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The purpose of this paper is to identify the factor structure of safety culture construct among engineering students at university context and to examine the measurement invariance of this instrument across different socio-demographic groups in a sample of engineering students in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

An exploratory online questionnaire was completed by 770 undergraduate and postgraduate engineering students across the UAE. Data were analyzed using a diversified multi-group and a robust and sophisticated cross-validation testing strategy. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to test factor structures identified in previous studies. Multi-group invariance testing was conducted to determine the extent to which factor structure is comparable across groups (i.e. gender, educational and experiential background).

Three-factor model was preferred for its parsimony. The results showed that the level of safety awareness and attitude is relatively satisfactory, whereas safety behaviour is inadequate. No significant difference was showed in multi-group invariance between demographic groups.

This research is a cross-sectional study and limited to the views of engineering students (informal group). The study would benefit from both informal and formal groups in assessing safety culture at university for a robust empirical evidence. The research highlights relevant implications for policy and program development, by pointing to the need to promote safety culture and mitigate safety-related accidents among engineering students.

This paper offers insight into benefit of understanding the level of safety culture among engineering students and extend knowledge of informal group involvement in safety-related accidents at university level.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the determinants of volunteer's motivation at major sporting events, how those affect future voluntary engagement, and whether there are differences in motivation based on the type of event.

A quantitative research design was chosen and volunteers at two major events in handball (n=96) and equestrian (n=83) were surveyed. Structural equation modelling was used based on a multi‐group analysis to answer the guiding research questions.

The results reveal that the expression of values and personal growth are the strongest factors influencing volunteer motivation and future behaviour. The factor “love of sport” had surprisingly no major effect on volunteer motivation at the handball event. Significant differences in volunteer motivation based on the type of event were detected.

A limitation of this study is the rather small sample sizes. Nonetheless, the results appear reliable. One implication of this research is that a model proposed in previous research to investigate volunteer motivation at mega sport events can be applied to major sport events and the multi‐group approach is useful when analysing different events.

Practitioners should try to find a good match between the interests and abilities of the volunteers and their tasks at the event, which includes their motivations.

The value of this research lies in applying a new methodological approach using multi‐group analysis to volunteer research.

People are increasingly responsible for making sound financial decisions to foster their financial satisfaction and well-being, which magnifies the importance of financial literacy, and this concept and measurement is still not yet crystallized in the literature, specifically capturing different behavior perceptions. Moreover, there is not a distinction based on different classifications of behavior, such as over or underconfidence, to understand the relation between literacy and decision process. To fill this gap, this paper aims to investigate whether the financial literacy conceptual model proposed applies similarly to every group independently of their previous self-confidence perception. For this purpose and quality control, OECD (2016) data were used with a final sample of 1,487 Brazilian citizens. Quantitative analysis technique using partial least squares structural equations path modeling and differences between groups using multi-group analysis was applied. In line with general studies, when analyzing the financial literacy usual model for the group as a whole, financial knowledge construct positively influences self-confidence, and both together positively affect financial behavior. However, for individuals with low financial knowledge and low self-confidence, as well as for those with too much or too little confidence, the model did not hold. Therefore, self-confidence perception influences the way financial knowledge is used for financial decisions and should be addressed in financial education and training to be more effective.

To operationalize the variables and test the paper’s hypotheses, the authors used the methodology developed in OECD (2016), based on the research instrument’s Brazilian application adapted from the questionnaire developed in OECD (2015), with data initially used and made available by Garber and Koyama (2016). Based on the recommendations of Hair Jr et al. (2017a, 2017b), the authors used partial least squares modeling PLS-PM (SmartPLS 3.2.6) to estimate the structural models.

Concerning structural relationships, the final model showed knowledge with a positive influence on self-confidence, self-confidence with a positive effect on behavior and knowledge with a positive influence on behavior, both directly and, through its relationship with self-confidence, indirectly. This underscores that, for the total sample, the greater people’s knowledge and self-confidence, the better their behavior. The unexpected absence of attitude in the final model, even allowing for potential measurement problems, brings up an important reflection on the mediating effect that the self-control variable may exert between attitude and behavior. A person may believe that saving for the future is important (attitude) but whether they actually save (behavior) may depend on self-control, which is needed to prevent immediate gains from being prioritized in practice.

The findings reported so far concern the study’s total sample. However, as expected from the literature review that provides the basis for the sixth and the most important hypothesis, respondents were found to be heterogeneous in terms of knowledge and self-confidence levels. These differences were evaluated by means of multi-group analyses that indicated that the model does not apply to respondents with low knowledge and low self-confidence and to those who are over- and underconfident. This implies inferring that financial education programs may be of little use if they only address technical knowledge development and fail to consider behavioral aspects such as those related to self-confidence, as this paper points out, and others. This signals the importance of diagnosing people’s profiles to enable developing solutions capable of minimizing the presence of behavioral biases. This need to be studied further.

