzed using partial least square – structural equation modeling. Results revealed that food and wine festival experience elements (e.g. authenticity, entertainment, and spending time with friends and family) positively influenced visitors' sense of community, identification with the event, and attachment to the hosting destination. Significant findings relating to the mediating effect of sense of community …

Cleaning Invisible Matter In Open-Kitchen Restaurants To Reduce The Impact Of Covid-19, Bendegul Okumus

Rosen Research Review

Commercial cooking in indoor settings is known to produce particulate matter, a mixture of solid particles and liquid droplets which can cause acute or chronic respiratory problems. Recent studies suggest that these invisible particles also make people more susceptible to adverse health effects of the COVID-19 virus. Dr. Bendegul Okumus was joined by a team and conducted an experimental scientific study in an open-kitchen chain restaurant to determine whether the levels of particulate matter (PM) pollution were potentially harmful for both kitchen staff and customers dining at the restaurant.

Risk Perceptions And Motivations Around Restaurant Dining During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Elizabeth Yost

Rosen Research Review

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused devastating financial decline within the restaurant industry. Dr. Elizabeth Yost from UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management and her collaborator have undertaken research to understand what motivates customers in this unchartered landscape. They have developed a new theoretical model which focuses on the impact of customer risk perceptions and optimistic bias. Other influencers are personality traits and factors such as customer loyalty and trust, which Dr. Yost argues can be maintained through transparency of information.

A Taste For Education And Research, Susan Vernon-Devlin, Robert Seltzer

Rosen Research Review

Pots, pans and commercial kitchen equipment are not the only things found in UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management’s kitchen labs. A component for hospitality education and research, the college’s labs teach fourth year medical students to practice culinary medicine with a grain of salt, flip the kegs on undergraduates brewing beer, and serve as taste-and-test kitchens for restaurant brands looking to spice up a menu.

Turning The Tables On Covid-19, Wei Wei

Rosen Research Review

The COVID-19 pandemic all but eviscerated the restaurant industry. Around the world, businesses shut doors. For some this would prove to be forever, and those that did reopen were stifled by strict social-distancing regulations and the challenge of how best to rearrange their servicescapes to meet regulations and still provide an enjoyable dining experience. The big question: how best to do this? Dr. Wei Wei from UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management and her collaborators examined the issues of built density and customer power to uncover a vital piece of the puzzle.

Restaurants Post Covid-19, Elizabeth Yost, Murat Kizildag, Jorge Ridderstaat

Rosen Research Review

When you’re suddenly forced to close 1,800 restaurant dining rooms without any certainty of being able to reopen them any time soon, you need to act decisively and prioritize if you plan to be around for a grand reopening. For Darden Restaurants and their market-leading US brands, those priorities during lockdown were ‘look after the people – look after the cash!’ Dr. Elizabeth Yost, Dr. Murat Kizildag and Dr. Jorge Ridderstaat of UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management investigate the company’s achievement.

The Impact Of Covid-19 On Restaurant Workers, Diego Bufquin, Jeong-Yeol Park, Robin Back

Rosen Research Review

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit many business sectors hard, none more so than the hospitality industry. Restaurant employees were already known to report high levels of depression and anxiety, as well as alcohol and drug use. How has the pandemic contributed to these problems? In the first study of its kind, Dr. Diego Bufquin, Dr. Jeong-Yeol Park and Dr. Robin Back from UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management, along with two collaborators, examine the relationships between restaurant employees’ work status, mental health, substance use, and career turnover intentions during the pandemic.

Investigating Restaurant Worker Well-Being In The Context Of The Covid-19 Pandemic: Occupational Stress And The Role Of Workplace Support In Retention And Career-Change Intentions., Craig Rapp

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-

Health and well-being have become one of the most important topics in organizational research. The Covid-19 pandemic has compounded the stress levels in all sectors across the world. The current environment has created unprecedented levels of employee turnover, in what economist have been calling the "Great Resignation," where individuals are not only quitting but are questioning their career choice and choosing to leave their profession altogether. This research utilized Conservation of Research (COR) theory and the Buffer Hypothesis (the notion that social support protects individuals from the negative impacts of workplace stress) to investigate occupational stress and well-being (i.e., burnout …

Darden Restaurants: The Role Of College Education In The Hospitality Industry, Rick Cardenas, Elizabeth Yost

Rosen Research Review

Rick Cardenas' first job was waiting tables at his local Red Lobster restaurant. Now he is Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Darden Restaurants, which owns and operates more than 1,700 restaurants under brands including Olive Garden, LongHorn Steakhouse, and Cheddar's Scratch Kitchen. Here, he explains to Rosen College's Elizabeth Yost how his own career developed and discusses the importance of a college education in the hospitality industry.

