Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Using Occupant-Centric Control For Commercial Hvac Systems, Burak Gunay, Zoltan Nagy, Clayton Miller, Mohamed Ouf, Bing Dong

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

Occupant-centric controls (OCC) are defined in a new position paper1 as an indoor climate control approach whereby occupancy and occupant comfort information are used in the sequences of operation of building energy systems. In addition to basic OCC techniques that have been adopted by building codes,2,3 more advanced algorithms have been implemented to reduce energy use and cost and to improve occupant comfort and indoor environmental quality (IEQ). Commercial solutions tailored for OCC applications also have begun to emerge. This article categorizes information available for OCC implementations into six information grades (IGs) formed by three levels for occupant data and …

What Is The Digital City?, Amit Midha, Archan Misra

Perspectives@SMU

Urban metropolises must adapt and evolve to address disruption and sustainability challenges

Myth Busted: Why Increased Diversity Doesn't Always Improve Performance, Richard Holden

Perspectives@SMU

Greater diversity doesn't necessarily equal better performance, and organisations still have to be mindful of how diversity is managed in order to improve performance, writes UNSW Business School's Richard Holden

The Changing Travel Habits Of Chinese Tourists, Singapore Management University

Perspectives@SMU

The pandemic has forced an evolution in the travelling habits of Chinese tourists and businesses must adapt and innovate or be left behind, says CUHK expert

On The Decomposability Of Fractional Allocations, Shurojit Chatterji, Peng Liu

SMU Economics and Statistics Working Paper Series

A common practice in dealing with the allocation of indivisible objects is to treat them as infinitely divisible and specify a fractional allocation, which is then implemented as a lottery on integer allocations that are feasible. The question we study is whether an arbitrary fractional allocation can be decomposed as a lottery on an arbitrary set of feasible integer allocations. The main result is a characterization of decomposable fractional allocations, that is obtained by transforming the decomposability problem into a maximum flow problem. We also provide a separate necessary condition for decomposability.

Three Essays On Empirical Asset Pricing, Xueying Bian

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

The dissertation consists of three essays on empirical asset pricing. The first chapter proposes a novel inter-firm link - similar employee satisfaction. Based on the employee satisfaction data on Glassdoor, the returns of similar employee satisfaction (SES) firms are documented to predict focal firm stock returns. A long-short portfolio sorted on the lagged returns of SES firms yields the Fama-French six-factor alpha of 135 bps per month. The observed predictability cannot be explained by risk-based arguments or subsumed by other known inter-firm momentums. According to the international tests, we observe stronger return predictability in countries with more flexible labor markets. …

Footprints Of A Winning Idea: Three Decades Of The Human Development Paradigm (1990-2019), Devin K. Joshi

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The rise and fall of international development paradigms has long captured the interest of scholars, but interpreting whether a paradigm is winning or losing depends largely on how we measure its success. In this research note, we contribute to this debate by assessing the influence of development paradigms via comparative bibliometric analysis. Focusing on the human development and capabilities approach (HDCA) promoted by the Human Development Reports (HDRs) of the United Nations, our analysis reveals how the HDCA has emerged to become an influential paradigm of development over the last three decades. As the HDCA has fared impressively well vis-à-vis …

Essays On Empirical Asset Pricing, Zilin Chen

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

The dissertation consists of three chapters on empirical asset pricing. The first chapter examines whether the cross-sectional variation in private subsidiaries’ information disclosure predicts the cross-sectional dispersion in future equity returns of public parent firms. Information disclosure on private subsidiaries is not mandatory for public firms in the U.S., and thus these subsidiaries could be a good choice for public firms to hide bad news. We construct a private subsidiaries’ information disclosure (PSID) measure and find that a value-weighted portfolio that longs stocks in the highest PSID quintile and shorts stocks in the lowest PSID quintile yields a Fama and …

Study On The Ideas For Developing M&A Funds In China In The Context Of Economic Transformation, Xiaoming Song

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

M & A fund is one category of private equity investment fund. In the past 25 years, private equity fund has grown into a considerable asset section. Since 2008, China's economy has experienced the pounding pain of structural transformation multiplied with other challenges, e.g. international economy’s lack of growth momentum, increased trade friction, aging population and so on. The trade friction between China and the United States has further exacerbated. Against this backdrop, from September 2018, there was a significant shift in the domestic central government’s economic policy, particularly the capital market policy, has undergone major changes with the repressed …