The results imply inferring that financial education programs may be of little use if they only address technical knowledge development and fail to consider behavioral aspects such as those related to self-confidence, as this paper points out, and others. Models must be reviewed in light of natural diferences of cognition and lead to customized financial education.

This signals the importance of diagnosing people’s profiles to enable developing solutions capable of minimizing the presence of behavioral biases. Therefore, not only training topics in personal finance but also a deeper education program since the kindergarden must be considered.

Its practical contribution is to suggest the development of financial education programs that also take account of the potential presence of behavioral biases, which may prevent the misallocation of (scarce) public- and private-sector funds stemming from a limited focus on developing the population’s actual financial knowledge.

In this article, the authors draw-upon an extended unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) and propose a research model involving performance expectancy (PE), effort expectancy (EE), facilitating conditions (FC) and competitive pressure (CP) as potential salient factors explaining the adoption of digitalization in European SMEs. The authors also postulate that there may be cross-cultural differences, thereby leading us to include the country as a moderator in the model.

The authors validate this model with a cross-cultural sample involving 188 owner-managers from the Czech Republic and Slovakia and through the partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) techniques as well as multi-group analysis.

The results using the study’s global dataset indicate that PE, FC and CP significantly affect owner-managers intentions toward digitalization in SMEs. The authors’ application of the multi-group analysis also suggests that although the two countries differ in digitalization adoption intention, the differences are statistically insignificant. In the conclusion, the authors highlight several implications these findings have for theory and practice.

The authors recommend that the providers of emerging digital technologies should improve on the performance features of those technologies and ensure they are relevant to the SMEs. By doing so, the adoption of digitalization will grow, because owner-managers of SMEs will have the confidence that adopting such technologies will improve their operations. Second, SMEs are required to provide adequate organizational and technical infrastructure to support digitalization adoption.

Aside from being among the few attempts to extend the explanatory power of UTAUT with PE, EE, FC and CP in investigating digitalization adoption in SMEs context, this study also validates its model with rigorous methodological approach as well as three datasets (global, Czech Republic and Slovakia) thereby strengthening the validity of the results.

Stock markets are considered as the largest and most important units for the development and growth of the economy. The present study attempts to provide a comprehensive view of factors influencing investment decision making process of stock market investors. A multi group analysis of gender is also carried out on the proposed model.

The data of 402 valid responses are collected through structured questionnaires from individual investors of North India. SPSS 23 is used to do the descriptive analysis and AMOS 22 is used to establish the validity of the constructs and for hypotheses testing. For performing multi group analysis, several invariance tests have also been conducted to check the robustness of the model.

The results reveal that all the factors such as firm image, accounting information, neutral information, advocate recommendation and personal financial needs significantly influence investment decision making concluding image of the firm being the most influential factor and advocate recommendation being the least influential factor for investment decisions. No significant differences between males and females were found.

The current study suffers from the limitation of restricted geographical area of North India. Moreover, there is also a scope to incorporate more demographic factors for predicting investment decisions.

This study incorporates a range of factors which covers all the aspects of investment decision making. This study also highlights the notion of signaling theory, thus contributing to the limited literature in Indian context.

This paper seeks to explore how moderation can and should be modeled in cross‐national/cultural contexts. A multi‐national study of consumer involvement is utilized to demonstrate proper methods for modeling the different types of moderation.

Using data from a consumer survey regarding wine purchasing preferences conducted in Australia, New Zealand and the USA, the paper demonstrates how to identify moderators of form and of strength. A form moderator is modeled using multiplicative interactions while a strength moderator is modeled using multi‐group analyses in structural equation modeling (SEM). Differences in consumers across the three countries are examined from the results.

This study suggests that search behavior is positively influenced by involvement in New Zealand and the USA but not in Australia. It also shows that perceived risk of occasion decreases involvement in all three countries, while partial support for the positive effects of importance of tradition on involvement is found. Furthermore, “perceived risk of occasion,” identified as a moderator of form, is found to significantly moderate the relationship between importance of tradition and involvement in the US sample only. Finally, the results demonstrate significant differences across the three samples in relationships among importance of tradition, perceived risk of occasion, involvement, and search behavior, indicating that the country variable has significant moderator effects.

Understanding form vs strength moderation is important when evaluating multi‐national/cultural differences so that proper methodology can be utilized. This paper provides international marketing researchers with guidelines on how to model interactions and multi‐group comparisons using SEM.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically test whether a systematic relationship exists between firms’ level of entrepreneurial marketing (EM) behaviours and firms’ characteristics, including firm age, firm size and firm’s founder.

