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The purpose of this study is to provide a textual approach to quantify the perception of uncertainty from management side and investigate how firms manage their overseas investment dynamics when perceiving an increase in economic policy uncertainty (EPU).

Using a textual analysis approach, the study evaluates firm-level perception of EPU. Based on the data from China's listed firms between 2007 and 2018, it examines the association between firm-level perception of EPU and overseas investment using probit model and fixed effects regression with robust standard error adjusted for heteroscedasticity and clustered by firm.

The study finds that the level of EPU perceived by individual firms is heterogeneous. Moreover, it finds that firm-level perception of EPU is positively associated with firms' overseas investment. When perceiving an increase in EPU, firms are more likely to invest abroad and their overseas investment is more diverse. Further analysis shows that the positive association between firm-level perception of EPU and overseas investment is weaker in firms with higher financing cost, investment irreversibility and management incentive but stronger in firms with more intensive industry competition. However, it does not find significant difference in the impact of firm-level perception of EPU on overseas investment of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and non-state-owned enterprises (non-SOEs). The results are robust to using alternative measures of primary variables and to endogeneity concerns.

First, although the data on outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) at the national and provincial levels are comprehensive, the data on OFDI at the firm level are still relatively scarce. As the firm-level OFDI data become available, future study could be extended to OFDI flow. Second, future study could use other information disclosed by firms to evaluate their perception of EPU from host countries and examine the impact of bilateral EPU on overseas investment. Third, by evaluating firm-level perception of uncertainty in terms of a particular type of economic policies, such as fiscal policy, monetary policy, trade policy and foreign investment policy, future study could probe the sources of EPU affecting firms' overseas investment.

First, although uncertainty increases the volatility of firms' investment activities, firms can recognize and seize investment opportunities in an uncertain economic environment and make profits through resource integration. Second, as the association between firm-level perception of EPU and overseas investment depends on firm and industry characteristics, firms with higher financing cost, investment irreversibility and management incentive should be more cautious when making overseas investment decisions during uncertainty times. Third, governments should increase the transparency and the stability of their economic policies to help firms plan their investment policies.

The study extends the literature related to EPU measurement by constructing a firm-level perception index of EPU based on firms' annual reports using a textual analysis approach. Moreover, it sheds some light on the mechanism of how firms modulate their overseas investment activities under uncertainty.

The view that dynamic capabilities theory can help explain how lean organizations improve has been put forward by scholars. However, there is still a lack of research on the matching relationship between the application of lean practice and the internal elements of enterprise organization from the perspective of dynamic capabilities. The purpose of this study is to validate the moderating effect of dynamic capabilities on the relationship between lean practices and operational performance.

This study used the method of survey and empirical research to collect sample data from 263 enterprises in China. Through literature review, this study put forward the moderating hypotheses around dynamic capabilities, lean practices and operation performance and used the method of regression analysis to validate these hypotheses.

The results showed that dynamic capabilities have a partially moderating effect on the application of lean practices. Specifically, dynamic capabilities have a significant moderating effect on the relationship between just-in-time, total quality management, total preventive maintenance and operational performance, while dynamic capabilities have no significant moderating effect on the relationship between human resource management and operational performance.

The research conclusion complements and enriches the lean practices literature from the perspective of dynamic capabilities. Existing studies mainly focus on the moderating role of external environmental factors, while there is a lack of empirical research on the role of dynamic capabilities in lean practices literature. The research results will help enterprises further understand the matching relationship between lean practices and dynamic capabilities and then improve the success of lean practices application.

This study provides a configurational examination of how policy designs influence the innovation performance of the emergency industry in China.

This study employs the Data Envelopment Analysis Malmquist index (DEA-Malmquist) to quantify the innovation performance of the emergency industry and then codes the innovation policies to calculate the syntactic components based on institutional grammar tools (IGTs). The configurations of syntactic components were determined by applying the fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA).

The results indicate that rules- and norms-oriented policy designs would improve the innovation performance of China's emergency industry. In the developed provinces, the “Deontic” and “aIm” combinations in the policy are useful for improving performance. In the developing provinces, the ambiguity of the “aIm” and “Context” conditions in the policy is leading to low performance. Additionally, a lack of strategy-oriented policy design would also result in poor performance.

