Search results

Adrian Bristow writes: Sunny Southsea indeed¡ This was the finest spell of weather the annual Summer Meeting of the Association of Technical Institutions has enjoyed for years. Outside a Latin sun beat down, while in the depths of the Portsmouth Guildhall men in dark flannel suits shifted delicately on their chairs and sweated. Principal Davey, of Portsmouth College of Technology, going in first on his home ground, presented a challenging paper on ‘Problems of Expansion’. He should know. In 1959/60 his College had 482 full‐time and sandwich course and Diploma students with a teaching staff of 98. In 1966/67 there were 2520 full‐time and sandwich course and Diploma students, 85 Research Assistants and 2500 post‐graduate special course students, and the teaching staff had more than trebled.

Almond oil is a gourmet product with functional food characteristics owing to its high almond oil content and high nutritional quality. One of the primary constraints on its production is the lack of information regarding oil extraction from an industrial perspective, including by-products generation.

The performance, quality and composition characteristics were analyzed, both from the physical-chemical and organoleptic point of view, of the almond oils obtained through two pressure systems: screw press (SP) and hydraulic press (HP). To ensure the success of almond oil production at a commercial scale, in this work, an economic study of the costs of the process was carried out as a complementary part of optimizing the production of virgin almond oil.

Physicochemical analysis showed little difference, just in total sterols (HP 2069, SP 2153) and some quality indexes (K232: HP 1.63, SP 2.13; peroxide index: HP 1.74, SP 0.95), in contrast to sensory analysis. Consumer judges valued roasted almond oil extracted using a HP the best. The production cost of the oil extracted with the SP was €23.05/l. With the HP it was €25.13/l, owing to the lower oil yield in the extraction. The most expensive treatment was for the HP with toasted almonds (€27.76/l), owing to the greater need for processing.

Production costs derived from the method used have received little attention. This paper presents data that allow for the transference between academic and industrial ambit and their economic viability.

Drawing on gender-role stereotypes and defensive attribution theory, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of perpetrator-victim sex, observer sex and observer sexting experience on perceptions of seriousness and responsibility in the context of revenge pornography.

In total, 239 university students read one of two versions of a hypothetical scenario, responded to items concerning their perceptions of the situation described, and responded to items concerning their sexting experience.

Men were more likely to believe the situation was serious when it involved a male perpetrator and a female victim rather than vice versa. However, perpetrator-victim sex did not influence women’s perceptions. Participants without sexting experience were more likely than participants with sexting experience to believe the situation was serious, and to hold the victim responsible.

Whilst there is a growing body of literature regarding revenge pornography from a legal perspective, there is little research on perceptions of revenge pornography situations. As the use of intimate images in relationships continues to rise, it is important to understand people’s attitudes and the extra-legal factors that shape them.

This study compared people’s endorsement of the money ethic across three countries: Taiwan, the USA and the UK. Exploratory factor analysis results for the whole sample suggested that the six‐item money ethic scale had three independent factors, low cross‐loading, and low inter‐factor correlations. Confirmatory factor analysis was performed for the whole sample and for each group. There was a good fit between the six‐item MES model and the data for the US sample and a poor fit for the Chinese sample, the UK sample, and the whole sample. For the whole sample, regression results showed that those who scored high on factor budget tended to have high self‐esteem, display organizational citizenship behavior (OCB)‐altruism, have low strain, and are female. Factor evil was positively related to OCB‐compliance and negatively related to OCB‐altruism. American men considered money as their success, British men considered money as evil. British women claimed that they budget their money carefully. Results are discussed in light of cultural differences and the rapidly expanding literature on the psychology of money beliefs and behaviors.

Entrepreneurship.

The case has been used at Master's level but it has direct application to any MBA programme or entrepreneurship module.

Adrian Gore started Discovery in 1992 with seed-funding of R10 million from merchant banking group, Rand Merchant Bank (RMB), as a health insurance company within the RMB stable. By 2009, Discovery had become a large, listed, financial services institution employing more than 5,000 people and comprising not only Discovery Health (DH), but also Discovery Life (DL), Discovery Invest (DI) and Discovery Vitality (a wellness programme). In addition, it had operations in the USA, where it licensed Vitality for use by employers and other health insurers, and in the UK where it operated two joint ventures with The Prudential plc – Pruhealth and Prulife.

To understand the similarities and differences between corporate and start-up entrepreneurship; to understand the entrepreneurial process within an established organization; to explore the environment within an established company in terms of how much it supports or constrains entrepreneurship; and to look at creative ways to overcome obstacles to entrepreneurship in established companies.

Teaching notes.

Using insights from the relevant literature and recent empirical data, this paper investigates the relationship between organisational change and employee turnover. It proposes a mechanism for how widespread change translates into individual decisions to quit, and corroborates four relevant hypotheses. The paper also illustrates the importance for managers of understanding avoidability – the extent to which turnover decisions can be prevented – and concludes with a research agenda, encapsulated by a model describing the relationship between organisational change and turnover.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse why Malta continues to show the highest level of turnout for European Parliament (EP) elections in a country where voting is not obligatory. By analysing the Maltese EP elections from 2004 to 2019, the paper seeks to understand why the Maltese engage with a second order election to the degree that they do.

The paper is a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, first assessing the context of the 2019 elections, the historical trends and then the factors that help explain why the Maltese continue to engage with EP elections.

The paper finds that the Maltese political system, highly polarised and dominated by two parties, primarily galvanises people to engage with elections, that it is more about party leadership than actual engagement with Europe and that second order elections in Malta are often run as first order elections.

This paper is the only systematic evaluation of the 2019 EP elections in Malta, discusses categorically that EP elections are rarely about Europe while also showing clearly that political parties can make second-order elections appear as first-order elections should the stakes be high enough.

The purpose of this paper is to review and examine the recent investment trends of firms operating in the food, feed and biofuel production and processing sectors in Latin America. The inter-related nature of these three sub-sectors and the great expansion they have gone through in the last decade showcases a series of socioeconomic and environmental policy challenges thus making it relevant to identify their different business models through a typology.

The paper first presents an unprecedented literature review based on field observations and media coverage of agri-business strategies of the food, feed and biofuel production in the region. It then moves to an in-depth analysis of investment operations that serve to classify such firms into a business model typology considering degree of internationalization and integration. The typology is a useful mechanism to enhance public policy analysis and uncover market or government incentives behind business decisions.

By focusing on investment strategies, the paper illustrates how both market and government incentives shape and affect the performance and consolidation of different players in the food, feed and biofuel sub-sectors in Latin America. The resulting effects have strong economic as well as social and environmental implications because such economic activities have an impact on global food and energy security.

Limitations include a reliance on largely qualitative evidence and research methods due to unavailability of consistent numerical data in these specific agri-business sub-sectors.

This paper is unique in its focus on business models in a particularly relevant set of agri-business sub-sectors in Latin America and its implications to promote investment and innovation in value chain development while considering regional-specific challenges.