Ordinary Consumers Research Articles

Характеристика Українськиї падевих медів

The subject of research – dew honey is highly valued in the food industry, and the authentication of its origin, in particular the differentiation from blossom honey, the assessment of its safety and quality requires the use of adequate parameters. In this context, sensorial indicators are the primary attributes available for use by ordinary consumers. The said indicators, together with melissopalynological analysis, are the indicators of the botanical and geographical origin of honey. Physical and chemical parameters supplement the information on the characteristics of the localization of the samples, as well as assess their safety and quality. The purpose of the study was to determine the differences between the pollen spectrum, sensorial, physical and chemical parameters of Ukrainian dew honey of different regional origin. Methodology. To achieve this goal, the sensorial, physical and chemical characteristics, as well as pollen profile of 8 samples of dew honey were analyzed. The results of the study. For most of the criteria for assessing the physical and chemical parameters obtained during the study, the data can be considered as being within the ranges of parameters values established within the national regulatory framework for safety and quality of honey – DSTU 4497:2005 ‘Natural honey. Specifications’ and the Order of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine of June 19, 2019 № 330. However, all samples did not meet national criteria for the electrical conductivity and more than a half of all samples did not meet national criteria for the mass fraction of glucose, fructose, and sucrose. The spectrum of pollen showed the presence of high content of spores of fungi, yeast, and green algae, the content and ratio of those differed due to the geographical origin of honey samples. The sensorial evaluation was performed for color, taste, aroma, consistency and crystallization, the presence of fermentation signs. The tendency to crystallize was detected in half of the honey samples, all samples were characterized by a brown range of different tinges, the smell and taste of each sample had a unique bouquet determined by the origin of honey. In one sample of honey with the high yeast content, the initial stages of fermentation were observed, which were accompanied by the presence of vinegar odor. The results obtained in this study indicate satisfactory quality, acceptable freshness, as well as the authenticity of each individual sample of honey. The special characteristics of dew honey differ from those of flower honey, therefore, it may be appropriate to revise the national regulatory framework to adjust the requirements for assessing honey safety and quality. Scope of research results is to apply the obtained results for further authentication of dew honeys for further study of their properties and wide application in the field of nutrition.

Should I suggest this YouTube clip? The impact of UGC source credibility on eWOM and purchase intention

PurposeIn spite of the increasing organic and interactive marketing activities over social media, a general understanding of the source credibility of voluntary user-generated content (UGC) is still limited. In line with the social identity theory, this paper examines the effects of consumers' perceived source credibility of UGC in YouTube videos on their attitudes and behavioral intentions. Additionally, source homophily theory is included to predict the antecedent of source credibility.Design/methodology/approachThree hundred and seventy two Generation Y respondents were interviewed using snowball sampling. Data were analyzed with component-based structural equation modeling technique of partial least squares-structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).FindingsFindings confirmed that perceived source credibility indirectly affects purchase intention (PI) and electronic word-of-mouth via attitude toward UGC. Besides, perceived source credibility mediates the effect of perceived source homophily on attitude toward UGC.Practical implicationsSince today's consumers have begun to trust and rely more on UGC than company-generated content on social media when making purchase decisions, companies may reconsider democratizing certain aspects of their branding strategies. Firms may fine-tune their marketing communication budgets – not only just by sponsoring public figures and celebrities but also by nurturing coproductive engagements with independent content creators who are ordinary consumers. Endowed with their imposing credibility, these micro-influencers and prosumers have high potentials to be uplifted to brand ambassadors.Originality/valueWhile consumers' purchase outcome can be measured easily using metrics and analytics, the roles of source homophily in stages leading up to the purchase is still elusive. Drawing on the rich theoretical basis of source homophily may help researchers to understand not only how credibility and attitude are related to PI but also how this nexus generates positive word of mouth among UGC followers within the social media circles.

