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The purpose of this study is to examine the role of social presence in enhancing positive behaviors in the virtual reality (VR)-based wine tourism context through an innovative approach.

Two sequential experimental studies were conducted to test proposed hypotheses using Web and head-mounted display (HMD) VR formats. Specifically, Study 1 probed the influence of social presence on mental imagery, which subsequently impacted destination visit intention, drinking intent and memorable experience. Study 2 used a field experiment to explore the boundary effects of environmental cues (nature versus social) on social presence and a series of behavioral intentions using an HMD format.

The findings represent one of the first efforts to unravel the influence of social presence on positive behaviors through mental imagery and the moderating role of environmental cues.

This research enhances the understanding of wine tourism, drawing upon social presence theory and stimulus-organism-response framework.

The outcomes provide valuable insights for wine tourism marketers in developing innovative marketing strategies by addressing the usage of social presence and environmental cues in a VR setting.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to enrich the existing knowledge of wine tourism by exploring the role of social presence and environmental cues in both Web and HMD VR formats.

To overcome the limitations of traditional multi-attribute decision making (MADM) methods, which only provide deterministic rankings of decision objects, this paper proposes a novel multi-attribute 3WD model. This model presents three-parameter interval grey number decision-theoretic rough sets (TPIGNDTRSs), aiming to offer a reasoned interpretation of loss functions in grey environments and ensure objective assessment of conditional probabilities.

Firstly, the traditional equivalence relation is replaced with the probabilistic dominance relation (PDR), categorizing decision objects into two state sets in DTRS for more objective conditional probabilities. Secondly, as the three-parameter interval grey number (TPIGN) introduces the most probable value on the basis of the traditional two-parameter interval grey number, it provides a more comprehensive method for describing grey information. Consequently, integrating TPIGN into DTRS refines the interpretations of loss functions in grey environments. Finally, by utilizing two main sorting techniques, relative kernel and degree of accuracy ranking and possibility ranking, two types of 3WD rules with TPIGNDTRSs, are constructed.

This study has successfully developed and validated a new multi-attribute 3WD model. The model was tested in two distinct domains: evaluating innovation efficiency in high-tech enterprises and recommending movies in a practical case. The findings reveal that the model can effectively integrate relevant information of high-tech enterprises, provide the government with enterprise-level assessments, and gather consumer preferences to recommend the most suitable movies.

This study treats the loss function as grey information in the 3WD model but overlooks the grey nature of evaluation values, limiting its applicability. Additionally, the model’s reliance on subjective expert judgments and historical data to establish the loss function may affect its objectivity. The implications of this research are that the novel model overcomes traditional MADM limitations, enhancing decision-making quality and efficiency in complex and grey scenarios. The model’s successful application in evaluating high-tech enterprises and recommending movies illustrates its dual value in both theory and practice.

Initially, the model proposed in this study is of significant importance for the development of the 3WD field, as it successfully addresses the challenges of uncertain loss functions and unknown conditional probabilities in grey information environments. Moreover, by integrating the 3WD model with MADM problems, it has broken through the bottlenecks of traditional MADM methods, offering new perspectives and strategies for solving MADM issues. Therefore, this research not only advances theoretical research but also provides powerful tools for practical applications.

This study aims to provide insights into wine consumers in Hong Kong and Mainland China, and the diversity of their behavior, by investigating their motivations, consumption and purchasing behavior and segmenting the sample based on wine knowledge and frequency of consumption to identify three distinct clusters that are then profiled.

Data was collected through an online survey of wine consumers of ethnic Chinese origin residing in Mainland China and Hong Kong, using two methods of recruitment (a convenience sample from wine-related databases, a panel survey undertaken by an international market research firm). The final sample comprised 477 respondents, about equally divided among Mainland Chinese and Hong Kong wine consumers. Analysis of the data using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences for Windows (SPSS) 29 included a series of descriptive analyses, followed by a two-step cluster analysis using an Euclidean distance method.

Wine knowledge and frequency of wine consumption were relatively higher within the sample as a whole than previous studies, but three distinct consumer segments are evident. There is evidence of a democratization of wine consumption, and a greater focus on wine consumption for enjoyment in relaxed and informal settings. rather than consumption driven by health and status, occurring primarily in commercial or business settings. The dominance of red wine in this market is also declining, and intrinsic cues – specifically, prior experience of the wine – are becoming important in wine purchase decisions.

This study uses a broad sample of wine consumers to identify trends in wine consumption patterns and motivations, and purchase decision-making behavior, of Mainland Chinese and Hong Kong wine consumers. The identification of three clusters of wine consumers offers both points of comparison with previous segmentation research globally and within China, whilst also identifying scope for further research.

Over the last years, powerful advances in the area of dynamic games have enriched game theory and made it more applicable to the modeling of real-world competitive strategies. The study of strategic behaviors of firms in an oligopoly market has received little attention, even though real firms have been shown to compete in output and in price in a single industry. The purpose of this study is to propose a game-theoretic approach to studying strategic behaviors of firms in an oligopoly market structure.

