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The purpose of this study is to empirically investigate the determinants and consequences of psychological reactance in the online shopping context. Leveraging the psychological reactance and self-congruity theories, functional and symbolic discrepancies enhance the psychological reactance toward online shopping. In addition, trustworthiness moderates the impact of online customers attitude ambivalence on their psychological reactance.

The authors conduct an empirical study on online customer cognitive factors. In this research paper, the postpositivism research view is used. The Smart PLS-SEM is used to analyze the data.

The current study findings reveal that self-concept and operational incongruence (i.e. symbolic and functional) are the main factors that lead to psychological reactance and resulting in online shopping hate. Poor website quality and other matters are so significant they create functional incongruence. Moreover, low trustworthiness strengthens psychological reactance in the online shopping hate context.

This study extends the psychological reactance and self-congruence theories to online shopping. Previously, literature has extensively studied the social commerce intention.

This study serves two objectives; first, it examined the impact of ownership structure and board characteristics on firm value; second, the moderating effects of board gender diversity (women appearance on board) and board ethnic diversity (Chinese, Indian, and Foreign ethnicities) have been examined on the relationship between ownership structure, board characteristics, and firm value.

The dynamic model, system generalized method of moments (S-GMM hereafter), is employed to control potential dynamic endogeneity, reverse causality, simultaneity and unobserved heterogeneity persistent in corporate governance-performance relationships during 2006–2017 of 483 Malaysian listed companies.

Findings pertaining to objective one reveal that there is a weak linkage between ownership structure and firm value, whereas board characteristics significantly affect firm performance based on resource dependence theory. While considering the results of objective two, there is mixed evidence of moderating impact of board gender and ethnic diversity on ownership structure, board characteristics and performance nexus.

The findings of the study are practically significant for regulatory bodies, namely, Bursa Malaysia, Securities Commission (SC) Malaysia, and policymakers to develop guidelines for ownership structure variables. Moreover, Malaysian firms need to disperse their concentrated ownership structure for enhanced firm value. In addition, board characteristics significantly affect firm performance in Malaysian listed companies.

The paper contributes to multiple aspects: first, it examined the impact of ownership structure and board characteristics on firm performance. Second, the moderating effect of board gender and board ethnic diversity contributes to research significant and valuable for the researchers and practitioners. Finally, the study employed S-GMM, controlling for dynamic endogeneity considered a main econometric problem for CG-performance relationships.

This study aimed at exploring the differential effects of different corporate governance (CG) indicators on risk management practices in Islamic financial institutions (IFIs) and conventional financial institutions (CFIs) of Pakistan. It also investigated the moderating role of institutional quality (IQ) in shaping the effects of CG practices on financial institutions of Pakistan.

A sample of 57 financial institutions including commercial banks, insurance companies and Modarba companies over the period 2006–2017 is used to carry out the empirical analysis. The authors applied the robust two-step system-generalized method of moments estimator, which is also called the dynamic panel data estimator. They also built the PCA-based composite index of CG and IQ by using different indicators to investigate the moderating role of IQ. They used three proxies for risk taking, five for CG and one for Shari’ah governance. To test the validity of the instruments, they applied the Arellano and Bond’s (1991) AR (1) and AR (2) tests and the J-statistic of Hansen (1982).

The results provided strong evidence that several individual characteristics of CG and the composite index are significantly related to the operational risk, the liquidity risk and the Z-score (a proxy for solvency risk). The results also revealed that IQ significantly and substantially contributes in reducing the level of risks. Finally, the estimation results indicated that the effects of CG on risk management are significantly different at IFIs and CFIs. This differential impact is mainly attributed to the fundamental differences in business models, operational strategies and contractual obligations of both types of institutions.

The findings of this study are important for enhancing our understanding of how CG relates to risk taking in Islamic and conventional financial services industries and how good quality institutions are important for formulating the governance effects on the risk-taking behavior of financial institutions. The findings suggest that a suitable size of board should be chosen to manage the risk effectively. As the findings show that the risk-taking behavior of IFIs differs from that of CFIs, the regulators and international standard setting bodies should tailor the regulatory frameworks accordingly.

