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The purpose of this paper is to examine the influences of negative performance feedback on firms' cost behaviors including productive behaviors (i.e. R&D behaviors) and non-productive behaviors (i.e. selling behaviors and business entertainment behaviors), as well as to investigate the roles of ownership types and marketization.

A sample of Chinese manufacturing firms from 2007 to 2018 is analyzed employing multiple regression models.

The results show that negative performance feedback has a positive but not significant effect on R&D behaviors, while its effect on selling behaviors is significantly positive. Meanwhile, there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between negative performance feedback and business entertainment behaviors. Furthermore, when facing a performance dilemma, state-owned enterprises tend to adjust selling behaviors, while nonstate-owned enterprises pay more attention to business entertainment behaviors. In terms of marketization, the firms in high-marketization regions are more likely to adjust their R&D, selling and business entertainment behaviors, while the firms in low-marketization regions are difficult to adjust these cost behaviors.

This study explores the role of negative performance feedback in firms' cost behaviors and provides empirical evidence about the differentiated influences regarding ownership types and marketization.

Integrating insights from existing studies and introducing the behavioral theory of the firm and prospect theory, this study proposes a more inclusive framework that addresses the impacts of negative performance feedback on firms' cost behaviors. This paper deepens the understanding of firms' decision behaviors in the dilemma of performance shortfall.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the development of educational leadership, administration and management (EdLAM) research by identifying thematic strands that hallmark key publications and synthesise major research findings and limitations.

This study combines bibliometric and content analysis methods to review 2,347 publications from 15 core EdLAM journals published from 2007 to 2016.

The bibliometric analysis identified five EdLAM thematic strands: school leadership for enhancing students’ academic achievement and teachers’ effectiveness; leadership for educational change, accountability and promoting democratic values; leadership for social justice, equal education and narrowing achievement gaps; principal’s instructional leadership for school improvement; and distributed leadership and its impact on organisational climate and teachers’ attitudes and stress. The content analysis revealed that the EdLAM research from 2007 to 2016 further developed the following research areas: the dynamics between leaders and teachers in leadership work, the potential risks of distributed leadership and the EdLAM challenges brought by the New Public Management and neoliberalism.

This study depicts state-of-the-art EdLAM research. It confirms the combination of bibliometric and content analyses as a useful approach for large-scale review studies. Finally, this review suggests future research directions.

This paper aims to explore the switching intention and behaviour of cloud storage services (CSS) individual users in China by integrating the variables of switching cost and habit into the expectation disconfirmation theory.

Based on 419 valid responses, structural equation modelling was used to examine the research model.

The results indicated that perceived usefulness and expectation disconfirmation have a positive and negative effect on user satisfaction, respectively. While expectation disconfirmation has a negative impact on perceived usefulness, user satisfaction positively affects users’ habit and switching cost. At the same time, switching intention is affected significantly and negatively by perceived usefulness, user satisfaction, as well as switching cost, where in switching intention and habit can commendably predict switching behaviour. The results can guide for CSS providers on how to successfully retain users in the competitive CSS market.

Previous researches have investigated the effects of perceived usefulness, switching cost and user traits on CSS adoption and continuance intention, as well as behaviour; they neglected the antecedents of switching cost and the effect of user habit on them. Additionally, relatively few studies have been devoted to an empirical examination of the switching behaviour from a particular CSS product to its rival products at the individual user level. This research tries to fill these gaps.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the alternative accounts produced by Green Earth Volunteers (GEV), a Chinese environmental non-governmental organisation, over a 10-year period in the context of their campaign to create visibilities about hydroelectric dam projects along the Chang Jiang.

Drawing on conceptions of the human–nature relationship, including those evident in ancient Chinese philosophy and mythology, and the Chinese way of viewing and resolving conflict, this paper offers an interpretive analysis of the alternative accounts of GEV in terms of their form and content.

In terms of their content, the alternative accounts reflect elements of interrelated thinking, being underpinned by a recognition of the relationship between humans and nature, which is evident in Confucianism, Taoism and ancient Chinese mythology. The strategies adopted by GEV are a non-confrontational but feasible way to promote their ecological beliefs in the Chinese context.

The study suggests that social and environmental accounting (SEA) in developing countries is steeped in local cultural and philosophical traditions that need to be considered and incorporated into the design of alternative accounts.

The study contributes to the very limited literature that offers qualitative analyses of SEA in developing countries.

