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Researchers have long been interested in understanding why and how corporate managers issue earnings guidance and the effect of such guidance on stakeholders’ (investors’ and managers’) behavior. Several recent studies have employed the experimental approach to address these issues. The purpose of this paper is to analyze and synthesize the literature on experimental studies of management earnings guidance. Consistent with the literature, I organize the synthesis to reflect (a) whether, why and how management issues guidance; (b) investors’ reactions to guidance; (c) the effect of guidance on management behavior. In addition, I provide institutional information (e.g., nature and timing of guidance) about guidance as well as provide several directions for future research. The synthesis reveals that the experimental studies have made a unique contribution to this literature by (i) providing evidence on process variables that underlie some empirical associations, (ii) directly measuring managers’ personal attributes and, (iii) closing the causality gap in the guidance literature.

This chapter considers the current standards that exist for the conduct of research and whether these standards are being met. Issues of scope and terminology are discussed and debated. Also considered are the reasons and benefits to the Academy of Social Sciences and other professional and disciplinary bodies by being involved in developing generic ethics principles in social science research.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the context of cognitive load and the role of in-app controls that serve as visual aids to promote business process understanding and the use of accounting information system (AIS) for small business users.

In total, 164 participants from small- and medium-sized enterprises were invited to participate in an experiment with between-subjects 2×2 factorial design. Researchers provided two sets of manipulations in the form of in-app control aids, namely Navigation and Guidance. Groups of individuals either received both navigation and guidance, only navigation or only guidance, or no treatment at all. These four different groups were then tested by a range of tasks to measure user understanding on small business domain knowledge and accounting business process provided by the system.

The findings indicate that although several early indications were visually observed wherein Navigation and Guidance may help reduce individual cognitive load and hence provide potential value for a better understanding of business process, the statistical analysis has not yet been able to substantiate the differences. Despite visually supporting the hypotheses, neither Navigation nor Guidance proved significant on accuracy (scores), efficiency (time) and individual cognitive difficulties. It appears that a systematic training on the accounting process is arguably imperative in order to reduce the extraneous cognitive load due to a relative gap of accounting logic and users’ knowledge of their business process. Ultimately, it would promote the germane knowledge where the integration of user’s own business process and accounting process can manifest effectively.

Aligned with the findings of the research and its correlation with learning, apparently the learning process is not merely determined not only by the application control features being embedded, but also by the domain knowledge of individuals who interact with the system. Training related to the discussion of the accounting process should be conducted more intensively to minimize the gap between the knowledge upon the problems on individual business process and the mechanism of the accounting process.

This research takes a new approach in examining user acceptance toward an AIS by comparing task performance with and without the assistive devices, to assess how these visual aids may overcome the cognitive load of the individual.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a new guidance scheme for aerial vehicles based on artificial intelligence. The new guidance scheme must be able to intercept maneuvering targets with higher probability and precision compared to existing algorithms.

A simulation setup of the aerial vehicle guidance problem is developed. A model-based machine learning technique known as Q-learning is used to develop a new guidance scheme. Several simulation experiments are conducted to train the new guidance scheme. Orthogonal arrays are used to define the training experiments to achieve faster convergence. A well-known guidance scheme known as proportional navigation guidance (PNG) is used as a base model for training. The new guidance scheme is compared for performance against standard guidance schemes like PNG and augmented proportional navigation guidance schemes in presence of sensor noise and computational delays.

A new guidance scheme for aerial vehicles is developed using Q-learning technique. This new guidance scheme has better miss distances and probability of intercept compared to standard guidance schemes.

The research uses simulation models to develop the new guidance scheme. The new guidance scheme is also evaluated in the simulation environment. The new guidance scheme performs better than standard existing guidance schemes.

The new guidance scheme can be used in various aerial guidance applications to reach a dynamically moving target in three-dimensional space.

The research paper proposes a completely new guidance scheme based on Q-learning whose performance is better than standard guidance schemes.

The chapter reflects on the strengths and limitations of David Carpenter’s proposal to support the work of research ethics committees through consideration of the virtues required by their members. Carpenter’s approach has many strengths, responsibilising researchers and ethics committees, and increasing the scope for robust and active theoretical engagement with ethical issues. I bring two alternative perspectives on research ethics to bear on this discussion. First, I discuss work in care ethics and relational ethics, approaches to ethics that have some similarities with virtue ethics but also distinct differences. Bruce Macfarlane’s text, on which Carpenter draws, notes care ethics briefly. I offer a more detailed consideration of what this perspective can offer, both for research ethics and for the virtuous research ethics committee. This helps to identify the relationships that are missing from a virtue ethics focus. Further, a context sensitive relational approach suggests ways in which we can strengthen Carpenter’s proposals to help research ethics committees select between competing principles or virtues. Second, my research ethics expertise is in undergraduate teaching for a multidisciplinary course, and an enquiry-based learning programme, which allows students in mixed discipline groups to plan, conduct, report and present their own original social research. The research skills training provided includes an interactive introduction to research ethics, what they are for and why they matter. Since we aim to offer practical guidance to research ethics committees when they consider what they should do and how this should be done, such a first principles approach may be useful.

The purpose of this paper is to provide evidence based guidance to researchers and practice personnel about forming and carrying out effective research partnerships.

A review of the literature, interviews and discussions with colleagues in both research and practice roles, and a review of the authors' personal experiences as researchers in partnership research.

Partnership research is, in some respects, a distinct “approach” to research, but there are many different versions. An analysis of research publications and of their research experience led the authors to develop a framework for planning and assessing the partnership research process, which includes defining expected outcomes for the partners, their roles, and steps in the research process.

