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The purpose of this paper is to extend significantly the technology acceptance model (TAM) of Davis to design an extended TAM model to be used in the evaluation and assessment of e-information services for information research such as e-library services. The present TAM extension is based on two variables of behavioral intention: the perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness of a system. Furthermore, the user satisfaction, free access, information architecture, content richness, policies and rules, publishers’ quality, system self-efficacy and task technology fit were incorporated into the TAM to extend it with other factors theoretically motivated and would be of interest more generally.

The researcher adopted an experimental approach-based comparison between an experimental group (107 researchers) using an electronic information service (the e-library service of the university) and a control group (107 researchers) not registered in this e-information service of the university.

The researcher used the effect size values based t-test independent samples at the 0.05 level to adapt the structural model equation to the experimental sample. Principal results show that the behavioral intention was influenced significantly by user satisfaction. The perceived usefulness of the e-library services was influenced significantly by the perceived ease of use, information architecture, content richness, free access, publishers’ quality, task-technology fit and e-library service self-efficacy.

This paper is useful in advancing a framework for the evaluation and assessment of the electronic information service used for information research and exploring users’ attitudes toward using that service.

The purpose of this paper is to provide evidence concerning the existence of earnings management (EM) from the perspective of external and internal auditors in Jordan.

A specially designed questionnaire was distributed to a sample of both external and internal auditors. To analyze the data of the study, t‐tests and ANOVA were used.

The results of the study showed that external auditors believe that management engages significantly only in legitimate EM that either increases or decreases income. However, internal auditors believe that management engages in legitimate practices that only increase income. In both cases, there were significant differences between their views. There is no significant difference between large and small companies regarding EM practices. However, the characteristics of internal governance structure have a significant effect on illegitimate EM, whereas no significant effect was found on legitimate EM.

The paper provides many recommendations, including the need to strengthen and reinforce the internal governance structure of companies and train external and internal auditors regarding EM techniques and measures of detection.

The originality of the study is that it provides evidence about EM practices from the perspective of both external and internal auditor in a developing country.

The purpose of present study is to explore the linkages among Intellectual Capital (IC), Corporate Governance (CG) and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) through direct and indirect empirical inquiry.

The main setting is designed for exploring the relationship among IC, CG and CSR. Therefore, these three constructs are examined directly in which their statistical relation is evaluated among themselves and indirectly in which their possible effects are examined onto firms’ unsystematic factors such as cash flow, short-term solvency, long-term solvency, profitability and asset utilization.

Empirical investigation is conducted on manufacturing firms listed in Istanbul Stock Exchange from 2007 to 2011. Empirical results do support a positive relationship among these important constructs.

The empirical research is carried out in manufacturing firms only.

IC, CG and CSR are three demanding research areas to study. This is the first attempt here to examine their possible linkages based on so-called direct and indirect empirical inquiries. The primary reason behind this attempt is that these concepts are assumed to be important for all stakeholders.

Four main strategies required for firms to be able to achieve their main objectives in organizations under the unified theory of the firm are technological advance, intellectual development, spirituality conducts and customer satisfaction concern. This study aims to explore the inclination of firms to adopt all these strategies in, factors that contribute to the adoption of all these strategies and significant relationship between these strategies of firms in the context of Malaysian firms.

Using primary data from the survey on a sample of firms in the financial sector of Malaysia, the study adopts several methods of analysis such as t-test for dependent sample, t-test for independent sample and correlation. Furthermore, ordinary least squares regressions are estimated to determine factors that have an impact on a particular strategy.

It is found that the strategies of the unified theory of the firm significantly contributed to the education level of managers. Highly educated managers tend to adopt strategies most of the time. It is also found that scores of customer satisfaction concern are highly related to scores of intellectual development and spirituality conduct. The correlation coefficient is also high between spirituality conduct and intellectual development.

The study analyzes the adoption of important strategies of a unified theory of firm among several firms using first-hand data (primary data) collected from the survey.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate employees' work motivation in China. It aims to give answers to two questions: what motivates employees in China? What are the effects of personal characteristics on work motivation for employees in China?