This study scrutinised Shanghai junior high school teachers’ emotions and emotion management strategies in relation to teachers’ work settings and content. A mixed-methods approach was applied to collect data via field observations, interviews, and a quantitative survey. The aim of this study was two-fold. Firstly, it aimed to identify the typical work settings in which teachers experienced work-related emotions. Secondly, it aimed to reveal teachers’ priority work in school and how it affected teachers’ choices of emotion management strategies.

The data were analysed through the lens of emotional labour theories and professional agency theories. Findings showed that classroom teaching and the professional learning community activities were two typical settings in which the teachers experienced the most intensive emotions. Most Shanghai teachers managed their momentary emotions by either genuinely expressing their emotions that matched their roles and the scenario, or by purposely suppressing emotions to meet social and organisational expectations. Furthermore, most teachers adopted the long-term mood regulation strategy by aligning their emotions with long-term goal achievement in the future. As professional agents, the Shanghai teachers did not only manage their own emotions at work using these two strategies, but also managed students’ emotions as part of the moral education.

This paper aims to show that the variational iteration method (VIM) and the homotopy perturbation method (HPM) are powerful and suitable methods to solve the Fornberg‐Whitham equation.

Using HPM the explicit exact solution is calculated in the form of a quickly convergent series with easily computable components. Also, by using VIM the analytical results of this equation have been obtained in terms of convergent series with easily computable components.

Numerical solutions obtained by these methods are compared with the exact solutions, revealing that the obtained solutions are of high accuracy.

Also the results show that the introduced methods are efficient tools for solving the nonlinear partial differential equations.

This study aims at proposing an approach for optimizing the shape of the top piston ring face for minimum friction force using an inverse method. The shape of the top piston ring face determines the amount of oil distribution in the interface of the ring and liner. Therefore, the shape has a significant impact on the tribological performance of this interface.

The shape of the ring face is represented by a polynomial function and is based on the load analysis of the ring. The optimization of the shape was performed using the Sequential Quadratic Programming method. The minimizing of the friction parameter at the interface was considered during the solving process to obtain an optimum ring shape.

The optimized high degree of the shape of the ring face could lead to a reduced friction parameter. The proposed method could be applied for the tribological design and optimization of the piston rings.

There still need effort to investigate the effect of design parameters (e.g. property of lubricant)on the optimization of the ring face.

The subject matter is important and the method has practical value.

With the accelerated technological advancement, innovation has become a critical factor, which affects the core competitiveness of a company. However, studies about the relationship between internal stock option mechanisms and innovation productivity remain limited. Therefore, this paper aims to examine the impact of stock options and their elements design on innovation output from an internal mechanism perspective.

Using a sample of 302 stock option incentive plans announced and implemented between 2006 and 2016, this study uses the propensity score matching and difference-in-difference model to find out whether the implementation of stock options improves the innovation outputs of enterprises.

Based on the statistical analysis, it is concluded that: stock options can stimulate corporate innovation; a stock option may drive innovation outputs through two ways, performance-based incentives and risk-taking incentives, with the latter one playing a more dominant role and the risk-taking incentives of stock options, could be optimised when the non-executives granting proportion is larger, the granting range is limited, the incentive period is longer, the exercisable proportion is increasing, the price-to-strike ratio is lower and relatively loose performance assessment criteria are applied.

The conclusion reached in the study may provide valuable information to listed firms in designing and implementing the stock option plans.

This study aims to investigate whether and how earnings guidance affects corporate innovation.

Exploiting the setting of China, where the Shenzhen Stock Exchange has required all public firms listed on its ChiNext board to issue earnings guidance since 2012, this study uses a difference-in-differences (DID) methodology to examine the effect of earnings guidance on corporate innovation and further conducts cross-sectional analyzes from the information risk and monitoring demand perspectives. Moreover, the authors conduct path analysis to verify the possible channels through which corporate innovation is impeded by market pressure or improved through increased corporate transparency.

This study documents a positive relationship between earnings guidance and corporate innovation, as measured by the number of invention patents, indicating that the “corporate governance” hypothesis dominates in China. Cross-sectional analyzes show that this positive effect is more pronounced for firms subject to greater information risk and monitoring demand. Finally, the path analysis further confirms that earnings guidance improves innovation by increasing corporate transparency.

First, this study captures the bright side of mandatory earnings guidance and suggests that increasing the disclosure frequency can yield benefits for firms. Second, the findings imply that regulations, regardless of what they refer to, should be based on a country’s specific context.

First, this study provides evidence supporting the “corporate governance” argument based on the context of China and, thus contributes to the debate on earnings guidance. Second, this study enriches the literature on the economic consequences of earnings guidance. Third, the study extends research on the determinants of corporate innovation.