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Management response to consumer comments has become a widely adopted marketing strategy to address the undesirable effects caused by negative remarks. Yet, when and what management response is more effective and under what circumstances remains under-researched. This study aims to fill this gap.

In three experiments using five different products, the authors manipulate psychological construal level (psychological distance: distant vs proximal) and management response (response of primary vs secondary features) and thereafter assess their bearings on consumer psychological and behavioral reaction toward products of two distinctive natures (hedonic vs utilitarian).

At a psychological distance, consumers show a preferable reaction to management response of primary over secondary features. In contrast, when the psychological distance is proximal, consumers react more positively to management response of secondary than primary features. In addition, these effects vary as a function of product nature, hedonic vs utilitarian.

The findings of this research bring a significant contribution to marketing communication literature and extend the construal level theory.

A better understanding of the relative effectiveness of distinct types of management response to negative consumer comments is essential for more targeted and effective marketing strategies.

Little research has documented the effects of distinct types of management response. How psychological distance might underpin these effects has not been explored. In addition, whether the interaction effect of management response and psychological distance varies with differences in product nature, namely, hedonic and utilitarian, remains unanswered until this research.

This study empirically investigates the impact of directors' and officers' liability insurance on corporate environmental investment.

This paper takes A-share listed firms in the most polluting industries from 2013 to 2019 as the research sample. The authors perform multiple regression analysis to examine the research question, and other approaches such as PSM and Heckman two-stage model are applied to test the robustness of the main results.

The authors find that D&O insurance insured firms significantly decrease the level of corporate environmental investment. The results keep consistent after alleviating potential endogenous concerns. Further analysis shows that the negative association between D&O insurance and environmental investment is more pronounced in firms facing greater environmental pressure and stronger market supervision, and firms located in regions with a rich legal environment.

This research extends the literature on the antecedents of corporate environmental investment and the consequences of D&O insurance.

The study may deepen people's understanding of D&O insurance and inform them of its negative effects. This research sheds light on the potential factor resulting in a relatively low level of corporate environmental investment in China, which has an important policy implication for government to carry out some regulations to make a difference.

Against the backdrop that more importance has been attached to environmental protection globally, this paper is the first study to examine the impact of D&O insurance on corporate environmental investment in the context of the transitional and emerging market-China.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of corporate environmental responsibility (CER) on corporate cash holdings. This paper also investigates the moderating effects of ownership type and institutional environment between CER and corporate cash holdings.

This study uses the data of the most polluting listed companies on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchange markets over the period 2010–2019. CER data from Hexun.com (a professional CSR evaluation system) are used to measure CER performance. Two proxies are used to measure the level of cash holdings simultaneously, where CASH1 is calculated as the ratio of cash and cash equivalents to total assets, and CASH2 is calculated as the ratio of cash and cash equivalents to net assets (total assets minus cash and cash equivalents). Finally, multiple regression analysis is applied to test the research hypotheses.

The results show that environmentally responsible companies hold substantially less cash, and the result is statistically significant and robust even after using firm fixed effects and applying alternative measures of cash holdings or alleviating potential endogeneity. In addition, the results of cross-sectional tests show that the negative relation between CER and corporate cash holdings is concentrated among non-state-owned enterprises, and firms in provinces with more developed institutions. Furthermore, the result of the analysis of the economic consequence shows CER significantly increases the value of cash holdings.

This study focuses on China's institutional context, which limits the generalizability of the findings to other countries. However, the objective of this research can be studied in other institutional settings, so the above limitations provide a springboard for further research. Furthermore, the environmental protection investment, green technology innovation, and even pollutant discharge of companies can also be important indicators to measure the performance of firms in fulfilling their environmental responsibilities, which can be considered in future research.

The findings of this study may help company management in China to establish a correct view of environmental responsibility to achieve corporate value creation and corporate sustainability. And our research can also provide the policy reference value for the Chinese government to further improve environmental protection policies and systems, guide enterprises to conduct green production to realize the country's vision of an environmentally friendly society.

Based on the current background that countries in the world advocate the development of a green economy, this is the first study to examine the impacts of the environmental responsibility of the most polluting companies on corporate cash holdings and the value of cash holdings in the context of China, an emerging market.

