The determinants that affect the financial performance of an insurance company are complicated due to the intangible nature of insurance products and the lack of transparency in the market. Consequently, the financial performance of insurance companies is important to various stakeholders such as policyholders, insurance intermediaries and policymakers. This study aims to investigate the determinants of financial performance of insurance companies based on their financial strength rating performance. The empirical data are drawn from A.M. Best Insurance Report Online: Non- US Database. The sample consists of 57 insurers in the United Kingdom over the period of 2006 to 2010. The analyses include eight firm-specific variables, which are leverage, profitability, liquidity, size, reinsurance, growth, type of business and organisational form. Rating transition matrices and regression models are employed in this study. Rating transition analysis demonstrates a significant degree of rating changes, as reflected in the rating fluctuations. Based on the empirical results, this study establishes that profitability, liquidity, size and organisational form are statistically significant determinants of financial performance of insurance companies in the United Kingdom. This study recommends an alternative to measure the size of an insurance company, which is based on the gross premium written. In addition, this study provides insights into the effects of the global financial crisis on the financial performance of the insurance companies.

Salt marshes are some of the most productive and valuable landscapes on earth, but they are vulnerable to the effects of sea-level rise, erosion and eutrophication. These processes act on a wide range of temporal and spatial scales, which complicate assessments of the health and stability of marsh ecosystems. High-frequency monitoring using in situ sensors captures the complete range of these dynamics, but extracting meaningful physical and ecological information from these signals requires process-based models coupled with statistical techniques. I develop and apply such methods to study two coastal landscapes, a coastal pine forest on the Eastern Shore of Virginia and a mesotidal salt marsh complex in the Plum Island Estuary, Massachusetts. Observations from groundwater wells in the Virginia pine forest indicate that storms are the dominant controls on the hydrology of the forest and that tidal influence is nonexistent. This forest exhibits a distinct spatial pattern in age structure in which young trees do not grow at low elevations. This pattern can be explained by a model that includes the interaction of sea-level rise, storms and the age-dependent variation in tree stress response, which predicts that the long-term evolution of the boundary is an ecological ratchet. Stresses due to sea-level rise slowly push the boundary at which young trees can survive upslope. Powerful storms then kill the mature, persistent forest at low elevations, which quickly pushes the forest boundary up to the regeneration boundary. Salt marshes need to accumulate sediment to replenish material lost as sea-level rises and creek banks erode. Fluxes of sediment can be monitored with simultaneous high-frequency observations of flow from acoustic Doppler current profilers and turbidity from optical backscattering sensors. I first investigate the relationship between water level and flow in marsh channels and develop predictive stage-discharge models to simplify the monitoring of fluxes. I then construct sediment budgets for eleven salt marshes in the Plum Island Estuary. The observed budgets depend strongly on the unique hydrodynamic conditions of each marsh channel. Variability in these conditions leads to the observed spatial and temporal variability in sediment fluxes from these marshes.

The dominant role of credit ratings, along with the failure of important FIs, exacerbated the 2008 crisis and caused further damage to European economies, which highlighted the need for effective regulation to prevent a reoccurrence. This thesis investigates the effect of EU and US recent regulatory reforms of the rating industry on the quality of credit ratings of financial institutions (FIs), as well as the impact of the new EU financial regulatory initiatives on the performance of FIs. The first empirical Chapter focuses on the EU reforms of credit rating agencies (CRAs) and provides evidence supporting the presence of a conservative rating bias in the post regulatory period, as increased scrutiny, fines and liability increase the cost of over rating. CRAs exhibit an unwarranted decrease in EU FI ratings, evidenced by an increase in false warning and a fall in the informativeness of FI rating downgrades in the post regulatory period. A subsequent rise in stock market responses to rating upgrades is consistent with CRAs expending greater effort to ensure they are justified. The second empirical Chapter focuses on the US reforms of CRAs and reports no significant impact on FI ratings, rather each CRA has responded differently to the passage of the US Dodd-Frank Act (DFA). There is, however, a significant reduction in stock market reactions to FI credit rating signals, consistent with diminishing reliance on credit ratings by market participants in the US. The third empirical Chapter builds and estimates a dynamic model of FI behaviour using discrete choice dynamic programming (DCDP). The model is used to simulate and examine the impact of regulations, including EU reforms of CRAs, capital adequacy regulation (Basel III), and the bail-in regime, on FIs' behaviour in the real economy. The results show that the shift to increasingly conservative rating behaviour triggered by the CRA reforms has caused FIs to respond by manipulating their capital ratios and to reduce lending activities. The results also show that more stringent capital requirements stimulate FIs to hold more capital, reduce lending and reveal a positive influence in reducing bank insolvency rates, particularly during the crisis period. The introduction of a bail-in regime reveals similar results, but crucially stimulates the adoption of a stable equilibrium (unlike Basel III). This thesis highlights drawbacks with the current regulatory reforms of the EU and US FI rating industries and suggests potential solutions. The thesis also informs the policy debate surrounding the best way to regulate both CRAs and FIs and ensure that there is not a reoccurrence of the problems present in the 2008 financial crisis.

