Business Commons^™

History Of Accreditation: Coaprt Model, Marcia Jean Carter, Ramon Zabriskie, Lynn Anderson, Maridith Janssen

Faculty Publications

Accreditation in therapeutic recreation began with undergraduate competencies identified in 1975 through the Council on Accreditation ( COA) sponsorship by the National Recreation and Park Association. This article chronicles the adjustments in these original standards. Accreditation criteria are at the heart of defining entry-level professional competencies in the profession of therapeutic recreation while also being used as quality indicators of academic programs. Therapeutic recreation was the first specialization recognized by the Council on Accreditation of Parks, Recreation, Tourism and Related Professions [(COAPRT) formerly COA] during the 1970s. In the 1980s and 1990s, while undergoing enhancements and expansion, controversy arose over …

Working For A Higher Purpose: A Theoretical Framework For Commitment To Organization-Sponsored Causes, John B. Bingham, Bret W. Mitchell, Derron G. Bishop, Natalie J. Allen

Faculty Publications

We explicate the theoretical foundations of employee commitment to organization-sponsored causes—voluntary, socially responsible practices or programs espoused by an organization—as targets of employee commitment. Although scholarly interest in organization-sponsored causes is increasing, little is understood about the mechanisms for employee involvement in organization-sponsored causes, since the motives and context for participation may differ significantly from participation in such causes outside of work. We propose that commitment to organization-sponsored causes can be conceptualized in terms of affective and normative mindsets and suggest that these mindsets, both separately and in combination, influence employees' behavioral support for the cause. We also draw upon …

Testimonials Do Not Convert Patients From Brand To Generic Medication, John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian, Gwendolyn Reynolds

Faculty Publications

Objectives—To assess whether the addition of a peer testimonial to an informational mailing increases conversion rates from brand-name prescription medications to lower-cost therapeutic equivalents, and whether the testimonial’s efficacy increases when information is added about an affiliation the quoted individual shares with the recipient.

Research Design and Methods—5,498 union members were randomly assigned to receive one of three different informational letters: one without a testimonial (No Testimonial Group), one with a testimonial from a person whose shared union affiliation with the recipient was not disclosed (Unaffiliated Testimonial Group), and one with a testimonial from a person whose shared union affiliation …

Analysis Of Reits And Reit Etfs Cointegration During The Flash Crash., Stoyu Ivanov

Faculty Publications

In this study I revisit the “disintegration hypothesis” of financial assets around a major crisis event. I examine whether the Vanguard Real Estate Investment Trust and iShares Dow Jones US Real Estate Index Fund exchange traded funds disintegrate from the ten largest Real Estate Investment Trusts during the 14:45 Flash Crash on May 6, 2010. I find that six of the ten largest REITs are not cointegrated with the Vanguard Real Estate Investment Trust prior to the Flash Crash and that five of the ten largest REITs are not cointegrated with iShares Dow Jones US Real Estate Index Fund prior …

Analysis Of The Effects Of Pre-Announcement Of S&P 500 Index Changes., Stoyu Ivanov

Faculty Publications

In this study we attempt to answer the question – does the start of pre-announcing of S&P 500 index changes in October 1989 have an effect on the trading pattern of added or deleted firms? We document that prior to October 1989 the excess returns of added or deleted firms follow a white noise process around the event, whereas after the start of pre-announcing the excess returns can be described as nonstationary. This indicates significant excess profits to be captured around the addition or deletion event after S&P started pre-announcing changes in October 1989 but not prior to that date.

Matching Contributions And Saving Outcomes: A Behavioral Economics Perspective, Brigitte C. Madrian

Faculty Publications

Including a matching contribution increases savings plan participation and contributions, although the impact is less significant than the impact of nonfinancial approaches. Conditional on participation, a higher match rate has only a small effect on savings plan contributions. In contrast, the match threshold has a substantial impact, probably because it serves as a natural reference point when individuals are deciding how much to save and may be viewed as advice from the savings program sponsor on how much to save. Other behavioral approaches to changing savings plan outcomes—including automatic enrollment, simplification, planning aids, reminders, and commitment features—potentially have a much …

Looking Good By Doing Good: The Antecendents And Consequences Of Stakeholder Attention To Corporate Social Performance, Peter M. Madsen, Zachariah J. Rodgers

Faculty Publications

Stakeholder theory suggests a relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate financial performance (CFP) because certain stakeholders reward certain types of CSR. This argument assumes that stakeholders attend to firms’ CSR activities—an assumption that has yet to be examined. We fill this gap by extending stakeholder theory to the context of stakeholder attention to firm CSR and exploring the antecedents and consequences of stakeholder attention to corporate disaster relief CSR. We test the resulting hypotheses on a sample of public companies that engaged in natural disaster relief efforts, finding that stakeholder attention partially mediated the relationship between disaster relief …