How Drinking Vessels Influence Customer Taste Perceptions, Marissa Orlowski

Rosen Research Review

First impressions count and it takes just a fraction of a second for us to decide whether we like someone when we meet them for the first time. With a collaborator, Rosen College of Hospitality Management's Dr. Marissa Orlowski is looking at how similar perceptions can be made about products and what implications this has for the food and beverage sector. They have discovered that the kind of vessel in which drinks are served affects both people's taste perceptions and their willingness to pay.

A New Model To Help Prevent Foodborne Disease, Sergio Alvarez

Rosen Research Review

Shellfish, such as oysters, are a well-known source of foodborne diseases. A bacterium called Vibrio vulnificus, commonly found in shellfish, can cause particularly severe illness. Unfortunately, regulations aimed at improving food safety also have the potential to damage the fragile economic status of small coastal communities that depend on oyster harvesting. Rosen College of Hospitality Management's Dr. Sergio Alvarez has led the development of a new bioeconomic model that has the potential to help improve food safety while minimizing economic harm.

Florida's Food Truck Industry: Tackling The Food Safety Challenges And Health Risks, Bendegul Okumus, Sevil Sonmez

Rosen Research Review

Street food is a popular part of daily life, with a vast variety of vendors and food trucks around the world. It is easily available and well-known foods contribute to the local economy. Despite these strengths, many cultures don't highly regard street food. In particular, it's often perceived as unhygienic compared to restaurant food. These concerns around standards are indeed upheld by research in some countries. Researchers Dr. Bendegul Okumus and UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management and Dr. Sevil Sonmez at UCF College of Business analyze the inspection challenges street food faces and review the gaps between food safety …

A Comparison Of Self-Service Technologies (Ssts) In The U.S. Restaurant Industry: An Evaluation Of Consumer Perceived Value, Satisfaction, And Behavioral Intentions, Motaz Zaitouni

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Innovation in technology has been growing rapidly in recent years. Many restaurants have been utilizing different types of self-service technologies (SSTs) to enhance their operations and customer satisfaction. Despite, the rapid spread of SSTs in the restaurant industry, very limited empirical research has been conducted to evaluate the influence of SSTs type on customer dining experience. Therefore, the purpose of this dissertation was to examine the SSTs values that influence restaurant customers' satisfaction and their decision to continue to reuse SSTs. More specifically, this study utilized the Theory of Consumption Values (TCV) to examine consumers' perception of the SST values …

The Effect Of Brand Diversification And Systematic Risk On Firm Shareholder Wealth: The Case Of Brinker International, Inc., Abdullah Makki

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Divestiture activity within the restaurant industry has increased in the last twenty years, however there is a dearth of research investigating the subsequent effects of the phenomenon. In particular none of the studies in the literature, have specifically examined the effects of restaurant firms' brand diversification strategies and systematic risk on shareholder wealth when controlling for divestiture completions. This research extends the knowledge from previous work on corporate unbundling and brand diversification strategies to the unique restaurant industry. Drawing on agency theory, the long- and short-term effects of the resulting brand diversification levels on firm shareholder wealth following a divestiture …

Why Do Restaurants Fail? Part Iii: An Analysis Of Macro And Micro Factors, H.G. Parsa, Amy Gregory, Michael "Doc" Terry

Dick Pope Sr. Institute Publications

Restaurants are a significant part of American life. According to the National Restaurant Association (2009), total revenues for the restaurant industry exceed $580 billion with nearly 1,000,000 operating restaurants in the US; providing jobs for over 13 million people. The sizeable economic impact of the restaurant industry can be measured by the 4% contribution it makes to the Gross Domestic Product in the United States. In addition, the restaurant industry has been expanding at a steady rate of 2 to 4 % over the past three decades. In 2009, despite the economic downturn, the restaurant industry grew by 2.5% (NRA, …

Restaurant Ownership Made Easy: Four Fast Franchises, Exhibit Brochure, Tanya Jo Ormseth

Rosen Library Exhibits

No abstract provided.

Inside The World Of Celebrity Chefs, Exhibit Brochure, Deb Ebster, Tanya Jo Ormseth

Rosen Library Exhibits

No abstract provided.

Orlando's Historic Restaurants, Exhibit Brochure, Tanya Jo Ormseth, Gina Rippens

Rosen Library Exhibits

No abstract provided.

An Evaluation Of The Orientation And Training Programs Of A Fast Food Franchise, Cheryl M. Donahey

Retrospective Theses and Dissertations

Very few attempts have been made to adequately evaluate training programs. The research reported here is an attempt to evaluate the effects of the revised orientation and training programs of a fast food franchise. Subjects consisted of 676 hourly employees of a Central Florida fast food franchise who completed questionnaires soliciting measures of the following perceptions: managements' consideration and structure levels and the effectiveness of the revised orientation and training programs. Modest support was found for the prediction that the revised programs would increase the employees' perception of managements' consideration. No evidence was found to support the hypotheses that employees …