Resilience in the face of adversity

With the third anniversary of 9/11 just passed and the threat of terrorist attacks still ever-present, reflection both personally and professionally has become a greater part of our lives. In a dynamic marketing environment, now more than ever, it is important to value the personal characteristics that makes us rise above a crisis and forge new pathways. This reminds me of an outstanding conference presentation I heard at the Academy of Management annual conference two years ago. Dr Steven Freeman, of the University of Pennsylvania, won a prestigious Best Paper award for his presentation, which outlined how an investment bank located in the twin towers not only survived the crisis but increased its market share

Identifying the Key Issues Measuring Loyalty

In the past researchers have chosen to measure loyalty using purely behavioural or attitudinal measures or attitude-behaviour combinations. The authors recommend that both attitudinal and behavioural loyalty should be measured to gain an appreciation of the loyalty make-up of the firm's customer base. Knowing the proportion of each type of loyalty is important as customer reactions to marketing efforts will differ depending on the factors underlying consistent purchase behaviour

A Comparison of Attitudinal Loyalty Measurement Approaches

The aim of this paper is to present the empirical tests of two measures of attitudinal brand loyalty to identify if they are items of a single construct or two distinct constructs. These two measures are an individual's propensity to be brand loyal, and attitude towards the act of purchasing a specific brand. This paper also seeks to determine which of these measures would be more useful for explaining purchasing behaviour. The results confirm the hypothesis that there is no significant relationship between the two measures in the business services market. This indicates that they are in fact not measures of the same concept but two separate concepts. Aggregating the scores from both measures to form a single score for attitudinal loyalty would reduce richness of explanation for marketing practitioners. in addition, the results suggest that the attitude towards the act of purchasing a brand can be used to explain or predict purchasing behaviour

Consumer Appraisals of Mobile Marketing Communications

This paper reports on a study that investigates the emotions elicited from appraising SMS-based mobile marketing (m-marketing) communications under three marketing conditions: product consistency, incentives and permission giving. Results from the experimental design show that appraising m-marketing communications elicits both single emotions and mixed emotions; that is, a mixture of positive and negative emotions in the same response. Additionally, the results show that the influence of specific marketing conditions may increase or reduce the intensity of the emotions elicited. This study contributes to marketing practice by examining consumer appraisals of m-marketing communications under different combinations of marketing conditions. The results provide insights into which emotions are likely to be elicited as a result, and how a specific marketing condition might influence their levels of intensity. The study contributes to marketing theory also through combining appraisal theory with Richins (1997) consumption emotion set

A Typology of Mass Services: The Role of Service Delivery and Consumption Purpose In Classifying Service Experiences

Purpose — The purpose of this paper is to provide services marketers with a deeper understanding of the elements that characterize mass services. The paper shows that many studies have been conducted within the context of professional and retail services, knowledge of mass service contexts is limited despite the growth of services within this context. Design/methodology/approach — This paper provides a conceptual overview of mass services and develops a typology for mass services based on an extensive review of the services literature. Specifically, the typology developed classifies mass services on the basis of service delivery and purpose. The typology forwarded, therefore, classifies mass services using a two-by-two framework with individual and collective mass services classified as either utilitarian or hedonic in nature. Findings — The typology found in this paper provides a practical insight into the characteristics of services falling into the classification of mass services. The value of the classification is that managers can better understand the unique aspects of mass services, thus, allowing for a better utilization of limited resources. Moreover, the paper provides insights into a service classification that has received limited research emphasis, yet, is attracting increasing industry attention. Originality/value — This paper provides academics and practitioners with a framework that has both tactical and strategic implications. These implications include enhancing the customer experience and thus customer retention, resource management, employee training and service management. Given that such a framework has not been forwarded in the literature, the typology presented in the current paper makes an original contribution to the literature

Does High Intensity Treadmill Therapy in Infants with Down Syndrome Contribute to Attaining Motor Milestones at an Earlier Age?

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this systematic review is to determine whether or not high intensity treadmill therapy is effective in helping children with Down syndrome attain motor milestones at an earlier age

