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The purpose of this paper is to report results of a study which investigated the growth of open access (OA) journals across the world with reference to the Asian region. Details of 117 OA journals were collected from the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) to determine the geographic distribution, language of publication and growth of periodical year-wise. The study makes detail analysis of four OA periodical published from India, Iran, Pakistan and Taiwan. Pattern of authorship and contribution according to nature of professional work were analyzed. The study reveals that most contributions were made by teaching professionals in comparison to working library and information officers. Single-authored contributions dominated (44 per cent) in all periodicals of the Asian region, indicating low amount of teamwork/collaborative contributions to library and information science (LIS) research by the authors of this region. To know the subject distribution of articles, the study was limited to 27 subfields within the broad spectrum of LIS. Annals of Library and Information Sciences (ALIS) published in India carried the highest number of articles (165) followed by Journal of Library and Information Sciences (JLIS) from Taiwan. The findings of the study also indicate that there is varied distribution of topics within the Asian LIS literature published in OA journals. Most popular areas of writing among authors in OA journals have been found to be bibliometics, webometrics, research productivity or research methods besides information seeking pattern, information need of users and digital libraries.

To gather data for the present investigation, survey of OA e-journals was made across the Web. The collection of data from OA journals and content was accompanied by searching the DOAJ. After selecting the OA journals, these were analyzed using the descriptions on their content page and key words chosen from each contribution. Selection of additional key words, i.e. words not in the title, was also made. Analysis of this data is discussed in this paper.

OA removes restrictions that exist on access to scholarly information and knowledge, it empowers the readers to read, download, distribute and make use of relevant literature, besides giving authors and their work fairly good visibility, readership and impact. The OA movement is gaining importance and the scholarly community is now realizing that tolled or subscribed access is creating a barrier and preventing their work from wider accessibility and readership. A number of journals across the world are now being published in OA mode. The present study attempts to map the growth of LIS literature in OA journals with special reference to periodicals published from Asian countries. The finding of this sample study suggests that many counties are promoting OA journals. While USA ranks first in publication of OA journals in the world. Taiwan publishes the highest number of articles in Asia. Majority of OA journals are published in English, and English appears to be most popular language for communicating research information. Of the four OA LIS journals analyzed in detail, it is observed that single-authored contributions are most popular. Collaborative contributions to LIS research were not so evident among authors of the Asian community. The teaching professionals or LIS teachers contributed the greatest number of articles, except for the Indian journal ALIS, demonstrating that working professional are more actively involved in writing and they outnumber the teaching community. Contributions from research students in all OA journals have been fairly significant. Research students may be encouraged to publish their master’s and doctoral research work in OA periodicals for better visibility, readership and impact. The study further reveals that ALIS from India and JLIS from Taiwan carried the highest number of articles. While areas like bibliometrics, webometrics and e-resources and OA are most popular areas of writing among Indian authors, information-seeking pattern, information need, digital and virtual libraries have been popular among authors from Taiwan. Webology from Iran has predominant articles on Web study or evaluation and social networking. Universities and LIS need to come forward to take a need-based approach to LIS research, suggesting ways for improving existing LIS services in their respective countries. To get the correct picture of growth of OA journals in the Asian region, more exhaustive and extensive study may be required. Researchers interested to carry further investigation will have to adopt appropriate measures to overcome the limitations mentioned in the study, for example, the source of data DOAJ may not be very extensive to give correct picture of OA journals. It is likely that some journals may not have been included in this directory. Researchers interested to carry further investigations will have to adopt appropriate measures to overcome these constraints.

Scope and limitation access to data and timely completion are the two vital factors for the success and accomplishment of the objectives of any investigation. Hence, considering the vast range of literature from every geographical region and limited time to complete research, the present study adhered to the following limitations. The study covers in its scope literature published in the period of five years (accessed from March 28 to May 25, 2011, only). The study includes only those publications/journals contributed by authors in English. The study includes four OA journals having full-text articles in English, abstracts not included. It considers those publications primarily inclined and relevant to library and information services. The study includes only those OA LIS journals listed or included in DOAJ.

The present study has been taken with view to analyze the growth of OA journals in LIS with special reference to Asian countries. While several studies have been conducted on growth and publishing of traditional LIS journals, the present study is perhaps an interesting attempt to make a comprehensive review of the phenomena. The finding of the recent study will be of interest to many LIS professionals, researchers and academicians as it demonstrate the growth of OA journals.

Since the education of Master of Science students in the discipline of agriculture is catalectic without libraries, the present paper seeks to assess the information literacy competency (ILC) of post graduate (PG) students at Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, India, along with the impact of instruction initiatives in this respect.

