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1 – 10 of over 10000Matthew Abunyewah, Thayaparan Gajendran, Kim Maund and Seth Asare Okyere
Disaster information is an important resource for flood preparedness, however, the transition of information provision to preparedness and consequently to damage reduction is…
Abstract
Purpose
Disaster information is an important resource for flood preparedness, however, the transition of information provision to preparedness and consequently to damage reduction is complex. The nature of complexity has made it imperative to provide context-specific evidence on how disaster information provision influences intentions to prepare for flood hazard. This paper seeks to investigate how message clarity and source credibility mediate and moderate the relationship between information sufficiency and intentions to prepare. This paper aims to provide valuable insights into the relationship between the major components of disaster communication and their influence on intentions to prepare.
Design/methodology/approach
The study used a cross-sectional survey design to test the relationship between information sufficiency, message clarity and source credibility. A total of 1,064 questionnaire surveys were conducted on a face-to-face basis. The data collection was done in one month with ten research assistants. Participants of the study were randomly selected from adults over 18-years old who have lived in the study areas for at least three years. Responses from participants were analysed using a structural equation modelling (SEM) technique and SPSS AMOS version 24 software.
Findings
Findings suggest that the information sufficiency-intentions to prepare relationship is enhanced when adequate disaster information communicated is clear and from a credible source. This implies that policymakers and risk communicators need to critically assess the clarity of disaster information content and the credibility of the source in the dissemination of information during the communication process. It also provides a better understanding of the factors that influence people’s intentions to prepare for flood hazards.
Research limitations/implications
This current study did not account for the specific nature or content of information necessary to increase message clarity and source credibility for disaster preparedness. In addition, the study did not cover the channels of communication ideal to stimulate people’s intentions to flood preparedness. Although these do not undermine the significance of the present study, they present entry points for further studies. In view of the on-going urbanisation dynamics and the complex socio-spatial patterns emerging in the Greater Accra Area, it is recommended that further studies explore the channels of communication that will suit the diverse socio-spatial profile of residents (e.g. age, location, ethnicity, etc.).
Originality/value
While a plethora of studies emphasize the role of source credibility, information sufficiency and message clarity towards disaster preparedness, there is at present little evidence on the mediating and moderating role of the communication variables. In this study, we propose and test the mediating and moderating role of message clarity and source credibility on the relationship between information sufficiency and intentions to prepare. The findings of this paper provide other incentives that encourage message audiences to take up precautionary measures towards flood hazards. In addition, with a view that people fail to prepare because of lack of sufficient information, the study findings suggest that the provision of sufficient information may enhance preparedness.
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Peter S. Davis, Joseph A. Allen and Clay Dibrell
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of strategy messages emanating from both top and middle/supervisory managers regarding five different aspects of strategy on…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of strategy messages emanating from both top and middle/supervisory managers regarding five different aspects of strategy on strategic awareness among boundary personnel.
Design/methodology/approach
The results come from a survey of bank tellers and customer service representatives within a single large regional bank.
Findings
The findings support a differential main effect on strategic awareness among boundary personnel depending on the source of messages, whether top management or middle management. More interestingly, there appears to be an interaction effect between the two sources regarding which will be the dominant information source for boundary personnel.
Research limitations/implications
The survey data were collected within a single banking institution at one time point.
Practical implications
The results provide useful information concerning the efficacy of messages concerning strategy from middle and top management in organizations.
Originality/value
The paper extends past research by investigating different levels of strategic understanding within the firm across different levels and determining information dissemination strategies for increasing the level of strategic awareness among boundary personnel.
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Mary Bambacas and Margaret Patrickson
The purpose of this paper is threefold. First, to investigate the interpersonal communication skills that human resource (HR) managers expect managers in supervisory positions…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is threefold. First, to investigate the interpersonal communication skills that human resource (HR) managers expect managers in supervisory positions possess. Second, to identify which of these skills HR managers expect managers use to engender subordinate commitment to the organisation. Third, the paper aims to investigate what interpersonal communication skills that enhance employee commitment to the organisation are most lacking in managers in supervisory positions.
