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Drawing upon the stimulus-organism-response model, this study aims to explore the impact of soft aspects of service quality on revisit intention through the mechanism of perceived empathy.

For the examination of the hypothesized relationships, the study adopts structural equation modelling to analyse the data of 562 respondents (i.e. 281 family members and 281 inpatients).

The empirical results suggest that service quality increased family member empathy perception, which, in turn, improved inpatients’ revisit intentions.

Past studies have focused on the roles of overall service quality. The authors have extended the literature by examining the specific but important aspect of service quality and its effects on emotional response. Importantly, the study explains that the affective reactions of a patient’s family, fastened with perceived empathy, have a central role in influencing the patients’ subsequent reactions. Moreover, the prior studies collected the data either from hospital employees or patients. However, in the present study, the authors used a unique sample (family members as well as patients) to have a deeper understanding. Thus, the study enhances the literature on the stimuli-response (i.e. service quality – revisit intentions) relationship in the context of service marketing in general and health care in specific. Important academic and managerial contributions and recommendations for future research are discussed.

The aim of this study is to comprehend the behavioural intention of females' perception toward smart healthcare technology. The study also examines the moderation effect of social influences between perceived smart healthcare technology and perceived usefulness among female users.

To test the model, this study collected data from female respondents (n = 913) responses. The data were analyzed by structural equation modeling (SEM) using Smart-PLS 3.2. To complement the findings from structural equation modeling, the study also conducted a post-hoc test via experimental research design. The authors also applied a t-test and PROCESS macro analysis to re-confirm the relationship mentioned above.

The findings revealed that perceived ease of use significantly mediates the relationship between females' perceived smart healthcare technology and intention to use. The findings also show that social influence moderates between smart healthcare technology and the perceived usefulness relationship.

Social influence is one of the major issues while adopting smart healthcare technology because the respondents perceived that they are accustomed to the technologies related to smart health once their surroundings and social environment influence them.

The current study is a pioneer in the context of a developing country and unique in that it makes two contributions: it extends previous research on smart health technology adoption in the healthcare business by considering females, and it gives a broad knowledge of the female healthcare consumers from emerging nations which can be useful for developing technology-driven healthcare services strategies.

Debates regarding climate change risk perception (CCRP), particularly its scale and impact on social and environmental sustainability, have continued for decades. CCRP is experiencing a renaissance with an increased focus on environmentally relevant behaviors to mitigate the effects of climate change. However, CCRP lacks investigation from the employee perspective. Supported by the social exchange and value–belief–norm theories, this study aims to address the impact of employees’ CCRP on their proenvironmental behavior (PEB) via the moderating roles of environmental values and psychological contract breach.

The nonprobability convenience sampling technique was used to collect survey data from a sample of 299 employees across 138 manufacturing firms in Pakistan.

The results show that employees’ CCRP positively impacts their PEB and that this relationship is moderated by their environmental values and psychological contract breach. Specifically, environmental values strengthen the CCRP–PEB relationship, while psychological contract breach weakens it.

The findings of the study emphasize useful guidance for managers and practitioners as a future avenue to restructure the climate change framework by emphasizing the conditions (i.e. environmental values and psychological contract breach). In doing so, the study is beneficial for managers and practitioners in helping to increase employees’ PEB through the development of climate change action plans.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is one of the first investigations into CCRP–employees’ PEB nexus in the developing country context. The study incorporates social exchange and value–belief–norm theory, which serve as the CCRP’s theoretical underpinnings. The findings advance the new knowledge about a firm’s social responsibility to achieve the sustainable development goals outlined in the UN’s 2030 Agenda.

This chapter seeks to shed light on the many factors that contribute to people becoming school shooters. These factors are divided into four domains: biological, psychological, social, and cultural. At the biological level, this chapter explores the potential influence of genetics, pre- and post-natal development, and body-related issues that may affect the perpetrators' sense of self. A psychological typology is presented, consisting of psychopathic, psychotic, and traumatized school shooters. Socially, school shooters often have multiple setbacks, failures, and rejections that contribute to their distress. Finally, the cultural domain includes such factors as media violence, role models for killing, and ideologies of hatred and supremacy. Rather than attributing school shootings to a simplistic cause such as bullying, this chapter discusses a wide range of potential influences that combine to cause mass attacks at schools.

The purpose of this research paper is to study attitudinal responses to the tone of a voluntary disclosure. It is known that tone can affect market response. Existing literature assumes that investors' attitudes mediate these effects, but these attitudinal mediators have not been directly measured. The authors are especially interested in cases where a firm is reporting poor financial results. The purpose is to trace the mechanism and conditions under which tone affects the credibility of a voluntary disclosure.

The authors conducted a 2 × 2 between-subjects study that manipulates financial performance (good/bad) and tone (positive/negative). The attitudinal dependent variable is the credibility of the management discussion, with persuasive intent as a mediator of the effects of tone on credibility.

In the case of bad financial results, a positive tone has a negative effect on credibility as the authors predict. This effect is fully mediated by perceived “persuasive intent”. In the case of good financial performance, credibility is higher when management adopts a positive tone, even though there, too, subjects perceive the persuasive intent.

