This thesis argues that Visual Merchandise Display (VMD) can enhance consumers intentions to buy luxury brands and this influence is stronger for the consumers with higher cultural capital (CC) than those with lower CC. Prior research in store atmospherics has suggested that consumers make inferences about a product, a store or a seller based on high-image or low-image store environment cues. Contemporary research in the luxury retailing literature explores qualitatively, the role of of museocological product presentation techniques in building and sustaining a luxury brand image. However, the extant literature does not consider that people can differ in their ability to decode or appreciate such display tecniques. This thesis builds on the emerging research in luxury retailing by investigating (empirically and quantitatively in four studies) the impact of VMD on consumer purchase intentions of luxury brands as well as the moderating role of the consumers CC. Furthermore, it attempts to explain this effect by adopting a consumer-style-of-processing approach, and it explores whether the consumers CC can determine their holistic or analytical way of processing of visual information in a retail context.

This thesis is concerned with the development of a marketing decision support system (MDSS) assisting in the allocation of the marketing budget to market segments, products, and promotional tools. The concept is illustrated using a case example of a US company operating in the UK ethical pharmaceuticals market with emphasis on marketing to general practitioners. The thesis is testing approaches to segmenting the GP market, which subsequently lead to the identification of seven market segments. The response to sales force effort, advertising and direct mail is then subjectively estimated for each product and market segment. When the estimates are transformed into a mathematical expression, a model is developed which, when optimised, leads to the allocation of the marketing budget. This thesis aims to contribute to the marketing literature in two ways. Firstly, it attempts to extend work by Doyle and Saunders (1985) to link segmentation and implementation - allocation of the marketing budget in this case. Secondly, it aims to add to the body of decision support research by including the allocation of resources not only to products and promotional tools but also to market segments.

In consumer research, variety-seeking has been recognised as a major cause of exploratory purchase behaviour and specifically brand switching. A major contribution from Hoyer and Ridgway (1984) examines the circumstances under which brand switching occurs as a result of the internal need for variety isolating other external factors (such as out-of-stock conditions and promotional activities) which also motivate brand switching. The authors’ theoretical model proposes that the occurrence of brand switching is a function of two factors; individuals difference characteristics and product characteristics. The present thesis proposes that in today’s retailing environment, with the proliferation in shopping channels, the increase in non-store retailing and the rise of the Internet, a third factor that of the ‘channel’ is likely to influence brand switching behaviour. A ‘channel’ factor is added to the original model of Hoyer and Ridgway (1984) and it is posited that channel characteristics (e.g. channel involvement, channel perceived risk, channel loyalty channel similarity and hedonism in channels) as well as the individual difference characteristics and product characteristics (proposed in the original model) will have an influence on brand switching behaviour. The new framework is tested in the context of consumer shopping for clothes in both store and non-store retailing environments (e.g. retail store, catalogue and the Internet), measuring consumer individual characteristics and perceptions of product and channel characteristics to clarify the nature of channel characteristics, their interaction and finally determine the influence of the three factors (individual, product and channel) on brand switching. A questionnaire is used (administered online) for a sample drawn from a company’s database. The data analysis involves a number of techniques including factor and reliability analyses for summarising the data and correlation and regression analyses for investigating associations among variables. Results indicate no linear relationships between brand switching and the three factors, although a number of conclusions are reached which emphasise the role of the ‘channel’ in consumer behaviour research.

Investigations into export performance have generated considerable knowledge about the construct, but they continue to identify research issues. These include the identification, and interaction, of the antecedents of export performance; understanding of the process and dynamics involved in export performance; the need for explanatory models; and the need for consistent and relevant research approaches. In an investigation of New Zealand export firms, the study addresses these concerns by utlising a two-stage, case study based research approach that results in the development of a conceptual model of export sales performance. The model is tested qualitatively and quantitatively, in a longitudinal study spanning six years. The conceptual model differs from existing models of export performance in a number of important respects, and thus contributes to theory relating to export performance in the following ways. The model highlights the central role of strategy process, extending current views of the role of strategy in export performance. This is reflected by two key predictor variables, export strategy implementation and competency management, not prominent in existing export performance models. Firm-level strategy determined firms’ relative emphasis on domestic versus export sales, suggesting a contingency dimension, associated mainly with changing external environments. Complex multivariate relationships were identified, through the use of the qualitative research software programmes, Nudist and Decision Explorer, not previously used together in export performance research. Implications for management, policy-makers and further research were identified from the results of the study.

