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Drawing insights from institutional theory, this paper aims to examine whether and to what extent banks have reconfigured their management control systems (MCSs) in response to growing institutional pressures towards sustainability, understood as environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues.

The authors conducted an exploratory study at the three largest Italian banking groups to shed light on changes made in MCSs to account for ESG issues. The analysis is based on 12 semi-structured interviews with managers from the sustainability and controls areas, as well as from other relevant operational areas particularly concerned with the integration process of ESG issues. Additionally, secondary data sources were used. The Malmi and Brown (2008) MCS framework, consisting of a package of five types of formal and informal control mechanisms, was used to structure and analyse the empirical data.

The examined banks widely implemented numerous changes to their MCSs as a response to the heightened sustainability pressures from regulatory bodies and stakeholders. In particular, with the exception of action planning, the results show an extensive integration of ESG issues into the five control mechanisms of Malmi and Brown’s framework, namely, long-term planning, cybernetic, reward/compensation, administrative and cultural controls.

By identifying the approaches banks followed in reconfiguring traditional MCSs, this research sheds light on how adequate MCSs can promote banks’ “sustainable behaviours”. The results can, thus, contribute to defining best practices on how MCSs can be redesigned to support the integration of ESG issues into the banks’ way of doing business.

Overall, the findings support the theoretical assertion that institutional pressures influence the design of banks’ MCSs, and that both formal and informal controls are necessary to ensure a real engagement towards sustainability. More specifically, this study reveals that MCSs, by encompassing both formal and informal controls, are central to enabling banks to appropriately understand, plan and control the transition towards business models fully oriented to the integration of ESG issues. Thereby, this allows banks to effectively respond to the increased stakeholder demands around ESG concerns.

The psychological foundations of consumers’ reasons for product choices are analyzed in the field of marketing. The purpose of this research is to identify the implicit reasons for white meat consumption in the UK and Turkey.

In the scope of the means-end chain theory, in-depth interviews were conducted with individuals, and the reasons for consumers’ product preferences were revealed by moving from concrete to abstract.

It has been determined that the white meat consumption of Muslims in the UK is primarily shaped by their religious approach. In Turkey, on the contrary, both consumption patterns and reasons for preference are changing. It has been found that white meat consumption is associated with values such as security needs, satisfaction with life, self-fulfillment and happiness.

This research has contributed to the marketing literature by examining consumers’ implicit consumption reasons for white meat in the context of religion and culture.

Marketing strategies should focus on building trust in halal certification, particularly in the UK. Brands should associate their promotion strategies with feelings of security and happiness, which are associated in the minds of consumers.

This study is a new study in terms of revealing the connotations of consumers about consuming chicken and fish and showing the implicit needs that the brands can emotionally associate with.

As cross-cultural mergers and acquisitions (M&A) have learning effects on organisations, assessing their impacts on corporate performance is crucial. This study aims to explore the impact of inter-firm cultural differences on long-term post-M&A stock market performance.

The authors select domestic M&A transactions of Chinese listed companies during 2010–2021 as the sample. Then, the authors use the partial least squares structural equation model (PLS-SEM) to construct the latent variable of cultural differences in four dimensions to explore long-term stock market performance.

Cultural differences first positively and then negatively impact post-M&A performance. Three transmissions mechanisms are identified: investor sentiment, takeover premiums and information disclosure quality. Further analysis reveals that acquirer stock performance improves with higher analyst coverage and non-local shareholders but worsens if there are business affiliations between the acquirer and target firms.

This study can help optimise information disclosure systems in M&A transactions for regulatory authorities and aid investors’ understanding of post-M&A performance changes. Furthermore, it can improve acquirers’ understanding of the risks and opportunities in cross-cultural M&A, thereby facilitating the adaptation of management practices to the im-pacts of cultural differences.

By integrating the theories of resource dependence and transaction costs, this study examines the reversal effect of cultural differences between merging companies on post-M&A performance. The authors use a PLS-SEM to empirically analyse the main effects and reveal three transmission mechanisms.