Most previous studies used substitute variables to understand policy impacts. This study contributes to identifying the impacts of the syntactic components of policy designs on the innovation performance of the emergency industry. The findings can assist policymakers in developing more effective policies to stimulate innovation development in the emergency industry.

Based on the “S-O-R” and attachment theories, this paper constructs a research model of the platform attribute factors of sports short video live e-commerce on consumers' psychological conditions, and explores how platform attributes affect consumer behavior through consumer attachment.

The study carried out questionnaire survey through the “snowball” method, and a total of 422 valid questionnaires were collected. The paper uses SPSS 26.0 and AMOS 26.0 to adapt the data and model, and adopts the method of structural equation modeling for analysis.

The research results show that the interactivity, identity, personalization and entertainment of live sports e-commerce platforms can actively stimulate consumer attachment, and directly drive their consumption behavior through their attachment.

Examining the platform attributes and system functions of short video live broadcast e-commerce from the perspective of consumer attachment can help sports e-commerce understand consumers' needs and satisfaction with the functions provided by the platform. Through timely optimization and improvement of system functions, the platform will make the connection between consumers and e-commerce closer, thereby increasing consumer stickiness and promoting the vigorous development of sports e-commerce.

This study identified and defined the platform attributes contained in the sports live broadcast e-commerce platform, combined the S-O-R model with the attachment theory, expanded the analytical framework of the S-O-R theory and made contributions to the extension of the attachment theory.

Social media fatigue (SMF) has been widely recognized; however, previous studies have included various concepts into a single fatigue construct. Fatigue has typically been explored from the stressor-strain-outcome (SSO) or stimulus-organism-response (SOR) perspectives. To further investigate SMF, the authors split it into the two constructs of exhaustion and disinterest. Furthermore, the authors introduced the concept of emotional labor and identified rules that may affect surface and deep acting strategies.

The authors designed and conducted a survey to collect data from social networking platform users.

Results from 364 users of social networking platforms supported most of the authors' hypotheses. First, most of the display rules affect the choice of deep or surface acting. Second, both types of acting lead to exhaustion, but only surface acting leads to disinterest. Third, discontinuance intention is affected by both types of fatigue.

This study contributes to SMF research by adding more antecedents (deep and surface acting) based on the emotional labor perspective and showing the impacts of communication rules on emotional labor. In addition, this study also distinguishes disinterest-style fatigue from exhaustion.

This paper examines the ways in which Chinese university middle managers evaluate subordinate performance in response to the Chinese Double First-Class University Plan, a national project that ranks the performance of universities. In exploring compromise arrangements, the hybridised valuing activity of middle managers is found to be shaped by emergent and extant macro-foundations.

The qualitative data from 49 semi-structured interviews at five Chinese public universities were conducted. Drawing on macro-foundational studies and the sociology of worth (SW) theory, the analysis helps to identify socially shared patterns of actions and outcomes.

The findings elucidate the interplay between diverse economic, social, political and institutional values and the compromise-making by middle managers. The authors find that contextual factors restrict Chinese academic middle managers' autonomy, preventing workable compromise. Through the selective adoption of international and local management practices, compromise has evolved into a private differential treaty at the operational level.

A nuanced explanation reveals how the macro-foundations of Chinese society influence middle managers who engage with accounting when facilitating compromise. This study helps outsiders better understand the complex convergence and divergence of performance evaluative practices in Chinese universities against the backdrop of global market-based forces and the moral dimensions of organisational life. The findings have wider implications for the Chinese government in navigating institutional steps and developing supportive policies to enable middle managers to advance productive but also sustainable compromise.

This study aims to systematically reveal the complex interaction between uncertainty and the international commodity market (CRB).

A composite uncertainty index and five categorical uncertainty indices, together with wavelet analysis and detrended cross-correlation analysis, were used. First, in the time-frequency domain, the coherency and lead-lag relationship between uncertainty and the commodity markets were investigated. Furthermore, the transmission direction of the cross-correlation over different lag periods and asymmetry in this cross-correlation under different trends were identified.