Public–private partnership (PPP) projects are increasingly significant in many countries. The purpose of this paper is to assess the impact of critical success factors (CSFs) on PPP projects and comprehensively consider the interrelations and interaction among dimensions and factors to achieve a better understanding of PPP project management.

An evaluation index system for PPP projects such as the presented case study is proposed based on a literature review and a survey. Then, interpretative structural modeling is used to transform the CSFs dimension into a multi-level hierarchical model to reflect the driven-dependency relation of each dimension; the fuzzy analytic network process model optimized by moment estimation theory is used to investigate the impact of CSFs by considering their internal impact.

Regarding the project used as the case study, the driving force and dependence for driving layer and dependent layer are determined. Moreover, in driving layer, efficient and well-structured payment mechanism is the most important CSF if considering the internship and interaction among CSFs, and efficient and well-structured payment mechanism and good governance provide most positive interaction; in dependent layer, population of beneficiaries is the most important CSF if considering the internship and interaction among CSFs, and public client’s satisfaction provides most positive interaction.

This paper developed an evaluation model to explore the interrelationships of dimensions and factors and then determine the impact of CSFs. The model propose in this paper relaxes the independence assumptions of traditional methods and is more in line with reality; besides, weighting method is optimized to obtain more objective and reasonable evaluation results. Through an empirical study, the validity of the model has been verified; therefore, the study can help project stakeholders better understand the CSFs and further improve project performance.

The purpose of this paper is to examine visitors’ motivations for going to the South Luogu Alley, a famous hutong with an over 700-year history in Beijing, China.

The study applied a self-administered questionnaire to collect data from visitors on the main street of the South Luogu Alley.

It was found that most visitors of the hutong are casual tourists pursuing relaxation, including tension release and spending time with friends and family; seeking authenticity is not visitors’ most important motivation.

This study used only one hutong to assess visitors’ motivations in hutong tourism, so the results may not be applicable to all hutongs.

The research on the demographics and different motivations of the South Luogu Alley visitors can be useful to managers of tourism-related organizations.

This study shows that tourists with different motivations for visiting a hutong have varying requirements for authenticity. The reconstruction of some historical hutongs is not always perceived as negative, and the influence of Western cultural elements can be seen as positive if they contribute to the sustainable development of the local culture.

The term “hutonger,” which includes casual visitors, entertainment seekers, authenticity seekers and pure escapees, based on these respective motivations, is introduced to describe the specific groups of hutong visitors and contribute to the hutong tourism literature.

In recent years, especially after the 2008 global financial crisis, the global economic recovery has been struggling. The trend of anti-globalization with populism and protectionism around the world is on the rise. As the largest developing country, China will engage in promoting global economic integration for common development of the world to promote the sustainable development and globalization. This paper will focus on the global operations of Chinese MNCs and explore their social responsibility to go global under the B&R Initiative, study their performance of social responsibility, analyze the potential risks and put forward countermeasures. Based on the report of the Top 100 Chinese MNCs released by China Entrepreneurs Association in 2016, we select 35 corporations related to the B&R, use their comparatively complete data and conduct a statistical analysis of their CSR data. To study the economic, social and environmental performance of CSR and sustainable development, we focus on three major indicators, including employee, environment and the public. Data from 2012 to 2016 are considered, for a total of five years. Through the analysis of CSR data, this paper points the social responsibility development status of major Chinese MNCs under the B&R Initiative and reveals some problems and risks that still exist in the fulfillment of social responsibility. In response to these issues, we make analysis from the perspective of stakeholders, so as to provide ideas for the development of social responsibility of the related corporations. At the initial stage of China's initiative of the Belt and Road, it is a new attempt to launch a research on the social responsibility of Chinese MNCs. Traditionally, research on CSR tends to make horizontal comparison of corporations in different countries and focuses on a certain year. Based on the traditional research and differ from them, we extend the time interval of research beyond a certain year and adopt the trend analysis to CSR data. In addition, case introduction is also used. According to the stakeholder theory and the comprehensiveness of the data, the research is focused on three main aspects, namely, employee, environment and the public. And, we have made a relative conversion of these indicators. These thoughts can examine the social responsibility development of related corporations in a given period and help promote the B&R Initiative.

A core challenge of assessing regional agricultural drought vulnerability (RADV) is to reveal what vulnerability factors, under which kinds of synergistic combinations and at what strengths, will lead to higher vulnerability: namely, the influence patterns of RADV.

