Explaning variation in luxury consumption

This PhD study extends the existing knowledge on the consumption of luxuries, by bringing together the conspicuous consumption and luxury consumption literature with self-concept and trait theory, in order to develop a conceptual framework that explains the phenomenon of luxury consumption from a consumer behaviour perspective. The model developed in this study describes and explains a) the psychological antecedents of luxury consumption in the form of a general – personal or social – selfconcept orientation, as well as in the form of various luxury-specific individual traits, and b) describes and explains a range of different consumption patterns of luxury goods. It is shown how an individual’s self-concept impacts a variety of luxury consumption behaviours via these mediating trait mechanisms. This integrative and parsimonious model helps in understanding the behaviour of these consumers and assists managers a) to better segment their markets, and b) predict consumer reactions to changes in their offering or communications, based on the interaction of multiple controllable drivers of luxury product consumption. This study offers significant theoretical contributions, as well as having important practical implications. It is the first to: a) conceptualize and empirically verify a comprehensive model that explains both the dispositions and the behaviour of the consumers of luxury goods; b) shed more light and detail in an overall proposed personal vs. social orientation to luxury consumption; c) describe and explain in detail the various personality traits of the consumers of luxury goods; and d) delineate and demonstrate empirically the various behavioural patterns of such consumers

Understanding the confounding factors of inter-domain routing modeling

The Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) is a policy-based protocol, which enables Autonomous Systems (ASes) to independently define their routing policies with little or no global coordination. AS-level topology and AS-level paths inference have been long-standing problems for the past two decades, yet, an important question remains open: "which elements of Internet routing affect the AS-path inference accuracy and how much do they contribute to the error?". In this work, we: (1) identify the confounding factors behind Internet routing modeling, and (2) quantify their contribution on the inference error. Our results indicate that by solving the first-hop inference problem, we can increase the exact-path score from 33.6% to 84.1%, and, by taking geolocation into consideration, we can refine the accuracy up to 94.6%

Co-creating stakeholder and brand identities: a cross-cultural consumer perspective

Co-creation of value and identity is an important topic in consumer research, lying at the heart of several important marketing concepts and offering a better understanding of a wide range of phenomena, such as consumer identity, satisfaction, or brand loyalty. The literature on co-creation of brand and stakeholder identities, however, draws from (and reflects) a focus on cultures with dominant independent selves. Managers are increasingly confronting globalized marketing environments and therefore must understand how cultural differences shape identity development and co-construction, from a brand, consumer, and multiple stakeholder standpoint. Drawing from a critical review of the literature, this study offers a novel conceptual framework, together with a set of propositions, which discusses how cultural differences might affect such reciprocal co-creation processes. The processes and outcomes involved in reciprocal identity co-creation are likely to differ as a function of cultural environments promoting different types of individual-level differences in self-perception. The study concludes by offering a research agenda to deepen understanding of cross-cultural reciprocal identity co-creation

A massive hemorrhagic pleural effusion does not exclude the diagnosis of tuberculosis: a case report

We report a case of an immunocompetent 18-year-old man with a massive hemorrhagic, exudative, lymphocytic pleural effusion. Blind transthoracic pleural biopsy showed granuloma formation, while the pleural fluid culture was positive for Mycobacterium tuberculosis, confirming the diagnosis of primary tuberculous pleuritis. A massive hemorrhagic pleural effusion is extremely rare in tuberculosis, but tuberculosis is a very protean disease and should always be included in the differential diagnosis of pleural effusion

BATHS IN ROMAN AND LATE ANTIQUE CHERSONISSOS: PRELIMINARY REMARKS ON THEIR TOPOGRAPHY, ARCHITECTURE AND BUILDING HISTORY

Baths count among the most frequent, but generally little studied, type-buildings of the Roman period in Crete. This study draws upon the rich evidence of bath buildings from the rescue excavations by the KG? Ephoreia of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities and the 13thEphoreia of Byzantine Antiquities over the past two decades in the area of ancient Chersonissos (modern Limenas Chersonissou) in the Pediada region. The purpose is to discuss aspects of the baths’ distribution in the urban area, their architecture, function and building history and to place them in their regional (Cretan) and supra-regional (provincial and empire-wide) context. In addition, we consider the place of baths and bathing in the Late Antique town, focusing on the evidence for architectural modifications and re-use. The evidence from Chersonissos provides an important addition to the growing number of studies on architecture in Roman Crete and a case-study of the spread and transformation of the bathing habit on the island during the Roman imperial period and Late Antiquity