This approach was developed to study market dynamics and pricing strategic behavior of firms that have the possibility of deciding to be one of the two types (price-maker or price-taker) and reconsider the choice overtime on the basis of their current insights and knowledge and their experience. Firms try to improve their performance in the competitive market in a strategic way, by considering their steady-state profits and choosing the best type given the other firms’ types, actions and interactions.

The results of the present study confirm the previous study that the Cournot market is a stable market, where each firm can be a price-maker and enjoy individual learning as well as social learning. On the contrary, the market with price-takers only is never stable, and, therefore, the Walrasian equilibrium may not be supported in some instances. The Cournot market loses its stability as the number of firms in the market increases due to the fact that it will be more profitable for a firm to switch to price-taking when the number of firms is high enough. In such a situation, when the number of price-takers increases, there are no stable markets and price dynamics are destabilized.

The study and modeling of real-world competitive strategies would enhance the understanding of oligopoly markets. The study of strategic behaviors of firms in an oligopoly market has received little attention, even though real firms have been shown to compete in output and in price in a single industry as price-takers and price-makers.

While being integrated together conceptually and practically, the literature on game theory in the context of financial markets lacks a cohesive understanding. This study aims to systematically scrutinize and analyse the literature of game theory in the context of financial markets, through a systematic literature review.

A systematic literature-based approach, through the theories, context, characteristics and methodology (TCCM) framework has been applied to 97 articles, extracted and filtered from two databases, Scopus and Web of Science, for a comprehensive review and understanding of the intellectual development in the domain of game theory and financial markets.

The review highlighted the most utilitarian theories within the literature, the context of research in terms of countries and industries, four themes which characterize the literature, as well as the methodologies and research designs used in this research domain. The paper also uncovered certain essential areas that present scope for further research.

While two of the largest indexation databases have been used, some relevant articles may have been excluded due to the restriction of databases and screening criteria, which may lead to the less exploration of several facets of the domain.

Practically, the paper has implications for multiple stakeholders including traders, businesses and governments. For traders, this paper acts as a guide to entering and understanding the dynamics of financial markets. The review also covers decision-making from the perspective of firms, including venture capitalists. This paper would allow firms to understand how game theory can help influence or analyze the strategic interactions between their stakeholders in terms of information disclosure, or consumers and their behavior to stimuli from the firm’s actions.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first of its kind that attempts to comprehensively provide an overview of the literature on game theory in financial markets. In doing so, this study shall help assess the current state of knowledge in the said field and locate gaps in the literature to propose new research directions.

This paper aims to determine the conditions for the core of the Triple Helix game to exist. The Triple Helix of university-industry-government relationships is a three-person cooperative game with transferable utility. Then, the core, the Shapley value and the nucleolus were used as indicators of the synergy within an innovation system. Whereas the Shapley value and the nucleolus always exist, the core may not.

The core of a three-person cooperative game with transferable utility exists only if and only if the game is convex. The paper applies the convexity condition to the Triple Helix game.

The Triple Helix game is convex if and only if there is output within the system; it is strictly convex if and only if all the three bilateral and the trilateral relationships have an output.

Convex games are competitive situations in which there are strong incentives towards the formation of large coalitions; therefore, innovation actors must cooperate to maximise their interests. Furthermore, a Triple Helix game may be split into subgames for comprehensive analyses and several Triple Helix games may be combined for a global study.

This paper extends the meaning of the Shapley value and the nucleolus for Triple Helix innovation actors: the Shapley value indicates the quantity a player wins because of the coalitions he involves in and the nucleolus the return for solidarity of an innovation actor.

This study aims to quantify sectoral energy and carbon intensity, revisit the validity of the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) and explore the relationship between economic diversification and CO₂ emissions in Bahrain.

Three stages were followed to understand the linkages between sectoral economic growth, energy consumption and CO₂ emissions in Bahrain. Sectoral energy and carbon intensity were calculated, time series data trends were analyzed and two econometric models were built and analyzed using the autoregressive distributed lag method and time series data for the period 1980–2019.

The results of the analysis suggest that energy and carbon intensity in Bahrain’s industrial sector is higher than those of its services and agricultural sectors. The EKC was found to be invalid for Bahrain, where economic growth is still coupled with CO₂ emissions. Whereas CO₂ emissions have increased with growth in the manufacturing, and real estate subsectors, the emissions have decreased with growth in the hospitability, transportation and communications subsectors. These results indicate that economic diversification, specifically of the services sector, is aligned with Bahrain’s carbon neutrality target. However, less energy-intensive industries, such as recycling-based industries, are needed to counter the environmental impacts of economic growth.

The impacts of economic diversification on energy consumption and CO₂ emissions in the Gulf Cooperation Council petroleum countries have rarely been explored. Findings from this study contribute to informing economic and environment-related policymaking in Bahrain.