An Exploration Into Key Roles In Making Project-Based Learning Happen: Insights From A Case Study Of A University, Gary Pan, Poh Sun Seow, Shankararaman, Venky, Kevin Koh

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Purpose: One of the main obstacles facing project-based learning (PBL) adoption relates to a lack of understanding by teachers and students in the roles they are required to play in the learning process. This study aims to address this obstacle, so as to better promote regular adoption of PBL pedagogy in educational institutions. Design/methodology/approach: The strategy was to undertake an in-depth case study of PBL courses taught in UNI-X’s undergraduate curriculum. The case study approach is particularly appropriate for this exploratory study because it allows to capture the organizational dynamics of the phenomenon better and also its ability to explain …

A New Structuring Option For Funds: The Singapore Variable Capital Company, Vincent Ooi

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The Singapore Variable Capital Company (“VCC”) offers a new structuring option for funds. This article considers the features of the VCC in terms of structure, operational aspects and commercial considerations, against the backdrop of similar structures in the BVI and Labuan. It submits that, with statutory modifications, opportunities exist to use the VCC for insurance, captive insurance and family offices.

Rural China Under The Covid‐19 Pandemic: Differentiated Impacts, Rural–Urban Inequality And Agro‐Industrialization, Qian Forrest Zhang, Zhanping Hu

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

We use field data collected in a village in northern China to examine the impacts of the COVID‐19 pandemic on rural economy and livelihoods. The lockdown effectively protected the village from the pandemic, resulting in zero infection. The economic impacts were mostly negative but differentiated across economic sectors and livelihood strategies; some gained from the business opportunities arising from the pandemic. Wage loss for migrant workers was the most common negative impact but lasted less than 2 months. Overall, rural China has escaped the worst impacts of the pandemic found in other developing countries. We argue that the structure of …

The Intrinsic Values Of Confucian Democracy And Dewey's Pragmatist Method, Sor-Hoon Tan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Given the historical association of Confucianism, or rather the Ru school of thought, with autocratic government since the Han dynasty, one of the challenges for contemporary scholars of Confucianism is to interpret and reconstruct Confucianism to guard against authoritarian tendencies without surrendering its distinctive ethical-political vision. Confucianism is incompatible with the conventional understanding of democracy as liberal democracy best represented by the United States, focused on limiting government with checks and balances, prioritizing protection of the civil and political rights of individuals, regular elections of representatives in which partisan competition for power offers citizens very little real choice, and it …

Strong, Cohesive Leadership Must Emerge From Cabinet Rejig, Tan K. B. Eugene

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In a commentary, SMU Associate Professor of Law Eugene Tan opined that “a total of 13 ministries having new ministers in two Cabinet reshuffles within a span of nine months is significant” and “these significant moves underscore not only the urgency of leadership renewal and succession, but also the need for certainty and confidence as Singapore transitions to the 4G leadership which will coincide with the post-Covid era”. He highlighted the need for a strong, cohesive leadership to emerge from the Cabinet reshuffle amid these exceptional times, as he believes that “a leadership that can galvanise the people will enable …

Enhancing Cultural Intelligence And Digital Literacy In Accounting Education: Insights From A University’S Global Student Consulting Programme, Clarence Goh, Yuanto Kusnadi, Gary Pan, Poh Sun Seow

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Recent literature has advocated for the use of project based learning to engage students in active learning. This study examines how students’ learning of cultural intelligence and digital literacy are enhanced through an overseas project-based learning (PBL) programme at a Singapore University (UNIS), called the UNIS-XO pedagogy. Specifically, this study provides a framework through which students, faculty members, and industry partner can collaborate through consulting programs with the aim to provide feasible recommendations to the clients. Our findings suggest that an experiential PBL with an overseas client is an important learning experience through which students can strengthen their digital literacy …

Hidden Framings And Hidden Asymmetries In The Measurement Of Personality: A Combined Lens-Model And Frame-Of-Reference Perspective, Julian Schulze, Stephen G. West, Jan-Philipp Freudenstein, Philipp Schaepers, Patrick Mussel, Michael Eid, Stefan Krumm