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Man Mei Kiu. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 48-60). / Abstract in English and Chinese. / Abstract --- p.i / 摘文 --- p.ii / Acknowledgement --- p.iii / Table of Content --- p.iv / List of Tables and Figures --- p.vi / Chapter CHAPTER 1. --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Demographic Characteristics --- p.1 / Theoretical Foundation of Relational Demography --- p.3 / Effects of Demographic Similarity --- p.4 / Demography in Assessment Center --- p.7 / Importance of Assessment Center in Industrial Settings --- p.10 / Assessors of Assessment Center --- p.12 / Culture Influence --- p.14 / The Present Study --- p.16 / The effect of race --- p.18 / The effect of gender --- p.18 / Chapter CHAPTER 2. --- METHOD --- p.20 / Participants --- p.20 / Measures --- p.21 / Independent variables --- p.21 / Dependent variables --- p.21 / Design --- p.22 / Chapter CHAPTER 3. --- RESULTS --- p.23 / Preliminary Analysis --- p.23 / Effect of Race --- p.25 / Average rating of exercise --- p.25 / Business focus --- p.26 / Thinking skills --- p.26 / Interpersonal effectiveness --- p.27 / Personal effectiveness --- p.27 / Further examination --- p.27 / Effect of Gender --- p.31 / Average rating of exercise --- p.31 / Business focus --- p.31 / Thinking skills --- p.31 / Interpersonal effectiveness --- p.31 / Personal effectiveness --- p.32 / Further examination --- p.32 / Chapter CHAPTER 4. --- DISCUSSION --- p.36 / Effects of Race --- p.36 / Effects of Gender --- p.39 / Types of Exercise --- p.41 / Chapter CHAPTER 5. --- IMPLICATIONS AND LIMITATIONS --- p.43 / Chapter CHAPTER 6. --- CONCLUSION --- p.47 / References --- p.48

An accurate television viewing choice model is an important tool for television industry executives, as well as advertisers. An efficient model can help television channels maximize ratings by improving both scheduling and the characteristics of their shows. On the other hand advertisers can predict ratings and demographic composition of audiences with better accuracy. Though there is considerable evidence to suggest that individual viewing choices are strongly affected by one's family members, quantitative models in marketing literature typically focus on the individual as the unit of analysis without incorporating the influence of family members. / Key Words: viewing choice modeling, television rating, group decision making / This thesis proposes a three-stage model to capture the process of household television viewing behavior. We divide the household viewing process into three sequential and interrelated decision stages (pre-decision, joint decision, and final-decision) according to the group decision making framework suggested in prior research. By defining utilities of different programme types on different channels, and weighting parameters of each family member, each family member's three decisions (pre-decision, joint decision and post-decision) are modeled as a function of these parameters with three sub-models. The model was estimated with maximum likelihood estimation, duly validated with simulation studies. Meanwhile, the model was extended to be time-dependent to allow past viewing history to influence current viewing choice, and applied on the people meter data for primetime telecasts on weekdays for the whole of 2006. The results indicate that our model has better prediction accuracy compared with models being currently used (Rust and Alpert 1984; Yang et al. 2010). Furthermore, we are able to demonstrate that models that ignore the influence of family members yield biased estimates. Our model also has better prediction accuracy compared with the traditional model proposed by Rust and Alpert (1984), and has more flexibility to fit households with different compositions. Finally, we find that there exist different household decision structures, initial latent preferences, and influences of past viewing history across different families and their members, and the heterogeneity can be explained by demographic variables. / Su, Lei. / "December 2010." / Advisers: Jessica Yuk-yee Kwong; Kin-nam Lau; Jian-min Jia. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 73-04, Section: A, page: . / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2011. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 126-133). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [201-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest dissertations and theses, [201-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract also in Chinese.

by Kwok Yiu Keung. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 102-109). / ACKNOWLEDGMENTS --- p.i / ABSTRACT --- p.iii / LISTS OF FIGURES --- p.vii / LISTS OF TABLES --- p.viii / Chapter Chapter 1: --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Chapter Chapter 2: --- LITERATURE REVIEW --- p.3 / Need for and Relevance of Research on Proposed Topic --- p.3 / Significance of this Research --- p.3 / Different Views of Sales Performance --- p.4 / Situation Approach --- p.5 / Attitudinal Approach --- p.6 / Modeled Instruction Approach --- p.7 / Antecedents and Consequences of Salesperson's Sales Performance --- p.8 / Antecedents of Sales Performance --- p.9 / Consequences of Sales Performance --- p.13 / Antecedents and Consequences of Sales Performance --- p.23 / Summary --- p.26 / Chapter Chapter 3: --- THE PROPOSED MODEL AND RESEARCH HYPOTHESES --- p.27 / A Model of Sales Performance of Salesperson --- p.27 / Conceptualization and Hypotheses --- p.30 / Summary --- p.38 / Chapter Chapter 4: --- RESEARCH METHODOLOGY --- p.39 / Measurement Scales --- p.39 / Data Collection --- p.41 / Reliability --- p.43 / Analysis of the Model --- p.45 / Structural Equation Modeling --- p.45 / The Measurement Model --- p.45 / Model Notations --- p.49 / Summary --- p.50 / Chapter Chapter 5: --- RESULTS FROM THE ANALYSIS --- p.51 / Scale Analysis --- p.51 / Reliability --- p.56 / Structural Equation Modeling --- p.57 / Full Model Evaluation --- p.57 / Reduced Model Evaluation --- p.59 / Summary --- p.65 / Chapter Chapter 6: --- DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION --- p.66 / Major Findings --- p.66 / Sales Performance and Its Antecedents --- p.66 / Sales Performance and Its Consequences --- p.68 / Contributions of the Research --- p.69 / Conceptual Contribution --- p.69 / Managerial Contribution --- p.69 / Limitations --- p.75 / Directions for Future Research --- p.75 / Extension of the Conceptual Model --- p.75 / Sample Quality --- p.76 / Methodology and Measurement --- p.77 / APPENDIX 1: Cross Cultural Translation --- p.78 / APPENDIX 2: English and Chinese Versions of Questionnaire --- p.86 / APPENDIX 3: Companies Participated in the Survey --- p.100 / APPENDIX 4: Description of Sample --- p.101 / REFERENCES --- p.102