The study used convenience sampling to select the sample and the respondents were randomly selected from employees of six organizations, from people in the personnel market and also from people walking around in shopping centres in a very representative city of China – Ningbo. Then, descriptive statistics, t‐test (one sample t‐test, independent sample t‐test and one‐way ANOVA), regression analysis and scatter plots were used to analyze the data.

The findings of the study are: all the 15 motivation factors listed in the questionnaire, including good pay, promotion, desirable work environment, good welfare package, good bonus system, good company policy, good interpersonal relationships, good supervisors, job security, the opportunity to use my ability, a sense of challenge and achievement, positive recognition, autonomy, self‐actualization and interesting job, do motivate employees in China; good pay is the most important motivator for employees in China; employees' work motivation is affected by their personal characteristics.

It is believed that these findings can assist organizations in China, those located in Ningbo in particular, in effectively motivating their employees. It may also be applied to organizations located in other parts of the world which have Chinese employees.

This study seeks to evaluate the application of a social‐virtual curriculum delivered through in‐classroom and web‐based activities, aiming to develop youth's social‐cultural skills, cultural competency and multicultural awareness. Specifically, the study evaluates the overall impact of the curriculum to the participating youth's Universality‐Diversity Orientation, diversity of contact, relativistic appreciation (RA) and comfort with differences. It examines the influence of gender, ethnicity and religion to the aforementioned variables. Finally, it aims to identify the role of the curriculum and the Web 2.0 in promoting multiculturalism and multicultural education and in changing youth's perceptions, and attitudes towards others.

A quantitative approach was applied, using the Miville‐Guzman Universality‐Diversity Scale that measures an individual's Universal‐Diverse Orientation. Descriptive (frequencies, percentages, means, standard deviations and Cronbach's alpha) and inferential (the independent t‐test, the paired‐sample t‐test and the one‐way analysis of variances) statistics were conducted. Questionnaires were given to 303 students. The pre‐measurement took place in April 2008 (70 per cent response rate) and the post‐measurement took place in June‐July 2009 (45 per cent response rate).

The study discusses the impact of the social‐virtual curriculum, the influence of gender, ethnicity and religion, the role of the social‐virtual curriculum and the Web 2.0 tools in promoting multiculturalism and multicultural education and in changing youth's beliefs, perceptions and attitudes towards others and the new learning, collaboration and communication culture established.

The study constitutes the foundation for further research to be conducted regarding the educational use of Web 2.0 tools, the in‐depth examination of the application of the educational networking within the school curriculum.

This study aims to measure and further compare the countries in terms of the achievement in the degree of financial inclusion over the study period and between income groups considering 26 nations from Asia for the period 2013-2017.

While measuring the degree of financial inclusion, the study prepares an index using weighted arithmetic mean and the inverse of the Euclidean distance method. Further, comparison between the study period and between the income groups has been made using the dependent samples t-test as well as the Wilcoxon signed-rank test and independent samples t-test, respectively.

The study extends empirical insights by laying out the ranks for the countries considered for each of the study periods individually as well as in terms of mean financial inclusion scores for the study period. Further, comparison in terms of mean financial inclusion scores shows significant differences between the income groups, whereas the differences between the study periods turn out to be non-significant.

Less availability of intended variables over time restricts the predictive capability of sketching the phenomena in a true sense and claims further an exhaustive research to pursue in the future.

With the declining trend except for 2016-2017 in the achievement of financial inclusion scores over time, the study suggests emphasizing the initiatives targeted to include the excluded within the ambit of the formal financial system, which somehow seems unstable.

The novelty of the study lies in the portrayal of a measure that seems representative of the scale for development with deeper insight.

The declining attractiveness of construction industry to the new-generation onsite construction professionals (OCPs) in China can be the result of insufficient supply of what they desire at work. There is a lack of studies that make clear the work values of this cohort and the fit between their work value preferences and job supplies. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to address this issue.

