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The management of uncertainty has received much attention recently in the fields of database and artificial intelligence. Several methods of evidential reasoning have been proposed for real‐world problems with which uncertainty is associated. Considers one of these problems, that of classification, which is encountered in many domains including medicine. Focuses on a classification technique for knowledge discovery (KD). Reasoning about classifications is a primary interest in KD. Deals with obtaining evidence to confirm or refute classes. Searches for any data dependencies which exist between a classifier attribute and any of the property attributes. To illustrate the method compares a neural network classification with one based on Tanimoto’s method. It is important to note that the aim is to demonstrate this approach rather than to compare these two methods of classification. After extracting the data dependency information, employs a non‐numeric evidential reasoning method to see how well this evidence supports each of the two respective classifications.

The management of uncertainty has received much attention recently in the fields of database and artificial intelligence. Several methods of evidential reasoning have been proposed for real‐world problems with which uncertainty is associated. One of these problems is that of classification and it is encountered in many domains including medicine, which is considered here. Focuses on a classification technique for knowledge discovery (KD). Reasoning about classifications is a primary interest in KD. Obtains evidence to confirm or refute classes by searching for any data dependencies which exist between a classifier attribute and any of the property attributes. To illustrate the method, compares a neural network classification with one based on Tanimoto’s method. The aim was to demonstrate the approach rather than to compare the two methods of classification. After extracting the data dependency information, employs a non‐numeric evidential reasoning method to see how well this evidence supports each of the two respective classifications.

The clustering of objects in a layered object storage system is by common consent an exceedingly difficult problem. Studies the performance of three heuristic placement algorithms. A series of eight reasonably realistic case studies were used as a benchmark battery, and several hundred experiments were carried out to evaluate results of using the algorithms. Presents the results and the insights gained from the study.

Develops a method for estimating the monthly milk price schedule needed to counter the effects of seasonality, which is an enduring feature of milk production in the UK. The issue of seasonality has been mostly ignored in studies estimating milk supply functions. In this paper milk supply functions which explicitly take account of seasonality are estimated for Northern Ireland and Scotland. Pre‐testing of monthly milk price and milk supply time‐series, using an extended HEGY test and an ADF test, indicated the presence of deterministic seasonality. Empirical milk supply models incorporating seasonal dummy variables to account for deterministic seasonality were estimated in the two regions of study. The results of these models were used to calculate the monthly producer milk price schedule required to encourage dairy farmers to produce an even monthly milk supply pattern. These calculations indicated that, in the long run, a peak‐to‐trough seasonal price differential of around 8 pence per litre would be required to produce an even pattern of milk supply in Scotland, and 11 pence per litre would be required in Northern Ireland.

MEN AND WOMEN about to retire are not always fortunate in having lectures on retirement available in their locality as, for example, Londoners have in the twelve‐week courses at Morley College (61 Westminster Bridge Road, SE1), where the Greater London Council, the Inner London Education Authority, Shell, and other big employers allow their staff afternoons off to hear specialists speak on pension problems, taxation, health, part‐time work, psychological and other problems of retirement.

Technical progress and its adoption are recognized as probably the most important source of improvement in the productivity and competitiveness of firms in any industry. While progress is an essential prerequisite for the transfer of technology, focuses on the process of transfer itself prompted by a lack of research in this area within the Northern Ireland food‐processing industry. The analysis investigated innovation and identified a diffusion pattern for the uptake of innovations. It also obtained a measure for the rate of technology transfer and identified the principal factors influencing the process. The results indicated factors that could be used to accelerate the diffusion of new technologies as being the education levels of managers; R&D expenditure; and the profitability of the innovation. There was also a suggestion that the poultry and dairy sectors were more progressive than the others in their approach to business.

This paper aims to investigate whether anthropomorphized (i.e. humanized) brands are judged less negatively for competence failures than for moral lapses and how these ethical judgments impact negative word-of-mouth (NWOM) intentions of less-lonely and more-lonely consumers.

Two scenario-based experiments were conducted, involving a total of 1,375 US mechanical turk (Amazon consumer panel) participants.

Findings show that brand humanization has an impact on ethical judgments only for less-lonely consumers. More specifically, for less-lonely consumers, a humanizing strategy backfires when the failure is moral but helps the brand when the failure is competence-related. On the other hand, more-lonely consumers judge the situation less negatively overall, and this effect is not impacted by the anthropomorphization strategy. Process tests indicate that these judgments indirectly affect consumers’ intention to spread NWOM following negative events.