Fundamentals of ophthalmic dispensing 18: Law and regulation – part 1

The sale of optical appliances is governed partly by ordinary consumer legislation and specifically through the Opticians Act and the various orders of the General Optical Council. Here Tina Arbon Black and Peter Black take a look at the legislation, regulations and standards that apply to ophthalmic dispensing.

Multiple cooperative amplification paper SERS aptasensor based on AuNPs/3D succulent-like silver for okadaic acid quantization

Okadaic acid (OA) is the main toxic component of diarrhetic shellfish poisoning, which can cause vomiting, diarrhea, and even induce tumor formation in people who accidentally ingest it. To strengthen the front-end prevention and control of shellfish safety, a surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) paper swab based on high-affinity binding and high-specific recognition performance of nucleic acid aptamer was proposed to detect OA by virtue of enhanced multistage plasmon coupling effect. Composite resonance bilayer constituted by evenly dispersed gold nanoparticles integrating with a three-dimensional (3D) succulent-like silver particle was facilely manufactured in-situ on the paper substrate. Subsequently, with the assistance of 3D nanotopography structured silver nano-octahedra connected on the signal probe, a multistage SERS signal cooperative amplification platform was formed with about 10-fold enhanced Raman intensity higher than either single-layer substrate. Owning to the unique strategy of superimposed signal enhancement, such paper SERS aptasensor possessed admirable specific recognition and sensitivity has been successfully used in the on-site quantization of OA, with a detection limit of 0.31 ng/mL. Furthermore, the construction of the SERS paper swab is of great significance to the promotion of rapid on-site analysis approach of OA content in seafood by customs, seafood market supervision departments and ordinary consumers.

Training Data Selection and Optimal Sensor Placement for Deep-Learning-Based Sparse Inertial Sensor Human Posture Reconstruction.

Although commercial motion-capture systems have been widely used in various applications, the complex setup limits their application scenarios for ordinary consumers. To overcome the drawbacks of wearability, human posture reconstruction based on a few wearable sensors have been actively studied in recent years. In this paper, we propose a deep-learning-based sparse inertial sensor human posture reconstruction method. This method uses bidirectional recurrent neural network (Bi-RNN) to build an a priori model from a large motion dataset to build human motion, thereby the low-dimensional motion measurements are mapped to whole-body posture. To improve the motion reconstruction performance for specific application scenarios, two fundamental problems in the model construction are investigated: training data selection and sparse sensor placement. The problem of deep-learning training data selection is to select independent and identically distributed (IID) data for a certain scenario from the accumulated imbalanced motion dataset with sufficient information. We formulate the data selection into an optimization problem to obtain continuous and IID data segments, which comply with a small reference dataset collected from the target scenario. A two-step heuristic algorithm is proposed to solve the data selection problem. On the other hand, the optimal sensor placement problem is studied to exploit most information from partial observation of human movement. A method for evaluating the motion information amount of any group of wearable inertial sensors based on mutual information is proposed, and a greedy searching method is adopted to obtain the approximate optimal sensor placement of a given sensor number, so that the maximum motion information and minimum redundancy is achieved. Finally, the human posture reconstruction performance is evaluated with different training data and sensor placement selection methods, and experimental results show that the proposed method takes advantages in both posture reconstruction accuracy and model training time. In the 6 sensors configuration, the posture reconstruction errors of our model for walking, running, and playing basketball are 7.25°, 8.84°, and 14.13°, respectively.

