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The purpose of this paper is to show how an academic library added access points to its digital reference service outside its traditional library web pages (e.g. online catalog, subscription databases). It seeks to determine whether, how, and to what extent these access points were used by patrons.

Almost 1,200 chat, e‐mail, and instant message digital reference transactions were examined. The data collected included: status of user; format by which questions were submitted (chat, e‐mail, IM); subject area of the question; type of question, and the access point from which the patron submitted the question. The data were analyzed using SPSS statistical software.

Patrons used the access points in external resources over 25 per cent of the time. They took advantage of the access points as their research needs arose. An increase in the amount of reference transactions received was observed after the addition of the external access points.

This study may be useful in planning, administering, and staffing digital reference services.

This is currently the only comprehensive study that has examined digital reference transactions in multiple formats, the correlation between access point and information need, and the impact of adding access points to digital reference in external resources.

This study aims to elucidate reference points and organizational identity in letters to shareholders (LTSs) of publishing companies and develops propositions on their relation to strategic adaptation. This study examines how characteristics of reference points (number, temporality and specificity) and organizational identity (focus, discontinuity and distinctiveness) relate to strategic adaptation. This research advances performance feedback theory and behavioral strategy by presenting rich data on how managers use reference points. This study also theorizes on the role of organizational identity as an observation frame. Finally, this study informs managers on how they can adapt reference points and organizational identity to drive strategic adaptation in their organizations.

This paper uses text analysis of LTSs of eight companies in the global publishing industry over six years. The research design is an exploratory, comparative case study.

The authors present the findings of rich empirical data analysis of reference points and organizational ideology, develop a typology and propose three proposed relationships. This paper develops three propositions on how characteristics of reference points (number, temporality and specificity) and organizational identity (focus, discontinuity and distinctiveness) relate to strategic adaptation.

This study elucidates reference points that managers use when they make sense of performance feedback. This study further develops a typology of reference points and suggests propositions on how reference points and organizational identity relate to strategic adaptation. The novel linguistic approach to revealing reference points-in-use and the study of decision-making in its empirical context contribute to a better understanding of the micromechanims of decision-making that are central to behavioral strategy.

This research aims to test focus of attention effects in risky choice.

As opposed to traditional aspiration-level theory, the shifting-focus concept introduces a second reference point, the survival point, and assumes a shifting focus of attention between the two reference points. In this conceptualization, risk-taking is a function of focus of attention on the survival reference point or the aspiration-level and resources relative to the two reference points. Four randomized controlled studies tested this concept.

Study 1 showed that with aspiration focus the probability of choosing a risky option was higher below an aspiration-level than above it. With survival focus, the effect was reversed. Study 2 found that close to the survival reference point, the probability of choosing a risky option was higher with aspiration focus relative to survival focus. Study 3 revealed that with scarce resources the risk taken was higher with aspiration focus than with survival focus, and the scarcer the resources the stronger was the effect. Study 4 demonstrated that with aspiration focus the risk taken was higher below an aspiration-level than above it. With survival focus the effect was reversed.

In addition to providing support for the validity of the shifting focus concept, this paper elaborates on the theoretical model by providing evidence for moderation effects. Risk-taking was affected by a focus of attention on one of two reference points, and the effect was moderated by resources relative to the two focal points. An advanced model is proposed to capture the effects of focus of attention and resources on risk-taking behavior.

To run a job guarantee public policy scheme, it is important to know the aspiration level or the reference point of labor, and accordingly, the labor hour and the wage sequence are to be prepared. The existing job guarantee schemes consider the same wage rates for all types of jobs. As a result, it is to identify the reference point. The present work aims to propose a job guarantee scheme where different types of jobs have different wage rates. The paper explains the choice problem between labor and leisure at different wage rates and proposes complete computational tools to be incorporated into the job guarantee schemes. The paper also gives a mechanism to prepare the list of jobs and corresponding wage rates by maintaining a balance between labor and leisure, where productive activities measure labor hours and labor welfare measures leisure hours. Lastly, the paper provides the analytical tools to interpret the ex-post data of the job guarantee public policy schemes.

The paper has been written based on the Coordination Game and its Welfare Implications in the job guarantee public policy schemes.

The present paper gives an initial work to measure the choice between labor and leisure for the different wage rates practically. This will help in getting the equilibrium strategies, namely, the combination of the labor hour and the wage rate between the policymaker and the labor. This method will help to implement the job guarantee schemes. For example, to run successfully the Basic Income policy, the basic income calculation should give due care; otherwise, there will be a downward trend in the basic income and the welfare of labor will be reduced, because the labor would have to supply excess labor to meet the target income.

