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The recent advent of the limited line discounters Aldi and Netto, coupled with the current recession, has opened up the potential for considerable change in grocery shopping behaviour patterns in the UK. Examines the attributes of grocery discounters and their already established customer base. While evidence to date indicates a polarization in shopping patterns, proposes that further market penetration for the limited line discounters will largely depend on their ability to persuade consumers from all socio‐economic groups to change their behaviour and start “two‐stop shopping”, in the sense of frequenting a multiple as well as a limited line discounter on a regular basis. Based on the findings of a small‐scale empirical study incorporating the complementary results from a survey and three focus groups, examines current attitudes towards limited line discounters among “fringe” ABC1 consumers. Assesses the current potential for two‐stop shopping based on this examination. Conclusions to date further confirm existing evidence of polarization; as yet there is little indication of growing customer loyalty for limited line discounters amongst the ABC1s.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the competitiveness and convergence of the G7 and big emerging markets (BEM) nations using various economic, demographic, trade, investment, and freedom and governance criteria.

The two groups of nations, G7 and BEM, are compared on the basis of various longitudinal and cross‐sectional variables. The longitudinal variables are GDP and real GDP growth, per capita GDP, international trade, foreign direct investment, index of ageing, and life expectancy at birth. Cross‐sectional competitive indices are Global competitiveness index, index of economic freedom, Democracy index, Human development index, Gini index, Government effectiveness, and Corruption perception index.

The findings show that BEM is growing faster than G7 in most economic indicators including GDP, trade, and investment. The growth results in some form of convergence. The freedom and governance infrastructure of the BEM is relatively weak to support their economic growth. The primary challenge of the BEM is coming from the economic interdependence they create in a globalized economy. Overall, the growth presents a new political reality that the world must recognize.

National competitiveness is a long‐term issue. A 30‐year longitudinal analysis may not be long enough to accurately reflect a nation's performance. Evidently, wealth creation in the emerging markets has profound influence in noneconomic areas. Political polarization and military confrontation are not unlikely.

Governments and businesses in G7, BEM, or the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) nations and institutions involved in global governance (e.g. World Bank, IMF, and WEF) may use the findings of the study to determine their policies. We should pay special attention to the global economic interdependence and guard against the negative effects of emerging markets' growth.

The comparative analysis between the G7 and BEM in terms of competitiveness and convergence is an original contribution. Also, the author's insight beyond economics is a unique section to follow. The author is not aware of any other study that has used the two concepts competitiveness and convergence together to understand the emerging markets.

To date, the cultural and societal effects of controversial advertising have been insufficiently considered. This study aims to investigate how advertising that uses violent representations of women transgresses the taboo of gender-based violence.

This study encompasses a visual analysis of the subject positions of women in five violent advertising representations and a critical discourse analysis of the defensive statements provided by the client organisations subsequent to the public outrage generated by the campaigns.

The authors identify taboo transgression in the Tease, Piece of Meat and Conquered subject positions, wherein women are represented as suggestive, dehumanised and submissive. Client organisations seek to defend these taboo transgressions through the use of three discursive strategies – subverting interpretations, making authority claims and denying responsibility – which legitimise the control of the organisations but simultaneously work to obscure the power relations at play.

The representational authority that advertisers hold as cultural intermediaries in society highlights the need for greater consideration of the ethical responsibilities in producing controversial advertisements, especially those which undermine the status of women.

Controversial advertising that transgresses the taboo of violence against women reinforces gender norms and promotes ambiguous and adverse understandings of women’s subjectivities by introducing pollution and disorder to gender politics.

This paper critically assesses the societal implications of controversial advertising practices, thus moving away from the extant focus on managerial implications. Through a conceptualisation of controversial advertising as transgressing taboo boundaries, the authors highlight how advertising plays an important role in shifting these boundaries whereby taboos come to be understood as generative and evolving. However, this carries moral implications which may have damaging societal effects.

Entrepreneurship evolves in and around fields, particularly around the creation of opportunities. A central problem remains that entrepreneurial opportunities are both distributed among and co-created by embedded actors. We propose framing this in cultural terms as a “multiverse problem,” whereby entrepreneurial possibilities are understood within the bounds of a field, but also through traversing adjacent topographies. We argue that a focus on entrepreneurial moments captures important dynamics that bring together adjacent possibles, leading to drastically different pathways. The usefulness of this argument is illustrated in this paper through the articulation of a cultural cartographic approach to mapping and realizing entrepreneurial possibilities. We develop four principles of cultural cartography, apply them to several examples, and demonstrate implications to cultural entrepreneurship and adjacent theoretical traditions.