Acquirer Valuation And Acquisition Decisions: Identifying Mispricing Using Short Interest, Itzhak Ben-David, Michael S. Drake, Darren T. Roulstone

Faculty Publications

We use short interest as an investor-based measure of over/undervaluation that distinguishes between the misvaluation and Q-theories of mergers. Using this measure, we find that misvaluation is a strong determinant of merger decision making. Firms in the top quintile of short interest are 54% more likely to engage in stock acquisitions and 22% less likely to engage in cash acquisitions. Stock (but not cash) acquirers have higher short interest than their targets. Overall, our results suggest that the previously documented underperformance of stock acquirers and the overperformance of cash acquirers can be explained by misvaluation, as captured by short interest.

Breaking Out Of The Design Science Box: High-Value Impact Through Multidisciplinary Design Science Programs Of Research, Jay F. Nunamaker Jr., Nathan W. Twyman, Justin Scott Giboney

Faculty Publications

Conducting research that will make an impact is a difficult challenge for any research discipline. Information Systems is no exception, and there is much discussion on how to increase the level of real-world impact of our research. This paper details a framework for generating high-impact research through a DSR-driven program of research. The framework rests on the propositions that as opposed to individual or ad-hoc team-driven approaches, increased impact is more likely to be realized by 1) sustained collaborative research programs that 2) employ multiple research methods to 3) shepherd concepts from the ideation stage all the way to realized, …

Revenge Of The Steamroller: Abcp As A Window On Risk Choices, Carlos Arteta, Mark Carey, Ricardo Correa, Jason Kotter

Faculty Publications

We empirically examine financial institutions’ motivations to take systematic bad-tail risk in the form of sponsorship of credit-arbitrage asset-backed commercial paper vehicles. A run on debt issued by such vehicles played a key role in causing and propagating the liquidity crisis that began in the summer of 2007. We find evidence consistent with important roles for both ownermanager agency problems and government-induced distortions, especially government control or ownership of banks.

What, I Shouldn’T Have Done That?: The Influence Of Training And Just-In-Time Reminders On Secure Behavior, Jeffrey L. Jenkins, Alexandra Durcikova

Faculty Publications

Organizations often implement Security Education, Training, and Awareness (SETA) programs to help improve secure behavior. SETA programs can be multifaceted; however, organizations often take a “one-size-fits-all” approach to improve security, without understanding how different SETA components influence behavior. In this research, we explain how two common SETA program components—online training and reminders—influence behavior through discrete theoretical mechanisms. First, we hypothesize that online training influences behavior through improving beliefs and intentions. However, because of dual-task interference, the relationship between beliefs and intentions may be hindered. We then explain how just-in-time reminders can help overcome dual-task interference and influence behavior directly. We …

Urban American Indians: A Comparison Of Father Involvement Predictors Across Race, Jonathan Padilla, Peter Ward, Gordon E. Limb

Faculty Publications

Father involvement in families of urban American Indians has been a neglected area of research. In this study, the authors examined the associations among parental relationship quality, father involvement, and coresidence. The authors conducted a multiple group analysis through structural equation modeling comparing 107 American Indian fathers with fathers of the general population in the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study. Although the results were similar between groups, findings indicated two key differences for urban American Indians. First, emotional supportiveness had a stronger relationship with physically active engagement for American Indian fathers. Second, parental relationship quality had greater total standardized …

Satisfaction With Family Life Scale, Ramon B. Zabriskie, Peter J. Ward

Faculty Publications

We wanted to present validity and reliability data for the Satisfaction With Family Life (SWFL) scale. This instrument has been successfully used in a variety of family samples and offers a brief, widely applicable tool to measure satisfaction with family life. The SWFL scale, modeled after the Satisfaction With Life scale, was designed to assess an individual’s global judgment of family satisfaction, which is theoretically predicted to depend on a comparison of family life circumstances with one’s own standards and expectations. The scale consists of five items on a Likert-type scale. Data were collected from parents and adolescents in 15 …

Who Says There Is A High Consensus Among Analysts When Market Uncertainty Is High? Some New Evidence From The Commercial Real Estate Market, James D. Shilling, C. F. Sirmans, Barrett A. Slade

Faculty Publications

This paper seeks to determine whether analyst consensus is a function of the level of price informativeness, and therefore attempts to gauge the extent to which analyst consensus is high when market uncertainty is high. There is the view that a small or declining volume of trading implies less information and lower quality information, and that a lower level of price informativeness will lead analysts to put more weight on their private information at the time of forecasting. We add to this view the notion that when uncertainty is high there might be a positive option value of waiting. In …

Planning Prompts As A Means Of Increasing Rates Of Immunization And Preventive Screening, Hengchen Dai, Katherine L. Milkman, John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian

