Impersonal Sources Research Articles

The Effect of Gratitude Intervention on Life Satisfaction of University students: The Role of Self-Esteem

Gratitude education is very common in traditional Chinese education. Gratitude is both an emotion and a trait (Rash et al.,2011). It is a tendency to perceive benefits bestowed by others or by some impersonal source, and accompanied by positive, social emotions (Lin C.C.,2015). As a trait, gratitude draws attention to positive outcomes in life (Emmons et al.,2019). Furthermore, this project chooses life satisfaction and self-esteem as variables in the research. ‘Life satisfaction is a subjective evaluation of overall quality of life’，and is the key dimension of subjective well-being (Proctor et al.,2009). Self-esteem is a sense of individuals’ general value or worth from his or her aspects (Rosenberg, 1979). Self-esteem is commonly considered as the “feeling that one is good enough” (Orth & Robins,2014). Life satisfaction and self-esteem are often used in studies of gratitude，but few of them find the complicated correlations between these three factors. So the purpose of this project is to explore whether gratitude interventions can enhance gratitude and subsequently increase life satisfaction and self-esteem.

Understanding Responses to Conflicting Advice on COVID-19

ABSTRACT This survey study tested a two-level model of responses to conflicting advice about COVID-19 and examined the underlying emotional and cognitive mechanisms and the moderating role of advice source. Results showed that at the individual message level, advice evaluation was associated with advice outcomes. At the message group level, advice evaluation and outcomes were linked to perceived contradiction in content among the advice and the quantity of conflicting messages received, both directly and indirectly via recipients’ emotions. Features of conflicting advice received primarily from impersonal sources had particularly strong associations with advice evaluation and outcomes. Implications for health communication were discussed.

Dissemination of Agricultural Information with Respect to Tribal Community

This study was conducted in Keonjhar district of Odisha state. Agriculture information management behaviour is to be focussed on the flow of information regarding seeking information on various practice of crops and seeking information on various agri-allied activities . The flow of information is based on the various aspect in which tribal people are most probably involved in transferring information through various methods. The result showed that observed that some respondents were receiving information about cultivation practices 33.33% followed by greengram cultivation practices 29.16% and black gram cultivation practices 25%. And 98.32% are receiving information from AAO followed by VLW (95.83%) and from training programme (54.15%) according to personal sources. According to impersonal sources majority of the respondents 64.33% are receiving information from radio followed by television (61.66%) and newspaper (59.16%). Agricultural information interacts with and influences agricultural productivity in a variety of ways. It can help inform decision regarding land, labour, livestock, capital and management. Agricultural productivity can arguably be improved by relevant, reliable and useful information and knowledge. Hence the creation of agricultural information by extension services, research, education programmes and others are managed by agricultural organizations that create information systems to disseminate information to farmers so that farmers can make better decisions in order to take advantage of market opportunities and manage continuous changes in their production systems. All these information seeking behaviours with respect to ICT, the farmers help them to manage in agricultural and other allied activities.

Source effects and cause involvement in prosocial online crowdfunding: A collective action perspective

This study investigates individual motivations to contribute to charitable crowdfunding campaigns from the collective action perspective. A three-group post-test with control experiment (personal source: close friends, family v. impersonal: organizational source v. control: no known source) accounting for individual predispositions (cause involvement, altruism, attitude toward crowdfunding, prior experience) was done. No significant effect of source personalness was found. Instead, a main effect on likelihood to donate to a charitable crowdfunding campaign depends on whether there was a source or not to begin with — with no known source being less influential than a personal and an impersonal source. Post-hoc analysis revealed a moderation effect of cause involvement to motivate greater donation likelihood when the source is perceived to be more personal. Theoretical implications for future research and practical suggestions for prosocial online crowdfunding for charitable purposes are discussed.