This paper is different from the existing studies in four aspects. First, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first empirical investigation in Pakistan, which does the comparison of IFIs and CFIs while examining the impacts of CG on risk management. Second, the paper constructs the composite index of CG by considering several different indicators of governance and examines the combined effect of governance indicators on risk management process. Third, this paper adds to the growing literature on the role of IQ by investigating whether it acts as a moderator between CG structures and risk management and if yes, then whether this moderating role is different for IFIs and CFIs. Finally, the paper builds upon the existing research work on the CG effects for different types of financial institutions by proposing a single regression based analytical framework for comparing the effects across two different types of institutions, harvesting the benefits of higher degrees of freedom and avoiding/minimizing the measurement error.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relation between debt structure and future external financing and investment. Furthermore, it aims to analyze the association between debt structure and future financial performance.

Volume, maturity, possessing collateral and having priority at the settlement date are the dimensions of debt structure that have been employed in this paper. The sample consists of 1,060 firm-year observations from Tehran Stock Exchange corporations during the period 2009–2018.

The findings reveal that greater reliance on financial leverage (debt volume) and short-term debt are associated with increases in future debt financing as well as future equity financing. Moreover, these two dimensions of debt structure are positively related to future investment. This paper also shows that the positive impact of financial leverage and short-term debt on future financing and investment can finally lead to a favorable financial performance. Regarding other dimensions of debt structure, the results suggest that although collateralized debt with the priority option at the settlement date enhances future external financing, this type of debt can ultimately lead to a reduction in future investment and financial performance. Finally, the findings indicate that uncollateralized debt exacerbates future financial performance.

Financial performance can be affected by several factors, including available funds, investment amount, investment efficiency and managerial capability. However, this paper only considers the investment amount and external financing as the channels through which debt structure improves future financial performance. This study has the potential to contribute to one of the most important issues in finance and business fields, despite its probable trivial drawbacks.

Financing strategies as one of the most controversial topics have been meticulously scrutinized in this paper and practical implications are made to facilitate the process of decision-making regarding the optimal type of debt financing.

This study extends the literature by analyzing the direct link between debt structure and firm performance in firms domiciled in developing markets.

The concept of Islamic banking (IB) as a discipline and the introduction of the full-fledged Islamic banks and Islamic windows are relatively newer developments in the banking sector in Oman. This paper aims to assess customers’ perceptions of the Islamic banks and IB windows in Oman.

Following the interpretive paradigm and an exploratory research design, data collected through personal interviews with a group of 60 respondents in two of the prominent cities in Oman were analysed qualitatively.

The study found that customers in Oman had mixed feelings about the Islamic Banks. While some of them were not sure if the banks follow the Islamic principles, a majority of them had not opened an account with the Islamic banks or Islamic windows. The study revealed some vulnerabilities in the areas of their operations, marketing practices, staff knowledge of products and customer-dealings, as well as customers’ understanding of Islamic banks, their principles and practices.

As the advent of IB is relatively new to Oman, the insights gained by this study will have wider implications for the growth of IB locally. The outcomes of this study would appraise the officials and regulators of Islamic banks and Islamic windows with customers’ perception of IB. The elimination of the identified weaknesses would help them to improve the knowledge, quality and the marketing and promotion of products and services while competing with the conventional banks.

This study is a pioneering effort to know the status of IB and customers’ motivations in Oman towards IB.

Public library’s core function is to meet the changing needs of challenging users by providing access to library collection and services. This study aims to explore the current status of public libraries’ collection, services, users, staff, physical facilities and IT infrastructure in Punjab, the most populous province of Pakistan. It further investigates the problems faced by these public libraries and puts forward practical solution.

This is a quantitative study based on questionnaire survey. A semi-structured questionnaire was designed to collect data. In total, 21 Library and Information Science graduates were employed to ensure the physical visit of all 176 public libraries in 36 districts of the province.

The findings revealed that with a few exceptions, public libraries were mostly in a poor condition. Absence of professional staff, out-dated collections, dilapidated library buildings and lack of IT infrastructure were the major issues prevailing in the libraries. Furthermore, little interest of political leadership and higher authorities is observed in the development of public library system.

This data will be helpful for policy and decision makers to plan and develop human resources, physical facilities and IT infrastructure in libraries. Findings may facilitate higher authorities for designing better services and strengthening public library system in the province.

This is a baseline study on public libraries’ status in the province. It aims to fill the gap by identifying total number of existing public libraries and exploring their current status along with the problems faced by these libraries.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the conformity of the impact of corporate finance decisions on market value with the basic theoretical approaches in the two emerging economies, which show great similarities in terms of the economic structures, and to examine the results obtained by determining how these decisions affect market value comparatively.