Exploring the Ivorian Shea Butter Potentialities: Consumers and Scientists Approach

Traditional shea butter is generally obtained through various uncontrolled methods, leading to a wide variability of quality. Nevertheless, consumers often complain about this fat because of it unconformity with their demands. Indeed, Ivorian ordinary consumers mostly prefer whitish odorless and fondant shea butter. Moreover, traders and industries interest in shea butter as raw material, would reside in its exceptional quality and potentialities of exploitation in several fields. An optimized traditional process was proposed by the present authors not only as a standard method, but also as a response to the whole users’ exigencies. Resulting beige and yellow shea butters present very weak acid and peroxide indexes, very high unsaponifiable matters. Viscosity decreased exponentially with the temperature increasing, when UV-Vis and near infra-red spectra revealed presence of UV-filter compounds, carotenoids, and chlorophyll. Chromatographic profile identified palmitic, stearic, arachidic acids, and essential fatty acids like oleic and linoleic and also exaltolides compounds. Samples also contained essential minerals (Calcium, magnesium, zinc, iron, etc.) carotene, vitamins A in relatively important amounts. Moreover, neither microbiological germs nor heavy were detected.
 All these valorizing characteristics would confer to the optimized shea butters good aptitude for households feeding and body care, and also profile a wide range of exploitation in food, cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries.

Simple and Cost-Efficient Classification of Ballpoint Pen Inks Using Digital Color Analysis.

We report here a simple and cost-effective technique for classification of the samples of writing inks based on their digital color analysis (DCA). The dynamics of artificial aging of writing inks under UV irradiation was studied by means of DCA for the first time. The color of ballpoint pen marks was recorded over time using an ordinary consumer DSLR camera. The inks were classified according to the parameters of their color degradation curves with precision superior to conventional Raman scattering method, which serves as a proof-of-concept of the proposed approach. The reported approach has broad prospects for implementation by criminalists for document investigation when document forgery is suspected. The proposed technique can be of interest not only in the field of forensic science but also for those who deal with dyes and dye-containing materials and their degradation over time as well as for the study of any processes, the evolution of which is reflected in a color change.

Effects of roasted coffee on the chemical, microbiological and sensory qualities of fermented cocoa and cashew juices

PurposeRoasted coffee provides a complex blend of different flavours which produce a range of sensory qualities. With the development of protocols for the production of fresh juices, jams and marmalades from cocoa and cashew pulp juices at Cocoa Research Institute of Ghana, this paper aims to study the effects of roasted coffee powder on fermented cocoa and cashew juices to diversify the uses of these two juices.Design/methodology/approachCocoa and cashew juices were fermented with the incorporation of 2% roasted coffee powder using Saccharomyces cerevisiae yeast starter. The fermenting juices were monitored by measuring pH, temperature, specific gravity and titratable acidity. At the end of the fermentation, the juices were poured into clean, sterilized containers to mature. They were then analysed for their physicochemical, microbiological and sensory qualities. These were repeated with cocoa and cashew juices without coffee powder to determine the effects of the roasted coffee on the fermented juices.FindingsThe addition of roasted coffee powder to cocoa and cashew juices did not have any significant effect on the fermentation performance of the juices. Three out of the four juices took a total of 13 days to complete fermentation with an average final specific gravity of 0.99. The quality of the fermented juices was not compromised by microbial activities. However, the addition of roasted coffee powder reduced the alcohol content of fermented cocoa juice from 9.0 to 5.0% and that of cashew from 11.0% to 7.5%. Sensory analysis using untrained panellists, who were ordinary consumers, showed significant differences among the four fermented juices in terms of appearance, taste and aroma. Their mean scores for coffee aroma ranged from 0.3 to 2.0 with coffee incorporated fermented juices having higher rankings.Originality/valueThese findings have shown the possibility of processing cocoa and cashew juices, which under normal circumstances would have been discarded along their value chains, into coffee-flavoured wines. They are also important to cocoa, cashew and coffee farmers, processors, as well as wine enthusiasts.