Design/methodology/approach
The approach of the study is a series of in‐depth interviews with 32 senior HR managers in organisations with over 100 staff.
Findings
The paper finds that senior HR managers expected managers to be effective in interpersonal communication focusing mainly on the clarity and frequency of the messages, their ability to actively listen and the ability to lead in a collaborative way. The way messages were sent, especially their clarity, and a leadership style that engendered trust, was of the highest importance when HR managers wanted to enhance employee commitment to the organisation. However, these skills were also the ones found most lacking.
Practical implications
HR practitioners need to consider more explicitly what behaviours are important to promote organisational commitment.
Originality/value
This paper highlights that the interpersonal communication skills that enhance organisational commitment and are most valued by organisations are those that are most lacking in managers. This paper also provides insight for practitioners to the interpersonal communication skills areas that managers need to develop so that their interaction with staff may enhance commitment to the organisation.
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This study aims to present a novel framework of “communication-led behavioral intention” in an effort to aid in the process of planning and coordinating social marketing campaigns…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to present a novel framework of “communication-led behavioral intention” in an effort to aid in the process of planning and coordinating social marketing campaigns on difficult subjects that go against social conventions, including the proper postnatal nutrition practices.
Design/methodology/approach
The study followed a quasi-experimental research design. Health communications (public service announcements) were shown to the women aged 18–65 years and responses were collected using a quantitative questionnaire. Structural equation modeling with exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses was used to investigate the linkage between the factors that influence breastfeeding outcomes.
Findings
A strong positive impact of contextual communication was confirmed empirically on the behavioral intention to follow and recommend exclusive breastfeeding. Three communication-specific factors – “content quality,” “message clarity” and “belief in message” – were found to play a pivotal role in inducing the “behavioral intention.” These relationships were found to be mediated by “empathy” which is an emotional state experienced out of the respondent’s ability to sense the thoughts and feelings of the characters in the communication.
Originality/value
This study is one of the few attempts on measuring breastfeeding outcomes using theoretical constructs. The framework suggested in the study has a lot of potential in assisting practitioners and researchers to develop effective interventions on complex topics that challenge social norms. Further, this paper offers important insights on the women with limited decision-making capacity on breastfeeding and child care.
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Lars Thøger Christensen, A. Fuat Fırat and Simon Torp
Marketing organisations increasingly talk about the importance of integrating their communications, of aligning symbols, messages, procedures and behaviours across formal…
Abstract
Purpose
Marketing organisations increasingly talk about the importance of integrating their communications, of aligning symbols, messages, procedures and behaviours across formal organisational boundaries. Often this implies tighter central control over communications and other organisational processes. This paper sets out to discuss potential negative consequences of such tight control in terms of organisational incapability to react to market changes in increasingly fluid environments due to a loss of sufficient corporate complexity and diversity.
Design/methodology/approach
In response, a flexible integration approach that draws attention to the handling of difference and variety within the context of an integrated communications project is articulated. The paper proposes a framework that balances centralisation and decentralisation through attention to dimensions of endogenous control, tight and loose couplings, networks, and common process rules.
Findings
The paper demonstrated that, in order to integrate its communications, an organisation needs to embrace diversity and variety and to balance the wisdom of its many voices with the effort to secure clarity and consistency in its overall expression.
Practical implications
The flexible integration approach advanced in this paper opens new avenues of research, practice and pedagogy, encouraging scholars, practitioners and teachers to explore the following dimensions of integrated communications: reception, variability, organisation, voice, couplings and transferability.
Originality/value
The paper contributes to the literature on integrated communications and corporate communications by addressing the organisational dimensions of integration and suggesting a new avenue of integrated communications research that is far more sensitive to the organisational context in which projects of integration exist and unfold.
