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The young population in Turkey is gradually increasing. Generation Y, which comprises the people born between 1980 and 1999 (Broadbridge et al., 2007) and free-spirited and tech-savvy, forms a large part of the population of the world, especially Turkey, and is of great importance to the housing sector for their home-buying preferences. In this study, housing preferences of students in Turkey’s two socio-economically different universities were comparatively analysed through quantitative methods.

A survey was simultaneously distributed among students of two universities. The survey consists of six main factors: “reliability”, “economic opportunities”, “transportation opportunities”, “quality of life and social opportunities”, “quality standards”, and “technological opportunities”, with 25 statements. The questionnaire was developed through a comprehensive literature review and the opinions of university stakeholders.

Results showed that the structure of the family and socio-economic differences affect home-buying preferences. The Mann–Whitney U test indicated that there was a meaningful difference of opinion between students of two universities. Munzur University students paid attention to economic opportunities when buying a home. Additionally, there was a meaningful relationship among the age groups in factors of “having a parking place” (p = 0.026) and “having a playground” (p = 0.026). As the age increases, students desire a playground around their future home.

The most important limitation of this study is the non-parametric data. Non-parametric data structure and the tests performed accordingly are less preferred than parametric data structure. For that reason, to what extent the results accurately represent Generation Y needs to be assessed through future study. Also, a certain number of sampling could be reached as purposive sampling was used.

This study contributes to the literature in terms of comparatively analysing buying preferences of Generation Y through statistical methods and showing the relationship between these preferences and socio-economic features statistically. Due to the insufficient quantitative research on the literature, this quantitative study was carried future home-buying preferences of Generation Y university students, who will also be actively involved in the housing market. The purpose of this study investigates marketing factors that affect housing preferences of students in Turkey.

In Part 1, a model of dining satisfaction and return patronage was developed and described. Based on extensive review of the relevant consumer behaviour literature the model was developed and underpinned by the disconfirmation and expectancy theory. As noted in the article, disconfirmation theory is widely accepted as an account of the process by which customers develop feelings of satisfaction or dissatisfaction, that is, when customers compare new dining experiences with some basis that they have developed from prior experiences. On the other hand, the assumption that a customer will weigh various restaurant attributes is based on expectancy theory. In the majority of studies using disconfirmation theory, expectations are formed according to customers’ pre‐experience beliefs and standards that they use to measure their purchase experience. These theories bring together the social, psychological and cultural concepts into four distinct groups of variables: input variables both internal and external, process variables and output variables (Lowenberg et al., 1979; Finkelstein, 1989). This paper is a continuation and explains: how the model of dining satisfaction and return patronage was operationalised, that is, how the research instrument was developed; how the sample size and survey procedures were developed and conducted; and how the selection of analytical procedures was conceived.

In today's business world customers of all industry sectors are becoming more informed as to the level of choice and competition for their custom. This has led to the requirement for businesses to develop and maintain marketing strategies that will increase their competitiveness within their respective sector. Relationship marketing (RM) is a marketing theory, which has benefited businesses in many other sectors, though the concepts may be fairly new in the facilities management (FM) sector. This study is concerned with the review of the fundamental principles of RM, and its benefits for the FM sector. The purpose of this paper is to test whether the FM sector in the UK is aware of the RM theory, and is implementing this theory in its day‐to‐day practices. Research aims are to: investigate the level of understanding present in the FM industry with regards to RM; and to ascertain the benefits that could be available for the industry if an RM orientation is to be employed.

Following the literature review, a questionnaire is distributed to the members of the British Institute of Facilities Management in the North of England.

The survey identifies the FM industry's capability of using many RM strategies, however, the industry does not classify its customers at present, in order to deliver more targeted services.

The study reveals that the FM sector understands RM and that RM is a concept that the industry would benefit from.

The market for goods and services is a continually changing environment influenced by many internal and external factors. The majority of economies in the World were deeply hit by the coronavirus epidemic (COVID-19) in the first half of 2020. This paper aims to contribute to the understanding of the role of a crisis, COVID-19 in this case, in moderating the market environment and its ability to accelerate or slow down ongoing processes.