Mutual fund investor’s behaviour towards information search and selection criteria

PurposeThe fund selection process of investors in a mutual fund needs to be understood for designing better marketing strategies. Knowledge and perception about the mutual funds can affect investor’s behaviour towards information search and selection criteria during the decision process. Therefore, this study aims to examine Indian mutual fund investors under the framework of Theory of Planned Behaviour and consumer’s behaviour model.Design/methodology/approachThe data have been collected from mutual fund investors in the National Capital Region–Delhi, India, through structured questionnaire. The collected data were examined with relevant statistical tools.FindingsKnowledge and perception affect information search behaviour of the investor. Investors having better knowledge of mutual funds access impersonal sources of information and performance of fund affects their choice, whereas investors having lesser knowledge of mutual fund take advice of experts and select funds based on fund characteristics. Investors with better return perception for mutual funds ignore performance as selection criteria, whereas investors having poor risk perception tend to reduce their bias by accessing personal sources of information. Education and income of investor affect knowledge and perception of mutual funds.Practical implicationsThe financial advisor-driven investors ignore performance as selection criteria and could lead to dissatisfaction later. Therefore, to make the industry investor driven, mutual funds need to focus on improving the knowledge of investors.Originality/valueThis paper shows the unique effect of knowledge and perception on information search behaviour of investors towards mutual funds. The knowledgeable investor selects mutual funds by understanding all risks and benefits.

Sources Of Information On Family Life Health Education (FLHE) Among The Youth And Preparedness Of Teachers for FLHE Curriculum Delivery In Nassarawa State, Nigeria

The youth constitute a significant demographic group with peculiar developmental and reproductive health needs. They encounter challenges such as limited access to proper health information needed for informed life choices and this makes them vulnerable to risky behaviour that threatens their proper development and well-being. This survey sought to find out the current and the preferred sources of information for the youth about family life health education (FLHE). It also sought to ascertain the preparedness of teachers to provide such education to in-school youth. The survey was a cross sectional study among in-school youth, out-of-school youth and science teachers in 6 selected schools in Nasarawa State, Nigeria. The findings showed that school teachers (44.1%), and mothers (28.4%) are the most common sources of FLHE information for the youth. Only 4% of the youth consider this to be satisfactory. About 36% would prefer impersonal sources such as television, films or magazines. This findings suggest that there is an urgent need for government and youth development stakeholders to redirect efforts to upscale the teaching of family life health education in schools as that is where pupils are currently obtaining the information they need. It is therefore suggested that more training should be conducted for teachers while the FLHE curriculum should be adapted to meet local needs. It is also important to prepare educational materials for media such as films, videos and magazines, as the youth have a preference for these sources.

Sistemas de recomendación en el comercio electrónico y la e-educación

La cantidad de información disponible y su dispersión, hace que los individuos acudan a fuentes de información externas a la hora de tomar decisiones de compra o cuando están buscando información con fines académicos y/o investigativos, a fin de obtener recomendaciones que optimicen el uso de sus recursos. En el contexto de internet, se han desarrollado aplicaciones denominadas Sistemas de Recomendación (SR), utilizadas para cumplir con estos fines, beneficiando tanto a las organizaciones como a los consumidores/usuarios. El objetivo del presente trabajo es explicar la incorporación de estrategias de marketing para la personalización de productos/información y la experiencia, en el comercio electrónico y en la educación a distancia o virtual. Las conclusiones obtenidas indican que la investigación desarrollada en torno al papel de fuentes de información impersonales en la toma de decisiones ha sido escasa. Sin embargo, su importancia en el proceso de comercio y de educación en internet se refleja en la posibilidad de personalizar la información a las preferencias o necesidades de sus diferentes usuarios, como ha sido demostrado en las aplicaciones de SR en el ámbito comercial.

Consumer characteristics as drivers of online information searches

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to investigate consumer characteristics (gender, subjective knowledge of product category, susceptibility to social influence, attitude to internet shopping and internet use) having a bearing on the proportion of online information searches conducted using personal and impersonal information sources, and to explore which of these factors impact the use of electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM).Design/methodology/approachA real-time longitudinal design is used to survey 274 consumers about their information searches when shopping for high involvement goods.FindingsSusceptibility to normative social influence and internet use prove the main drivers of the inclination to resort to the internet to conduct searches using personal information sources. Subjective knowledge also positively impacts the proportion of time spent online conducting searches using personal information sources. Men and consumers with a positive attitude to internet shopping use a greater proportion of impersonal online information sources. Complementary analyses show that the use of eWOM is driven by almost all consumer characteristics (except gender) investigated.Originality/valueBy using a real-time longitudinal approach, this study directly addresses calls for more research into information searches by investigating multi-channel source use in actual purchase situations and minimizing bias relating to forgotten information, while facilitating the collection of more valid data on consumer information search behaviour. The paper also ranks as one of the first to revisit the drivers of the proportion of online information sources in personal and impersonal sources in the era of Web 2.0.