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Objective: The symmetry principle and the frame-of-reference perspective have each made contributions to improving the measurement of personality. Although each perspective is valuable in its own right, we argue that even greater improvement can be achieved through the combination of both. Therefore, the goal of the current article was to show the value of a combined lens-model and frame-of-reference perspective. Method We conducted a literature review to summarize relevant research findings that shed light on the interplay of both perspectives and developed an integrative model. Results: Based on the literature review and on theoretical grounds, we argue that a basic …

Impact Of Penalty Cost On Customers' Booking Decisions, Jianghua Zhang, Daniel Zhuoyu Long, Rowan Wang, Chi Xie

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We study a novel newsvendor-type problem where the information on demand quantity is not exogenously given. The customer needs to make the booking decision based on her estimation on demand, which is affected by the value of shortage penalty cost. The problem is motivated by low-cost airline service practices where passengers need to book baggage allowance for their travel. The baggage overweight price affects the accuracy of passengers’ baggage weight estimation and thus their booking quantities. Through stochastic decision models, we analytically characterize the impact of shortage penalty cost on passengers’ booking decisions as well as airline’s profit. We consider …

Urban Consolidation Center Or Peer-To-Peer Platform? The Solution To Urban Last-Mile Delivery, Qiyuan Deng, Xin Fang, Yun Fong Lim

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

The growing population in cities and booming e-commerce activities create huge demand for urban last-mile delivery, exerting intense pressure on the cities' well-being. To keep congestion and pollution under control, a consolidator can operate an urban consolidation center (UCC) to bundle shipments from multiple carriers before the last-mile delivery. Alternatively, the consolidator can operate a peer-to-peer platform for the carriers to share delivery capacity. We provide guidance for the consolidator to choose between these two business models by comparative analysis. We capture the interactions between the consolidator and carriers using a game-theoretical framework. Under each business model, the consolidator first …

Impact Assessment And Measurement With Sustainable Development Goals, Hao Liang, David Fernandez, Mikkel Larsen

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

With the rapid growth of sustainable and responsible investment and widespread adoption of the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reporting and integration by organizations, how to assess and measure ESG impact has become a critical issue. Although the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provide a useful framework for investors and organizations globally to align their standards, the SDGs are vague on how to implement them at an organizational or activity level. Current practice relies heavily on third-party ESG rating providers, whose scores mostly apply to public equities only. They also suffer from biases, inconsistencies, and a lack of sufficient disclosure. …

Tips For Sme Transformation Amid Covid-19 Pandemic, Siow-Heng Ong

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

The author shared that following the economic downturn in 2020, revival in 2021 can only be very gradual. SMEs in different sectors of the economy face different challenges and have different options for response. Overall, SMEs are hopeful rather than confident. SMEs are generally hoping to manage cash flow and stretch their current funds for immediate business sustainability. Inevitably, their focus is on meeting critical business needs. Turnover and profits are not expected to return to pre-pandemic levels so any increase in hiring or other planning for the future will be slight. He suggested that for pragmatic managers of SMEs …

Urban Perception: Sensing Cities Via A Deep Interactive Multi-Task Learning Framework, Weili Guan, Zhaozheng Chen, Fuli Feng, Weifeng Liu, Liqiang Nie

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Social scientists have shown evidence that visual perceptions of urban attributes, such as safe, wealthy, and beautiful perspectives of the given cities, are highly correlated to the residents' behaviors and quality of life. Despite their significance, measuring visual perceptions of urban attributes is challenging due to the following facts: (1) Visual perceptions are subjectively contradistinctive rather than absolute. (2) Perception comparisons between image pairs are usually conducted region by region, and highly related to the specific urban attributes. And (3) the urban attributes have both the shared and specific information. To address these problems, in this article, we present a …

What A Delayed Political Succession Means For Singapore, Tan K. B. Eugene

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In a commentary, SMU Associate Professor of Law Eugene Tan discussed the implications of what a delayed political succession might mean for Singapore. He also explained how the search for Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat's successor presents a new test for Singapore’s leaders, and highlighted the key focus for leadership renewal amid the pandemic.

What The Cabinet Reshuffle Signals, Tan K. B. Eugene

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In a commentary, SMU Associate Professor of Law Eugene Tan opined that the “Cabinet reshuffle announcement was not intended to shed any light on which fourth-generation (4G) leader would be the prime minister-in-waiting," but it “effectively confirms ministers Chan Chun Sing, Ong Ye Kung, and Lawrence Wong as the main contenders to be the 4G prime minister”. He discussed what the Cabinet reshuffle signals and explained why the 4G leadership needs more time to come to a consensus on who their new leader would be.

