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Many brands claim they were born by coincidence, yet the effects and contingencies of this communication strategy are little understood by extant marketing research on unexpected events. This study aims to investigate how consumers react to brand communications portraying a coincidental vs planned origin.

This research presents five experimental studies embedding coincidental brand origins into different types of marketing communications (i.e. crowdfunding campaigns, visual ads and brand biographies).

This research finds that coincidental brand origins increase persuasion (measured as money pledged to a crowdfunding campaign, overall brand equity and purchase intention) but only for consumers high in need for cognition (NFC). This effect is mediated by processing enjoyment, as the intrinsic need for thinking that characterizes high NFC consumers is satisfied by the opportunity to process the coincidence. Further to process, the authors show that explicitly providing an explanation for the coincidence makes the effect disappear, as this deprives high-NFC consumers of the opportunity to autonomously engage in and enjoy the cognitive process.

Brand managers able to leverage coincidences in their storytelling efforts should target high-NFC consumers and should not provide an explanation for the coincidences.

This research advances the limited literature on how consumers react to coincidences in a marketing context, the understanding of how brand communication strategies persuade consumers through information processing and the NFC literature.

This study aims to answer the following research question: “How do meaningful coincidences influence management decisions?” This question has gained relevance mainly because of the increasing attention of scholars in explaining the irrational pressures that shape management decisions, which should be inevitably taken into account to discover the causative factors of firms’ performances.

A multiparadigm approach to theory building has been adopted, known as “metatriangulation.” This study consisted of exploring the interplay between the synchronicity concept of Jung and cognitive studies. As a result, this work proposes a conceptual framework that refers to both sensemaking and cognitive decision-making literature.

The framework proposes that the perceived certainty (or not) about the potential outcome for the well-being, coming from the occurrence of meaningful coincidences, elicits a set of positive (or negative) affective states. These states activate a series of cognitive errors that drive the assignment of a symbolic content to the coincidences, bringing different risk-oriented management decisions.

The provided model is purely conceptual and based on the current pool of knowledge available. As much as empirical evidence will be produced, this model may need revision. This framework proposes the interpretation of meaningful coincidences not only as the output of a number of information processing biases, but also as inputs, through the elicited affect heuristic, for the occurrence of other cognitive errors that drive management decisions.

The explained influence of irrational forces on management decisions, also considering luck and chance, can be fruitful to avoid these behaviors or to intentionally adopt them in selected cases, e.g. when looking for attractive unexploited opportunities within markets.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is the first work that attempts to unveil the impact of meaningful coincidences and, more in general, of irrational forces on management decisions. Moreover, the provided framework explains how superstitious events are sometimes looked for to guide decision-making.

The purpose of this study, which is grounded in decision-making theory, is to explore whether the occurrence of meaningful coincidences can positively influence executive confidence during periods of crisis.

Through a qualitative study with 24 interviews, this study focuses on Italian hospitality facilities in the Campania Region of southern Italy to explore how an executive confidence led by meaningful coincidences can influence managerial decisions during crisis situations. Data are analyzed through a deductive coding for qualitative analysis.

The framework proposes the connection by coincidences and confidence, emphasizing the process through which meaningful coincidences can positively influence executive confidence and managerial decision-making. The insights that emerge suggest a number of positive and beneficial aspects for decision-making during a period of crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study in the literature aimed at investigating, by means of qualitative methodologies, the positive outcomes of executive confidence in decision-making led by meaningful coincidences during crisis periods in the specific context of the Italian hospitality industry.

The purpose of this paper is to calculate the probability of collision of flying aircraft crossing on straight paths in any direction.

The probability of deviations from the intended flight paths is used to calculate the probability of collision that is integrated over time to cover whole events.

The probabilities of collision are calculated in terms of the r.m.s. position errors and encounter geometry, that is aircraft velocities and flight path angles and crossing angles.

The method does not apply to aircraft flying in parallel tracks at the same velocity in air corridors: that case has been covered elsewhere, as well as the case of climbing or descending aircraft.

International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) specifies as target level of safety (TLS) a probability of collision not exceeding 5×10⁻⁹ per hour. To meet the ICAO TLS standard, it is necessary to calculate collision probabilities for all stages of flight.

A low collision probability is a safety metric; the value does depend on a realist choice of probability distribution.

Calculates the probability of collision for crossing flights, corresponding to a common scenario on air traffic management.

Game‐theoretic studies1,2 have been extended and complemented by a coincidence theorem based on and closely related to the Lefschetz fixed‐point theory. It is shown (Theorem 4) that admissible Hausdorff‐spaces (e.g. Banach spaces) exhibit coincidences of pairs of maps associated with multi‐valued maps which have been introduced and discussed in previous papers in this Journal.1,2

In this paper, we use the notion of cyclic representation of a nonempty set with respect to a pair of mappings to obtain coincidence points and common fixed points for a pair of self-mappings satisfying some generalized contraction- type conditions involving a control function in partial metric spaces. Moreover, we provide some examples to analyze and illustrate our main results.

Theoretical method.

We establish some coincidence points and common fixed point results in partial metric spaces.

Results of this study are new and interesting.

This article takes an autobiographical approach in describing the evolution of the equity and environmental justice debate. The intent is not only to provide a historical approach in identifying the emerging research and policy questions, but also to describe the author's own scholarly growth in studying them.

Short-term military simulations of scenarios or conditions that U.S. military personnel might meet are generally the largest, in terms of cost and personnel, of all operational training events. That at least six such exercises were scheduled for September 11, 2001 raises serious questions about whether or not the events of 9/11 were at least partially orchestrated by U.S. command.

In light of the aforementioned military exercises and the fact that the 9/11 Commission's Final Report barely mentions them, neither were they significantly discussed nor investigated during the hearings, this essay briefly explores four key questions that will hopefully stimulate further inquiries, investigations and perhaps subpoenas that will ultimately break the silence and force declassification of the information surrounding the war games.1.Has there been a high-level suppression of information about the military drills?2.Might the military drills have been a significant factor in the success of the attacks?3.Who was in charge of the military drills and what motives may have been operating for this person?4.In what way might Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person charged in the United States for the attacks, be a link that connects to the person in charge of the games to another tragedy that may have been “an inside job” – i.e. Senator Paul Wellstone's death, and how might Moussaoui connect all of this to the Pentagon?

The purpose of this paper is to obtain new knowledge about the accounting measurement of financial sustainability in local governments, by studying the influence of political factors on the evolution of income statements.

This paper analyses income statements of Spanish municipalities from 2006 to 2014, together with mayor profiles and political-institutional factors, using the generalised method of moments system.

The income statement represents a useful measure to assess financial sustainability, showing the effect of political factors on three dimensions proposed by IFAC (i.e. service, revenue and debt), such as ideological coincidence, political competition, political ideology, and absolute majority or political fragmentation.

The findings can be useful for policymakers and accountants responsible for accountability, supervisory bodies, fiscal authorities, voters, users of public services and other stakeholders interested in governmental income statements.

In the Eurozone, the crisis of government finance has made the citizens and the policymakers question the size and volume of public services. Likewise, in countries such as Spain, politicians remain one of the main problems for citizens. These circumstances make it very interesting and timely to study the accounting measurement of financial sustainability and its political explanations.

The findings provide new empirical evidence about the accounting measurement of financial sustainability in local governments, and they identify political factors that influence the evolution of income statements.

Some of the basic ideas of pursuit‐evasion games have been presented in an earlier paper. This paper is an extension and an elaboration of these ideas with emphasis on the determinability of pursuit‐evasion games.