Investigating relations of information seeking outcomes to the selection and use of information sources

ABSTRACTThis paper reports the findings of a study investigating the relationship between information seekers' selection and use of information sources and their perceptions of information seeking outcomes (i.e., successes and failures) in the context of information seeking barriers as well as contextual factors such as knowledge, emotions and social role. Fifty‐three participants performed four simulated information‐seeking tasks over a two‐day period and reported their experiences and findings in an online logbook. Semi‐structured interviews with 23 participants were also conducted in order to examine the issues that arose from the logbook. Data collected from the study were analyzed by applying both qualitative and quantitative methods. The findings suggest that use of impersonal sources provides a higher likelihood of successful outcomes in information seeking episodes compared to interpersonal sources. Meanwhile, interpersonal sources were found to be more effective in providing personalized information. Moreover, there were no significant associations among users' education, cognitive and emotional characteristics, and other contextual factors and successes and failures in information seeking. Lastly, constraints such as, lack of help from people, unreliable information, and time limitation seemed to influence information seeking outcomes and increase the chances of unsuccessful results.

The influence of the source and valence of word-of-mouth information on post-failure and post-recovery evaluations

The purpose of this paper was to better understand the impact that word-of-mouth recommendations (WOM) source (i.e., personal vs. impersonal sources) and WOM valence (average vs. excellent) have on satisfaction and trust following a failure and recovery event. Our results showed that customers who received WOM recommendations from personal rather than impersonal sources (WOM source) were less dissatisfied with the organization when severe versus mild failures occurred. Likewise, failure severity had less negative impact on customer satisfaction evaluations when the valence of WOM information was excellent versus average. These results were more pronounced for severe failures. In addition, WOM source and WOM valence both moderated the relationship between recovery quality and trust with the organization. Specifically, excellent recovery quality had a much greater influence on trust when WOM information was obtained from personal versus impersonal sources (WOM source). Finally, when customers received WOM information that rated the service organization as excellent (WOM valence), customers also considered recovery quality to have a greater impact on their perceptions of trustworthiness than if these recommendations were average.

The Impact of Word of Mouth (WOM) on the Bank Selection Decision of the Youth: A Case of Bahrain

For the youth, word of mouth (WOM) is an influential marketing tool in determining their bank selection decisions. The extent to which WOM influences the youth in selecting their banks depends on the amount of trust they might have in the source of WOM and how experienced said source is with the bank that they are recommending. This study found that WOM sources are of two types: personal and impersonal. Among the personal sources identified in this study, the study found WOM from parents who have accounts in the recommended banks is the most influential. Among the impersonal sources, the study found that online reviews posted in specialized media have the most impact on young people’s bank selection decisions.

Changing job seekers' image perceptions during recruitment visits: the moderating role of belief confidence.

The purpose of this study was to understand how an important construct in social psychology-confidence in one's beliefs-could both (a) influence the effectiveness of organizations' recruiting processes and (b) be changed during recruitment. Using a sample of recruits to a branch of the United States military, the authors studied belief confidence before and after recruits' formal visits to the organization's recruiting stations. Personal sources of information had a stronger influence on recruits' belief confidence than impersonal sources. Moreover, recruits' confidence in their initial beliefs affected how perceptions of the recruiter changed their employer images. Among participants with low-initial confidence, the relation between recruitment experiences and employer images was positive and linear across the whole range of recruitment experiences. Among recruits with high-initial confidence, however, the recruitment experience-image relationship was curvilinear, such that recruitment experiences were related to images only at more positive recruitment experiences. The relationship between recruitment experiences and changes in belief confidence was also curvilinear, such that only more positive recruitment experiences led to changes in confidence. These results indicate not only that belief confidence influences the effectiveness of recruiting efforts but also that recruiting efforts can influence belief confidence. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved).

