Children’s buying behaviour in China: A study of their information sources

Purpose Reports an empirical study on children’s buying behaviour in China with a special focus on their information sources. Design /Methodology The key literature on consumer socialisation of children is reviewed. Primary data was collected from a sample of 155 children aged 10 to 13 using questionnaire survey. Various statistical methods such as Pearson correlation and tests were employed to analyse the data. Findings Chinese children regard TV commercials as an important information source for new product. However, they place greater level of trust in interpersonal information sources, especially in their parents who are perceived as the most credible information source with respect to their learning about new food products. Originality /Value The study has made a contribution to the extant literature on Chinese children as consumer. The findings would be valuable in assisting companies, specially those in the food industry, to have a better understanding of Chinese children’s buying behaviour

A study of food buying behavior among Chinese children

The paper reports a study on food buying behaviour among Chinese children aged between 10-13 years old. There are two important findings. Firstly, the growing influence of commercial environment. During the learning of consumer behaviour by Chinese children, the parental role of guidance remains prominent, and their recommendations have a decisive impact on children’s food choices. Secondly, the perceived importance of product attributes. Chinese children tend to pay more attention to nutrition, hygienic conditions and food safety, which shows that children seem to be mature early at this stage and start to behave in a more adult-like fashion when making purchase comparisons

Some new less conservative criteria for impulsive synchronization of a hyperchaotic Lorenz system based on small impulsive signals

In this Letter the issue of impulsive Synchronization of a hyperchaotic Lorenz system is developed. We propose an impulsive synchronization scheme of the hyperchaotic Lorenz system including chaotic systems. Some new and sufficient conditions on varying impulsive distances are established in order to guarantee the synchronizability of the systems using the synchronization method. In particular, some simple conditions are derived for synchronizing the systems by equal impulsive distances. The boundaries of the stable regions are also estimated. Simulation results show the proposed synchronization method to be effective. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

The B\to D_s^{(*)}\eta^{(\prime)} decays in the perturbative QCD

In this paper, we calculate the branching ratios for $B^+\to D_s^+\eta, B^+\to D_s^+\eta^{\prime}$, $B^+\to D_s^{*+}\eta$ and $B^+\to D_s^{*+}\eta^{\prime}$ decays by employing the perturbative QCD (pQCD) factorization approach. Under the two kinds of $\eta-\eta^{\prime}$ mixing schemes, the quark-flavor mixing scheme and the singlet-octet mixing scheme, we find that the calculated branching ratios are consistent with the currently available experimental upper limits. We also considered the so called "$f_{D_s}$ puzzle", by using two groups of parameters about the $D^{(*)}_s$ meson decay constants, that is $f_{D_s}=241$ MeV, $f_{D^*_s}=272$ MeV and $f_{D_s}=274$ MeV, $f_{D^*_s}=312$ MeV, to calculate the branching ratios for the considered decays. We find that the results change $30\%$ by using these two different groups of paramters.Comment: 12 pages, 1 figure. Typos removed, minor correction

Transplanted olfactory ensheathing cells promote regeneration of cut adult rat optic nerve axons

Transplantation of olfactory ensheathing cells into spinal cord lesions promotes regeneration of cut axons into terminal fields and functional recovery. This repair involves the formation of a peripheral nerve-like bridge in which perineurial-like fibroblasts are organized into a longitudinal stack of parallel tubular channels, some of which contain regenerating axons enwrapped by Schwann-like olfactory ensheathing cells. The present study examines whether cut retinal ganglion cell axons will also respond to these cells, and if so, whether they form the same type of arrangement. In adult rats, the optic nerve was completely severed behind the optic disc, and a matrix containing cultured olfactory ensheathing cells was inserted between the proximal and distal stumps. After 6 months, the transplanted cells had migrated for up to 10 mm into the distal stump. Anterograde labeling with cholera toxin B showed that cut retinal ganglion cell axons had regenerated through the transplants, entered the distal stump, and elongated for 10 mm together with the transplanted cells. Electron microscopy showed that a peripheral nerve-like tissue had been formed, similar to that seen in the spinal cord transplants. However, in contrast to the spinal cord, the axons did not reach the terminal fields, but terminated in large vesicle-filled expansions beyond which the distal optic nerve stump was reduced to a densely interwoven mass of astrocytic processes