The problem of this study is to describe and analyze faculty attitudes toward administrators in an urban junior college district. The purposes of this study are to ascertain the attitudes of junior college faculty toward campus-level administrative positions and to determine what relationship existed between general and specific measures of faculty attitude.

The purpose of this study was to understand whether physician leaders are subject to gender bias in the form of differential work outcomes. Specifically, the primary goal was to examine whether the gender of a successful physician leader, the medical specialty in which he or she works (surgery or pediatrics), and participant level of social dominance orientation (SDO; level of egalitarianism) influenced the allocation of workplace outcomes (i.e., evaluations of performance, promotion recommendations, and characterizations of ability and effort). This study further explored if ability and effort characterizations mediated the relationship between gender, specialty, and participant SDO on evaluations of performance and promotion recommendations. Attempting to elucidate the atypical but increasing phenomenon in which successful female leaders in male-typed jobs receive higher performance evaluations, but lower rates of promotion as compared to equivalent males; this study drew on attribution theory to explain that characterizations of successful women as “hard workers” (effort) may be seen as deserving of high evaluations of performance but not promotions, while being “brilliant” (ability) may be seen as deserving of promotions and reserved for successful men. Results revealed an unexpected overall boost for female surgeons, awarded especially by participants low in SDO (those most egalitarian) such that female surgeons received significantly better outcomes as compared to female pediatricians and equivalent outcomes as compared to male physicians. Male surgeons and pediatricians were largely awarded equivalent outcomes across all levels of participant SDO. Further, mediation was supported only for female surgeons, such that higher characterizations of effort explained higher evaluations of performance, particularly by those low in SDO. Further research is required to understand why successful women receive higher evaluations of performance, but not promotions.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-12T17:39:31Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 arquivo519_1.pdf: 8081494 bytes, checksum: ba2427869f3a7c683fd296629937e553 (MD5) license.txt: 1748 bytes, checksum: 8a4605be74aa9ea9d79846c1fba20a33 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Um projeto de inovação tecnológica consiste em uma série de análises e procedimentos que tem como fim estimar o valor de uma tecnologia, ou seja, gerar uma estimativa dos rendimentos futuros que tal empreendimento/tecnologia possa proporcionar. A abordagem tradicional da análise de investimentos para esta categoria de projetos possui uma limitação no que tange a: 1 estimação do valor da tecnologia que exige a incorporação de variáveis qualitativas que não são consideradas por essa modelagem; e 2 a elevada variabilidade das estimativas do fluxo de caixa projetado, em virtude das diferentes categorias de risco inerentes a esse tipo de projeto. A partir desta limitação apresentada no estado da arte da avaliação deste tipo de projeto, esta pesquisa de cunho exploratório pretende utilizar a metodologia de rating como uma alternativa a avaliação de projetos de inovação. Pois um sistema de classificação através de rating possui a flexibilidade necessária para a incorporação de variáveis qualitativas que podem auxiliar na mensuração do valor da tecnologia, bem como fornece uma série de procedimentos que permitem a estimação do risco de tais projetos. Tal aplicação da metodologia de rating gera o Sistema de Classificação de Risco de Projetos de Inovação (SCRP), que a partir de uma amostra de 40 projetos de investimento industrial fornecidos pelo Banco do Nordeste do Brasil, indicadores setoriais, macroeconômicos e tecnológicos, provê uma classificação de viabilidade e risco para tais projetos. As Support Vector Machines, técnica de inteligência artificial com resultados exitosos em várias áreas das finanças, inclusive com ratings é introduzida nesta pesquisa para testar a classificação gerada pelo SCRP. A aplicação do SVM fez uso do código LIBSVM e do Software Matlab. A classificação obtida pelo SCRP apresentou um ajuste médio de 83,6% quando comparado aos 10 melhores projetos classificados pelo critério da TIR e de 87,6% de ajuste médio para com os 8 piores projetos classificados pelo critério do VPL, a classificação obtida através do SVM, apresentou uma acuracia de 37,5% frente aos dados de teste