This paper quantitatively investigates EM behaviours from data collected from 752 business owners through structured interviews. The data analysis applied was multi-group confirmatory factor analysis (multi-group CFA).

Results from the analysis show that not all of the firms’ characteristics determine firms’ level of EM practice. The level of EM behaviours has a systematic relationship with firms’ age but not with the founding status of the firms’ manager. The impact of firm size on the level of EM behaviours is evident only when the firms’ age is taken into account.

This paper concludes that relationships between EM behaviours and firm characteristics are more complicated than anticipated. Firms’ characteristics alone may not be a good measure for identifying the level of a firm’s EM. EM cannot be conceptualized solely in relation to the activities of small firms, young firms or founder-operated firms.

This paper examines EM behaviours in a large survey and uses multi-group CFA to examine firms’ EM practice through latent variables, instead of observed variables. The findings should complement knowledge regarding the EM concept generated from existing literature.

Studies that examine users’ perceptions of museum’s website quality are scarce. The purpouse of this paper is to propose a multi-group comparison between two superstar museums to outline the variables that define website quality regarding museum websites towards achieving e-loyalty, trust and perceived control.

The sample comprised 305 valid online questionnaires, collected from a panel survey using a quota-sampling technique. The proposed model was tested using partial least squares analysis multi-group comparison between Prado and Thyssen-Bornemisza museum websites.

Website quality plays a determinant role in users’ behavioural outcomes. As evidenced in the results for the first time in a museum setting, website quality has the potential of influencing e-loyalty, trust and perceived control. Besides, trust has a positive influence on e-loyalty and perceived control, on trust. The multi-group comparison revealed no significant differences between the two museum superstars, which offer highly useful insights for the correct design of these websites.

This research addresses a multi-group comparison using partial least squares, a quite recent technique that advances knowledge regarding this method. It contributes to knowledge museum website management and online literature by means of proposing website quality as a dimension that includes content, ease of understanding, emotion, informational fit-to-task, promotion and visual appeal and by revealing significant effects of the relationships of the proposed model. Museum managers are provided with valuable inputs to design websites in an appropriate and suitable way for their users so they will be more willing to repeat their navigation experience.

The purpose of this paper is to study the formation of denomination of origin brand image in two different Spanish wine regions.

A sample of wine consumers was selected in two denominations of origin (DOs): Rioja and La Mancha. Partial least squares method was used to estimate the measurement and the proposed structural model. A multi-group analysis was also employed to determine the main differences between both wine umbrella brands.

The main components that contribute to the creation of brand image were tested: functional image and reputation, and affective image. The comparison found that the values obtained for La Mancha are significantly inferior to those of Rioja as regards affective image.

The choice of two Spanish wine regions and the analysis of wine consumers who were purchasing in wine shops suggest future research works that will consider not only extending the number of wine brands studied, but will also cover other kinds of commercial establishments, differentiating the place of consumption or suggesting a variety of wine styles.

The results obtained suggest the relevance of DOs in the commercialisation of wines, and consequently the activities and alliances that should be developed to improve the main components of brand image.

A multi-group analysis focused on two Spanish DOs has been used to determine the strengths and weaknesses of each umbrella brand. The basis used for this has been the study of functional and affective aspects in one of the most traditional wine countries in Europe, Spain. This research is of value to academics, wineries and public institutions, as it may allow them to design marketing and commercialisation strategies.

This study aims to investigate the differences between inside and outside business-to-business salespeople. Although prior research has highlighted a need to compare these two distinct sales positions, limited research examines the two. Specifically, this study investigates differences between inside and outside salespeople for the following constructs: positivity, intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, emotional exhaustion, job satisfaction and turnover intentions.

A Qualtrics panel of 210 business-to-business salespeople from a variety of US industries was used, with 43.8% classifying themselves as inside. Multi-group analysis using partial least squares structural equations modeling (PLS-SEM) was conducted where job type serves as the moderator for the entire model.

Results indicated four of six significant differences based on position. Specifically, positivity had a significant impact on emotional exhaustion for outside salespeople only. For extrinsic motivation, inside salespeople exhibited a stronger impact on emotional exhaustion. Furthermore, the impact of emotional exhaustion on turnover intentions was stronger for outside salespeople. The impact of job satisfaction on turnover intentions was stronger for inside salespeople. These results are supported by social exchange theory and distraction conflict theory.

This research highlights that sales managers and organizations need to consider different policies based on position type to increase job satisfaction and reduce turnover intentions. Practical guidelines for effectively managing the two positions are provided.

The value of this paper is that it indicates that there are indeed significant differences between these two types of sales positions, and thus, future research should not combine them into a single sample.