Influences of gender, need for affect, and tolerance for risk-taking on use of information sources

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine gender, need for affect and tolerance for risk-taking as influences on consumers’ use of information sources. Design/methodology/approach – A survey was conducted using a convenience sample of 171 male and 180 female US college students. Data were analyzed using PASW Statistics 18 and Analysis of Moment Structure (AMOS) 18. Findings – Results showed that consumers may be characterized by their use of information sources. First, consumers who use internal information sources are women. Second, consumers who use personal external information sources are women and individuals who enjoy processing feelings. Third, consumers who use impersonal external information sources are women, feeling processors, and risk-takers. Consumers in the third group may find the market-dominant information more useful than the personal opinions of reference groups, indicating that they may tend to be pro-active in exploring and getting what they want rather than allowing their reference groups to suggest ideas to them. Research limitations/implications – Results of the current study cannot be generalized to the larger population of other consumer groups. This research affirms and extends the Consumer Decision Process Model (Blackwell et al., 2005) regarding individual difference variables (e.g. gender, need for affect, tolerance for risk-taking) related to consumers’ use of information sources in apparel shopping. Practical implications – Results of the study suggest that apparel marketers who provide information through impersonal sources pay special attention to women and risk-takers because they are more likely to be the group of consumers on the other side of the communication link. Marketers may want to focus on promotional strategies that stimulate consumers’ emotions and valence toward products, brands, and/or stores thereby responding to customers’ need for affect. It is also recommended that marketers consider which categories of impersonal sources best fit their target customers. Originality/value – This study is the first to investigate the effects of consumers’ gender, need for affect, and tolerance for risk-taking on their preference of using information sources in clothing shopping.

Ambidextrous information search: linking personal and impersonal search routines with individual performance

Organizations invest resources to develop information capabilities, to utilize personal and impersonal information. While the utilization of knowledge is likely to improve organizational performance, it is unclear what the consequences of utilizing personal and impersonal sources of information are for individuals. This study sought to increase understanding of the performance implications of using personal and impersonal information, by examining four business units of a large financial institution. Utilizing competing theoretical models, we tested whether personal and impersonal sources of information substituted for, or complemented each other. The results indicated that individuals who utilized information from personal and impersonal sources of knowledge in a complementary fashion had superior performance. Parsing impersonal knowledge sourcing, we found that the use of specific impersonal information repositories increased performance, while the use of general impersonal information decreased performance. In general, this study shed light on the origins of individual knowledge capabilities, and indicated that individuals gain advantages, by engaging in particular knowledge-sourcing routines.

The Influence of Culture on Breast-Feeding Decisions by African American and White Women

The purpose of this study was to examine how culture influenced breast-feeding decisions in African American and white women, using the Theory of Culture Care Diversity and Universality as a framework. One hundred eighty-six participants responded to the following: The word culture means beliefs and traditions passed down by your family and friends. How has culture affected how you plan to feed your baby? Qualitative content analysis was used to analyze the data. Four categories of responses were identified: influences of family, known benefits of breast-feeding, influences of friends, and personal choice. The findings suggest that race alone may not be as influential in infant feeding decisions as other factors. Although some women acknowledged the effect of their cultural background and experiences, most women reported that their culture did not affect their infant feeding decision. In this population, breast-feeding decisions were based on the influences of family, friends, self, and the perceived knowledge of breast-feeding benefits. Although breast-feeding statistics are commonly reported by race, cultural influences on infant feeding decisions may transcend race and include the influence of family and friends, learned information from impersonal sources, and information that is shared and observed from other people.