Reconciling Joint Tenancies With Writs Of Seizure And Sale, Alvin W. L. See

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This article examines the use of the writ of seizure and sale as a method of execution against a joint tenant’s interest in land and how it is to be reconciled with established principles of co-ownership law, in particular the fundamental distinction between a joint tenancy and a tenancy in common.

Digital Readiness Index For Arbitration Institutions: Challenges And Implications For Dispute Resolution Under The Belt And Road Initiative, Allison Goh

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Post-COVID-19, a paradigm shift has occurred in the adoption of technology in arbitration. Leading arbitral institutions have adapted quickly, highlighting the foresight of institutions who have existing technological infrastructure in place. This article proposes a ‘Digital Readiness Index’, which aims to evaluate arbitral institutions on their level of digital readiness based on five evaluative indicators. Cross referenced against Institute for Management Development (IMD’s) 2019 World Digital Competitiveness Rankings, the findings reveal synergies between an economy’s digital competitiveness and the adoption of technology in dispute resolution. To further the development of dispute resolution processes under the Belt and Road Initiative, strategic …

Beliefs And Social Norms As Precursors Of Environmental Support: The Joint Influence Of Collectivism And Socioeconomic Status, David K. Sherman, John A. Updegraff, Michelle S. Handy, Kimin Eom, Heejung S. Sim

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The present research investigates how the cultural value of collectivism interacts with socioeconomic status (SES) to influence the basis of action. Using a U.S. national sample (N = 2,538), the research examines how these sociocultural factors jointly moderate the strength of two precursors of environmental support: beliefs about climate change and perceived descriptive norms. SES and collectivism interacted with climate change beliefs such that beliefs predicted environmental support (i.e., proenvironmental behaviors and policy support) more strongly for those who were high in SES and low in collectivism than for all other groups. This interaction was explained, in part, by sense …

Selective Engagement? Future Path For Us-China Economic Relations And Its Implications, Heng Wang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The US-China economic interactions will have profound ramifications for the world. The article explores the following questions: what is the path forward for US-China economic interactions? What are its implications? It argues that selective engagement is the possible future path for US-China economic interactions. Selective engagement involves selective focuses, which currently are an unprecedented emphasis on market access, and delegalized implementation. Selective engagement contrasts sharply with deep free trade agreements that focus on regulatory disciplines and legalized dispute settlement. Selective engagement carries profound implications, ranging from rule vacuum and inconsistency, increased protection and economic disintegration, to the marginalization of multilateralism. …

Tackling Regional Climate Change And Food Security Issues: An Introduction, Md. Saidul Islam, Edson Kieu

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Regional organizations are central to effectively addressing the current and future impacts of climate change and food security issues. Climate change and food security issues can only be dealt with through extensive policies that adopt a multi-sector, multi-stakeholder approach. An examination of three regional organizations (the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the Pacific Islands Forum, and the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) can provide new insights into current climate change mitigation policies that will ensure food security for future generations. This opening chapter thus begins with the premise that regional organizations are optimally positioned to address climate change and …

A Hybrid Equity Release Plan For Retirement Financing, Koon Shing Kwong, Yiu Kuen Tse, Junxing Chay

Research Collection School Of Economics

There are two main equity release plans for retirement financing: reverse mortgage plan and home reversion plan. Both plans entitle the homeowners not only to release cash from their properties but also to allow them living there for life. In the lease buyback scheme (LBS) recently introduced in Singapore, the home owner sells the tail-end of the property lease to the government in exchange for a cash payment upfront. Unlike the two main equity release plans, the LBS only allows the owner to stay in the property for the front part of the lease but not for life.

In this …

The Evolution Of Income Risk And Consumption Insurance In South Korea Over The Last Two Decades, Taehyun Ahn, Chung Gu Chee, Seonghoon Kim

Research Collection School Of Economics

Using data from the Korea Labor Income Panel Study, we study the evolution of income risk and consumption insurance against transitory and permanent income shocks in South Korea over the last two decades. We find a decreasing trend in both income and consumption risks. Furthermore, we estimate that 47.6% of permanent income shocks and 9.8% of transitory income shocks pass through to consumption. We also provide evidence of substantial improvements in consumption insurance among the less educated and the older cohort nearing retirement. Our results suggest that recent developments of social safety net and welfare system may have played an …