Future research could examine the specific process for lonely consumers (i.e. the role of empathy) and manipulate the size of the negative events (i.e. consumer perceptions of moderate vs extreme failures).

Brand managers need to consider their specific situations, as anthropomorphization can have both positive and negative effects depending on the consumers and the failure type (moral vs competence).

Extant research indicates that a humanizing strategy backfires when the market has negative information about the brand. This research introduces types of negative information, as well as consumers’ loneliness as moderators and contributes to the literature in branding, business ethics and word-of-mouth.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the connections of agricultural productivity, access to credit and farm size in Africa using Ghana as a case study.

The paper employs mixed methods – quantitative and qualitative strategies for data collection and analyses. The hierarchical competitive model was used for the quantitative analyses supplemented with qualitative analyses using key informant interviews, focus group discussions and household case studies.

The results show that there is significant relationship between credit from formal and informal sources and agricultural productivity. Thus access to formal and informal credit increases farm household agricultural productivity by about 0.10 (p=0.05) and 0.45 (p < 0.01), respectively. The quadratic terms of formal and informal credit as well as farm size were found to significantly influence agricultural productivity. The implication of this is that the relationships between formal credit, informal credit and farm size on one hand and agricultural productivity on the other are non-linear in nature. The interactions of formal credit with informal credit; informal credit with farm size; and formal and informal credit with farm size have significant relationships with agricultural productivity. The amount of remittance received by farm households has negative and insignificant influence on agricultural productivity. Market access is also an insignificant determinant of agricultural productivity in Ghana.

This paper provides new insights on whether the scale of production (farm size as proxy) and access to financial services (credit as a proxy) matter in promoting agricultural productivity in Africa using Ghana as a case study. Thus the paper is of relevance to policy-makers and practitioners in Africa and Ghana in particular who are seeking to make informed policy decisions on effectively incorporating credit provision into the agricultural transformation agenda of the continent.

A Crown Court hearing of a charge of applying a false A description under S.2, Trade Descriptions Act, 1968, is given in some detail under Legal Proceedings in this issue of BFJ. It concerns using the word “ham”, ie., the natural leg of a single pig, to various pieces from several pigs, deboned, defatted, “tumbled, massaged and cooked” in a mould shaped to a leg of ham, from which the average purchaser would find it impossible to distinguish. As the defence rightly claimed, this process has been used for at least a couple of decades, and the product forms a sizeable section of the bacon trade. Evidence by prosecution witnesses, experienced shop managers, believed the product to be the genuine “ham”. There is nothing detrimental about the meat, save that it tends to contain an excess of added water, but this applies to many meat products today; or that the manufacturers are setting out to cheat the consumer. What offends is the description given to the product. Manufacture was described in detail—a county trading standards officer inspected the process at the defendant company's Wiltshire factory, witness to the extent of their co‐operation—and was questioned at great length by defending counsel. Specimens of the product were exhibited and the jury were treated to a tasting test—presumably designed to refute prosecution's claim that the meat was of “poor value”. The trial judge said the jury had no doubt been enlightened as to the methods of manufacturing ham. The marketing of the product was also a subject of examination.

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how the specification of hedonic pricing models can be improved by using insights generated from qualitative research. In doing so, it seeks to address one of the main problems in the specification of hedonic models, namely that theory yields little guidance in the selection of the characteristics that should be included on the right-hand side.

Building on the behavioural tradition in real estate research, this paper introduces a research approach that integrates insights from qualitative analysis in an econometric model of land values. The empirical segment explores the way in which asking prices of building plots for industrial purposes are determined in The Netherlands. It draws from interviews with municipal land developers, who dominate supply in this market. The information secured during these interviews relates to the characteristics considered important and the kind of information used in the valuation process. Based on these qualitative data, an econometric model is developed and estimated.

The estimation results confirm qualitative evidence that the typical developer considers only a limited number of features of the land in the valuation process and that the primary source of information in setting asking prices relates to the prices charged in neighbouring municipalities.

This paper represents a novel attempt to examine the determination of land and property values by merging qualitative and quantitative, econometric analyses.