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The authors aim to examine how emojis interact with assertiveness in social media posts to encourage social media engagement and cooperation in environmental campaigns.

Two experiments were used to test three hypotheses.

Study 1 shows that when assertive Twitter messages include the smiley-face emoji, study participants indicate stronger social media engagement and behavioral intentions to recycle used jeans. In Study 2, participants indicate stronger social media engagement and behavioral intentions to sign a petition for reducing plastic pollution when (non) assertive Facebook messages (do not) include emojis.

The current research advances our understanding about how emojis interact with assertive and nonassertive message tonality in environmental social media campaigns. This research also provides new insights showing that positive emotion is the psychological mechanism underlying matching effects of emoji and message assertiveness.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: to explore what kinds of social media content public libraries create to communicate with users online, and to examine the relationships between social media content types and corresponding levels of user engagement.

The sample comprises 4,637 Facebook posts collected from 151 public libraries across the USA. The authors identified ten types of Facebook posts based on the open coding, and calculated the degrees of user engagement for each type of Facebook post, represented by the numbers of likes, shares and comments. Also, The authors examined the effects of the inclusions of images or video clips on user engagement.

The authors observed that the most frequent type of post was related to announcing upcoming events held in libraries. This study also found that posts about community news or emotionally inspiring messages elicited much engagement from users. Posts having an image or images tend to receive more user engagement.

Based on the findings of this study, the authors discussed practical strategies for public libraries to effectively use social media to better facilitate user engagement.

This study is one of a few attempts that examine the relationships between the types of social media content and the degrees of user engagement in public library environments. Also, the authors have proposed a coding scheme useful to analyze social media content in the context of public libraries.

Prosocial advertisers widely use assertive messages to encourage prosocial attitudes and behaviors, but ironically, assertive messages may cause reactance. By applying cultural theories and the reciprocity principle, this study aims to observe whether consumers’ responses to assertive messages hold across culturally different audiences (Americans vs South Koreans) and different consumption situations (price discount vs no discount).

American and Korean participants take part in three experimental studies examining the interactions of nationality, price discounts and assertive messaging for influencing consumer responses, first to a prosocial ad encouraging recycling (Study 1), the second for a campaign requesting donations for disadvantaged children (Study 2) and the third to prosocial messages encouraging water conservation (Study 3).

The three experiments strongly support the moderating role of price discounts and cultural backgrounds in the persuasiveness of assertive prosocial messages. American consumers generally dislike assertive messages, but feel reciprocal obligations if marketers include price discounts, whereas South Korean consumers accept both assertive and nonassertive messages without resistance, and discounts have no effects on persuasion.

The findings make two key contributions to the literature and to prosocial advertising practices. First, although many corporations have adopted philanthropic strategies, few researchers have examined how specific consumption contexts determine the effectiveness of prosocial persuasion. The findings show how price discounts and message framing potentially alter the effectiveness of prosocial messages across Eastern and Western cultures. Second, assertive language evokes reactance, but the findings suggest that reactive responses to prosocial advertising are culture-specific.

International nonprofit organizations and brands using philanthropic strategies might use the guidelines of this study for tailoring strategic, practical prosocial messages that will appeal to consumers from diverse cultural backgrounds. In particular, pro-environmental and charity campaigns targeting North American or Western European populations may consider bundling discounts into promotions to evoke reciprocity.

Findings provide novel implications for social marketers regarding on how to couple message assertiveness and price discounts to maximize the success of prosocial messages in different cultures.

The purpose of this study is to investigate user perceptions of mobile app characteristics and interrelationships among identified mobile app characteristics, perceived benefits and post-adoption behaviors.

Using a self-administered online survey (n = 503) drawn from a consumer panel of US smartphone users, this study tests the proposed model that explains why stickiness and word of mouth (WOM) are enhanced during the post-adoption stage.

The results indicate that user perceptions of mobile app characteristics, perceived ubiquity, perceived informativeness and perceived personalization are positively associated with mobile app usefulness, thereby leading to increased stickiness and positive WOM intentions. Furthermore, perceived personalization is found to become the strongest predictor of usefulness and playful engagement with the mobile app.

The findings are derived from a one-shot correlational study. There is no guarantee that the proposed model establishes causal directions among the latent constructs. Therefore, future research should test the conceptual model in an experimental setting by manipulating the degree and types of ubiquity, informativeness and personalization.

The findings of this research provide managerial guidelines for developing effective mobile app strategies involving utilitarian and hedonic benefits, thereby enhancing user stickiness and WOM intentions.

This paper is the first attempt to develop a conceptual framework that integrates user perceptions of mobile app characteristics into the underlying process of post-adoption behaviors. It empirically demonstrates the importance of ubiquity, informativeness and personalization in building and sustaining loyal relationships with mobile app users.

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether the framework of brand credibility effects is applicable to service categories and to examine if brand credibility's impact differs according to service type and involvement level.

Using a self‐administered survey (n=385), this study tests the proposed model, including six latent constructs: brand credibility, perceived quality, perceived risk, information costs saved, perceived value for money, and purchase intention.

The results indicate that brand credibility exerts a strong effect on purchase intention by increasing perceived quality, perceived value for money, and information costs saved, and by decreasing perceived risk across multiple service categories. The results also indicate that the magnitude of brand credibility's impact on purchase intention varies under different conditions with regard to utilitarian and hedonic services.

This study is based on student samples with a limited number of service categories. Future research is needed to examine the generalizability of the proposed model by using non‐student samples with different service classifications.

Establishing brand credibility seems to be especially effective in utilitarian services when marketing communication campaigns have the consistency of brand attributes that invoke either value for money or lower service brand‐related information efforts.

This study offers an initial attempt to explain how brand credibility influences its key outcomes under different service classes. Perceived value for money could be considered a new mediator of a causal relationship between brand credibility and purchase intention in service sectors.

The purpose of this paper is to suggest an empirical model to assess the separate effect of the government's research and development (R&D) policy program in small and medium enterprise (SME) performance.

The paper reviews the R&D related papers and finds out the specific aspects of the Korean R&D policy program, classifying every R&D policy program and giving them unique names such as funds, technology and human resource support. Finally, the paper provides the whole empirical model and research questions for future studies.

First, the paper suggests the research model and several questions about whether the direct government funding of R&D policy program has had an effect on SMEs' business performance. Second, the interaction of direct government R&D funding, technology and human resource support are compared. Finally, a research model is suggested with proper research methodology.

Owing to the research purpose, the paper ends with the suggestion of an empirical model. Panel data needs to be applied to verify the suggested model.

There are various papers regarding the effect of R&D investment from private and public sectors, but few papers exist about the causal relationship between the government R&D policy program and SMEs' performance.