Private hospitals in Malaysia are now extending their healthcare services to cater for patients travelling from the global market. These organisations are aggressively gearing themselves up to deliver quality services and to demonstrate quality assurance on their services. Hence, service quality strategies and initiatives have become critical for success in hospitals and the way forward. In pursuing quality initiatives, hospitals need to gain access to quality-related information and adopting the appropriate management accounting practices would be an important enabler and facilitator to generate useful management information leading to organisational successes. This study examines the usage of management accounting practices in these hospitals and attempts to develop a management accounting framework that would effectively facilitate the implementation of service quality initiatives pursued. Structured questionnaire was used to gather the perceptions of hospital management on service quality implementation level, usage level of management accounting practices usage and performance level of hospitals. Quantitative methods using MANOVA and structural equation modelling with AMOS were employed for data analysis. The results show that service quality implementation level was not found to be higher in hospitals that have obtained more types of quality achievements as compared to those that have obtained less or no achievements. Hospitals have benefitted from the implementation of quality initiatives related to management, process and analysis. However, such benefit was not found in quality initiatives related to patient care. In terms of the mediating role of management accounting practices, the results show no mediation effect on the impact of patient care on hospital performance. Meanwhile, there was partial mediating effect on the impact of management, process and analysis on hospital performance. Specifically, the mediating effect was found to be stronger from the advanced accounting practices compared to the basic accounting practices. The findings lead to a conclusion that adopting the appropriate management accounting practices would effectively facilitate hospitals in their quality pursuits. Limitations of this study and recommendation for future research are presented.

Literature in family business perpetuity and sustainability is well documented from the advanced economies, but there is a scarcity of insights from emerging markets where this research relates. Further, while the academic discourse has concentrated on issues of succession and corporate social responsibilities, very little discourse have dwelt on issues of sustainability of the family business; and whereas evidence from literature indicates that the survival rate in family businesses is very low. The evidence of a small percentage of family owned businesses being sustained into their third generation highlights the seeming inherent difficulty in achieving sustainability by most family businesses. Hence there is scarcity of empirical data on the constructs determining the sustainability of family business; and evidence of the low survival rate of family businesses, this thesis, therefore, investigated, and gave an understanding and interpretation of how family business owners can develop the capabilities to survive across generations using the stewardship theory paradigm and relying on evidence from an emerging market economy. A qualitative method with 41 in-depth face-to-face interviews involving owners and managers of family-owned micro, small and medium sized businesses was used. The data were analysed using the thematic analysis procedure with the aid of a Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software (CAQDAS). Findings from this thesis contribute to the theoretical literature on stewardship and family business. One of the key findings indicated that, family structure and family internal dynamics have a greater challenge in sustainability. This is the consequence of polygamy, which is well practiced in Nigeria, and in many African countries. It was also found that the element of spirituality arising from the ideals and values of the owning family is a factor for achieving family wellbeing and business sustainability. In the realm of the stewardship theory as the guiding theory for this thesis, it was further found that the stewardship of managers and indeed other non-family member employees within the business is provisional stewardship as non-family members rely on other incentives from the owning family members to behave as stewards. Based on the findings, and building on the stewardship theory, the thesis came up with nine propositions on the constructs determining family business sustainability and developed a model of sustainability for the micro, small, and medium sized family businesses.

With the Internet revolutionising the banking industry, customers nowadays expect much more from their banks, demanding more convenient, flexible, and easy-to-use financial products and services that could not be easily offered by traditional retail banking. Consequently, several new banking applications have emerged in order to cope with this demand, Internet banking (IB), as an example of these applications, is considered to revolutionise the traditional way of thinking about banking services. Despite the potential benefits offered, Jordanian bank customers are reluctant to adopt IB services. In response to this issue, this study aims to enhance the general understanding concerning the factors that affect customers’ adoption of IB in a developing country of the Middle East, namely Jordan, where the results can be also applied to other developing countries in general. The main objective of this research was to investigate factors influencing the adoption of IB services by Jordanians. Two technology acceptance models, namely the Diffusion of Innovations Theory (DIT) developed by Rogers (1983), and the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) developed by Davis (1989), were integrated with external variables in order to synthesize a new exploratory model; the synthesized model was then tested empirically for its predictive power. Two data collection phases were utilised: (1) quantitative data was collected in the first phase to test the research model and confirm related hypotheses using a survey questionnaire (463 respondents); and (2) qualitative data was gathered in the second phase via a semi-structured interview exercise (six participants). This phase was incorporated in order to explore bank customers’ perceptions of IB influencing factors identified in the first phase, and to provide further confirmation for the research model and hypotheses. Results showed that eight factors directly determine customer intentions to adopt IB services. Those factors are: perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, trialability, compatibility, observability-result demonstrability, innovativeness, government support, and information about Internet banking. Accessibility and perceived financial cost were found not to be direct predictors of intention; however, the latter has emerged to affect intention indirectly through perceived ease of use. While results indicated that personal innovativeness was found to be the most influential predictor of intention to use IB, both directly and indirectly through perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, perceived financial cost was the least influential factor to affect intention since it only exhibited indirect influence through perceived ease of use. Gender, age, education, occupation, and income, all proved to be influential in determining customers’ intentions to use IB services. Moreover, results revealed that users of IB were significantly different from non-users in terms of their attitudes relating to all investigated variables. Overall, the results of the current study showed that the proposed model has a good explanatory power and is therefore robust in predicting customers’ intentions to adopt IB in the Middle East and in other developing countries in general. This research contributes to the identification theory and practice of technology acceptance for Internet banking in five ways. Filling the gap in IB adoption literature in developing countries through examining the factors that might impede or encourage the adoption of these services among customers; developing and validating an integrated technology acceptance with a good explanatory power in predicting and explaining the potential users’ behavioural intentions towards technology adoption in non-Western contexts; developing a valid and reliable instrument to measure individuals’ intentions to use IT innovations; providing valuable insights into how to enhance customers’ acceptance of IB services in a developing country context by indicating the relative importance of the identified influencing factors and providing a set of specific strategies in a form of practical recommendations designed to overcome the low adoption rate of IB in developing countries.