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Sih Damayanti, Tri Rakhmawati, Sik Sumaedi and I Gede Mahatma Yuda Bakti
This research aims to develop an index for measuring Indonesian quality label awareness among motorcycle helmet users. The index measures quality label awareness and its…
Abstract
Purpose
This research aims to develop an index for measuring Indonesian quality label awareness among motorcycle helmet users. The index measures quality label awareness and its antecedent variables, which are the variables that represent marketing effort on promoting the quality label.
Design/methodology/approach
The indicators of the index were derived from a literature review. A survey was performed. The respondents are 487 motorcycle drivers and passengers helmet users in Jakarta. The authors conducted some statistical analyses, namely, exploratory factor analysis, Cronbach’s α analysis, and multiple regression analysis.
Findings
A quality label awareness index was developed and tested. The index consists of quality label awareness and its determinants. The determinants are label marketing clarity and label marketing credibility. The research result showed that the index is valid and reliable.
Research limitations/implications
The authors performed the survey only at Jakarta using convenience sampling technique. Thus, the findings may not be generalized to other contexts. Given this, replication research is important to be performed in the future in order to test the stability of the findings in other contexts.
Practical implications
The index can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of quality label and quality label marketing programs.
Originality/value
This study is believed to be the first to develop and test consumers' quality label awareness index.
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Vidushi Pandey, Sumeet Gupta and Manojit Chattopadhyay
The purpose of this paper is to explore how the use of social media by citizens has impacted the traditional conceptualization and operationalization of political participation in…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore how the use of social media by citizens has impacted the traditional conceptualization and operationalization of political participation in the society.
Design/methodology/approach
This study is based on Teorell et al.’s (2007) classification of political participation which is modified to suit the current context of social media. The authors classified 15,460 tweets along three parameters suggested in the framework with help of supervised text classification algorithms.
Findings
The analysis reveals that Activism is the most prominent form of political participation undertaken by people on Twitter. Other activities that were undertaken include Formal Political participation and Consumer participation. The analysis also reveals that identity of participant does not play a classifying role as expected from the theoretical framework. It was found that the social media as a platform facilitates new forms of participation which are not feasible offline.
Research limitations/implications
The current work considers only the microblogging platform of Twitter as the data source. For a more comprehensive insight, analysis of other social media platforms is also required.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is one of the few analyses where such a large database covering multiple social media events has been created and analysed using supervised text classification algorithms. A large proportion of previous studies on social media have been based on case study and have limited analysis to only a particular event on social media. Although there exist a few works that have studied a vast and varied collection of social media data (Gaby and Caren, 2012; Shirazi, 2013; Rane and Salem, 2012), such efforts are few in number. This study aims to add to that stream of work where a wider and more generalized set of social media data is studied.
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Rosha Makvandi and Milad Farzin
The present study aimed to identify the characteristics of effective messages in electronic word of mouth (eWOM) communication on social networks to be considered in the planning…
Abstract
Purpose
The present study aimed to identify the characteristics of effective messages in electronic word of mouth (eWOM) communication on social networks to be considered in the planning of eWOM strategies. For this purpose, the present study tries to identify these factors through a qualitative approach.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative approach based on the thematic analysis was used with semi-structured interviews and opinions of 25 experts in the field of e-marketing and e-retailing. The collected data were analyzed and coded in the MaxQDA software.
Findings
The results of the study showed the extracted seven main themes of message sender specifications, aesthetic appearance, choosing the right content, sending strategy, message usefulness, correct targeting, type of information and also 47 subthemes. These seven criteria provide a way to design the right strategies.
Research limitations/implications
Limited studies in this area were a challenge and also integrating the opinions of the interviewees due to contradictory and different views, as well as unfamiliarity with some new approaches to digital marketing, were among the limitations of the present study that managed and controlled their effects. Practical and theoretical implications for developing and planning effective eWOMs in social networks presented.
Originality/value
Understanding the way of creating appropriate features of effective and suitable messages in the planning of eWOM strategies is crucial to digital marketers. This study recommends considering the extracted features in designing effective messages.