THE PROSPECTS OF USING CRYPTOCURRENCY BITCOIN AS A FINANCIAL INNOVATION IN THE INFORMATION ECONOMY OF UKRAINE

We have established that a relatively new market of cryptocurrency is the subject of great interest for research under the current conditions of financial innovations in payment services. Our findings have revealed objective prerequisites for creating cryptocurrency as an innovative means of information-based payment. Cryptocurrency poses a challenge to the financial system of Ukraine since both the central bank and other state regulators can not control its emission and circulation. They show the growth dynamics in cryptocurrency market capitalization where Bitcoin predominates. Although cryptocurrency is not included in the National Register of payment systems and it is officially prohibited for circulation in Ukraine, our country ranks among the world’s top five countries by number of users of different bitcoin-wallets.
 We have examined the strengths of Bitcoin that have made this cryptocurrency a convenient means of international payment with a high investment potential. The results show disadvantages to using cryptocurrency for both the whole country in general and ordinary consumers in particular. We have defined main threats that national governments can face in case of an unregulated spread of cryptocurrency. Also this study, based on the works of leading foreign scientists and financial market experts, systematizes factors that influence the price of Bitcoin. It substantiates opportunities and prospects for the cryptocurrency market development in Ukraine.
 The study has shown that cryptocurrencies have their own niche in payment systems; they are quite competitive and reliable financial instruments. The growth dynamics of cryptocurrency market capitalization in the world makes Bitcoin the most successful example of the use of virtual currency in the information economy. As the modern society is being inevitably virtualized, our country’s economy should follow the path of innovations by finding solutions to a number of technical, economic and legal issues on the cryptocurrency market development in Ukraine through involving the experience of the leading European countries.

The Impact and Empirical Analysis of the Development Level of E-commerce Industry on China’s Export Trade

With its advantages of low cost and high efficiency, e-commerce is not only favored by ordinary consumers, but also effectively promotes SMEs to find business opportunities and win the market. This article starts with the development scale of China’s e-commerce industry and the status quo of export trade, and measures the overall index of China’s e-commerce industry development level from 2008 to 2018 through empirical methods to analyze its impact on China’s export trade. The results show that the development level of the e-commerce industry has a significant positive impact on China’s export trade. Finally, it analyzes the existing problems in the development of China’s e-commerce industry.

Specific nature of medicines and value of medicines.

Medicines are not ordinary consumer or industrial goods but goods of a specific nature. The article provides an overview of the fundamental characteristics that distinguish medicines from common consumer goods. Another essential attribute of the term medicine is its values (clinical, economic, human), which form a crucial concept of the medicine category.

Deregulation and the Lawyers' Cartel

At one time, the legal profession largely regulated itself. However, based on the economic notion that increased competition would benefit consumers, jurisdictions have deregulated their legal markets by easing rules relating to attorney advertising, fees, and, most recently, nonlawyer ownership of law firms. Yet, despite reformers’ high expectations, legal markets today resemble those of previous decades, and most legal services continue to be delivered by traditional law firms. How to account for this seeming inertia? We argue that the competition paradigm is theoretically flawed because it fails to fully account for market failures relating to asymmetric information, imperfect information, and negative externalities. In addition, the regulatory costs imposed on sophisticated consumers such as corporate purchasers of legal services differ radically from those imposed on ordinary consumers who use legal services infrequently. Merely increasing the number and types of legal services providers cannot make legal markets more efficient. We illustrate our theoretical account with evidence from the United Kingdom, Europe, and Asia. For legal markets to better serve the public, regulators must tailor solutions by segment. Regulators should seek to minimize negative externalities associated with the delivery of legal services to the corporate segment and confront information asymmetries that lead to the maldistribution of legal services in the consumer segment. Deregulation alone is insufficient and may in fact exacerbate existing market failures.

