Our Lips are Sealed: a Social Constructionist Approach to Understanding Menstrual Concealment at Menarche

At menarche, menstruators receive messages from various sources that urge them to conceal evidence of their menstruation. Concealment refers to the notion that menstruation is to be hidden, especially from men. This belief is often exploited and/or expressed in interactions between menstruators, mothers, and peers, in advertisements, educational materials, day-to-day conversation, and personal disciplinary actions. Themes of concealment are analyzed within a social constructionist framework to understand how narratives develop over time to guide human behavior and maintain social order. This paper argues that the menstrual concealment taboo is a social construction that has been institutionalized into the fabric of American society and mediates experiences of menstruation to promote body shame

A Conceptual Framework of Reverse Logistics Impact on Firm Performance

This study aims to examine the reverse logistics factors that impact upon firm performance. We review reverse logistics factors under three research streams: (a) resource-based view of the firm, including: Firm strategy, Operations management, and Customer loyalty (b) relational theory, including: Supply chain efficiency, Supply chain collaboration, and institutional theory, including: Government support and Cultural alignment. We measured firm performance with 5 measures: profitability, cost, innovativeness, perceived competitive advantage, and perceived customer satisfaction. We discuss implications for research, policy and practice

Privacy Relinquishing and Safeguarding: When are Consumers Willing to Disclose or Protect Their Information?

This dissertation explores consumer privacy, an issue that has received substantial attention recently. The first aim of this dissertation is to redefine consumer privacy. Research in marketing has focused primarily on consumer privacy concern but has not explicitly defined consumer privacy itself. Further, research on consumer privacy has resulted in fragmented definitions, which are siloed across disciplines, organizations, ethical and legal realms. This fragmented approach to consumer privacy research has left more gaps than the answers it seeks to provide. A more fitting definition of privacy, conceptualized along a continuum of total exposure to total anonymity, is offered. Actual privacy is defined as an individual’s state or condition concerning the degree to which information about a person is not known by others and ranges on a continuum from total exposure (low privacy) to total anonymity (high privacy).” Further, a differentiation between actual privacy (i.e., an individual’s state of privacy) versus perceived privacy (i.e., an individual’s belief of their privacy state) is also presented. Perceived privacy is defined as the degree to which an individual believes that information about themselves is not known by others and ranges on a continuum from total exposure (low privacy) to total anonymity (high privacy). Also, a framework of consumer’s information privacy levels, consisting of seven levels, is presented. Knowledge of the different levels of consumers’ information privacy provides marketers with a definite approach on how to handle consumers’ information, and what level of privacy is most concerning for consumers. Finally, this dissertation reports the results of an experimental study (n = 631), conducted through Qualtrics. The study contained two parts. Part 1 was a 2 (relationship quality) x 2 (perceived convenience) between subjects design. Part 2 manipulated privacy violation. Data were analyzed using SEM. Results of part 1 show that relationship quality positively influences privacy relinquishing intentions and negatively influences privacy safeguarding intentions. Similarly, perceived convenience has a positive effect on relinquishing and a negative effect on safeguarding. In addition, disposition to value privacy has a moderating effect on the relationship between relationship quality and safeguarding intentions, where respondents in the high disposition to value privacy were less willing to relinquish information. Interestingly, respondents in the high disposition to value privacy reported lower intention to safeguard their privacy. This finding is consistent with the privacy paradox phenomena, which suggests that while consumers may express their concern for privacy, their behaviors are contradicting and do not employ any protective privacy measures. Results of part 2 show that privacy violation caused a positive effect on betrayal, and betrayal led to less privacy relinquishing intentions and high safeguarding intentions. Theoretical and managerial implications are also included