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Ferdy Novianto, Sumartono, Irwan Noor and Lely Indah Mindarti
This paper aims to examine the effect of communication, resources, disposition and bureaucratic structure to the success of energy subsidy policy, to examine the effect of…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the effect of communication, resources, disposition and bureaucratic structure to the success of energy subsidy policy, to examine the effect of moderation of variable scenario of renewable energy policy on the influence of communication, resources, disposition and bureaucracy structure on the success of energy subsidy policy.
Design/methodology/approach
This study was purposively (based on specific objectives) conducted in Jakarta, which is associated with the implementation and subsidy policy scenario, the study focused on the center of government, namely, the capital city, Jakarta. Collection of data in this research survey was conducted in June-August 2017. The sampling technique was proportional stratified random sampling that took up most of the 770 members of Masyarakat Peduli Energi dan Lingkungan and Masyarakat Energi Terbarukan Indonesia using a representative sample of results that have the ability to be generalized. Based on the formula Slovin (Solimun and Fernandes, 2017), a sample of 145 respondents was obtained. The research approach used was a quantitative with the analysis tool called the generalized structure component analysis.
Findings
This paper exhibited that all relationships between variables have a p-value of 0.05 except the third moderation and fourth moderation relationship. So it can be said that all relationships between variables are significant except the relationship between the variables of moderation to the relationship between the disposition variable (X3) on the successful implementation of subsidy policy (Y) and the relationship between the moderation variable to the relationship between bureaucracy structure variable (X4) to the successful implementation of subsidy policy.
Originality/value
The originality of the research refers to the following: The Policy Theory described by Edwards III (1980), and reinforced by the findings of Ratminto and Winarsih (2005), and Bloom et al. (2009), that communication, resources, dispositions and bureaucratic structures affect the success of the energy subsidy policy. This becomes the formulation of a hypothesized research problem whether communication, resources, disposition and bureaucratic structure affect the success of the energy subsidy policy. In fact, the conditions in Indonesia are quite different from the Western world, and the system in Indonesia has embraced subsidies. Therefore, this study also examines the moderating effects of renewable energy policy scenarios in the relationship between communication, resources, dispositions and bureaucratic structures on the success of the subsidy policy energy. Given that there is no strong theory that examines the effects of moderation of these four factors on the success of the energy subsidy policy. Therefore, as the development of Edward III Theory, this study examines the proposition of whether renewable energy policy scenarios reinforce or weaken (moderation effects) on the effects of communication, resources, dispositions and bureaucratic structures on the success of energy subsidy policies.
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Hassan Taibah, Sudha Arlikatti and Simon Andrew
The purpose of this paper is to describe empirical research intended to gauge the channels of risk information and their perceived effectiveness expressed by Hajj pilgrims in 2013…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to describe empirical research intended to gauge the channels of risk information and their perceived effectiveness expressed by Hajj pilgrims in 2013 to better inform risk-reduction strategies at crowded religious events.
Design/methodology/approach
To do so, a research team partially funded by the Transportation and Crowd Management Center of Research Excellence from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia conducted face-to-face interviews with 348 Hajj pilgrims in 2013. The semi-structured survey instrument used the Protective Action Decision Model framework to gather information on six pre-decisional variables that influence threat perceptions, stakeholder perceptions and decisions to take protective actions against impending threats.
Findings
Results of the multinomial logit regression using the traditional media (i.e. television and radio) as the reference category found support for ease of access, language of choice, gender and age differentials, as factors positively or negatively influencing respondents’ selections of their top three most preferred channels for risk communication materials. Printed materials (i.e. pamphlets and billboards) ranked first followed by smart technologies and outreach activities.
Research limitations/implications
The convenience sampling strategy adopted with only four female interviewers compared to 17 male interviewers, limited the number of female respondents to only 47 (13.7 percent) due to cultural restrictions. Interviews were conducted only in English and Arabic, leaving out the preferences of other language speakers.
Originality/value
Despite these limitations, this study makes a valuable contribution to theory and practice by highlighting the social and cognitive variables influencing risk communication at Hajj. No studies to date have examined choices and preferences of heterogeneous Hajj pilgrims.
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