This study focused on Chinese new-generation OCPs. Work values and job supplies were measured by two rounds of questionnaire surveys. Factor analysis was implemented to identify work value types. Paired samples t-test, independent samples t-test and one-way ANOVA were performed to figure out work value preferences and degree of supplies–values (S-V) fit and compare them across subgroups.

Intrinsic, “good time”, work-team-related, altruistic/prestigious and extrinsic work value types were identified. Chinese new-generation OCPs most valued work-team-related and intrinsic work aspects, while significant insufficient supply was relevant to intrinsic, extrinsic and “good time” aspects. Work value preferences and S-V fit showed significant differences among subgroups of gender, growth background, work rank and project type.

The results provide insights for construction companies to practice work-value-based human resource management toward new-generation OCPs and make targeted measures to address the misfit between supplies and values experienced by these OCPs.

This study for the first time examined work values of Chinese new-generation OCPs. It opens a new perspective for research based on S-V fit theory that focused on industry level. The effects of demographic and professional variables on the work values and the degree of S-V fit were revealed. This study thus contributes to the extant literature of work values and S-V fit.

Built upon three components (attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control) of the theory of planned behavior (TPB), the purpose of this paper is to analyze the factors that influenced accounting students’ intention to pursue public accounting instead of private accounting as their career choice in China.

The TPB is used to predict the rational intention of accounting students in this study. A binary logistic regression analysis was applied to test all hypotheses because of its suitability.

The authors find that the variety and marketability of public accounting experiences, high turnover plus, low firm cohesion in the workplace, and perceived difficulties in traveling extensively affected students’ intentions to pursue the public accounting profession significantly. By highlighting these factors that affect students’ intention to pursue public accounting, this paper has important implications for the accounting educators and other stakeholders in China and other emerging economies.

By understanding the factors influencing the accounting students’ interests in pursuing public accounting, accounting educators and accounting firms could make some changes, redesign accounting curriculum, and enhance internship experience and recruiting process in order to increase more interests in public accounting. Professional organizations and policy makers might learn some lessons to take some actions to encourage young accounting professionals to work for public accounting firms. Moreover, this study has provided a valuable perspective to accounting educators, practitioners, and policy makers in other emerging economies with the same shortage of qualified public accountants.

This paper aims toanalyse the difference in business performance and obstacles across male-owned versus female-owned enterprises in India.

This study is based on a comprehensive enterprise survey of 9,281 Indian firms operating in different regions of the country, conducted under the World Bank’s Enterprise Survey, 2014. The survey contains information on a variety of enterprise characteristics such as ownership, type of firms, size of firms, locations and age, performance indicators and information on 16 parameters of business obstacles. Business performance indicators have been derived from data in the form of growth in sales, employment, labour productivity and capability utilization by gender ownership of the firms. Simple statistical tools such as descriptive statistics, chi-square test and the independent-samples t-test have been used to analyse the data. Further, an ordered probit regression model has been estimated to identify the relative importance of parameters affecting female-owned enterprises.

Of the total 9,281 firms surveyed under the World Bank’s Enterprise Survey, about 8 per cent were being managed by a top female manager and about 15 per cent firms reported to have at least one female owner. Among the female owners, about 36 per cent were reported to own 50 per cent and above share of the firm. Chi-square statistics indicate that there is a significant difference in enterprise characteristics of male- versus female-owned firms in terms of location, size, type and age. Result of the independent-samples t-test indicates a significant difference in business performance across male- and female-owned businesses in terms of annual sales growth, labour productivity growth and capacity utilization of the firms. Similarly, the perception of male- and female-owned firms significantly vary on 10 obstacles out of total 16 business obstacle parameters. Overall, females perceive comparatively less business obstacles as compared to males. An ordered probit regression model has revealed the relative importance of enterprise characteristics, performance indicators and extent of business obstacles among female-owned enterprises.

This study provides an insight on the differences in the firms’ performance across gender ownership based on a large survey data. This study can be helpful in designing policies for promoting gender-based business enterprises in a focused manner.

There are limited empirical evidences on difference in organizational profile, business performance and understanding business obstacles across male- versus female-owned firms in India based on a large survey data.