The current study moves beyond customer-perceived value and corporate image and demonstrates that switching costs are important factors in influencing a customer's decision to stay with a service provider. This work finds support for a contingency model involving customer-perceived value, corporate image, and switching costs. The results indicate that the impacts of customer-perceived value and corporate image on customer loyalty decrease under conditions of high switching costs. Implications of the results are discussed.

Due to the absence of interlayer coupling and inversion symmetry, transition metal dichalcogenide (MX2) semiconductor monolayers exhibit novel properties that are distinctly different from their bulk crystals such as direct optical band gaps, large band spin splittings, spin-valley coupling, piezoelectric and nonlinear optical responses, and thus have promising applications in, e.g., optoelectronic and spintronic devices. Here we have performed a systematic first-principles study of the second-order nonlinear optical properties of MX2 (M = Mo, W; X = S, Se) monolayers and trilayers within the density functional theory with the generalized gradient approximation plus scissors correction. We find that all the four MX2 monolayers possess large second-order optical susceptibility χ (2) in the optical frequency range and significant linear electro-optical coefficients in low frequency limit, thus indicating their potential applications in non-linear optical devices and electric optical switches. The χ (2) spectra of the MX2 trilayers are overall similar to the corresponding MX2 monolayers, albeit with the magnitude reduced by roughly a factor of 3. The prominent features in the χ (2) spectra of the MX2 multilayers are analyzed in terms of the underlying band structures and optical dielectric function, and also compared with available experiments.

Purpose -The objective of this study is to examine the effect of corporate image, perceived value, and switching costs on customer loyalty in customer/provider relationships of different length. Design/methodology/approach -Five key constructs, namely: corporate image, perceived value, switching costs, customer loyalty, and length of relationship, were employed. Using a systematic sampling technique, student interviewers randomly approached customers exiting hair salons. The final survey sample consisted of 279 respondents. Findings -This paper supports a contingency model with regard to customer loyalty and its antecedents. The results suggest that corporate image impacts customer loyalty in both newer and older relationships. Whereas in newer relationships, corporate image has a cardinal influence on switching costs, in more-established relationships switching costs are influenced primarily by perceived value. In both cases, switching costs influence customer loyalty. Research limitations/implications -As extant research claims that relationship quality, and not length, moderates the relationship between loyalty/repurchase behavior and their antecedents, future research could adopt relationship quality as a moderator to test the model of the present study. Practical implications -The results support the importance of enhancing corporate image to retain newer customers. In longer-established relationships, corporate image remains a determinant of repurchase decisions. However, customer value also has a significant influence on switching costs and loyalty. Originality/value -The current study moves beyond customer-perceived value, switching costs, and corporate image to demonstrate that relationship length has a significant influence on customer loyalty.

This work examines whether promoted brands and private labels attract different or similar consumers through psychographics and store image that drive purchase attitudes for these brands. The results using regression analysis demonstrate that these attitudes are driven by differences in psychographics and store image. Attitude toward promoted brands is characterised by positive store image, smart shopper self-perception, need for affiliation, and money attitude regarding power-prestige and anxiety. Private label attitude is characterised by more positive store image, and money attitude regarding retention and distrust. Noticeably, the conclusion of Ailawadi et al. (2001) regarding the indirect effect of demographics on the feasibility of using store brands and national brand promotions via psychographics appears weak, since we conclude that the impacts of demographics on the two types of purchase attitudes are weakly funneled through psychographics.