A questionnaire survey was used to obtain the opinions of 100 customers and 100 local retailers on the digitisation of the shopping process in a medium-sized Czech town. After the first wave of crisis faded away, the respondents reflected on their opinions before, during and after the crisis. The data were processed using linear mixed models respecting repeated measures.

The crisis seems to have shifted the interest of both groups towards e-commerce but it did not change the disproportion in opinions between them. The interest of customers was significantly higher, even after the crisis.

The credibility of the results is limited mainly by the one-time gathering of the data after the crisis. However, the results indicate a persistent challenge to which small retailers are exposed.

The originality of the results comes from the specific situation brought about by the COVID-19 crisis and the structure of respondents, enabling us to catch an immediate shift of opinions caused by the crisis and to compare the changes in both groups of respondents.

Severe accuracy loss may occur when finite element comes to the distorted mesh model, and the calculation may fail when element mesh degenerates into concave quadrangle or the element boundary is curved. This is a valuable research topic, and many efforts have been made to develop new finite element models. This paper aims to propose two quasi-conforming membrane elements based on the assumed stress quasi-conforming method and fundamental analytical solutions to overcome the difficulties.

First, the fundamental analytical solutions which satisfied both the equilibrium and the compatibility relations of plane stress problem are used as the initial assumed stress of both elements. Then, the stress-function matrices are used as the weighted functions to weaken the strain-displacement equations, which makes only string-net functions on the boundary of the elements are needed in the process of strain integration. Finally, boundary interpolation functions expressed by unknown nodal displacement parameters are adopted to the process of strain integration.

The formulations of both elements are simple and concise, and the elements are immune to the distorted mesh, which can be used to the mesh shape degenerates into a triangle or concave quadrangle and curved-side element. The results of the numerical tests have proven that the new models possess high accuracy.

New formulations of quasi-conforming method are described is detail, and the new strategy exhibits advantages of both analytical and discrete methods.

Purpose: Risk is a multifaceted concept, and its identification requires complex approaches that are often misunderstood. The consequence is that decisions are based on limited perception rather than the full value and meaning of what risk is, as a result, the way it is being tackled is incorrect. The individuals are often limited in their perceptions and ideas and do not embrace the full multifaceted nature of risk. Regulators and individuals want to follow norms and checklists or overuse models, simulations, and templates, thereby reducing responsibility for decision-making. At the same time, the wider use of technology and rules reduces the critical thinking of individuals. We advance the automation process by building robots that follow protocols and forget about the part of risk assessment that cannot be programed. Therefore, with this study, the objective of this study was to discover how people define risk, the influencing factors of risk perception and how they behave toward this perception. The authors also determine how the perception differed with age, gender, marital status, education level and region. The novelty of the research is related to individual risk perception during COVID-19, as this is a new and unknown phenomenon. Methodology: The research is based on the analysis of the self-administered purposely designed questionnaires we distributed across different social media platforms between February and June 2020 in Europe and in some cases was carried out as a interview over communication platforms such as “Skype,” “Zoom” and “Microsoft Teams.” The questionnaire was divided into four parts: Section 1 was designed to collect demographic information from the participants; Section 2 included risk definition statements obtained from literature and a preliminary discussion with peers; Section 3 included risk behavior statements; and Section 4 included statements on risk perception experiences. A five-point Likert Scale was provided, and participants were required to answer along a scale of “1” for “Strongly Agree” to “5” for “Strongly Disagree.” Participants also had the option to elaborate further and provide additional comments in an open-ended box provided at the end of the section. 466 valid responses were received. Thematic analysis was carried out to analyze the interviews and the open-ended questions, while the questionnaire responses were analyzed using various quantitative methods on IBM SPSS (version 23). Findings: The results of the analysis indicate that individuals evaluate the risk before making a decision and view risk as both a loss and opportunity. The study identifies nine factors influencing risk perception. Nevertheless, it must be emphasized that we can continue to develop models and rules, but as long as the risk is not understood, we will never achieve anything.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the status quo of digital poverty among adolescents in China, analyze the characteristics and the causes, then propose countermeasures to provide reference for alleviating digital poverty among adolescents.

