Pleasantly Plump: Offsetting Negative Obesity Stereotypes for Frontline Service Employees

Obesity is described as the fastest growing public health challenge facing developed nations (Prentice, 2006). This research introduces the topic of obesity to the retailing literature by examining the interplay between obesity in frontline employees and customer evaluations of service transactions. Baseline effects are established that show customers evaluate employees and firms more negatively if the frontline worker is obese compared to average weight. Two follow-up studies identify means by which firms may offset the negative obesity effects. Specifically, signaling theory is drawn upon in Study 1 to justify the introduction of observable quality cues as a means to offset negative stereotypes. Results indicate that the presence of unambiguous quality cues attenuate unfavorable judgments of the obese employee and the affiliated retail store. In Study 2, a countervailing, jovial stereotype is primed as a means to offset the more prominent negative ones. Retail managers can use this research as a means to understand an important caveat to frontline service evaluations and as the basis for managing a prominent negative stereotype.     

Does dispositional mindfulness moderate how individuals engage in their passions? An investigation into video games

ABSTRACT

The Dualistic Model of Passion (DMP) is an emerging framework in social psychology that assesses individuals’ passion for an activity. Although a passion parallels the definition for a serious leisure activity, the DMP further differentiates between a harmonious (HP) versus an obsessive (OP) passion, which are associated with adaptive versus maladaptive outcomes, respectively. Building on recent research in the area of mindfulness and the growing interest in problem video gaming, the present study explores the effect of dispositional mindfulness on reports of HP and OP. An online sample of adult video game users (N = 1,124; 68.95% male) completed assessments of their passion for video gaming as well as their dispositional mindfulness. Results revealed a negative association between dispositional mindfulness and OP for video gaming, but no association between dispositional mindfulness and HP for video gaming. Further, a moderation effect was found such that high dispositional mindfulness appears to protect against internalizing an OP for video gaming. Finally, results from a latent profile generally supported the role dispositional mindfulness plays in reducing the severity of OP for video gaming. The implications for theory and positive video game engagement are discussed.     

A voice from the silent masses: An exploratory and comparative analysis of noncomplainers

This study used a critical incident survey with both qualitative and quantitative sections to investigate noncomplainers. Noncomplainers are customers who experience service failures but do not voice complaints. The qualitative study (n=149) explored reasons why customers do not complain after experiencing service failures. In the quantitative study (n=530), two kinds of noncomplainers who either (a) received organization-initiated recoveries or(b) exited the encounters without recoveries were compared with three kinds of complaining customers who received (a) satisfactory recoveries, (b) dissatisfactory recoveries, or (c) no recoveries. The five customer groups were compared across repurchase intentions, negative affect, perceived regret, and intentions to engage in negative word of mouth. The results of the comparative analyses challenge existing views of noncomplainers’ repurchase intentions and negative outcome levels. Clay M. Voorhees (voorhees@bus.msu.edu) is an assistant professor of marketing at Michigan State University. His research interests are in the areas of service decision making, consumer complaining behavior, customer equity, and the development and application of innovative research methods to service decision making models. Clay’s research has been published inJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Service Research, andJournal of Services Marketing. Michael (“Mike”) K. Brady (mbrady@cob.fsu.edu) is an associate professor of marketing and director of the doctoral program at Florida State University. His research interests are in the areas of managing the service decision-making process, managing service failure, and the strategic ramifications of branding for service firms. Mike’s research has been published in theJournal of Marketing, Journal of Service Research, Journal of Retailing, Psychology & Marketing, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Services Marketing, International Journal of Service Industry Management, and other outlets. Mike has won both the M. Wayne Delozier Award for Best Conference Paper at the Academy of Marketing Science Conference and the Steven J. Shaw Award for Best Conference Paper at the Society for Marketing Advances Conference. Mike serves on the editorial review boards of theJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Service Research, andJournal of Retailing and was named an Outstanding Reviewer by theJournal of Retailing in 2004. David M. Horowitz (dmh03@fsu.edu) is a marketing doctoral candidate at Florida State University whose interests include services marketing, cognitive anthropology research methods, and marketing and public policy issues. He completed his MBA at San Diego State University and holds a BS in industrial engineering from Stanford University. David’s research has been published in theJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science and the proceedings of national and regional conferences.     

The riot as politics

Conclusion Two independent tests with a total of 36 large and medium-sized non-southern cities have demonstrated support for a political explanation of the major riots of the 1960s. It is argued that politically interested and motivated segments of the black community were disaffected because of the failure of government to respond to their demands. Their participation turned minor disorders into major uprisings. An alternative hypothesis, that public policy response generates increased expectations and ultimately greater violence, has been rejected. However, the findings rest upon the riot experience of a small number of cities in the 1960s. It seems very unlikely that the public policies of these cities would have much impact on the expectations of their black citizens and thus the rationale of the alternative hypothesis is undermined. The public policies of other governments, at other times, might have more influence on the expectations of their citizens. Additional research would be required to identify circumstances under which public policy response might lead to increased expectations, disaffection, and ultimately greater violence.     

