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Whistleblowing has been receiving increased attention and support in recent times as a means of detecting and correcting wrongdoing in organizations. This study aims to examine perceptions, attitudes and consequences (actions and reactions) of whistleblowing, as well as the predictors of internal and external whistleblowing intentions, by using Graham’s (1986) model of principled organizational dissent in a small emerging and collectivist culture like Barbados.

The study utilized a self-administered survey of 282 accounting employees working in organizations in Barbados.

Results reveal that there is little awareness of whistleblowing legislation. Most respondents perceive whistleblowing as ethical and favor internal over external whistleblowing. Findings show that personal responsibility and personal costs significantly influence internal whistleblowing intentions, while personal costs influence external whistleblowing. Using qualitative data, several themes emerged as influencing whistleblowing: perceived benefits of whistleblowing, actual whistleblowing experiences (handling of reports), personal costs (climate of fear and hostility), perceived lack of anonymity and cultural norms.

Future research should control for social desirability bias and use more rigorous qualitative approaches such as face-to-face interviews and focus groups to gain in-depth opinions and feelings on the topic.

Whistleblowing can be achieved through such mechanisms as perceived organizational support, strong ethical codes of conduct, rewarding ethical behavior and promoting sound work ethics in organizations.

This paper explores whistleblowing in an emerging economy where there has been little research on the topic. Thus, this study supplements the existing research in emerging economies by examining the applicability of Graham’s (1986) model of principled organizational dissent.

The purpose of this paper is to report the findings of two studies that explored consumer misrepresentation (lying) during personal information disclosure in a commercial context. Disclosure strategies and mediating processes that might influence lying were also investigated.

Two studies were carried out to examine the phenomenon of interest. The first study examined the extent of consumer lying in a consumer‐commercial exchange context, the variation of lying about different kinds of personal information and a classification of consumers in terms of disclosure tendencies. The second study examined two mediating processes that may drive lying behavior: cost‐benefit evaluations and fairness evaluations.

The findings suggest that individuals tend to falsify some items more than they do others, and, even in information categories that are not “personally identifying,” there is a high level of misrepresentation. It was also found that consumers can be grouped based on their disclosure strategy (lying, omitting, truthfully disclosing), and the strategy appears to be related to perceived experience with disclosure. Finally, it was found that the cost‐benefit of disclosure influences consumer lying, but fairness perceptions do not appear to influence lying behavior.

Based on the findings in this study, a percentage of information appears to be faulty. This brings into question data quality, in that good marketing decisions presumes good data. Information‐based marketing exchanges appear to be driven by cost‐benefit evaluations. If this is the case, then marketers should strive to ethically develop elicitation strategies that either reduce the perceived cost of consumer disclosure or increase consumers' perceptions of the value they receive in exchange for personal information.

This paper provides useful information on consumer lying with regard to disclosing personal information in a commercial context.

This paper aims to investigate the cooperative governance mechanisms for personal information security, which can help enrich digital governance research and provide a reference for the formulation of protection policies for personal information security.

This paper constructs an evolutionary game model consisting of regulators, digital enterprises and consumers, which is combined with the simulation method to examine the influence of different factors on personal information protection and governance.

The results reveal seven stable equilibrium strategies for personal information security within the cooperative governance game system. The non-compliant processing of personal information by digital enterprises can damage the rights and interests of consumers. However, the combination of regulatory measures implemented by supervisory authorities and the rights protection measures enacted by consumers can effectively promote the self-regulation of digital enterprises. The reputation mechanism exerts a restricting effect on the opportunistic behaviour of the participants.

The authors focus on the regulation of digital enterprises and do not consider the involvement of malicious actors such as hackers, and the authors will continue to focus on the game when assessing the governance of malicious actors in subsequent research.

This study's results enhance digital governance research and offer a reference for developing policies that protect personal information security.

This paper builds an analytical framework for cooperative governance for personal information security, which helps to understand the decision-making behaviour and motivation of different subjects and to better address issues in the governance for personal information security.

Purpose: Online gaming (OG) has become an increasing societal phenomenon during the current Pandemic times. This is due to lockdowns and people being confined to home environments. This chapter sheds light on the attraction of OG, from the perspective of it being a virtual immersion tool of emancipation. There has been an increasing amount of working from home arrangements during Pandemic times and more time is being spent in virtual immersion. As discussed in the article, there is a potential conflict between individual accountabilities, for example, to attain a certain degree of work-related performance and the hedonistic pleasure attained from OG (which is the type of focus of virtual immersion in this chapter). OG bears personal, business and societal costs, which are discussed in this chapter.

Need for this study: This study provides a picture of the implications of an individual’s virtual reality immersion for the purpose of OG, from the perspectives of personal and social accountabilities in the virtual and physical worlds in the current Pandemic environment.

Methodology: This is a concise overview of the theoretical underpinnings, impacts on accountabilities and implications relating to OG. The chapter provides a survey and discussion of the literature on increasing trends of OG, profit-making potential of OG and the related accountability perspectives.

Findings: This chapter has extended on the Internet accounting and accountability research literature by considering OG accountabilities and costs and benefits. OG supports an individual’s emancipation. From the perspective of OG, there are numerous forms of emancipations that can be achieved and that may result in ‘sacrifices’ by others including other online gamers. There is a substantial risk of a lack of accountability towards the others in the online and real-life environment on behalf of the one who is emancipated through escape.