Corporate entrepreneurship (CE) has attracted considerable attention worldwide, and the challenges of managing employees’ entrepreneurial behaviours are increasingly recognised. However, the paucity of research on managers’ entrepreneurial behaviour in the United Arab Emirates multinational corporate environment creates a salient gap in the current understanding of how national and organisational cultures that not always align frame the critical problems of CE. This study aims to fill this research gap by examining multinationals’ CE antecedents drawing on an institutional perspective in Dubai.

The author conducts 54 in-depth interviews with middle managers in multinational enterprises. This study adopts a multiple case study research design to reveal whether an emergent discovery is exclusive to a particular case or is consistently replicated by multiple cases. The author has used abductive reasoning to systematically integrate analytical framework deduction with raw data induction.

This study’s findings indicate that CE in Dubai is ineffective and fragmented. Arguably, the cultural background of employees creates different circumstances and determinants of entrepreneurial behaviour. Hence, CE may not achieve epitome competencies without identifying multicultural nuances in an organisational context.

Existing research has placed relatively little emphasis on the role of individual national culture in multinational enterprises. This study’s results offer potentially valuable implications for theory, practice and future research addressing other emerging countries. This model presents a distinct CE architecture with compelling evidence for national culture (at the macro level), organisational culture, Corporate Entrepreneurship Assessment Instrument and emergent factors (at the meso level) and individual middle managers' real-life experience (at the micro level).

This paper has analysed the impact of cultural dimensions, investor sentiment and uncertainty on bank stock returns. Also, the study examined the influences of the interaction between cultural dimensions and individual (private) sentiment (investor sentiment).

To meet the study's objectives, a two-step generalised method of moments estimator was applied to the study sample, which included 105 banks in the nine Middle East and North African region countries between 2010 and 2020.

The cultural dimensions of individualism and masculinity were found to have a positive and significant effect on banks' buy and hold stock return (BUH). At the same time, power distance and uncertainty avoidance were discovered to have negative effects. Besides, the findings revealed that the interactions of power distance, individual sentiment and uncertainty avoidance had positive and significant relationships with banks' BUH. However, individualism, individual sentiment and masculinity had inverse relationships with banks' BUH. Furthermore, the findings revealed that investor sentiment positively influenced banks' BUH. Finally, uncertainty influenced banks' BUH stock returns positively.

Important implications for participants in the financial sector and governments may be learnt from this study's conclusions. Due to cultural biases, this study's findings suggested that investors overreact in the stock market.

Additionally, this research comprises one of the few studies that have overviewed the link between classical and behavioural finance in MENA countries with distinctive cultural characteristics.

This study aims to examine decision factors for global sourcing, differentiated into transcontinental and continental sourcing to obtain insight into locational aspects of sourcing decisions and global trends. This study analyzed various country perceptions to reveal their influence on sourcing decisions. The country of origin (COO) theory explains why certain country perceptions and images influence purchasing experts in their selection of suppliers.

This study used a two-study approach. In Study 1, the authors conducted discrete choice card experiments with 71 purchasing experts located in Europe and the USA to examine the importance of essential decision factors for global sourcing. Given the clear evidence that location is a factor in sourcing decisions, in Study 2 the authors investigated purchasers’ perceptions and images of countries, adding country ranking experiments on various perceived characteristics such as quality, price and technology.

Study 1 provides evidence that the purchasers’ personal relationship with the supplier plays a decisive role in the supplier selection process. While product quality and location impact sourcing decisions, the attraction of the buying company and cultural barriers are less significant. Interestingly, however, these factors seem as important as price to respondents. This implies that a strong relationship with suppliers and good quality products are essential aspects of a reliable and robust supply chain in the post-COVID-19 era. Examining the locational aspect in detail, Study 2 linked the choice card experiments with country ranking experiments. In this study, the authors found that purchasing experts consider that transcontinental countries such as Japan and China offer significant advantages in terms of price and technology. China has enhanced its quality, which is recognizable in the country ranking experiments. Therefore, decisions on global sourcing are not just based on such high-impact factors as price and availability; country perceptions are also influential. Additionally, the significance of the locational aspect could be linked to certain country images of transcontinental suppliers, as the COO theory describes.