Faculty Publications

Building on psychological insights about the way people make decisions, behavioral scientists have proposed various methods to increase behaviors that promote welfare without limiting freedom of choice (Thaler & Sunstein, 2008). Recently, researchers have begun exploring the power of such methods for encouraging people to engage in beneficial health-related behaviors, particularly those that are often put off or forgotten (Loewenstein, Brennan, & Volpp, 2007). For example, motivated by evidence of substantial inertia at the status quo, researchers have demonstrated that if people are automatically assigned an appointment to receive a flu shot (while retaining the right to change or cancel …

Book Review Of Management: A Faith-Based Perspective, By Michael E. Cafferky, Annetta M. Gibson, Charles H. Tidwell Jr.

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Towards An Understanding Of The Role Of Standard Setters In Standard Setting, Abigail Allen, Karthik Ramanna

Faculty Publications

We investigate the effect of standard setters in standard setting. We examine how  certain professional and political characteristics of FASB members and SEC commissioners predict the accounting ‘‘reliability’’ and ‘‘relevance’’ of proposed standards. Notably, we find FASB members with backgrounds in financial services are more likely to propose standards that decrease ‘‘reliability’’ and increase ‘‘relevance,’’ partly due to their tendency to propose fair-value methods. We find opposite results for FASB members affiliated with the Democratic Party, although only when excluding financial services background as an independent variable. Jackknife procedures show that results are robust to omitting any individual standard setter.

Is China’S Outward Investment In Oil A Global Security Concern?, Ilan Alon, Aleh Cherp

Faculty Publications

The dramatic increase in investment by Chinese SOEs in overseas oil assets is primarily driven by energy security concerns. Whether such investment will benefit or harm energy security of other countries is hotly contested. On one hand, this investment can supplement the overall lack of investment in the sector, benefiting all consumers. On the other hand, it may exacerbate environmental and political problems associated with fossil fuels.

The Oral Presentation: Enhancing The Experience In An Online Business Communication Course, Marsha L. Bayless, Judith L. Biss, Betty S. Johnson

Faculty Publications

This study addressed student and faculty experiences in using a commercially available website to facilitate the delivery and evaluation of student presentations in the online business communication course. Of the students enrolled in online business communication, 75 students participated in the study by sharing their perceptions of the effectiveness of the oral presentation process. Additionally, their faculty members assessed the process from the instructor’s perspective. The findings and conclusion revealed that the process provided useful student feedback and was more effective than pedagogical methods tried before.

Look! Up In Cyberspace! Is It Web 2.0? Is It Web 3.0? No! It’S Superweb – Technologies For The Classroom!, Susan Evans Jennings, M. Gail Weatherly

Faculty Publications

Using the familiar Bloom‟s Taxonomy pyramid, traditionally applied in educational learning objectives, can be useful in helping to choose the right technology to assist in reaching the desired educational outcomes. Many Web technologies provide free or low-cost teaching tools. Some of the many options available for the computer are provided here along with lesson ideas to incorporate these tools into the learning environment.

Benefits And Barriers In Mining The Healthcare Industry Data, John Wang, Bin Zhou, Ruiliang Yan

Faculty Publications

The authors’ paper addresses the applications of data mining within the healthcare industry. Healthcare data are seen as one of the more rewarding and most difficult of all data to analyze. Proper data mining techniques provide the methodology and technology to transform the voluminous amounts of data into useful information for decision making. Data mining can be utilized to help find cures for existing diseases, uncovering patterns for genetic diseases and the causes of new diseases across the globe. By implementing data mining techniques the industry is finally gaining control over the inadequacy of readily available records. Data mining has …

The Globalisation Of Chinese Capital, Ilan Alon

Faculty Publications

The globalisation of Chinese capital will be one of the hallmarks of 21st-century economics, shaping debates over state capitalism, ‘free’ markets and international institutions. China internationalised its product markets and upgraded its manufacturing prowess towards the end of the 20th century by allowing inward foreign direct investment (FDI) and by promoting export trade. This was supported in part by cheap labour, and resulted in growing trade surpluses with key trading partners—particularly the US. Outward FDI was discouraged in order to preserve foreign reserves, and together these policies have helped China accumulate significant amounts of capital, now making it a multi-trillion …

The Impact Of Corruption On Firm Tax Compliance In Transition Economies: Whom Do You Trust?, Anna Alon, Amy M. Hageman

Faculty Publications

Tax compliance is an important issue for governments and the public alike. To meet public needs and fund public mandates, firms around the world are expected to comply with tax laws. Factors that are related to organizational (firm) tax compliance have not been sufficiently examined in the literature. Due to the increasing global influence of transition economies, factors associated with firm tax compliance in transition economies are particularly of interest. Based on a sample of over 5,000 firms from 22 former Soviet Bloc transition economies, we find that higher levels of corruption and higher levels of particularized trust (reliance on …