Based on the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) Information Literacy Standards for Science and Engineering/Technology, 2006, an instrument was developed with 79 scoring items in the first part of the questionnaire along with non‐scoring items in the second part. Broad headings of the questions asked are shown in detail. Validity and reliability of the instrument are also reported.

Information literacy competency of PG students has been found satisfactory along with significant difference between the first and second year students. Results of the paper distinguish between the first and second year students in the light of five information literacy (IL) standards along with other considerations. Various instruction initiatives were found to have a positive impact upon the ILC of PG students.

Since the study has been able to establish a positive relationship between instruction initiatives and ILC, such initiatives may be introduced in other academic institutions.

None of the earlier reported research instruments had used science and engineering/technology IL standards, especially upon PG students in agriculture. This study further paved the way for the development of such an nstrument along with assessing the ILC of PG students and impact of instruction initiatives in an agricultural university.

The purpose of the study is to identify the key antecedents relating to the interaction design of the e-groceryretail mobile applications and offer innovative marketing interventions to facilitate consumer–brand interaction and generate continuous usage intention.

Data were collected from the subjects using a personally administered questionnaire by adopting a non-probability method. The target respondents of this study were individuals who are users of smartphone and have purchased groceries through mobile applications at least once in two months. On the basis of responses received, a sequential predictive analytic method that includes structural equation modelling (SEM) and artificial neural network (ANN) techniques were employed.

The findings of the study highlighted the critical role of collaboration design in harbouring satisfaction and maintaining a regular clientele for e-grocery applications by confirming the presence of complementary mediation. Such validated proposition and tested research model backed by significant methodological rigour advances the research based on post-acceptance behavioural affordances in interactive marketing literature.

The study endeavours to understand users' post-acceptance behaviour by analysing the contemporary factors relating to the interaction design of the platform in terms of mobile application attributes that would drive user patronage intentions. Further, the study highlights the pioneering role of collaboration design for e-grocery retailers, as the recent alliances among strategic players to achieve synergistic business leadership have proven to be a game-changing evolution in the industry.

The emergence of virtual reality (VR) has the potential to revolutionize various industries, including tourism, as it delivers a simulated environment that closely emulates real-life experiences. Therefore, this study aims to explore how the factors, i.e. enjoyment, emotional involvement, flow state, perceived privacy risk, physical risk and cost, influence the customers’ intention to use VR for tourism.

This study integrates the technology acceptance model, hedonic consumption theory with other factors, including cognitive response, authenticity, perceived privacy risk, perceived physical risk, perceived cost and perceived presence. Partial least squares structural equation modelling approach was used to test the proposed research model.

The finding based on the sample of 252 respondents revealed that authenticity is the most influential factor impacting behavior intention followed by perceived cost, attitude, cognitive response and enjoyment. Also, the study supported the moderating impact of personal innovativeness between attitude and behavioral intention to use VR for tourism.

The findings of the study offers practical implications for service providers, site managers, destination marketers, tourist organizations and policymaker to develop more effective strategies for offering VR services for tourism.

This study enriches the current understanding of VR adoption in context of tourism with empirical evidences.

This study aims to understand the expectations of elderly bank customers with mobile banking services and to measure its impact on their long-term satisfaction and continued intention. The study is based on two theories, expectations-confirmation theory (ECT) and hedonic adaptation theory.

A self-administered longitudinal survey was completed with a sample of 208 elder customers who do not use mobile banking services. Latent growth curve modelling approach was used to determine the change in their post-adoption experience over four time points.

Results of the study confirm that the use of mobile banking services prolongs the duration of customer satisfaction and continued intention level, post-adoption, reinforcing the hedonic adaptation theory.

Mobile banking services are going to be a significant component of the multichannel banking agenda. But it might be interesting to review other digital channels of banking services. The key contribution of this study is that it measures the expectation-confirmation link of elderly customers with mobile banking services. The study sheds light on factors that positively influence customer inclination and adoption of multichannel banking services in the long run, which is important for the commercial success of such channels.

The study highlights the importance of elder customers' pre-expectations, related dimensions which are important for post-adoption experiences of mobile banking services to improve customers' satisfaction and continued intention in the long run. This is crucial for the commercial success of banks.

This is the first such study that used the expectation confirmation model (ECT) and related it with hedonic adaptation theory to assess elderly customer's post-adoption satisfaction and continued usage of mobile banking services over time.