A market segmentation approach to esteem and efficacy in information search

PurposeBuilding on consumer purchase behavior and self‐confidence theories combined with insights from marketing segmentation literature, this study aims to investigate the influence of self‐esteem and self‐efficacy on consumers' selection of sources of information when making a product buying decision.Design/methodology/approachMultivariate analysis of variance was used to analyze the main and interaction effects of the independent categorical variables on multiple dependent interval variables. An online survey was distributed using search engine marketing.FindingsThe results indicate that sources of information are used differently among individuals with differing levels of self‐esteem and self‐efficacy. For example, individuals with higher self‐efficacy relied on themselves for information, while those with lower self‐efficacy relied on impersonal sources of information, such as the media or internet. Individuals with higher self‐esteem relied on themselves and impersonal sources (media and internet) as important sources of information, compared with those respondents with low self‐esteem.Research limitations/implicationsMeasuring situational influence using brief descriptions of hypothetical consumption situations was required. These descriptions could not include all possible facets of a natural setting resulting in subjective interpretations by respondents of what constitutes socially acceptable behavior.Practical implicationsConsumer experiences and expectations will vary during a purchase situation. Understanding how individuals seek varied sources of information based on self‐esteem and self‐efficacy is pertinent to marketing professionals when creating advertising programs particularly for products which offer potential socially risky situations, such as gift‐giving.Originality/valueThis research contributes by expanding the understanding of search behavior and the influence of self‐esteem and self‐efficacy on different purchase situations.

Information sources for environmental scanning: do industry and firm size matter?

PurposeThe objective of this paper is to enhance the knowledge about environmental scanning at the corporate level. It seeks an answer to the research question: Is there an influence of industry sector and firm size on the use of external information sources?Design/methodology/approachTo verify three research hypotheses, the authors performed a cross‐sectional study among 165 Portuguese firms. The explorative data analyses consisted of multivariate analysis of variance and Tukey's honestly significant difference test.FindingsOverall, the range of frequently used external information sources is relatively limited, consisting of both personal and impersonal sources. Results suggest a certain “industry effect” and indicate above all a “size effect”. Besides this, the service sector possesses most sourcing peculiarities, and smaller firms underuse some relevant sources.Research limitations/implicationsThe research design applied limits the sample to Portuguese firms and their environment. This geographically circumscribed approach may limit the extent to which the conclusions and implications can be generalised and universally applied.Originality/valueDespite the importance of environmental scanning, little research has hitherto been conducted to analyse variances across industry sectors and firm size. This paper is one of the first attempts to study their joint effects on the use of scanning information sources.

Getting a Workout: Mortgage Modification, Class, and Shifting Financial Institutions

The foreclosure crisis of the Great Recession (2007-2009) has presented American homeowners with a diverse array of options for dealing with a mortgage they can no longer afford. In this article I explore how homeowners navigate this ever-changing financial landscape. I combine in-depth interviews with homeowners at risk of foreclosure in San Jose with an institutional ethnography of a foreclosure prevention help center. I find that most homeowners pursue one of two strategies for dealing with their mortgage troubles. The first strategy, employed largely by working class homeowners, relied on reaching out to their peers with similar financial difficulties. This proved to be both an efficient strategy and a particularly good source of insider information. The second strategy, pursued primarily by middle class homeowners who were ashamed of their financial circumstances, relied on impersonal and anonymous sources of information. This strategy was not only less efficient and less informative; it also frequently resulted in missed opportunities. Importantly, class variation in strategies of action was largely the result of differential access to other troubled homeowners.

Use of online versus offline information sources by tourists

Understanding how tourists acquire knowledge is crucial to developing effective marketing communication strategies. With the advent of the Internet, tourist information search strategies have changed drastically. However, few studies have analysed their new search patterns in depth. This article analyses preferred information sources including both personal and impersonal sources. The trade-off between online and offline sources is also examined. Results indicate that travellers seek more information online when the source is impersonal. For personal sources and for long, expensive and foreign trips, offline sources still remain crucial.

Information Source Accessibility and Usage as dDeterminants of Business Performance of Community Banks in Osun State, Nigeria

The paper discusses an investigation on the relationship between information source accessibility and business performance of the community banks over a six-year period. The Expost-Facto Survey design was used in collecting data from 258 managers of 43 functioning community banks at the time of study with a retrieval rate of 80%. The data were analyzed using both the descriptive and inferential statistics. Results revealed that the customer source was the most used of all the information sources. The personal sources were also preferred to the impersonal sources while information accessibility had a positive relationship with the banks’ business performance. The study therefore recommended the creation of greater awareness of information relevance and sourcing using formalized information packaging and managing systems.KEY DESCRIPTORS: Information Source Accessibility, Information Source Usage, Business Performance, Information Provision Productivity, Community credits.