Volba dodavatele elektřiny v ČR v roce 2020 z pohledu nákladů na spotřebu elektřiny pro domácnosti a pro podnikatelský maloodběr – simulační model

The situation on the Czech electricity market from the point of view of small customers or households is confusing every year. Although information on electricity consumption prices for households and small businesses is already freely available on the Internet (web pages of the Electricity Regulation Office), understanding the rules for calculating electricity consumption costs is still not easy for ordinary small consumers. For small entrepreneurs, the question often arises as to whether tariffs intended for households can be used for the electricity consumption, or whether it is necessary or appropriate to switch to tariffs for small business consumption. This article is focused on the analysis of the offer of electricity suppliers for the year 2020 in the Czech Republic from the point of view of the distribution rate D25d for households, resp. C25d for entrepreneurs in order to assess differences in the cost of electricity consumption and to select those products and suppliers for which the annual cost of electricity consumption is minimal. Monte Carlo simulation, where the monthly electricity consumption is generated (normal probability distribution), is used for the analysis together with the basics of multicriteria decision making, especially the non-dominance testing principle. The results show that the differences in the annual electricity consumption costs can be around 15% and the tariff rates for households are cheaper than the tariff rates for the entrepreneurs (also here the difference in annual costs can be around 15-20%).

Проблемы функционирования и перспективы развития сертификации в строительстве

The article presents an overview of the state of the market of mandatory and voluntary certification in construction on the territory of the Russian Federation. The key unresolved problems of the existing conformity assessment systems are identified. Based on the analysis carried out, there are proposed some mechanisms and ways of solving these problems, which would help restoring trust in voluntary certification systems among both active market participants and ordinary consumers of certification objects.

The Mysterious Market for Post-Settlement Litigant Finance

Litigant finance is a growing and increasingly controversial industry in which financial firms advance a plaintiff money in exchange for ownership rights in the proceeds of the legal claim on a nonrecourse basis: A plaintiff must repay the advance only if compensation is ultimately received for the legal claim. The nonrecourse nature of this funding exempts it from most states’ consumer credit laws, enabling funders to charge higher interest and fees than would otherwise be permitted. When this funding involves ordinary consumers, critics of the industry contend that the uncapped interest rates exploit vulnerable litigants, while its defenders argue that the availability of these cash advances improves the welfare of consumers, especially those who have no other credit options. This funding made headlines during the recent NFL concussion litigation, with more than one thousand players reported to have received such cash advances and with class counsel raising concerns of “predatory lending.” Because the industry has not been forthcoming with facts, the larger policy debate thus far has largely relied on anecdotes and speculation. In addition, the debate has ignored the important differences between pre- and post-settlement litigant funding. This Article is the first to present systematic, large-scale data on post-settlement litigant funding—the type of funding most NFL players reportedly received. We were given unrestricted access to the complete archive of sixteen years of funding applications and funding contracts from one of the largest consumer litigant funding companies in the United States. These data, which are robust and representative, enable us to make transparent the terms and true price to consumers of this formerly mysterious funding. We find that the Funder offers not only clearer contract terms but also better financial terms to post-settlement clients relative to pre-settlement clients. Yet these better terms do not come close to reflecting the virtually nonexistent litigation risk to the Funder. We therefore recommend that post-settlement litigant funding be subject to the same regulations as conventional consumer credit and that a standardized, simple disclosure be required.

A Study of a Method to Understand the Intention of Taste Expressions of Sake through Text Mining

We study the intended meaning of taste expressions used to describe sake which cannot be clearly defined, by using word-of-mouth information from users on an e-commerce site. Furthermore, we elucidate the taste characteristics perceived by ordinary consumers of sake. We conducted a multiple regression analysis with “Nihonshu-do(Sake meter value),” “San-do(Acidty),” “Amakara-do” and “Noutan-do” as objective variables, and the frequency of various taste expressions, confirmed by word-of-mouth information, as the explanatory variable. Through this analysis, we clarified the relationship between various taste expressions and the “Nihonshu-do,” “San-do,” “Amakara-do,” and “Noutan-do” of sake. We were thus able to make a quantitative evaluation of ambiguous taste expressions related to sake.