This paper derives theories and explains how the equilibrium in this coordination game can be achieved. The paper explains how the policy of the job guarantee schemes can be practiced practically. In the MGNREGA scheme, the public institution declares different categories of jobs with different wage rates. The categories have been classified with respect to the hours required to complete the job. Therefore, the public institution declares different lists or a sequence of pairs of labor hours and wage rates. Moreover, the list is stochastic, because the list can be changed by the inclusion of an offer from the market as well. The labor has to select from the list. The challenge on the part of the public institution is to prepare the list in such a way so that the inclusion of the market offers will not distort the equilibrium of the coordination game. An important method has been proposed here to analyze the ex-post data of job offers so that the preparation of the future sequence of the job offers can be prepared with due care. One objective of the policymaker here is to make a list of job offers in such a way so that the labor supply will be converging to a point and that will not deviate if the wage rate increases further. This objective will make a balance of the distribution of funds between the existing registered labor and the new entrants into the job guarantee schemes.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the target and bidder reference points on the method of payment in mergers. When considering initial and final results for target and bidder, the target appears to have more negotiating power than the bidder in achieving the financial mix preference that was initially articulated.

The authors examine the impact of target and bidder reference points on the consideration sought by the target and the consideration offered by the bidder. The authors test whether the target reference points has an impact on the final method of payment agreed upon by the target and the bidder.

The authors find that targets with a longer distance to their respective target reference points prefer to receive cash financing in the consideration sought, while bidders with a longer distance to their respective reference points prefer stock financing in consideration offered. The authors also find evidence that target’s longer distance to its reference point is associated with the use of cash over stock, while the bidder reference point has no impact on the final method of payment used in the merger.

These insights may be used by the management to formulate the optimal mix of financing in M&A transactions.

This is an original paper exploring the effect of behavioral finance on corporate decision making.

A growing body of literature has emphasized the importance of innovative strategy as a source of competitive advantage. Drazin and Shoonhoven summarized the literature using multilevel theoretical perspectives (community, population, and organization) that affect organizational innovative behavior. In parallel, Fiegenbaum et al. developed an organizational level theory, based on prospect theory, to explain how risky strategies are determined within organizations. They argued that organizational reference points delineate organizational attitudes toward risk‐taking into two polarized regimes: risk‐aversive whereas below it is risk‐assertive. They described the organizational mechanism that converts attitudes toward risk‐taking into actual risk‐aversive and risk‐assertive strategic behavior. A three‐dimensional space is provided that illustrates the spectrum of strategic reference points (SRP). The current study extends SRP theory. It is proposed that the nature of the industry, organizational strategy, and performance impact the kind of reference points used, which, in turn, impact risk‐taking behavior towards innovative strategy.

This study aims to investigate the reference and public service models used at academic libraries in the California State University system.

This exploratory study used a qualitative mixed methods design with an online survey and follow-up interviews with public services librarians.

The majority of the libraries in this study continue to use a traditional reference model with a physical desk staffed by librarians. Some libraries have moved to tiered or on-call reference using students and staff to triage patron questions. The majority of libraries’ public service points also follow a traditional configuration with separate service points for reference and other library public services.

As this research is limited to one public university system, the results may not be generalizable to all academic libraries. Replicating this research in other systems would increase the generalizability of the results and allow for the generation of potential best practices for reference models and public service point configurations.

Librarians who are considering changes to their reference models and service point layouts can use the results as a starting point for conversations about the benefits and challenges of various models as well provide support to create an environment where changes to the models can be successfully implemented.

This study is one of the few to investigate multiple academic libraries’ approaches to reference and public services in the research literature. As such, it addresses a gap in the literature that case studies alone cannot fill.

With the rise of alternate discovery services, such as Google Scholar, in conjunction with the increase in open access content, researchers have the option to bypass academic libraries when they search for and retrieve scholarly information. This state of affairs implies that academic libraries exist in competition with these alternate services and with the patrons who use them, and as a result, may be disintermediated from the scholarly information seeking and retrieval process. Drawing from decision and game theory, bounded rationality, information seeking theory, citation theory, and social computing theory, this study investigates how academic librarians are responding as competitors to changing scholarly information seeking and collecting practices. Bibliographic data was collected in 2010 from a systematic random sample of references on CiteULike.org and analyzed with three years of bibliometric data collected from Google Scholar. Findings suggest that although scholars may choose to bypass libraries when they seek scholarly information, academic libraries continue to provide a majority of scholarly documentation needs through open access and institutional repositories. Overall, the results indicate that academic librarians are playing the scholarly communication game competitively.

This issue's Special Feature is a discourse on the factors that influence the design and use of reference service areas. Robert Pierson identifies 13 characteristics every reference service area should have, and proposes specific design techniques by which these desired features can be obtained. The text is augmented by illustrations.