Do personal computers make sense? Do the benefits outweigh the costs? That's something you need to determine before you buy a computer (or add to your existing supply). A few years ago, many organizations underestimated the costs of computers and overestimated their benefits. Now, the prevailing wisdom may be going too far in the other direction. Our trailing‐edge skeptic notes some of the absurd projections of earlier years, showing the simple math that undermined the business plans. Going on to discuss some reasons why earlier cost‐benefit equations were seriously off in one direction, he proceeds to the current situation. Finally, notes from the literature cover four months (December 1988 through March 1989) with few startling developments but many worthwhile articles and reviews.

This paper studies banking crises in a framework where the government can be biased in favor of a “business elite.” When the deposit contract is such that the run on the bank takes place only if the economic system is in a recession, the presence of a “crony” government introduces an element of indeterminacy, i.e. equilibrium can be multiple. Moreover, by means of an information updating mechanism, it is shown that the crisis may spread out to countries “similar” to the one that is examined, i.e. that contagion is possible.

This study aims to examine the influence of accounting professionals’ Machiavellian behavior and ethical judgments on their intention to report fraudulent acts and also to examine the moderating effect of Machiavellianism on the relationship between professionals’ ethical judgments and whistleblowing intention, as well as the mediating effect of personal responsibility, personal costs/benefits and the seriousness of the questionable act on this relationship.

The data were collected via a survey sent to 201 Tunisian accounting professionals and analyzed using the structural equation method.

The results indicate that ethical judgments support the whistleblowing intentions among Tunisian accountants. However, this relationship is affected by Machiavellian behavior that minimizes whistleblowing. Furthermore, the results show that Machiavellianism is negatively associated with whistleblowing intention and has an indirect effect on whistleblowing through perceived personal benefit and the seriousness of the questionable act.

Examining the ethical ideologies that may affect whistleblowing, including Machiavellianism and ethical judgment, in the Tunisian context contributes to the literature on the accounting profession in the Middle East and North Africa. The results of this study could raise awareness among policymakers and regulators in developing countries, particularly in Tunisia, to value whistleblowing as a mechanism for detecting and controlling organizational misconduct and enact regulations that encourage accounting professionals to report fraudulent acts while protecting them.

The purpose of this paper is to study the determinants of the use of personal loans in small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs).

Personal loans are addressed as a function of the borrower and collateral. To empirically test the hypothesis of this study, a probit model was applied to a group of companies in Bahia Blanca, Argentina, with a previous analysis of the possible effects of sample selection.

Older companies, firms with lower expected growth rates, younger owners, those who seek to create value or growth, and owners who perceive low emotional costs associated with bankruptcy, are less likely to use personal loans to finance their operations.

This study is limited by the availability of data on SMEs in Argentina.

The results highlight the importance of financial aid programmes that focus on SME scarce availability of collateral.

This study makes three principal contributions: first, it investigates the phenomenon of personal loan utilisation in SMEs; second, it analyses financing decisions from both the supply and demand perspectives; and third, it presents a database that includes variables that have not been previously studied in Argentina or other emerging economies.

This article examines options for the reform of adult social care funding, noting that universal agreement on the need for a new system has not been matched by political consensus on how this could be achieved. The costs and outcomes of some of the principal options for reform are summarised ‐ including a revised version of The King's Fund partnership model and the policy of free personal care ‐ and how these compare with the existing means‐tested system if left unreformed. These and other models are not mutually exclusive, and the selection of which options to pursue will involve delicate balancing of political, economic and administrative criteria. On balance, our view is that a revised version of the original partnership model offers the best outcomes in relation to costs, and one that can be blended with other funding options to reflect the changing nature of trade‐offs between costs, affordability and simplicity.

This paper aims to examine how knowledge sharing behavior is influenced by three sets of dynamics: a rational calculus that weighs the costs and benefits of sharing; a dispositional preference that favors certain patterns of sharing outcomes; and a relational effect based on working relationships.

Concepts from social exchange theory, social value orientation, and leader‐member exchange theory are applied to analyze behavioral intentions to share knowledge. The study population consists of employees of a large pension fund in Canada. Participants answered a survey that used allocation games and situational vignettes to measure social value orientation, propensity to share knowledge, and perception of cost and benefit.

The results suggest that personal preferences about the distribution of sharing outcomes, individual perceptions about costs and benefits, and structural relationship with knowledge recipients, all affect knowledge sharing behavior significantly. Notably, it was found that propensity to share knowledge is positively related to perceived benefit to the recipient, thus suggesting that evaluation of cost and benefit in social exchange is not limited to self‐interest, but is also influenced by perceived recipient benefit. Moreover, it was found that the relationship with the sharing target (superior or colleague) also influenced sharing.

Most studies emphasize the organizational benefits of knowledge sharing. This study examines knowledge sharing from the perspective of the individual who approaches knowledge sharing as a social exchange that involves perceptions of costs and benefits, preferences about sharing outcomes, and relationship with the sharing target. The study also introduces innovative methods to measure social value orientation and propensity to share knowledge.