Reports on a study designed to analyse the effectiveness of real and created spokespersons in advertisements. Compares male and female spokespersons′ effectiveness by audience gender. Concludes that celebrities can be used to gain attention and maintain sales, while created spokespersons′ effectiveness is in establishing a lifelong link with the product.

This study aims to analyze the connection between institutional isomorphic pressures and both women serving on boards and women’s influence on boards within large American firms.

This study examines a longitudinal panel data set of all Standard and Poor’s (S&P) 500 organizations across a seven-year period from 2009 to 2015.

The analyses affirm that institutional isomorphic pressures impact the prevalence and influence of women on boards. Evidence suggests that coercive and normative pressures strongly impact the number of women serving as corporate directors, whereas the power of women directors is linked only to mimetic pressures.

The research suggests that to increase the number of women serving as directors, the industry must first increase the overall number of women serving in senior management roles. Once women directors gain a critical mass of three women on the board, the association with the total number of women directors, the number of boards upon which they concurrently serve, the power of women directors being selected to board leadership and the influence of women directors increase.

This paper extends existing board diversity work by examining institutional pressures at the international, national and firm levels. By examining the relationship between coercive, normative and mimetic pressures on both the prevalence of women on boards and the influence of women on boards, the authors illuminate certain mechanisms that shape the likelihood of board appointment and placement in more powerful positions.

Sustainability labels play a crucial role in providing consumers with quick and easily accessible information to assess the environmental, social and economic impacts of products. This research examines how different sustainability labels influence consumer perceptions and assessments of alternative food networks (AFNs).

The authors conducted three cross-sectional studies to explore consumer perceptions of sustainability labels for AFNs. The authors tested labels representing the three sustainability dimensions, labels of different graphical quality and different awarding bodies.

Consumers did not differentiate between sustainability dimensions but assessed labels in a holistic manner. The overall rating of a label positively influenced perceived sustainability. Self-designed and professionally designed labels had a positive effect on the intention to buy from an AFN. Professionally designed labels also enhanced the perceived authenticity of the networks. Notably, the source of the label, whether self-awarded or awarded by an official body, did not significantly impact consumer perceptions. However, interaction effects revealed professionally designed labels had a stronger positive effect on purchase intention when they were self-awarded.

AFNs can derive benefits from using labels. Self-organized, non-profit AFNs are well advised to have labels professionally designed.

This research contributes to the understanding of the effects of sustainability labels for community-based AFNs, diverging from the traditional focus on individual products.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the spillover effects of offensive commenting in online community from the lens of emotional and behavioral contagion. Specifically, it examines the contagion of swearing – a linguistic mannerism that conveys high-arousal emotion – based upon two mechanisms of contagion: mimicry and social interaction effect.

The study performs a series of mixed-effect logistic regressions to investigate the contagious potential of offensive comments collected from YouTube in response to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign videos posted between January and April 2016.

The study examines non-random incidences of two types of swearing online: public and interpersonal. Findings suggest that a first-level (a.k.a. parent) comment’s public swearing tends to trigger chains of interpersonal swearing in the second-level (a.k.a. child) comments. Meanwhile, among the child-comments, a sequentially preceding comment’s swearing is contagious to the following comment only across the same swearing type. Based on the findings, the study concludes that offensive comments are contagious and have impact on shaping the community-wide linguistic norms of online user interactions.

The study discusses the ways in which an individual’s display of offensiveness may influence and shape discursive cultures on the internet. This study delves into the mechanisms of text-based contagion by differentiating between mimicry effect and social interaction effect. While online emotional contagion research to this date has focused on the difference between positive and negative valence, internet research that specifically looks at the contagious potential of offensive expressions remains sparse.

Poses the question: do women have different leadership styles from those of men? With the current and projected impact of women‐led business on the world′s economies, this question is an important one. Surprisingly, however, there is an insignificant amount of empirical research into this leadership‐gender debate – most of the contemporary literature is purely conceptual. Therefore, the goal of the present study is to initiate scientific inquiry of this topic. An exploratory investigation of a sample of women business owners and managers was conducted to examine their leadership styles. From this preliminary study, utilizing the qualitative research methodology of content analysis, a heuristic model of female leadership is developed.