The purpose of this paper is to test the conceptual model of consumers’ intention and satisfaction towards mobile wallets. This study uses the integrated UTAUT model which includes variables such as ease of use, trust, security, self-efficacy, etc., and an additional variable (hedonism) to test consumers’ behaviour in the context of mobile banking technologies. Regression analysis, ANOVA and descriptive analysis are used to test the relationship among several dimensions such as perceptions, preferences, satisfaction and usage rate of mobile wallets in North India. A sample of 204 North Indian consumers was taken to understand the consumers’ adoption behaviour towards mobile wallet. The study explains the significance of the proposed model and its effectiveness to understand the behaviour of North Indian consumers. The result shows a significant association between consumers’ perception, preference, usage and satisfaction. Security, trust and hedonism are few of the most influencing variables in the study. Demographic variables such as gender and age also influence consumer satisfaction and usage rate of mobile wallets in North India. The proposed model and results of the study bring valuable insights into researchers and practitioners in the context of usage of mobile wallets.

Various standardized scales were used in the present study. Statistical techniques like descriptive statistics, analysis of variance, t-test, χ² and regression analysis were used to assess the data. The data were collected with three separate questionnaires on variables perception, preference, usage and satisfaction.

Findings of this study show a strong relation between customer’s perception, preference and satisfaction of mobile wallet users. The result also shows the impact of customer’s perception, satisfaction and preference on the usage rate of mobile wallets in India. The authors have collected responses from the various regions in south and North India.

The first contribution of this study is that it shows a strong correlation between consumers’ perception, preferences and satisfaction. Various studies are available to understand the impact of perception on satisfaction (Samudra and Phadtare, 2012; Venkatesh and Davis, 2000, Thakur, 2013), but very few studies have integrated it with preference and mobile wallet usage. Moreover, no study is available on these variables specifically for North Indian consumers. This study is unique in the sense that it discuss the association of consumer’s perception with type of transactions they prefer to do in M-wallets. This paper also identify one more crucial factors, “hedonism” which is not discussed extensively in the literature.

The study has several implications to the mobile technology industry and the banking system to identify new strategies for mobile wallet usage. Factors like security, convenience and trust influence consumers’ intention. This indicates that industries and banks must verify users’ privacy norms and evaluate social trends to enhance user’s satisfaction and usage rate. Hedonism is determined as one of the significant variable to measure consumer’s satisfaction and usage tendency. Mobile technology providers should work on the appearances and design of the apps, and promote its convenience and benefits to increase its usage in North India. Based on the findings of this study, companies can also evaluate preferred wallet services for consumers, and factors affecting those services. This will help them to add more attractive services based on consumers’ feedback, and remove unwanted services.

The study also stressed the impact of society and family/friends on mobile wallet’s usage. Customers learn new things from family and society and get influence with their choice and preferences. This will help institutions to understand various factors leads to mobile wallet usage and enhance the satisfaction level of customers.

Although various studies have been conducted on the perception of customers on various mobile payment systems, but this paper is the first of its kind to study customer’s perception about wallets and type of transactions; they prefer to do through mobile wallets. This paper also study the impact of mobile wallet usage and various factors affecting the usage rate. This paper also identified one crucial factor, “hedonism”, which is not discussed thoroughly in the literature, and its significance in North India.

This study aims to identify articles examining human-robot interaction and the effects of robotic systems on employment.

In this research, electronic searches were performed for articles published between 2000 and 2022 in Emerald, Springer, PubMed, Science Direct, Wiley and Google Scholar. In the searches of robotic systems with keywords such as “motivation, job satisfaction, job loss, performance, job giving,” 5 quantitative and 5 qualitative studies were included in the systematic review. The selected research was conducted using the Johanna Briggs Analytical Cross-Sectional Studies Checklist from the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) critical evaluation lists and the JBI Critical Appraisal Checklist for Qualitative Research, depending on their type. The included studies are mostly on employee-robot collaboration.

Although the majority of the articles examined in this study are included in keywords or titles, it is determined that there is a gap in descriptive quantitative studies in the literature on the effects of employee-robot collaboration, robotic systems and robotic systems on variables such as motivation, job satisfaction, job loss, performance and employment, although they do not mention a framework that directly investigates human-robot interaction and the effects of robotic systems on employment.

There are several limitations in this study. One of them is that, although the databases are comprehensively scanned, only studies published in English between 2000 and 2022 are included in the systematic review. Another limitation is the heterogeneity between studies.

As a result of the authors’ findings, the practical effects of the research are reflected as follows: It serves as a guide for future studies to fill the gap in the field, especially for academics and researchers working in the field of social sciences on robotic systems and intelligent automations. In addition to the qualitative studies on this subject, there is a need for the use of robotic systems in the field of human resources and management and quantitative studies with more sample sizes, especially at the corporate (firms) and individual (employees) level. Considering that the number of studies on this subject is very insufficient, this research is important in terms of shedding light on future studies.

The authors believe that the impact of robotic systems on employment is one of the few conceptual articles that systematically examines 6 dimensions (job satisfaction, performance, job loss, employment, motivation, employment).