In this study, the effect of corporate finance decisions on market value is tested empirically with panel data analysis method by using data of 274 real sector firms traded in BIST and 249 firms in BOVESPA industry index, between 2010 and 2014.

The analysis results show that the increase in the borrowing level of firms operating in both countries reduces the market value; the increase in the level of profitability in the firms has a positive effect on the market value. In addition, it is possible to say that the effect is different in terms of investment decisions for Turkish and Brazilian firms.

The limitations of the study are that the non-financial sectors between 2010 and 2014 in Turkey and Brazil including the company data, and the companies with missing years are removed from the data set. The findings show that more effective and balanced management of the variables by the financial manager affects these rates and have an impact on increasing the market value.

In this study, a fundamental subject in finance is addressed by analytical methodology and comparative tests for countries are conducted.

This paper aims to examine the assumption used in previous studies that all Muslims adopt and believe the same law on the prohibition of bank interest and to investigate the indirect effect of religiosity on customers’ decision for using Islamic banking services.

This study uses an exploratory approach and the natural experimental design with seemingly causal models. A total of 363 questionnaires were distributed to three groups of bank customers, i.e. Islamic banks customers, conventional banks customers and customers of both banks (121 respondents in each group).

The results show that the role of religiosity in the customers’ decision for using the Islamic banking services depends on religious norms variable. Religiosity affects the decision of customers in the traditional group, but it does not have any effect for the contemporary group. Other findings suggest that religiosity indirectly affects the decision for using the Islamic banks through intervening variables of trust and information source.

This is the first paper to investigate the relationship between religiosity and customers’ decision for using the Islamic banking services by considering the religious norm variable. This paper also examines indirect affects of religiosity to the Islamic banks’ choice through intervening variables of trust and information source.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the significance of culture generally, and Arab culture in particular, for the development of trust in business-to-business (B2B) banking relationships.

Qualitative fieldwork was employed, gathering in-depth interview data from bankers and their business clients in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). In total, 80 relationships between bankers and business clients were investigated.

The development of trusting relationships between bankers and clients is affected by the cultural origins of the relationship partners. Strongly held religious beliefs, and loyalty to family, tribe and nation, lead to strong affect-based trust between bankers and clients from Arab culture. Cognitive-based trust is more characteristic of UAE banker/client relationships that involve partners from outside the Arab world.

The study was conducted in the UAE. Additional tests in other Arab countries would be valuable. The qualitative nature of the study means that statistical generalizations cannot be drawn.

The cultural origins of banking relationship managers are of considerable importance when seeking to develop relationships of trust with business banking clients in the Arab world.

This substantial, qualitative study of banker relationships with business clients throws considerable light on the importance of culture as an antecedent to trust in B2B banking relationships.

The desire of international retail brands to implement sustainable supply chain practices in the fashion value chain and improve suppliers' sustainability efforts; this research paper elucidates the relationship between blockchain technology and sustainability to impact apparel firms' triple bottom line.

For studying the impact of sustainable supply chain practices on the triple bottom line, a survey questionnaire was chosen and sent out to 500 garment companies simultaneously, of which 371 responded. The data collected is cross-sectional. The questionnaire survey was developed keeping in mind a few demographic elements such as experience, age and qualification to generalize the findings. For analysis, SmartPLS is used to run model structuring and regression analysis.

Test runs on model structure confirm the instrument's validity and reliability. Bootstrapping on the theoretical model to test developed hypotheses suggests that supply chain sustainability practices positively affect social, environmental and economic performance in a direct relationship. Further, indirect relation testing conducted to test blockchain technology's moderation influences only the constructs' relations.

The clubbing of sustainable supply chain practices and blockchain technology is a novel idea in the apparel industry; however, there are more constructs in the context of practice-based theory and supply chain which impact firm performance. Also, the research limits itself from discussing IT infrastructure and smart contract types that impact the technology's performance.

The study provides a framework for interpreting the synergetic influence of SSCP on firm social, environmental and economic performances, which is demanded both by consumers and regulators in an industry. The results suggest that managers sustainably design the production ecosystem, thus eliminating any discrepancy or slackness in the complete chain. Usually, suppliers are ignored, which are precursors in implementing SSCP.

The paper studies sustainability problems through ecological modernization theory and practical-based theory giving a unique perspective on the issue faced by the apparel industry and combining sustainable supply chain practices and blockchain.