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The object of the exercise is to perform an overall evaluation of the INSEAD library service as perceived by segments of the overall user‐group. The aim is to translate the results of such an evaluation into keener insight into the habits of the users, and ultimately into policy formulation and action for the future development of the service.

In a previous paper we have attempted to describe the potential value of measuring how users perceive the library, and we have shown how segments of the user population could be defined by a perceptual criterion. This paper is an attempt to describe progress in the research on both quantitative and qualitative levels: we attempt to describe measurements of preferences in collection, resources and services developments of those segments of the user‐group. We attempt also to signal correlations of these expressed preferences in terms of perceptions previously indicated.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate commitment escalation tendencies and magnitude in groups of entrepreneurship-minded decision makers.

The paper uses a software-based management simulation to expose 447 graduate business students in the USA and India to research stimuli under conditions that resemble important aspects of entrepreneurs’ business environment, such as a focus on overall firm performance. Unlike most previous escalation research that studied individuals, the primary unit of analysis is a three-person group.

The paper demonstrates a positive relationship between the groups’ entrepreneurial intentions and escalation magnitude. The paper also finds a direct relationship between sunk costs and subsequent investment amounts, suggesting an additional route through which sunk costs may impact escalation behavior – anchoring and insufficient adjustment.

The authors hope that the findings will stimulate further research on commitment escalation modalities and mechanisms among entrepreneurship-minded decision makers and provide impetus for efforts to develop effective debiasing strategies.

The study addresses a long-standing gap in entrepreneurship research, by demonstrating a significant positive relationship between entrepreneurial intentions and escalation behaviors. Also noteworthy, the results are generated using a different research method (simulation) than the experimental approach used in most extant escalation research. As such, the exploration provides important triangulating evidence that is currently lacking from the rich escalation literature.

The paper aims to evaluate the effectiveness of ethics courses provided to Malaysian accounting students and their impact on ethical judgement‐making ability.

Third‐year accounting students from six Malaysian universities participated in a pre‐ and post‐ethics course study. The sample consisted of four universities which provide an ethics course (experiment group) and two universities which do not provide an ethics course (control group). Rest's Defining Issues Test instrument was employed and the p‐score was calculated. Univariate tests were used to compare levels of ethical judgement‐making ability.

Students who attended an ethics course improved significantly in their ethical judgement‐making ability compared to students who did not attend the course. Male students, non‐Muslim students and students in private universities benefit more from attending an ethics course compared to their female and Muslim students and those students in public universities.

The findings indicate that providing ethics courses reshapes the ethical thinking of future accountants and thus are likely to improve the local ethical climate amongst professionals in the field. Results indicate significant improvements in cognitive moral development, although many students continue to apply conventional (Stage 4) reasoning skills when dealing with issues. The research provides a positive signal to the accounting faculties indicating that their effort in inculcating ethical values is worthwhile and this endeavour has to continue.

This study involves a controlled field study of a unique group of Malaysian accounting students and applies Kohlberg's theory of moral development to demonstrate the effect of an ethics intervention. Particular attention was given to examining conventional (Stage 4) judgment‐making processes and how this appears to be influenced by religious affiliation and university type. This adds value to the ethics literature as there are only a few studies examining the merits of Stage 4 reasoning. Most importantly, it helps to fill a gap in the literature by providing both cross‐sectional and longitudinal data from multiple samples of ethics classes, using both experiment and control groups.

Explores the dynamic relationships involved in achieving a strategic quality orientation in a business setting. The relevant literature was revived. A methodology for implementing a strategic quality perspective was developed and tested in a field study. The methodology stresses both the technical and cultural aspects of the implementation process and provides a road map for other businesses pursuing ISO 9000 and total quality management.

This paper investigates brand‐level marketing communications decisions of town centre‐based planned shopping centres in the UK.

Following exploratory semi‐structured interviews with town centre‐based shopping centre managers, the main stage of the research comprised a postal questionnaire. This investigated two main areas: the nature of the process by which marketing/promotional activities were planned; and the actual “marketing” activities used by respondents (and their perceived importance), with particular reference to marketing communications activities. The questionnaire was administered to shopping centre managers in urban shopping destinations classified as major city, major regional, regional and sub‐regional in the Management Horizons Europe UK Shopping Index – 173 destinations in total across the whole of the UK.

The results are structured using Shimp's categories of general choices, specific choices and programme evaluation. Regarding general choices (i.e. targeting, objectives budgeting), centre positioning was regarded as very important and key target audiences were general public and media at the local/regional level. Objectives focused on raising centre profile and improving footfall. Centres spent an average of 13.6 per cent of operating budget on promotional activities. With regard to specific choices (i.e. mixing communication elements, creating messages), the most widely used promotional elements were found to be press and radio advertising, events and festivals, leaflets and other promotional literature and also public relations. Evidence of integration between communications elements existed although there is potential for greater synergy.