Страны Латинской Америки и Россия в международной торговле основными тропическими фруктами

The orientation of a part of the population of economically developed countries to a healthy diet, the spread of ideas of vegetarianism, concern for the environment, and relatively higher incomes contributed to an increase in demand for fruits, berries and nuts of tropical and subtropical origin. Some of them, in particular bananas, oranges, tangerines, lemons, have become common food products and practically everyday consumption for the majority of the population of developed countries in the last quarter of the 20th century. In the future, some other types of fresh fruit and berry products from the tropics and subtropics (for example, pineapple, kiwi, avocado) gradually, due to increased production and international trade, also became more economically available to the ordinary consumer. Based on the analysis of statistics from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations for 1961-2019, the article shows a number of trends in international trade (for exports) of major tropical fruits are reflected, with a deeper look at the participation of Latin American countries in this process. It was revealed that some states of this region, such as Mexico, Ecuador, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Colombia, Honduras, Peru, Brazil, Chile, occupy significant positions in the supply of bananas, pineapple, avocado, mango, papaya to the world market. Currently, Russia is one of the largest countries in the world in terms of imports of fruit and berry products, therefore, the issue of its participation as a subject of demand in the world tropical fruit market is raised.

Preparation and optimization of Si3N4 ceramic slurry for low-cost LCD mask stereolithography

Mask stereolithography provides a new way to manufacture various high-performance engineering ceramics. However, the specialized commercial ceramic stereolithography equipment and materials are too expensive for ordinary researchers and consumers. The problem of lacking low-cost ceramic stereolithography technology needs to be solved. Due to the low intrinsic surface charge, high refractive index and high light absorption of silicon nitride ceramic, its light curable slurry with high solid content, low viscosity and low sedimentation still needs further study. In this investigation, a 40 vol% silicon nitride ceramic slurry suitable for liquid crystal display (LCD) mask stereolithography was developed. Through the experimental analysis of the slurry performance, 20 wt% of low shrinkage monomer ACMO, 30 wt% of non-reactive solvent POE and 50 wt% HDDA were optimized as the liquid phase of the silicon nitride slurry. A mixed dispersant of KD1 and CC42 was chosen to control the slurry viscosity and sedimentation. The curing thickness was increased to 38 μm under 56.8 mJ/cm2 exposure. The application of low-cost LCD based mask stereolithography in silicon nitride printing may play a role in the research and application of ceramic mask stereolithography.

A review of a potential and promising probiotic candidate-Akkermansia muciniphila.

Akkermansia muciniphila, a common colonizer in the intestinal mucus layer of humans, has gradually been considered as promising candidate for the next-generation probiotic, given its physiological benefits from animal and human studies. This article comprehensively reviewed A. muciniphila from the published peer-reviewed articles in the aspects of its role in the host physiology and commonly consumed food that can boost its abundance, which should provide useful and fundamental information for scientists and engineers and even ordinary consumers. Akkermansia muciniphila is not only a crucial biomarker that indicates the physiology of human beings but also has huge potential to become a probiotic given its physiological benefits in various clinical scenarios. Current barriers in terms of regulations, necessity for large-scale clinical experiments and production feasibility need to be resolved before A. muciniphila can be widely applied as the next-generation probiotic.

Re-shaping global-ness by spending overseas: Analysis of emerging Chinese consumption abroad

In most urban network studies, advanced producer service firms and transportation carriers are regarded as the main agents building intercity connections. With rising global incomes and increasing mobility of people worldwide, however, flows consisting of ordinary consumers have become a new way for cities to be connected to the globe. Using transaction data from China UnionPay, this paper explores the spatial network pattern of emerging Chinese overseas consumption by tracing the origins, destinations, and volumes of spending flows. We find that a global network built on consumption flows originating from mainland China improves the global-ness of countries and regions that have historically been peripheral in the financial networks created by multinational firms or inter-port transportation. Given the soaring consumption capacity of urban Chinese residents and the re-orientation of urban policies in China, it is expected that Chinese consumption will keep re-shaping the global-ness of both Chinese cities and numerous destinations worldwide.