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How does a food manufacturer devise a new product which fills a consumer need? And, having made the new product to his own specification, how does he persuade the consumer to buy — and continue buying it? Rita Exner of Cadbury Typhoo explains

Understanding the factors that contribute to the growth of sediment delta lobes in river systems has significant benefit towards protecting civil and social infrastructure from severe weather events. To develop this understanding, this paper aims to construct a three‐dimensional numerical model of a sediment delta depositing on to a two‐dimensional bedrock basement entering an ocean at a constant sea‐level.

The approach used adapts and applies techniques and schemes previously used in building numerical heat transfer models of melting systems. Particular emphasis is placed on modifying fixed grid enthalpy like schemes.

The resulting model provides important insight on the features that control the partition of sediment delta deposition between the land and ocean domains. The model also illustrates how tectonic subsidence may control the rate of delta growth.

This is the first numerical heat transfer inspired model of a three‐dimensional sediment delta deposit over both land and ocean domains. The problem has scientific merit in that it represents a melting‐like moving boundary problem with two distinct moving boundaries and a space/time dependent latent heat. Further, this work is a necessary first step towards building a comprehensive understanding of how to restore delta systems to protect civil and social infrastructure.

This study aims to apply theory on consumer learning in virtual experiences to compare how media technologies (i.e. virtual reality [VR] and standard websites) and users’ gender influence the ways in which tourists gather pre-purchase information.

A laboratory experiment with fully immersive VR was conducted to examine consumers’ behavior in gathering pre-purchase information. The sample comprised 128 consumers who had taken a cruise vacation or who were considering purchasing a cruise package in the near future.

The results generally reveal the central role of the feeling of presence, which, in turn, positively impacts users’ enjoyment and aspects of consumer learning (i.e. brand attitude, product knowledge and purchase intent). In particular, the results suggest that compared with standard websites, VR facilitated the tourists’ learning as consumers, especially among women, who tend to dominate the information-gathering stage of planning family vacations.

The results imply that travel agencies and tourism centers working with cruise vacation companies should incorporate VR to make their offers more attractive, especially to women.

The study was the first to apply theory on consumer learning in the cruise tourism industry, specifically to compare fully immersive VR devices versus standard websites and gauge the effect of gender.