The aim of this thesis is to contribute to the literature in finance and economics providing a deeper understanding about insider trading and its effects over information dissemination in the financial markets. To this end, this thesis is organized in three chapters. The first chapter tests whether insiders exploit their stock’s mispricing after earnings announcements to make profitable trades. The analysis involves estimating a model of ‘normal’ market reaction to an earnings announcement and use the deviation of the fitted value from the realized market reaction as a measure of mispricing after earnings announcements. In line with the mispricing hypothesis, the results show that insiders sell (buy) more often after large positive (negative) values of our mispricing measure and earn significant post trading returns. The second chapter extends the analysis in the first chapter by exploring more deeply the source of that mispricing. Focusing on insider sales, this chapter studies whether insiders exploit investors’ sentiment during earnings announcements to make profitable trades. In line with Miller (1977) model, the results show that insiders sell in response to market reaction of earnings announcements that are associated with an increase in divergence in investors’ opinions about their firms’ valuation and more binding short sale constraints. Finally, the third chapter studies the interaction between 2 types of informed investors, insiders and short sellers, during earnings announcements. The chapter documents that insiders and short sellers are skilled information processors who compete for trading on the news released at earnings announcements. In line with competition, stock returns are significantly more negative faster for stocks with intensive trading by both traders together than in cases where they trade intensively alone. The evidence suggests that insiders and short sellers tend to accelerate their processing skills after earnings announcements and trade faster making stock prices more efficient.

This thesis examines cultural influences on employees’ perceptions of target-based pay. As the positive effect of this instrument can only be expected when the employees perceive individual benefits, this research focuses specifically on cultural influences on employees’ perceptions of target-based pay. Based on the findings of the literature review, the influence factors on employees’ perceptions of target-based pay, as defined by previous researchers, were mapped with Hofstede’s VSM framework. During the verification of the findings of the literature review, through discussions with a practitioner expert panel, a further cultural factor “general pay perception” was added to the original form of Hofstede’s model. A survey was then designed to examine the influence of the cultural factors on the employees’ perceptions of target-based pay in a multi-national manufacturing SME with subsidiaries in Germany, the Czech Republic and China. The data were initially explored by means of a factor analysis, which refined the survey scale into a 6-dimensional structure detailing the cultural factors at play. These 6 dimensions were in line with the extended VSM framework determined previously in this study. This framework, with its underlying attributes, was employed as an assessment instrument of the cultural influence on perceptions of target-based pay in further research round. The reliability and validity of the assessment instrument was successfully tested and subsequently the results were verified and validated through panel discussions. The survey data were also explored in two comparison studies using descriptive statistics: one focusing on cross-country comparison and the other on organisational position comparison. This research makes a contribution to knowledge by developing a methodology for the study of cultural influence on perceptions of target-based pay and by providing valuable real-world data for future research. The theoretical understanding based on the findings of this study also contributes to the effective administration of target-based pay in practice.

This thesis intends to advance our understanding of consumer behaviour, and proposes an extension to the theoretical and methodological framework of the Behavioural Perspective Model. Drawing on the intellectual tradition of connectionism and employing advanced artificial neural network modelling techniques, the research programme described here assesses the appropriateness of connectionist architectures in explaining consumer behaviour. This thesis traces the developments in the fields of consumer behaviour analysis to critically evaluate the significance of limitations inherited from radical behaviourism, and proposes a hybrid connectionist approach to address these methodological constraints. The study is both highly quantitative and interpretative in nature, and generates a large body of empirical evidence to support the methodological and theoretical deliberations. Two types of data are used here: a simulated dataset to assess the capacity of the pruning algorithms to reveal the underlying relations within the data; and a consumer panel dataset to which the neural network algorithms are applied to develop predictive, descriptive, and interpretative connectionist models that aim to explain the consumer purchasing decision-making process. Even though it is beyond the scope of this research project to propose mechanisms to explain all elements of consumer purchasing decision and it will therefore remain to be addressed as part of an ongoing collaborative research programme, the main conclusion to be drawn from this work is that the connectionist framework and artificial neural networks can be considered a significant contribution to the extension of theoretical and philosophical framework of intentional behaviourism.