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The abuse of alcohol and other drugs (AOD) has become one of the most important social problems in modern society. AOD abuse causes untold personal anguish to the abusers and their families, is associated with high levels of crime, and the health consequences include death and disability. Billions are spent on treatment, prevention, and incarceration. The papers in this special issue focus on two key issues in the study of AOD abuse: etiology and treatment. Etiology is a key factor because it is the foundation for prevention and treatment programs. If the etiology of AOD abuse can be unraveled, abuse can be prevented and treatment can be effectively targeted. But, effective treatment also requires an understanding of how treatment works.

The etiology and treatment of substance abuse are matters of great concern in applied social science. This special issue of the International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy consists of a collection of papers on these matters presented in regular sessions on Alcohol and Drugs of the American Sociological Association at the 1995 meetings. Also included are models for study of the progression of substance abusing careers and for the evolution of drug alcohol treatment developed by the panels' discussant and co‐editor of this issue, Mark Peyrot.

This study examines the relationship of personality characteristics to drug treatment effectiveness for prison releasees. Prison releasees from two drug treatment programs (an out‐patient setting and a therapeutic community setting) are compared with each other and to releasees from a comparison group. Treatment success is measured 6 months after release from prison in terms of 1) abstinence of illicit drug use and 2) lack of recidivism. The data are analyzed using logistic regression with demographic, criminal history, past drug use, psychological, and treatment measures included in the equations. Findings suggest that several personality dimensions are related to treatment effectiveness, sometimes in unexpected ways. The findings also reveal that different personality characteristics are associated with each of the two measures of treatment success. The results are discussed in terms of policy implications for treatment programs.

The business intelligence (BI) research witnessed a proliferation of contributions during the past three decades, yet the knowledge about the interdependencies between the BI process and organizational context is scant. This has resulted in a proliferation of fragmented literature duplicating identical endeavors. Although such pluralism expands the understanding of the idiosyncrasies of BI conceptualizations, attributes and characteristics, it cannot cumulate existing contributions to better advance the BI body of knowledge. In response, this study aims to provide an integrative framework that integrates the interrelationships across the BI process and its organizational context and outlines the covered research areas and the underexplored ones.

This paper reviews 120 articles spanning the course of 35 years of research on BI process, antecedents and outcomes published in top tier ABS ranked journals.

Building on a process framework, this review identifies major patterns and contradictions across eight dimensions, namely, environmental antecedents; organizational antecedents; managerial and individual antecedents; BI process; strategic outcomes; firm performance outcomes; decision-making; and organizational intelligence. Finally, the review pinpoints to gaps in linkages across the BI process, its antecedents and outcomes for future researchers to build upon.

This review carries some implications for practitioners and particularly the role they ought to play should they seek actionable intelligence as an outcome of the BI process. Across the studies this review examined, managerial reluctance to open their intelligence practices to close examination was omnipresent. Although their apathy is understandable, due to their frustration regarding the lack of measurability of intelligence constructs, managers manifestly share a significant amount of responsibility in turning out explorative and descriptive studies partly due to their defensive managerial participation. Interestingly, managers would rather keep an ineffective BI unit confidential than open it for assessment in fear of competition or bad publicity. Therefore, this review highlights the value open participation of managers in longitudinal studies could bring to the BI research and by extent the new open intelligence culture across their organizations where knowledge is overt, intelligence is participative, not selective and where double loop learning alongside scholars is continuous. Their commitment to open participation and longitudinal studies will help generate new research that better integrates the BI process within its context and fosters new measures for intelligence performance.

This study provides an integrative framework that integrates the interrelationships across the BI process and its organizational context and outlines the covered research areas and the underexplored ones. By so doing, the developed framework sets the ground for scholars to further develop insights within each dimension and across their interrelationships.

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between perception of training, organizational commitment and organizational citizenship behavior. Moreover, the study examines the moderating role of power distance on the relationship between perception of training and organizational commitment.

Using stratified sampling technique, the data were obtained from 379 employees working at branches of public and private banks located in five metropolitan cities in Pakistan. To test the established hypotheses, structural equation modeling technique was adopted using Analysis of Moment Structures (AMOS) 21.0.

The findings stated a significant relationship between perception of training and organizational citizenship behavior, but there was no relationship found between perception of training and organizational commitment. Moreover, organizational commitment partly mediated the relationship between perception of training and organizational citizenship behavior. The results also described that power distance moderates the relationship between perception of training and organizational commitment.

The results of the study can be beneficial for banking sector and strategy makers who have extended vision and anticipate organizational citizenship behavior from their employees. The study also offers the scope and space for the prospective researchers and scholars to carry out further research.

There is extensive literature available on the relationship between perception of training, organizational commitment and organizational citizenship behavior. However, it is observed that very few studies took the opportunity to examine the moderating role of power distance on the relationship between perception of training and organizational commitment, particularly in the context of Pakistan. Therefore, this study can be considered as original and have a great value in understanding the developed relationships in the scenario of Pakistan.