Research into the marketing of planned shopping centres has been somewhat lacking in comparison to other aspects of their operations. As centres face a more intensely competitive environment, the need for effective marketing and promotion is increasingly acknowledged, and this paper provides evidence of the current use of marketing activities in this context.

This study aims to examine and compare ethical perceptions between genders on various potentially unethical consumer situations in Indonesia and Thailand.

A survey was conducted by distributing self-administered questionnaires to a convenience sample of university students in two large cities in Indonesia and Thailand. There are 278 respondents in Indonesia 158 participants for Thailand. Most respondents aged between 18-24 years.

Indonesian youths were found to believe that “passively benefiting”, “questionable action” and “downloading” are more unethical than Thai youths do. The relationship between gender and consumer ethics is not consistent in Indonesia and Thailand. Female youths in Indonesia tended to be more ethical in four out of seven dimensions of Consumer Ethics Scales than their counterparts, while no gender differences were found in Thailand.

The results show the different consumer ethics between Indonesia and Thailand that may reflect cultural variations, where Indonesia is more multicultural than Thailand. The mixed findings of the gender differences may suggest that there are no intrinsic gender differences in consumer ethics. Further, the results also provide implications for educators and public policy makers in both countries to encourage more active roles played by universities in building ethical sensitivity among future leaders.

This is one of the few studies examining the impact of gender on consumer ethical behavior in Southeast Asian countries, where various unethical behaviors (e.g. buying and using pirated products) are prevalent.

Recent misconduct and highly questionable behavior has fostered considerable distrust, cynicism, and antagonism among the populace toward the leadership of virtually all social institutions. This paper aims to examine the impact of ethics training on business students values.

Focuses on the central question whether exposure to ethical dilemmas and discussions in the classroom setting will lead to new paradigms of leadership incorporating instrumental values.

The results support the contention that senior level students were influenced in their perceptions of the importance of instrumental values in comparison to freshmen. As hypothesized no difference was found between men and women in both the importance and reinforcement of the instrumental values examined. The results do not support the contention that increased emphasis on ethics in textbooks and courses has had a significant impact.

Directions for future training are considered in light of the findings.

Points to the conclusion that current models of business education are not helping to reinforce instrumental values.

This paper aims to identify the influence of personal factors on the ethical judgement of future accountants in Malaysia. In particular, there are two research objectives for this study: first, to investigate the influence of ethical ideology on the ethical judgement of accounting students and second, to investigate the influence of emotional intelligence (EI) on ethical judgement.

The respondents of the study were final year undergraduate accounting students from three public universities in Malaysia. A survey questionnaire comprising instruments about ethical ideology, EI and ethical judgement was distributed. A total of 205 responses were received and were deemed as useable. To achieve the research objectives, multiple regression was performed.

The findings indicate that idealism and EI have a positive influence on the ethical judgement. In contrast, the study discovered that relativism influences ethical judgement negatively.

This study fills the research gap as research on personal factors on the ethical judgement of future accountants is very limited and scarce. It gives insights to the various parties concerning how to enhance ethical judgement among future accountants, which ultimately will improve the credibility of the accounting profession.

If females are more ethical than males, as the literature on the subject generally suggests, engaging and encouraging females in their careers would certainly promote an ethical environment. The present paper is motivated by such a viewpoint and aims to investigate gender‐based differences in the ethical disposition and the underlying dimensions in ethical decision‐making processes, by specific examination of business students.

The main research instrument is a quantitative questionnaire through which the responses of 162 business students (45 females and 117 males) are examined. For data analysis univariate analysis by invoking one‐way analysis of variance and multivariate approach using cluster analysis are conducted to investigate gender‐based differences in the ethical disposition. To determine the underlying dimensions in ethical decision‐making processes, for female and male business students, the principal axis approach to factor analysis has been used.

The findings provide evidence that female business students are more ethically predisposed than their male counterparts. It is further observed that males exhibit less diversity in ethical decision making while females more readily invoked different ethical dimensions for different business scenarios.

The paper offers valuable insight into the role of gender in ethics in the context of Indian business. The fact that females appear to demonstrate greater sensitivity on ethical issues suggests that practitioners may want to use this knowledge for developing their organizational strategies, ethical codes, and evaluation systems. Further, the study also highlights the importance of realigning the curriculum in a manner that the teaching of ethics becomes an integral part of business school education.