Double or quits: should money found be risked?

This article examines social attitudes towards risk-preference and risk-aversion. First, we briefly discuss the theoretical approach to the analysis of risk-preference and risk-aversion that was developed within rational choice theory. Next, we present an approach to operationalise risk-preference using survey data. Our measurement of attitudes towards risk follows the usual strategy: respondents are asked to choose between a small amount of money they get for sure, and a large but risky amount. Drawing on the theoretical models and earlier empirical research, we formulate hypotheses about the social factors that have an impact on actual decision making in the situations under study. The hypotheses are tested using survey data. The article ends with a brief discussion. The novelty of our paper is that – to the best of our knowledge – neither previous Hungarian nor international research has attempted to examine attitudes towards risk using data from large-scale surveys

Epilogue: Turning to the Wall: Concepts across Space and Time

The epilogue to this journal issue interrogates a variety of aspects of walls as mental structures and tropes of historical memory. Engaging with the issue’s contributing authors, Tóth argues that the idea of the wall functions as metonymy, activating a siege mentality and mobilizing its target audience – hence its rhetorical power and attraction as policy. Discussing the wall’s symbology as a border of the nation state but also pointing out its increasing privatization, the piece concludes with an exploration of the potential that walls may have for the creative subversion of their original function to seal off, categorize and divide humans

Nonlinear hydrodynamic theory of crystallization

We present an isothermal fluctuating nonlinear hydrodynamic theory of crystallization in molecular liquids. A dynamic coarse-graining technique is used to derive the velocity field, a phenomenology, which allows a direct coupling between the free energy functional of the classical Density Functional Theory and the Navier-Stokes equation. Contrary to the Ginzburg-Landau type amplitude theories, the dynamic response to elastic deformations is described by parameter-free kinetic equations. Employing our approach to the free energy functional of the Phase-Field Crystal model, we recover the classical spectrum for the phonons and the steady-state growth fronts. The capillary wave spectrum of the equilibrium crystal-liquid interface is in a good qualitative agreement with the molecular dynamics simulations

Customer Loyalty Problems in Retail Banking

According to analyses of the most business consulting companies (KPMG, Capgemini, Deloitte, TowerGroup, etc.) customers are discontented with the retail banking experience. To achieve higher business growth, banks must increase customer loyalty by delivering a distinctive experience that combines the right mix of convenience, value and service and forges an emotional bond with consumers. Winners will be those that transform themselves into customer-centric enterprises by having a clear vision of what they want to achieve, fully aligning business processes and IT infrastructure to achieve those goals and engaging their employees in the process. The first step to do it is the identification of customer satisfaction. This paper intends to reveal its essential elements.customer loyalty, customer attitudes, retail banking

The Demand for Redistribution: A Test on Hungarian Data

Rational choice theories of the size of government would predict larger demand for redistribution (and, as a consequence, a higher level of redistribution) in more unequal representative democracies operating under conditions of majority voting. To explain the actual mismatch between the distribution of incomes and preferences, the logic of pure self-interest can be refined by introducing past mobility experience and future mobility expectations. In addition, ideological attitudes and values (for example, about the role of individual responsibility in society) are in this respect also assumed to define general welfare attitudes. This article looks at the explanations of the actual intensity of the demand for redistribution in a transition country that shows high levels of support for various state activities while not showing an extremely high level of inequalities

OPTIMAL DYNAMIC PARAMETER SELECTION FOR A STOCHASTIC WHEEL SUSPENSION MODEL UPON PASSANGER'S COMFORT

The object of the paper is to provide a method which is able to design optimal dynamic parameters for car suspension systems. The mechanical model is a two-degree-of-freedom damped system which is excited by stochastic geometrical loading. The type of loading is a band limited (pink) noise generated by a realistic road surface. The model represents a wheel suspension system of a vehicle. The aim of the optimization is to define the road type-dependent damping and stiffness parameters of the suspension system which may provide the maximal passanger's comfort. The method is illustrated by a numerical example

Fenntarthatóság – fenntartható fogyasztás – egyetemi hallgatók fogyasztásának vizsgálata alapján

A jelenlegi társadalmi-gazdasági folyamatok fenntarthatatlansága, potenciálisan önpusztító jellege a közvélemény és a környezeti problémakörrel foglalkozó kutatók körében napjainkra egyaránt tudatosult. Immár tudományos tény, hogy e folyamatok már a közeli jövőben beszűkíthetik a jövőbeni társadalmi-gazdasági választási lehetőségeket. E tendenciák kapcsán hangsúlyt kap a fejlett országok – köztük hazánk – állampolgárai részéről a jelenlegi fenntarthatatlan életmód megváltoztatásának szükségessége. A szerzők tanulmányukban arra a kérdésre keresik a választ, hogy a Szegedi Tudományegyetem hallgatóinak körében mi befolyásolja a környezettudatos fogyasztói magatartást. Ehhez megvizsgálják, hogy az ökológiai lábnyom alkalmas-e a környezettudatos fogyasztás mérésére, továbbá elemzik az ökológiai lábnyom méretének alakulását a SZTE hallgatóinak körében. Végül feltárják az ökolábnyomot befolyásoló tényezőket, ezek hatásának irányát és mértékét, amelyhez elméleti keretül elsősorban az érték-hit-norma elmélet (Value-Belief-Norm Theory) szolgál

Exploring the position of cities in global corporate research and development: a bibliometric analysis by two different geographical approaches

Global cities are defined, on the one hand, as the major command and control centres of the world economy and, on the other hand, as the most significant sites of the production of innovation. As command and control centres, they are home to the headquarters of the most powerful MNCs of the global economy, while as sites for the production of innovation they are supposed to be the most important sites of corporate research and development (R&D) activities. In this paper, we conduct a bibliometric analysis of the data located in the Scopus and Forbes 2000 databases to reveal the correlation between the characteristics of the above global city definitions. We explore which cities are the major control points of the global corporate R&D (home city approach), and which cities are the most important sites of corporate R&D activities (host city approach). According to the home city approach we assign articles produced by companies to cities where the decision-making headquarters are located (i.e. to cities that control the companies’ R&D activities), while according to the host city approach we assign articles to cities where the R&D activities are actually conducted. Given Sassen's global city concept, we expect global cities to be both the leading home cities and host cities. The results show that, in accordance with the global city concept, Tokyo, New York, London and Paris surpass other cities as command points of global corporate R&D (having 42 percent of companies’ scientific articles). However, as sites of corporate R&D activities to be conducted, New York and Tokyo form a unique category (having 28 percent of the articles). The gap between San Jose and Boston, and the global cities has consistently narrowed because the formers are the leading centres of the fastest growing innovative industries (e.g. information technology and biotechnology) in the world economy, and important sites of international R&D activities within these industries. The emerging economies are singularly represented by Beijing; however, the position of Chinese capital (i.e. the number of its companies’ scientific articles), has been strengthening rapidly