Commercial friendships between gay salesmen and straight female customers

Perhaps it is now sacrosanct in marketing to contemplate that many service encounters, especially those in retail settings, are social encounters in which bonds between and among customers and employees are critical drivers of consumption (Beatty et al., 1996; Rosenbaum, 2006). Indeed, within retail settings, it is often possible for salespeople and customers to form so-called “commercial friendships” (Price and Arnould, 1999). These friendships result in both salespeople and their customers having social interactions that are close to those experienced in personal friendships (Swan et al., 2001), and which are extremely satisfying for all parties. Outside of marketing, the social science literature (Grigoriou, 2004; Rumens, 2008; Russell, DelPriore, Butterfield, and Hill, 2013) and popular press (de la Cruz and Dolby, 2007; Hopcke and Rafaty, 1999; Tilmann-Healy, 2001, Whitney, 1990) is replete with knowledge regarding the “absolutely fabulous” friendships (Hopcke and Rafaty, 1999) that often form between gay men and straight women. In fact, Western culture regularly highlights the compatibility of gay men and straight women in film, television, and writing, to the extent that they have now influenced popular thinking on the topic, so that gay men and straight females are viewed as sharing common plights and interests (Rumens, 2008). Yet, thus far, marketing researchers have looked askance at the effect of friendships between gay male employees and heterosexual female customers in consumption settings, such as retail stores and boutiques. Indeed, with the exception of Peretz’s (1995) participant observation regarding how young and outwardly gay salesmen use their ambiguous gender to sell women’s clothing, in a Paris-based luxury boutique, any theoretical explorations regarding retail-based commercial friendships between gay salesmen and female customers are non-existent—until now. This research addresses this apparent chasm in the literature by putting forth an original framework that shows how the emotional closeness between gay salesmen and female customers, due to the absence of sexual interest and inter-female competition, results in an intense emotional closeness, that facilitates pleasurable retail transactions, customer satisfaction, loyalty, and positive word-of-mouth. In doing so, this work extends the commercial friendship paradigm by considering retail-based, commercial friendships between an under-researched marketplace dyad; gay men and straight females. It is worth noting here that some straight women may find the idea of commercial friendships with gay salesmen as undesirable, due to the very notion of having relationships with retail organizations or employees (Noble and Phillips, 2004), or a personal disdain for homosexuality

Back on the market: Understanding condom use behaviour in heterosexual adults 50 years+

Older adults began their sexual lives with an unprecedented sense of freedom thanks to the development of the contraceptive pill and women’s liberation movement. However with divorce rates rising and marriage rates declining, older adults are increasingly ‘back on the market’. This is also accompanied by a rise in the incidence of sexually transmitted infections that could be prevented by using a condom. The current literature on condom use typically has a youth focus and in particular an emphasis on contraception. Given the differing nature of sexual encounters for older consumers, there is a need for alternative explanations of condom use behaviour that reflect key motivations and barriers in this age cohort. Therefore we propose a new conceptual model to explain heterosexual older adult condom-use behaviour by drawing on two theoretical frameworks; protection motivation theory and sexual scripting theory. The new framework contains four categories of factors; sexuality, gender roles, threat appraisal and coping appraisal

Introduction – London 1600-1800: Communities of Natural Knowledge and Artificial Practice

This essay introduces a special issue of the BJHS on communities of natural knowledge and artificial practice in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century London. In seeking to understand the rise of a learned and technical culture within a growing and changing city, our approach has been inclusive in terms of the activities, people and places we consider worth exploring but shaped by a sense of the importance of collective activity, training, storage of information and identity. London’s knowledge culture was formed by the public, pragmatic and commercial spaces of the city rather than by the academy or the court. In this introduction, we outline the types of group and institution within our view and acknowledge the many locations that might be explored further. Above all, we introduce a particular vision of London’s potential as a city of knowledge and practice, arising from its commercial and mercantile activity and fostered within its range of corporations, institutions and associations. This was recognised and promoted by contemporary authors, including natural and experimental philosophers, practical mathematicians, artisans and others, who sought to establish a place for and recognition of their individual and collective skills and knowledge within the metropolis

The microbiome associated with equine periodontitis and oral health

Equine periodontal disease is a common and painful condition and its severe form, periodontitis, can lead to tooth loss. Its aetiopathogenesis remains poorly understood despite recent increased awareness of this disorder amongst the veterinary profession. Bacteria have been found to be causative agents of the disease in other species, but current understanding of their role in equine periodontitis is extremely limited. The aim of this study was to use high-throughput sequencing to identify the microbiome associated with equine periodontitis and oral health. Subgingival plaque samples from 24 horses with periodontitis and gingival swabs from 24 orally healthy horses were collected. DNA was extracted from samples, the V3–V4 region of the bacterial 16S rRNA gene amplified by PCR and amplicons sequenced using Illumina MiSeq. Data processing was conducted using USEARCH and QIIME. Diversity analyses were performed with PAST v3.02. Linear discriminant analysis effect size (LEfSe) was used to determine differences between the groups. In total, 1308 OTUs were identified and classified into 356 genera or higher taxa. Microbial profiles at health differed significantly from periodontitis, both in their composition (p < 0.0001, F = 12.24; PERMANOVA) and in microbial diversity (p < 0.001; Mann–Whitney test). Samples from healthy horses were less diverse (1.78, SD 0.74; Shannon diversity index) and were dominated by the genera Gemella and Actinobacillus, while the periodontitis group samples showed higher diversity (3.16, SD 0.98) and were dominated by the genera Prevotella and Veillonella. It is concluded that the microbiomes associated with equine oral health and periodontitis are distinct, with the latter displaying greater microbial diversity