The study developed an initial scale of digital poverty among adolescents and used survey data to revise the scale, on this basis, formed a questionnaire, which was distributed to nationwide adolescents. The study developed its findings from the 837 valid questionnaire respondents.

The digital poverty among adolescents is mainly shown in the poverty of digital ability, digital psychology and digital environment and presents the following characteristics, that is, insufficient information seeking ability and information selection ability needing to be improved; equipped with basic information awareness but lack of information evaluation ability; lack of patience in obtaining information and inclined to the principle of least effort; imperfect knowledge structure and immature psychological emotions and vulnerable to external interference; having a certain relationship with the information environment, but not significantly affected by regional economic differences. Finally, the study puts forward countermeasures to alleviate digital poverty among adolescents.

Understanding of the digital poverty among adolescents will likely demand rethinking into a number of issues ignored by information poverty studies.

Few studies focus on digital poverty among adolescents. This study developed an initial scale of digital poverty among adolescents and revised it by survey data, then conducted an empirical study through questionnaire, which could expand the understanding of information poverty in the field of library and information science.

The optimal design of a laminated cylindrical shell is obtained with the objectives defined as the maximisation of the axial and torsional buckling loads. The ply angle is taken as the design variable. The symbolic computational software package MATHEMATICA is used in the implementation and solution of the problem. This approach simplifies the computational procedure as well as the implementation of the analysis/optimisation routine. Results are given illustrating the dependence of the optimal fiber angle on the cylinder length and radius. It is shown that a general purpose computer algebra system like MATHEMATICA is well suited to solve small boundary value problems such as structural design optimisation involving composite materials.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the possible consequences of the intra-individual level-based perceptions of participative, supportive and instrumental leadership styles and the dissonance factors of leadership styles perceptions on employee engagement using the information-processing and connectionist perspectives of leadership perceptions.

Hypotheses relating to direct and moderated effects of perceptions of leadership styles on employee engagement were tested using a two-stage intra-individual level study (n=172 in each stage). Hierarchical regression analysis was used to test the hypotheses.

The findings revealed that perceptions of preferred and experienced supportive leadership styles are individually important predictors of employee engagement. It was also revealed that differentiated leadership styles have stronger (complementary) effect on employee engagement when the perceptions of experienced participative and supportive leadership styles were aligned with perceptions of respective preferred leadership styles. Furthermore, it was also found that the low level compared to the high level of dissonance factor or the difference between preferred and experienced instrumental leadership style acted as a complementer on employee engagement.

This study has made contributions to facilitate scholars to build better information-processing models and implicit theories for differentiated leadership and employee engagement links. Finally, the study provides new information on the consequence of perceptions of leadership style and the dissonance factor of leadership perceptions on followers’ actions such as employee engagement.

This will be the first empirical study examining the relationships between the dissonance factor of leadership perceptions of participative, supportive and instrumental styles and employee engagement.

The purpose of this paper is to report the findings of a study which examines the relationship between transformational leadership and intention to leave through the mediating role of employee engagement, employer branding, and psychological attachment.

Transformational leadership, employee engagement, employer branding, and psychological attachment were assessed in an empirical study based on a sample of 405 full-time employees working in information technology (IT) organizations in India. The data which were obtained using Google doc and a printed questionnaire was analyzed through structural and measurement model.

The results reveal that transformational leadership style directly influences employee intention to leave. Transformational leadership and employer branding is mediated by employee engagement. The leadership relation with psychological attachment is mediated by employer branding.

The implications of the study are of utmost importance for Indian IT industries facing high voluntary turnover in recent times. Transformational leaders in teams contribute to develop employee engagement, employer branding, and psychological attachment. Imparting transformational leadership training to team leaders can help in generating psychological attachment with the employees which would go a long way.

This study explores the relationship among transformational leadership style, employee engagement, employer branding, and psychological attachment which has not been explored theoretically and tested empirically in an Indian context.