Impacts of FFW on nutrition in rural Kenya

Assessing the impacts of Food-for-Work (FFW) on human capital formation depends on understanding the specific nutritional contributions of FFW to the overall diet of FFW participant households. However, empirical studies in this area are very scant. This paper is an attempt to fill such gap. The primary objectives are to measure the magnitude of the FFW contribution to participants' nutritional status. Primary data collected from a random sample of 300 farm-households in the Rift Valley Province of Kenya are used. A linear programming model is used to estimate the shadow prices of nutrients. These prices are then entered into an econometric model of consumer demand for nutrients in order to estimate own and cross-price elasticities for each nutrient component. The results indicate that FFW significantly improves the nutritional status of FFW participant households. More specifically, participants experienced an implicit income gain, which resulted in a significant nutritional improvement. The poorest FFW participant households exhibited even higher nutritional gains (32.46%) than those participants from relatively higher income groups. FFW participant households showed a 90% higher propensity to spend on nutrients than the non-FFW participants. The findings of this study are expected to assist in the design of future ‘targeted’ food aid projects.     

How to give and receive: An exploratory study of charitable hybrids

Most charitable organizations can only rely on appeals to purely philanthropic motivations in attempting to solicit donor contributions. The decision processes exhibited by the targets of charitable solicitations are very different from those the same individuals use in making daily purchase decisions. Although both charitable giving and purchase contexts have been studied extensively, there are numerous organizations that require targeted customers to use a decision process that merges elements of both domains. Charitable hybrids, such as museums and universities, are such organizations, supplementing traditional revenue streams by soliciting charitable contributions, thus evoking a complex consumer decision process. For these firms, giving good service may yield an added benefit of maximizing charitable contributions received. Drawing on both the services and charitable giving literatures, a model of the consumer decision process is developed in this hybrid situation. In an exploratory test of the model, initial evidence is found that both classes of effects have significant influence on donors' intentions to give. However, in charitable giving contexts, organizational identification appears to fill a central role in influencing decision outcomes, which diminishes the role of satisfaction. The findings provide provocative evidence that further research in this setting is warranted. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Reading between the lines: An empirical examination of qualitative attributes of financial analysts’ reports

This paper examines whether two qualitative attributes of financial analysts’ reports, detail and tone, are significant in explaining how the market responds to analysts’ reports, after controlling for the information contained in the reports’ quantitative summary measures. Report detail is hypothesized to reflect the level of effort expended by the analyst in preparing the report, and therefore the usefulness of their intrinsic firm value estimates. Report tone is predicted to signal the analyst’s underlying sentiment regarding the firm and may be used to assess the extent to which analysts’ conflicts of interest interfere with the mapping of firm value estimates into stock recommendations. Consistent with these hypotheses, we find that the tone of financial analyst reports contain significant information content incremental to the reports’ earnings forecasts and recommendations, and report complexity (one component of report detail) helps explain cross-sectional variation in the market’s response to the reports’ recommendations.     

Cost-effectiveness of sequenced treatment of rheumatoid arthritis with targeted immune modulators

Aims: To determine the cost-effectiveness of treatment sequences of biologic disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs or Janus kinase/STAT pathway inhibitors (collectively referred to as bDMARDs) vs conventional DMARDs (cDMARDs) from the US societal perspective for treatment of patients with moderately to severely active rheumatoid arthritis (RA) with inadequate responses to cDMARDs.

Materials and methods: An individual patient simulation model was developed that assesses the impact of treatments on disease based on clinical trial data and real-world evidence. Treatment strategies included sequences starting with etanercept, adalimumab, certolizumab, or abatacept. Each of these treatment strategies was compared with cDMARDs. Incremental cost, incremental quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs), and incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICERs) were calculated for each treatment sequence relative to cDMARDs. The cost-effectiveness of each strategy was determined using a US willingness-to-pay (WTP) threshold of $150,000/QALY.

Results: For the base-case scenario, bDMARD treatment sequences were associated with greater treatment benefit (i.e. more QALYs), lower lost productivity costs, and greater treatment-related costs than cDMARDs. The expected ICERs for bDMARD sequences ranged from ～$126,000 to $140,000 per QALY gained, which is below the US-specific WTP. Alternative scenarios examining the effects of homogeneous patients, dose increases, increased costs of hospitalization for severely physically impaired patients, and a lower baseline Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ) Disability Index score resulted in similar ICERs.

Conclusions: bDMARD treatment sequences are cost-effective from a US societal perspective.