The research paper establishes a bridge between the communications and finance literature on the effect of tone in voluntary disclosures. The empirical findings provide initial evidence and new detail regarding an attitudinal response (credibility) that the finance literature often assumes is responsible for mediating market responses to voluntary disclosures. One unexpected finding with interesting implications is that positive tone increases credibility in the case of good news. The implication is that a firm may indulge in taking a victory lap to celebrate good news, without harming the credibility of their corporate communications. Additional research is warranted that combines theory and methods from communications and finance, to further elaborate the attitudinal mechanisms behind the market effects of tone in voluntary disclosures.

At the most general level, the original contribution is the creation of a theoretical and methodological bridge between the communications and finance literature, regarding the effect of tone in voluntary disclosures. This research proposes an integrated theoretical framework, in which the concept of incentives shapes the relationships between the firm's financial situation, a disclosure's tone and its credibility. Methodologically, the authors employ an experimental method, which is more typical in the communications literature, to illuminate the attitudinal effects of tone that are frequently mentioned and assumed in the finance literature.

The majority of emerging adults in the United States spend time in cohabiting unions. Prior research has suggested that higher levels of sexual non-exclusivity may exist among those in cohabiting relationships compared to marital unions. Although these basic patterns have been explored in prior work, research examining the potential reasons why levels of sexual non-exclusivity differ by union status has been limited. Drawing on a relational perspective and using the fifth wave of data from the Toledo Adolescent Relationships Study (TARS), the present study found that higher levels of sexual non-exclusivity in cohabiting relationships were explained by intimate relationship characteristics and sexual histories rather than sociodemographic factors, partner heterogamy, or partner- and couple-level drug use. These findings highlighted that understanding the higher rates of sexually non-exclusive experiences in cohabiting relationships, compared to marital relationships, requires attention to specific dynamics of the intimate partnership and prior relational experiences of both partners. The study concluded that cohabitation has a unique place in emerging adults’ relationship landscape and may set the groundwork for future relationship functioning.

We develop and test an innovative approach to teaching financial statement analysis (FSA) and assessing student learning outcomes based on making complex stock investment decisions compared to professional analysts. We train students to apply FSA and emphasize interdisciplinary factors and high integrative complexity. Our innovative FSA teaching approach, which we apply in an MBA financial reporting course, involves the instructor lecturing on FSA as a tool for integrative and complex decision making, students researching and applying FSA to public companies, and presenting the rationale for individual and group stock investment decisions. The instructor gives high-quality and timely feedback on the students’ application of FSA with a focus on investment judgments involving critical thinking, problem-solving, and teamwork skills. Our detailed efficacy analysis shows that our FSA teaching approach is effective. Students who perceive a public company to have credible management, effective competitive strategy, and an acceptable level of financial flexibility make comparable individual and group stock investment decisions as professional analysts.

Compared to Whites, People of Color (POC) in the USA face substantial cultural, structural and institutional challenges on their paths to entrepreneurial success. Many of these challenges have their roots in institutional racism—pervasive discriminatory practices and policies found within institutions. Institutional theory suggests that organizations gain access to institutions and resources when they conform to “appropriate” business practices. How does the reality of institutional racism square with institutional theory when many of those institutions, like banks, are fundamentally afflicted by racist practices and norms? Can another institution, the family, act as a resource substitute to provide POC business owners the necessary resources for success?

Focusing on White-, Black- and Asian-American business owners, the authors analyze data from the USA. Census's Annual Business Survey.

Despite vast performance differences between POC- and White-owned businesses, family firms of every racial group outperform their same-race nonfamily counterparts. Idiosyncratic resources families bring into family firms, known as familiness, appear to help mitigate the challenges to entrepreneurial success that POC face.

Policy makers should consider specific types of support different entrepreneurs require given the kinds of hurdles racial minorities continue to face in the USA.

Despite scholarly attention on family firm heterogeneity, there is scant research on race.

This research is one of the first to explore the implications of institutional racism on institutional theory and the first to employ this concept within the context of family firms.

In an era where health professionals are increasingly demanding, and communicative skills are one of the keys to improve the relationship with the patient. The communicative competencies of assertiveness, clarity in verbal and non-verbal language, and positivity, based on the positive construction of the patient’s health path, improve the therapeutic relationship, as well as the relationship between professionals in the world of health complexity. The ACP Model is validated with extensive application by hundreds of professionals in Portugal who use it daily. Active learning is one of the most effective means of raising awareness and involving the professionals who are learning and implementing the ACP Model.

Whilst a growing body of support exists for the use of prison animal programmes (PAPs), research within UK prisons is sparse. Opportunity to add to this body of literature is also limited due to the practical barriers around safely embedding animals within forensic settings. This study aims to capitalise on an opportunity to explore a visitation model of a prison-based dog programme (PBDP), recently implemented within a UK prison. The intervention requires staff members to volunteer to bring their pets into the prison on a weekly basis and to accompany them as they complete their normal day-to-day prison roles.

Data was collected within a Category B adult prison for males convicted of a sexual offence. Semi-structured interviews were carried out with six prisoners who had spent time with the visitation dogs and six staff members who had been part of those interactions. Reflexive thematic analysis was used to analyse the data, and three themes were developed that focused specifically on the value of this model of PBDP (staff members bringing their pets into the prison).

Three themes (reconnecting men to their outside lives; legitimising pro-social narrative; and “a safe space for them to open up”) were developed from participants’ lived experience of the intervention and its perceived value.

The potential for a low-level PAP to contribute to a rehabilitative prison culture was supported.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is the first study to explore the value of this particular model of PBDP within a UK prison.