The new approach divides global sourcing into transcontinental and European sourcing to evaluate special decision factors and link these factors to the locational aspect of sourcing decisions. To deepen the clear evidence for the locational aspect and investigate the possible influence of country perceptions, the authors applied the COO theory. This approach enabled authors to show the strong influence of country perception on purchasing departments, which is represented by the locational effect. Hence, the success of transcontinental countries relies not only on factors such as their availability but also on the purchasers’ positive perceptions of these countries in terms of technology and price.

This study aims to investigate the effects of board cultural diversity (BCD) and board gender diversity (BGD) of the board of directors on environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance in the European banking sector using resource-based view (RBV) theory. In addition, this study analyses the linkages between BCD and BGD and knowledge sharing on the board of directors to improve ESG performance.

This study selected a sample of European-listed banks covering the period 2021. ESG and diversity variables were collected from Refinitiv Eikon and analysed using the ordinary least squares model. This study was conducted in the European context regulated by Directive 95/2014/EU, which requires sustainability disclosure. The original population was represented by 250 banks; after missing data were excluded, the final sample comprised 96 European-listed banks.

The findings highlight the positive linkages between BGD, BCD and ESG scores in the European banking sector. In addition, the findings highlight that diversity contributes to knowledge sharing by improving ESG performance in a regulated sector. Nonetheless, the combined effect of BGD and BCD negatively impacts ESG performance.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to measure and analyse a regulated sector, such as banking, and the relationship between cultural and gender diversity for sharing knowledge under the RBV theory lens in the ESG framework.

This study examines the effects of financial literacy and financial risk tolerance on investor behavior by introducing social stigma as a mediator and emotional intelligence as a moderating factor.

Data is collected from 761 financially independent individual investors, with a minimum age of 25 years, a minimum of five years of stock market experience and residing in five selected major Indian cities. The collected data is subsequently analyzed using SmartPLS. Homogeneous purposive sampling followed by snowball sampling was employed.

The findings of the study demonstrate a strong and noteworthy impact of financial literacy on investor behavior. The research reveals that social stigma acts as a partial mediator and emotional intelligence plays a significant moderator with direct effects and indirect effects between financial literacy, financial risk tolerance, social stigma and investor behavior.

Exploring emotional intelligence in financial decisions enriches academic programs by integrating it into financial education. Collaboration between academia and financial institutions yields practical tools, infusing emotional intelligence into services. This prompts systemic shifts, reshaping education and societal discourse, fostering inclusive, emotionally intelligent financial landscapes, aiming to redefine both academic teachings and real-world financial practices.

Integrating emotional intelligence into government-led financial literacy programs can transform societal perspectives on financial decision-making. Customized services, destigmatizing workshops and collaborative efforts with academia foster an emotionally intelligent financial landscape, reshaping traditional paradigms.

Promoting open societal discussions about finances combats stigma, fostering a supportive space for risk-taking. Emphasizing emotional intelligence in awareness campaigns cultivates inclusivity and confidence. Normalizing financial talks empowers individuals, enhancing their well-being. Elevating both financial literacy and emotional intelligence enhances overall financial health, nurturing a community adept at navigating financial journeys.

This study marks a notable contribution to behavioral finance and social stigma theory by examining their intersection with emotional intelligence. It uniquely introduces social stigma as a mediator and emotional intelligence as a moderator, unexplored in this context. This novelty underscores the research’s significance, offering practical insights into financial well-being.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-08-2023-0626

This study aims to investigate the influence of CEO’s only-child status on corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices. It seeks to extend the understanding of upper echelon theory by examining unexplored CEO characteristics and their impact on CSR decisions.