Subsidising artemisinin-based combination therapy in the private retail sector

Background Malaria causes ill health and death in Africa. Treating illness promptly with artemisinin-based combination therapy (ACT) is likely to cure people and avoid the disease progressing to more severe forms and death. In many countries, ACT use remains low. Part of the problem is that most people seek treatment from the retail sector where ACTs are expensive; this expense is a barrier to their use. The Global Fund and other international organisations are subsidising the cost of ACTs for private retail providers to improve access to ACTs. The subsidy was initially organised through a stand-alone initiative, called the Affordable Medicines Facility-malaria (AMFm), but has since been integrated into the Global Fund core grant management and financial processes. Objectives To assess the effect of programmes that include ACT price subsidies for private retailers on ACT use, availability, price and market share. Search methods We searched the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL; 2015, Issue 1, The Cochrane Library, including the Cochrane Effective Practice and Organisation of Care (EPOC) Group Specialised Register); MEDLINE (OvidSP), EMBASE (OvidSP), CINAHL (EbscoHost), EconLit (ProQuest), Global Health (OvidSP), Regional Indexes (Global Health Library, WHO), LILACS (Global Health Library, WHO), Science Citation Index and Social Sciences Citation Index (ISI Web of Science) and Health Management (ProQuest). All databases were searched February 2015, except for Health Management which was searched November 2013, without any date, language or publication status restrictions. We also searched the International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (ICTRP; WHO), ClinicalTrials.gov (NIH) and various grey literature sources. We also conducted a cited reference search for all included studies in ISI Web of Knowledge, checked references of identified articles and contacted authors to identify additional studies. Selection criteria Randomised trials, non-randomised trials, controlled before-after studies and interrupted-time-series studies that compared the effects of ACT price subsidies for private retailers to no subsidies or alternative ACT financing mechanisms were eligible for inclusion. Two authors independently screened and selected studies for inclusion. Data collection and analysis Two review authors independently extracted data, assessed study risk of bias and confidence in effect estimates (certainty of evidence) using Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE). Main results We included four trials (two cluster-randomised trials reported in three articles and two non-randomised cluster trials). Three trials assessed retail sector ACT subsidies combined with supportive interventions (retail outlet provider training, community awareness and mass media campaigns). One trial assessed vouchers provided to households to purchase subsidised ACTs. Price subsidies ranged from 80% to 95%. One trial enrolled children under five years of age; the other three trials studied people of all age groups. The studies were done in rural districts in East Africa (Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania). In this East Africa setting, these ACT subsidy programmes increased the percentage of children under five years of age receiving ACTs on the day, or following day, of fever onset by 25 percentage points (95% confidence interval (CI) 14.1 to 35.9 percentage points; 1 study, high certainty evidence). This suggests that in practice, among febrile children under five years of age with an ACT usage rate of 5% without a subsidy, subsidy programmes would increase usage by between 19% and 41% over a one year period. The ACT subsidy programmes increased the percentage of retail outlets stocking ACTs for children under five years of age by 31.9 percentage points (95% CI 26.3 to 37.5 percentage points; 1 study, high certainty evidence). Effects on ACT stocking for patients of any age is unknown because the certainty of evidence was very low. The ACT subsidy programmes decreased the median cost of ACTs for children under five years of age by US$0.84 (median cost per ACT course without subsidy: US$ 1.08 versus with subsidy: US$ 0.24; 1 study, high certainty evidence). The ACT subsidy programmes increased the market share of ACTs for children under five years of age by between 23.6 and 63.0 percentage points (1 study, high certainty evidence). The ACT subsidy programmes decreased the use of older antimalarial drugs (such as amodiaquine and sulphadoxine-pyrimethamine) among children under five years of age by 10.4 percentage points (95% CI 3.9 to 16.9 percentage points; 1 study, high certainty evidence). None of the three studies of ACT subsidies reported the number of patients treated who had confirmed malaria. Vouchers increased the likelihood that an illness is treated with an ACT by 16 to 23 percentage points; however, vouchers were associated with a high rate of over-treatment of malaria (only 56% of patients taking ACTs from the drug shop tested positive for malaria under the 92% subsidy; 1 study, high certainty evidence). Authors' conclusions Programmes that include substantive subsidies for private sector retailers combined with training of providers and social marketing improved use and availability of ACTs for children under five years of age with suspected malaria in research studies from three countries in East Africa. These programmes also reduced prices of ACTs, improved market share of ACTs and reduced the use of older antimalarial drugs among febrile children under five years of age. The research evaluates drug delivery but does not assess whether the patients had confirmed (parasite-diagnosed) malaria. None of the included studies assessed patient outcomes; it is therefore not known whether the effects seen in the studies would translate to an impact on health

Anthony H. Coombs, Scott Haslam, Judith M. Haslam, and Hasco LLC v. Juice Works Development, Inc., TCBY, Mrs. Fields\u27 Original Cookies, Mrs. Fields, Inc., Mrs. Fields\u27 Brand, Inc., Mrs. Fields\u27 Holding Company, Inc. and Mrs. Fields\u27 Famous Brands: Brief of Appellant

Appeal from the ORDER OF DISMISSAL OF DEFENDANTS JUICE WORKS DEVELOPMENT, INC., TCBY SYSTEMS, INC. AND MRS. FIELDS\u27 ORIGINAL COOKIES, INC. by the HONORABLE MICHAEL K. BURTON Third District Court Salt Lake County, Uta