Human Resources and Organizational Behavior – dealing with the HR issues in mergers and acquisitions (M&As).

MBA and other similar programs at the post-graduation level.

The current case deals with human resource (HR) issues in the merger of Kotak Mahindra Bank (KMB) and ING Vysya Bank (IVB). The case discusses various aspects of the merger process and focuses on the key challenges that firms face while integrating the employees of the merged entities. The case also highlights the steps taken by KMB to ensure that the merger process is smooth and employees are adequately motivated. The case also discusses the process adopted by the merged entity to efficiently integrate the employees.

The case can be a part of an organizational behavior course and a banking course. The current case allows students to make decisions while dealing with situations pertaining to employees’ integration in an M&A deal. The major expected learning outcomes of the current case include being able to: understand industry structure using the Indian banking industry as a case in point; identify the major challenges in any M&A deal; list down key HR issues in any merger activity; analyse strategies that can be adopted to deal with HR challenges; and construct a plan of action for integrating employees in a merged entity.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS: 6: Human Resource Management.

Research findings indicate that there is positive relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and company's reputation but relationship between CSR and company's profitability has not been explored in the Indian context. CSR level of business firms in India is increasing in terms of both amount of the disclosure and the number of participating firms. Therefore the purpose of this paper is to explore the link between good financial performance measure and other indicators of corporate responsibility. This paper also aims at studying the trend of disclosure of CSR reporting by Indian companies.

This study seeks to investigate the relationship between ethical commitment and financial performance over the four‐year period, through statistical regression and correlation analysis. Studies of few Indian companies who have successfully implemented CSR initiatives have also been analyzed to investigate the level and nature of engagement of Indian companies in social responsibility initiatives.

It has been reported that there is little evidence that companies with a code of ethics would generate significantly more economic value added (EVA) and market added value (MVA) than those without codes.

Indian corporations need to develop a proper strategy to integrate CSR goals with stockholders' goals. Top management should create a dedicated CSR team, which should identify the core areas of CSR and strengthen internal practices such as corporate governance, transparency and disclosure issues.

In the Indian context very few studies have analyzed the linkages between CSR and Organizational profitability. This article presents a new approach to correlate the relationship between CSR and Organizational profitability in terms of EVA and MVA.

By working through the case and assignment questions, students will be able to conduct a marketing environmental analysis to aid strategic decisions; analyse the first-mover advantages of a retail firm and how these can be sustained; comprehend online retail business models and the challenges therein; understand the trade-offs of online/offline retail experiences specific to an emerging market’s beauty and personal care sector; conceptualize and formulate actionable growth strategies that balance the individual and collective requirements of brick and mortar and retail e-commerce environments.

The case is set in 2022, right after Nykaa – the pioneer of beauty and wellness e-commerce platforms in India makes a blockbuster stock market debut in 2021. Starting in 2012 with a disruptive online model for selling beauty and wellness products online in India, Nykaa had come a long way with expansions in physical retail and other segments such as fashion. The firm, which initially aimed to be a virtual store, is now thinking of aggressively expanding in the brick-and-mortar retail space as it opens its 85th retail outlet.

Falguni S. Nayar, founder and CEO of Nykaa, wanted to roll out 300 physical stores targeting 100 cities in India in the next couple of years. She aspired to establish Nykaa as a category leader as the “Indian Sephora” in the beauty and personal care market. Nykaa’s first-mover advantage in the online beauty and personal care marketplace worked well to establish it as a brand with positive endorsements by digital shoppers that enhanced the investment potential with potential financiers. However, the pandemic had brought every physical retailer to the online platform. Most e-commerce platforms dealing in grocery to lifestyle had added personal care products to their existing merchandise.

Additionally, several start-ups had ventured into the online marketplace. Online was a cluttered marketplace with little to no differentiation. In this bloodbath, would the first-mover advantage for Nykaa in the online space still count as a competitive advantage? Nayar was all set to expand Nykaa’s physical presence aggressively. The concern was that the beauty and personal care segment had also moved online as a function of long stay-at-home periods. In the post-pandemic times, would the customer indeed revert to brick and mortar once again? Nykaa was also into product formulations, but so was every big and small player in the space. What was the differentiated winning formula for the consumer’s heart and mind?

The case can be effectively used in foundation courses in marketing and a wide range of specialized courses on marketing management (core/foundation course), retail marketing and e-commerce/digital marketing and e-commerce for B-school learners. The complex decision points faced by an innovative e-commerce start-up firm on its road to market expansion make the case suitable for niche courses such as Marketing for Start-ups. Moreover, learners in executive MBA programs with considerable experience can benefit from the case analysis that balances a growing retail company’s long- and short-run objectives.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 8: Marketing.