Using Partial Least Squares In Operations Management Research: A Practical Guideline And Summary Of Past Research, David Xiaosong Peng, Fujun Lai

Faculty Publications

The partial least squares (PLS) approach to structural equation modeling (SEM) has been widely adopted in business research fields such as information systems, consumer behavior, and marketing. The use of PLS in the field of operations management is also growing. However, questions still exist among some operations management researchers regarding whether and how PLS should be used. To address these questions, our study provides a practical guideline for using PLS and uses examples from the operations management literature to demonstrate how the specific points in this guideline can be applied. In addition, our study reviews and summarizes the use of …

Disgruntled Employee Retaliation: Does The Employer Have Responsibility?, Robert C. Schwab, Susan M. Taylor

Faculty Publications

CASE DESCRIPTION: This short case focuses on harassment and intimidation problems faced by a manager and his family shortly after an employee has been terminated. Whether the departed employee is the intimidator, whether the employer is obligated to investigate and get involved in the matter, and which options or possible actions the manager and his family can take are the key issues in the case. The case has a difficulty level of four, and is best-suited for use in junior or senior undergraduate-level courses in human resource management or employment law. This case can be presented and discussed in about …

Disgruntled Employee Retaliation: Does The Employer Have Responsibility?, Robert C. Schwab, Susan M. Taylor

Faculty Publications

CASE DESCRIPTION: This short case focuses on harassment and intimidation problems faced by a manager and his family shortly after an employee has been terminated. Whether the departed employee is the intimidator, whether the employer is obligated to investigate and get involved in the matter, and which options or possible actions the manager and his family can take are the key issues in the case. The case has a difficulty level of four, and is best-suited for use in junior or senior undergraduate-level courses in human resource management or employment law. This case can be presented and discussed in about …

Regional Differences In Preferences For Managerial Leader Behavior In China, Romie F. Littrell, Ilan Alon, Ka Wai Chan

Faculty Publications

This study demonstrates the complexities of analyzing determinants of cultural differences between and within national cultures. Ralston, Yu, Wang, Terpstra, and He (1996) investigated geographic regional differences in values in China, finding significant differences among the regions. This study investigates geographic regional differences in preferred managerial leader behavior in four provinces. In 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2005 the Leadership Behavior Description Questionnaire XII (LBDQ XII) was administered to people working in business organization in Zhengzhou City, Henan Province; Suzhou City, Jiangsu Province; Guangzhou City, Guangdong Province; and in the Macau Special Administrative Region, in the Peoples’ Republic of China. Significant …

Amphibious Entrepreneurs And The Emergence Of Organizational Forms, Walter W. Powell, Kurt Sandholtz

Faculty Publications

We study the emergence of organizational forms, focusing on two mechanisms—reconfiguration and transposition—that distinguish the founding models of the first 26 biotechnology companies, all created in the industry's first decade, from 1972 to 1981. We analyze rich archival data using hierarchical cluster analysis, revealing four organizational variants of the dedicated biotech firm (DBF). Three were products of reconfiguration, as executives from Big Pharma used past practices to incorporate new science. One DBF variant resulted from 'amphibious' scientists who imported organizing ideas from the academy into their VC-funded start-ups. We argue that such transpositions are fragile, yet charged with generative possibilities. …

Examining The Determinants Of Hotel Chain Expansion Through International Franchising, Ilan Alon, Liqiang Ni, Youcheng Wang

Faculty Publications

This study proposes and tests an agency-based organizational model of internationalization through franchising in the hotel sector. Using data obtained from a Franchisor Questionnaire 2001-2008, we analyzed a panel of 117 observations of 17 U.S.-based hotels. Our analysis reveals that a hotel franchisor’s decision to internationalize through franchising is positively related to the percentage of franchises, the ratio of franchised units to the total number of units. The article contributes to the literature by empirically modeling international franchising of hotels, which present unique characteristics among franchising companies, with a high investment capital requirement, maturity in the product life cycle, and …

Macroeconomic Prospects For China’S Outward Fdi, Ilan Alon, Tanya Molodtsova, Jian Zhang

Faculty Publications

This article presents evidence from panel data on overseas foreign direct investment (OFDI) by Chinese firms in 103 countries during 2003-2007. The data suggest that Chinese imports, unlike Chinese exports, stimulate investment in the country of origin. This article supports the theory that Chinese investment abroad is horizontal and designed to serve the Chinese local market (import platform investment). Estimates suggest that a 1% change in imports from China will lead to a 0.15% change in Chinese OFDI. We also find that an appreciation of the Chinese exchange rate will have a strong influence on firm entry decisions.