Privacy as a Public Good

Privacy is commonly studied as a private good: my personal data is mine to protect and control, and yours is yours. This conception of privacy misses an important component of the policy problem. An individual who is careless with data exposes not only extensive information about herself, but about others as well. The negative externalities imposed on nonconsenting outsiders by such carelessness can be productively studied in terms of welfare economics. If all relevant individuals maximize private benefit, and expect all other relevant individuals to do the same, neoclassical economic theory predicts that society will achieve a suboptimal level of privacy. This prediction holds even if all individuals cherish privacy with the same intensity. As the theoretical literature would have it, the struggle for privacy is destined to become a tragedy. But according to the experimental public-goods literature, there is hope. Like in real life, people in experiments cooperate in groups at rates well above those predicted by neoclassical theory. Groups can be aided in their struggle to produce public goods by institutions, such as communication, framing, or sanction. With these institutions, communities can manage public goods without heavy-handed government intervention. Legal scholarship has not fully engaged this problem in these terms. In this Article, we explain why privacy has aspects of a public good, and we draw lessons from both the theoretical and the empirical literature on public goods to inform the policy discourse on privacy

A Conceptual Framework of Reverse Logistics Impact on Firm Performance

This study aims to examine the reverse logistics factors that impact upon firm performance. We review reverse logistics factors under three research streams: (a) resource-based view of the firm, including: Firm strategy, Operations management, and Customer loyalty (b) relational theory, including: Supply chain efficiency, Supply chain collaboration, and institutional theory, including: Government support and Cultural alignment. We measured firm performance with 5 measures: profitability, cost, innovativeness, perceived competitive advantage, and perceived customer satisfaction. We discuss implications for research, policy and practice

THREE ESSAYS ON INFORMATION TRANSMISSION IN ASYMMETRIC INFORMATION GAMES

This dissertation consists of three chapters where we study information transmission in various environments.The first chapter analyzes the effect of the presence of an uninformed sender on the information transmission between an informed sender and the receiver. The sender is uninformed with a positive probability and it is not verifiable whether she is informed or not. In almost all equilibria, the uninformed sender pools with a subset of types of the informed sender. We show that there exists an equilibrium in which the informed sender's cheap talk message conveys more precise information and the informed sender is better off by the presence of the uninformed sender.In the second chapter, a buyer is uncertain of information on product qualities. We introduce a variable that generates social value of information, which is buyer's action such as the usage and maintenance of a product after purchase. If the buyer is concerned about his action, the seller has more incentive to reveal product information. Furthermore, more information is revealed as the variance of the quality is larger or as the average quality is lower. In this model, the certification cost is increasing in the sense that a better certificate is more costly. Then, there are multiple equilibria and the least level of revelation is ex ante Pareto optimal.In the third chapter, we study firms' voluntary disclosure in an oligopoly market for differentiated products in which firms are allowed to advertise a rival's product as well as their own product. We show that full information is revealed by a high quality firm's comparative advertisement, where the advertisement on the rival's product is negative. Moreover, full revelation is the unique equilibrium outcome. The results imply that by allowing for negative advertisement on rivals' products, a society can increase consumers' welfare without mandatory disclosure laws

Women’s Fashion Consumption in Saudi Arabia

This study investigates the influence of the sociocultural factors affecting the fashion and clothing consumption of Saudi women. It is a multidisciplinary study that combines fashion and consumer behaviour approaches in order to define and explain the collective sociocultural norms that underlie the patterns of women’s fashion and clothing consumption in Saudi Arabia. It applies a mixed-method approach as a strategy for data collection, with primary data gathered through observation, a face-to-face questionnaire completed by 654 respondents and interviews with local retailers and experts in the fashion market. The analysis of the empirical data revealed significant findings related to consumption patterns and the characteristics of the local market. It identified that there are two main systems that define fashion consumption in female Saudi society. Each system operates in a different social setting (public and female-only social settings) that requires communicating or establishing a specific value or a set of values to meet social expectations. The research findings also indicate the structure of the market and its operational system used to respond to consumer demands. In the light of these findings, theoretical models were developed to define the particularities of fashion consumption in Saudi Arabia as outcomes of this study. This study could have a substantial influence in academia as it provides a broader insight into fashion consumption behaviour in Saudi Arabia compared to that available in the existing literature. It could also help retailers and investors to understand the particularities of Saudi women’s fashion consumption in more depth. This understanding could be applied to develop strategies to meet Saudi women’s fashion demands.Saudi Cultural Burea