The paper uses manually collected CEO family information and Chinese Stock and Market Accounting Research data as a basis to examine the influence of CEOs’ early-life experiences on their engagement in CSR activities. The study applies attachment security theory from developmental psychology and uses upper echelon theory, particularly focusing on CEOs’ only-child status. A comparative analysis of philanthropic donations between CEOs who are only children and those who have siblings is conducted. The study also examines the moderating effects of corporate slack resources and CEO shareholdings.

Preliminary findings suggest that CEOs who are only children are more likely to engage in CSR compared to their counterparts with siblings. However, the difference in donation amounts between the two groups tends to attenuate with decreased slack resources and increased CEO shareholdings.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this research represents the first attempt to investigate being the only child in one’s family and the CSR-related decision of CEOs, which extends the upper echelon theory by introducing the family science theory into the management domain.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused severe challenges to ethnic minorities in the UK. While the experiences of migrants are both complex and varied depending on individuals' social class, race, cultural proximity to the host country and acculturation levels, more in-depth studies are necessary to fully understand how COVID-19 affects specific migrant groups and their health. Taiwanese migrants were selected because they are an understudied group. Also, there were widespread differences in pandemic management between the UK and Taiwan, making this group an ideal case for understanding how their acculturation journey can be disrupted by a crisis.

Qualitative data were collected at two different time points, at the start of the UK pandemic (March/April 2020) and six months on (October/November 2020), to explore migrant coping experiences over time. Theoretically, the authors apply acculturation theory through the lens of coping, while discussing health-consumption practices, as empirical evidence.

Before the outbreak of the pandemic, participants worked hard to achieve high levels of integration in the UK. The pandemic changed this; participants faced unexpected changes in the UK’s sociocultural structures. They were forced to exercise the layered and complex “coping with coping” in a hostile host environment that signalled their new marginalised status. They faced impossible choices, from catching a life-threatening disease to being seen as overly cautious. Such experience, over time, challenged their integration to the host country, resulting in a loss of faith in the UK’s health system, consequently increasing separation from the host culture and society.

It is important to note that the Taiwanese sample recruited through Facebook community groups is biased and has a high level of homogeneity. These participants were well-integrated, middle-class migrants who were highly educated, relatively resourceful and active on social media. More studies are needed to fully understand the impact on well-being and acculturation of migrants from different cultural, contextual and social backgrounds. This being the case, the authors can speculate that migrants with less resource are likely to have found the pandemic experience even more challenging. More studies are needed to fully understand migrant experience from different backgrounds.

Public health policymakers are advised to dedicate more resources to understand migrants' experiences in the host country. In particular, this paper has shown how separation, especially if embraced temporarily, is not necessarily a negative outcome to be corrected with specific policies. It can be strategically adopted by migrants as a way of defending their health and well-being from an increasingly hostile environment. Migrants' home country experience provides vicarious learning opportunities to acquire good practices. Their voices should be encouraged rather than in favour of a surprising orthodox and rather singular approach in the discussion of public health management.

The paper has clear public health policy implications. Firstly, public health policymakers are advised to dedicate more resources to understand migrants' experiences in the host country. Acknowledging migrants' voice is a critical first step to contribute to the development of a fair and inclusive society. Secondly, to retain skilful migrants and avoid a future brain-drain, policymakers are advised to advance existing infrastructure to provide more incentives to support and retain migrant talents in the post-pandemic recovery phase.

This paper reveals how a group of previously well-integrated migrants had to exercise “coping with coping” during the COVID crisis. This experience, over time, challenged their integration to the host country, resulting in a loss of faith in the UK’s health system, consequently increasing separation from the host culture and society. It contributes to the understanding of acculturation by showing how a such crisis can significantly disrupt migrants' acculturation journey, challenging them to re-acculturate and reconsider their identity stance. It shows how separation was indeed a good option for migrants for protecting their well-being from a newly hostile host environment.