First, there is significant coherency between uncertainties and CRB mainly in the short and medium terms, with natural disaster and public health uncertainties tending to lead CRB. Second, uncertainty impacts CRB more markedly over shorter lag periods, whereas the impact of CRB on uncertainty gradually increases with longer lag periods. Third, the cross-correlation is asymmetric and multifractal under different trends. Finally, from the perspective of lag periods and trends, the interaction of uncertainty with the Chinese commodity market is significantly different from its interaction with CRB.

First, this study comprehensively constructs a composite uncertainty index based on five types of uncertainty. Second, this study provides a scientific perspective on examining the core and diverse interactions between uncertainty and CRB, as achieved by investigating the interactions of CRB with five categorical and composite uncertainties. Third, this study provides a new research framework to enable multiscale analysis of the complex interaction between uncertainty and the commodity markets.

This paper aims to offer the first known synthesis of peer-reviewed literature on trade-based money laundering (TBML). Given the topic is in its nascent stage yet gaining prominence across scholarship and practice, this foundation is pertinent for future TBML research.

A systematic literature review was undertaken with a formulaic search string. Both qualitative (thematic) and quantitative (meta) analysis methods were used to illustrate the findings.

The systematic literature review, using qualitative and quantitative synthesis, led to a thematic categorization of extant TBML literature into four categories: TBML risk assessment, TBML detection, the role of professionals and understanding of TBML. Due to the limited number of studies, insights that can be drawn from the extant literature on the best way to combat TBML are also limited.

As the first systematic literature review on TBML, this study identified that the existing TBML literature has focused on increasing the understanding of the phenomenon in terms of its definition and mechanisms, detection, linkage with other crimes, such as organized crime and terrorism financing, and risk assessment frameworks. The originality of these findings lies in identifying areas future researchers might explore to broaden the academic literature.

The color painting of ancient buildings has high historical and artistic value but is prone to aging due to long-term outdoor exposure. The purpose of this study is to develop a new type of sealing coating to mitigate the impact of ultraviolet (UV) light on color painting.

The new coating was subjected to a 500-h UV-aging test. Compared with the existing acrylic resin Primal AC33, the UV aging behavior of the new coating, such as color difference and gloss, was studied with aging time. The Fourier infrared spectra of the coatings were analyzed after the UV-aging test.

Compared with AC33, the antiaging performance of SF8 was substantially improved. SF8 has a lower color difference value and better light retention and hydrophobicity. The Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy results showed that the C-F bond and Si-O bonds in the resin of the optimized sealing coating protected the main chain C-C structure from degradation during the aging process; thus, the resin maintained good stability. The hindered amine light stabilizer TN292 added to the coating inhibited the antiaging process by trapping active free radicals.

To address the problem of UV aging of oil-decorated colored paintings, a new type of sealing coating with excellent antiaging properties was developed, laying the foundation for its demonstration application on the surface of ancient buildings.

This study aims to explore a new restaurant category’s development from birth to maturity, thereby explaining the rationale for category innovation strategies.

The authors conducted a qualitative case study analysis of the New Chinese-style Fusion Restaurant category’s development from birth to maturity. Thematic analysis was conducted on data collected from semi-structured interviews and textual information.

A new restaurant category’s maturation is determined by the formation of society’s shared knowledge about the category’s crucial attributes, which is an outcome of market participants’ category-related social practices. The authors develop a novel, four-stage framework for the socialized construction of this shared knowledge: a knowledge creation (KC), knowledge diffusion (KD), knowledge integration (KI) and knowledge structuralization (KS). This knowledge evolution along this KC–KD–KI–KS sequence can holistically describe the category maturation process. This framework can help understand the rationale for a restaurant category’s maturation by analyzing the interrelationships among market participants’ social practices, knowledge-related activities and market development.

This study explains how market participants’ knowledge-related activities facilitate a new restaurant category’s maturation. This can help restaurant managers cope with increasingly homogeneous competition by applying a category-innovation strategy.

This study extends product categorization research on restaurants by articulating a product category’s maturation process from a knowledge perspective.