A two-phased grey rough combined model is proposed to identify influence patterns of RADV from a new perspective of learning and mining historical cases. The grey entropy weight clustering with double base points is proposed to assess degrees of RADV. The simplest decision rules that reflect the complex synergistic relationships between RADV and its influencing factors are extracted using the rough set approach.

The results exemplified by China's Henan Province in the years 2008–2016 show higher degrees of RADV in the north and west regions of the province, in comparison with the south and east. In the patterns with higher RADV, the higher proportion of agricultural population appears in all decision rules as a core feature. A smaller quantity of water resources per unit of cultivated land area and a lower adaptive capacity, involving levels of irrigation technology and economic development, present a significant synergistic influence relationship that distinguishes the features of higher vulnerability from those of the lower.

The proposed grey rough combined model not only evaluates temporal dynamics and spatial differences of RADV but also extracts the decision rules between RADV and its influencing factors. The identified influence patterns inspire managerial implications for preventing and reducing agricultural drought through its historical evolution and formation mechanism.

The manufacturability of extremely fine porous structures in the SLM process has rarely been investigated, leading to unpredicted manufacturing results and preventing steady medical or industrial application. The research objective is to find out the process limitation and key processing parameters for printing fine porous structures so as to give reference for design and manufacturing planning.

In metallic AM processes, the difficulty of geometric modeling and manufacturing of structures with pore sizes less than 350 μm exists. The manufacturability of porous structures in selective laser melting (SLM) has rarely been investigated, leading to unpredicted manufacturing results and preventing steady medical or industrial application. To solve this problem, a comprehensive experimental study was conducted to benchmark the manufacturability of the SLM process for extremely fine porous structures (less than 350 um and near a limitation of 100 um) and propose a manufacturing result evaluation method. Numerous porous structure samples were printed to help collect critical datasets for manufacturability analysis.

The results show that the SLM process can achieve an extreme fine feature with a diameter of 90 μm in stable process control, and the process parameters with their control strategies as well as the printing process planning have an important impact on the printing results. A statistical analysis reveals the implicit complex relations between the porous structure geometries and the SLM process parameter settings.

It is the first time to investigate the manufacturability of extremely fine porous structures of SLM. The method for manufacturability analysis and printing parameter control of fine porous structure are discussed.

The purpose of this study is to explore how event attendees experience interactive encounters in the most competitive segment of the business sector of events – conferences.

A total of 26 in-depth personal interviews was conducted with previous conference attendees. Line-by-line open coding, axial coding and selective coding are performed.

This study develops a framework for experiences during customer–customer encounters (CCEs), which presents a dual motivational structure that explains one’s participation in CCEs, a classification of typical CCEs, four processes that one experiences during CCEs and three levels of situational factors that influence experiences during CCEs.

This study makes one of the first attempts to propose a multidimensional conceptualization of CCE experiences using an attendee perspective. Beyond the utilitarian and social benefits, this study suggests that it is important for event studies to explore the psychological and emotional meanings of CCE experiences through an experiential lens and that the competitive battleground in event industry should lie in staging memorable experiences during CCEs.

The microcutting performance of the ¹⁰B/Al composite is significantly poor because of the existence of hard boron particles. The effects of cutting parameters, including uncut chip thickness and cutting speed, on the material removal mechanism and surface generation are investigated to improve the surface quality.

The 2D finite element model, which includes a rigid cutting tool, a reinforced phase, a matrix and a dense layer, is established. The effects of uncut chip thickness on material removal mechanism and surface generation are analyzed from a probabilistic perspective. The relationship between the uncut chip thickness and the probability in which the machined surface will have a better surface quality is constructed. A Gaussian distribution formula is applied to describe the machined surface quality.

Two representative particle-removal modes, namely, cutting-through and pulling-out modes, are observed. For cutting-through mode, when the relative cutting location is small, better surface quality is obtained. For pulling-out mode, the quality of the machined surface gradually improves because the further increase of the relative cutting location reduces the height of the generated pit and scratches. The microcutting at high cutting speed tends to suppress the scratch phenomenon. The best surface quality will be obtained at small uncut chip thickness and high cutting speed.

The surface quality generated in microcutting of the ¹⁰B/Al composite can be improved by optimizing the cutting parameters and controlling the particle-removal modes based on the proposed Gaussian distribution formula.