This review and analysis provides guidance that may reduce commonly-reported misunderstandings and help to plan more successful partnerships and projects. It also identifies future research which is needed to define more precisely the questions and purposes for which partnership research is most appropriate, and methods and designs for specific types of partnership research.

As more research moves towards increased participation of practitioners and patients in the research process, more precise and differentiated understanding of the different partnership approaches is required, and when each is most suitable. This article describes research approaches that have the potential to reduce “the research-practice gap”. It gives evidence- and experience-based guidance for choosing and establishing a partnership research process, so as to improve partnership relationship-building and more actionable research.

This research aims to explore the research data ethics governance framework and collaborative network to optimize research data ethics governance practices, to balance the relationship between data development and utilization, open sharing, data security and to reduce the ethical risks that may arise from data sharing and utilization.

This study explores the framework and collaborative network of research data ethics policies by using the UK as an example. 78 policies from the UK government, university, research institution, funding agency, publisher, database, library and third-party organization are obtained. Adopting grounded theory (GT) and social network analysis (SNA), Nvivo12 is used to analyze these samples and summarize the research data ethics governance framework. Ucinet and Netdraw are used to reveal collaborative networks in policy.

Results indicate that the framework covers governance context, subject and measure. The content of governance context contains context description and data ethics issues analysis. Governance subject consists of defining subjects and facilitating their collaboration. Governance measure includes governance guidance and ethics governance initiatives in the data lifecycle. The collaborative network indicates that research institution plays a central role in ethics governance. The core of the governance content are ethics governance initiatives, governance guidance and governance context description.

This research provides new insights for policy analysis by combining GT and SNA methods. Research data ethics and its governance are conceptualized to complete data governance and research ethics theory.

A research data ethics governance framework and collaborative network are revealed, and actionable guidance for addressing essential aspects of research data ethics and multiple subjects to confer their functions in collaborative governance is provided.

This study analyzes policy text using qualitative and quantitative methods, ensuring fine-grained content profiling and improving policy research. A typical research data ethics governance framework is revealed. Various stakeholders' roles and priorities in collaborative governance are explored. These contribute to improving governance policies and governance levels in both theory and practice.

The purpose of this paper is to describe regulatory activities since the initial regulatory actions between 2001 and 2003 in response to securities firm research analyst conflicts of interest that were identified after the “internet bubble.”

The paper describes a number of important regulatory activities, including: interpretive activities, such as the 2004 Second Joint Research Memorandum; establishment of a new licensing requirement for research analysts; additional rulemaking, in the form of 2005 changes to the SRO Rules that are meant to tighten those rules; the December 2005 report of the NASD and NYSE studying the operation and effectiveness of prior regulatory actions, including the SRO Rules; enforcement actions against both firms' and research analysts' behavior; industry sweeps gathering information regarding industry practices in respect of debt research; and rulemaking for purposes of implementing interpretive guidance and Joint Report.

Following extraordinary and sweeping regulatory actions between 2001 and 2003, securities regulators have continued a high level of activity with respect to securities research. Research regulation stands as a hallmark for the current era of securities regulation for at least three reasons: it has displayed a wide range of regulatory tools including rulemaking, publication of interpretive guidance, “sweep” examinations, licensing, and enforcement, and has been largely “principles‐based” rather than prescriptive in nature; it is marked by complexity: a web of SEC, SRO, and informal or “best practices” regulation now exists covering every aspect of securities research; and it is a cornerstone of an emerging regulatory theme of heightened and more detailed compliance for investment banking operations.

This is a valuable summary and analysis of seven years of regulatory activity on a complex issue by experienced securities lawyers

Theory is a kind of condensed human knowledge. This paper is to examine the mechanism of interdisciplinary diffusion of theoretical knowledge by tracing the diffusion of a representative theory, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM).

Based on the full-scale dataset of Web of Science (WoS), the citations of Davis's original work about TAM were analysed and the interdisciplinary diffusion paths of TAM were delineated, a supervised machine learning method was used to extract theory incidents, and a content analysis was used to categorize the patterns of theory evolution.

It is found that the diffusion of a theory is intertwined with its evolution. In the process, the role that a participating discipline play is related to its knowledge distance from the original disciplines of TAM. With the distance increases, the capacity to support theory development and innovation weakens, while that to assume analytical tools for practical problems increases. During the diffusion, a theory evolves into new extensions in four theoretical construction patterns, elaboration, proliferation, competition and integration.

The study does not only deepen the understanding of the trajectory of a theory but also enriches the research of knowledge diffusion and innovation.

The study elaborates the relationship between theory diffusion and theory development, reveals the roles of the participating disciplines played in theory diffusion and vice versa, interprets four patterns of theory evolution and uses text mining technique to extract theory incidents, which makes up for the shortcomings of citation analysis and content analysis used in previous studies.

Professional Doctorates (PDs) have been added to the curriculum of many universities worldwide, as an alternative to the traditional Doctor of Philosophy (PhD). PDs are more focused on practice-based knowledge that advances professional practice and contributes to society, industry and the economy. The dominance of the PhD as the typical higher degree by research has led universities to develop frameworks for their PDs which are very similar to the PhD framework. This includes the assessment of the PD, which in many cases follows the same process and is based on the same criteria as for the PhD. This similarity in the assessment of the two types of doctorates creates challenges for external examiners (EEs), who are invited to evaluate the contribution of the PD within frameworks which are tailored around the PhD. Here, the authors focus the investigation on the Doctorate in Business Administration and conduct a review and analysis of institutional documents from universities in England in an attempt to understand the similarities and differences between the examination process of the PD and the PhD and the extent to which the examination process of the PD supports the evaluation of the practice-based contribution that is at its heart. Through this review and analysis, the authors identify the challenges that exist for EEs who are called to assess PDs, and make recommendations which will support EEs to evaluate the contribution of the PD.