Little empirical research has been conducted on competitive intelligence (CI). This paper aims to contribute to the quantitative strand of the CI literature by exploring and validating the theoretical constructs of the CI process.

Data from 601 questionnaires filled out by South African and Flemish exporters were subjected to exploratory factor analysis and construct equivalence analysis between the sub‐samples.

The results showed that the CI process consists of three constructs, while the context in which CI takes place consists of four constructs. This agrees to some extent with the literature. When verifying the constructs for both cultures it was found that all but one CI context construct can be viewed as equivalent in both groups. Bias analysis identified one item in the questionnaire that was biased. Via regression analysis it was also indicated that the context in which CI takes place influences the CI process to a large extent. The research identified size as an important influencing factor in a business' CI process.

Businesses involved in CI should take note that an improvement in their formal infrastructure, employee involvement and internal information processes could enhance their CI capability.

This paper contributes towards the formalising of the constructs of competitive intelligence.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the direct effect of external pressure on environmental outcomes and manufacturing performance and examine the mediating effect of sustainable management practice.

This study draws upon institutional theory and resource-based view to understand how factors such as external pressure and sustainable management relate with environmental outcomes and manufacturing performance. The model specifies previously unexplored direct and mediating relationships between external pressure, sustainable management, environmental outcomes and manufacturing performance. The empirical analysis is based on data collected from the sixth edition of the International Manufacturing Strategy Survey. The research hypotheses are tested using structural equation modelling.

Results show that while there is a significant direct and mediating relationship between external pressure, adoption of formal sustainability programmes and environmental outcomes, such significant relationships do not exist with manufacturing performance.

The study shows that external pressure can influence adoption of sustainable practices but this does not necessarily lead to an improvement in manufacturing performance. As such managers need to identify the actual benefits of sustainability and weigh them up against costs of implementing such programmes.

The relationship between the adoption of sustainable practices and organisational performance is a complex one. In contrast to previous studies, this study found that while external pressure and sustainable management relate positively with environmental outcomes, no such relationship exists with manufacturing performance. This raises a number of question marks over naive implementation of sustainable strategies.

Quality has progressed from a rough conceptualization of a tactical problem to a viable competitive opportunity that should be maximized strategically. We discuss the viability of quality as a sustainable competitive advantage. Based on a longitudinal study of general service hospitals, we provide results indicating that quality not only has a temporal effect on organizational performance, but also translates into long‐term benefits. The findings of this study reinforce anecdotal claims of the efficacy of quality‐based strategies in improving organizational performance.

To examine the post dissatisfaction behaviour of Malaysian consumers vis‐à‐vis their complaint behaviour and defection. Specifically, the relationship between public complaint behaviour (i.e. complaining to the organization), private complaint behaviour (complaining to family members and friends without a word to the organisation) and customer defection were considered. The research also investigates the moderating effect of gender and income in this relationship.

Consisted of a survey of 218 randomly selected customers of banks in Malaysia.

shows that both public and private complaints are associated with defection, albeit the determinant strength of private complaint is more robust. These findings are generic as there is no gender‐moderated effect. However, income moderates the private complaint‐defection relationship. Lower income customers are more likely to defect without a word to the bank than higher income Malaysian bank customers.

Emphasises that an apparant each of complaints doesn’t mean that all is well. Also, stresses the need for encouraging complaints from customers and a system to hand complaints. Originality/value Income levels may affect a customers expression of dissatisfaction.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the influence of purchase intentions on repurchase decisions, and also to examine the moderating effects of reference groups and perceived risks.

The travelers on Taiwan tourist trains were surveyed. Convenience sampling was used to collect primary data. A total of 1,200 questionnaires were distributed and 1,155 effective samples were collected. The effective return rate was 96 percent. Regression analysis was used to test hypotheses.

The paper finds that; purchase intentions will have a positive effect on repurchase decisions: the higher the informational reference group influence, the greater the positively moderating effect between purchase intentions and repurchase decisions; the higher the value‐expressive reference group influence, the greater the positively moderating effect between purchase intentions and repurchase decisions; and the higher the psychological risk, the greater the negatively moderating effect between purchase intentions and repurchase decisions.

Limitations of the study are: the research targets the travelers on tourist trains. Consequently, it is less efficient in external validity due to the limited scope; the conceptual limitation needs to be elaborated more; and, since the research adopts the cross‐sectional research method without longitudinal section study it may be limited in the generalization. The moderating effects of reference groups and perceived risks have been examined on the inconsistency between purchase intentions and repurchase decisions in the study.

In tourism, reference group influence can provide the opportunity for individuals to communicate with group members in sharing the experiences of a destination and selection of a particular purchasing decision. The sole moderating effect of psychological risk has been verified among three dimensions. Therefore, the measurement and enhancement are critical for marketers to handle future business.

The extra value of the paper is to combine theory and practice together, and verify the moderating effects of reference groups and perceived risks between purchase intentions and repurchase decisions.