A growing body of research suggests that having more women in the boardroom leads to better corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance. However, much of this work views the CSR-enhancing effect of women directors as largely driven by their moral orientations and rarely considers other underlying mechanisms. Moreover, less explored are the firm-specific conditions under which such CSR-promoting roles of female directors might be performed more (or less) effectively. In this paper, we seek to bridge this gap in the literature by (1) proposing an additional account for the positive influence of female independent directors on the firm's CSR and (2) illuminating the organizational context in which female directorship is likely to translate into good CSR performance. We argue that women independent directors might take CSR issues more seriously than their male counterparts not only because of their stronger moral orientations, but also because they have reputational reasons to do so. Further, we suggest that female directors' concerns about CSR-relevant matters are more (less) likely to gain support from other members of the organization when their company is doing more (less) business in the product markets where reputation for CSR is more (less) vital for success. Using a sample of Standard & Poor's (S&P) 1500 index firms (2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009) and the data on their board composition and CSR ratings, we find strong support for our argument. We find that the number (or proportion) of women independent directors is positively associated with a firm's CSR ratings and that the strength of this relationship depends on the level of the firm's consumer market orientation.

Abstract:In this paper, we investigate the effect of an epidemic outbreak on consumer expenditures. In light of scanner panel data on consumers' debit and credit card transactions, we present empirical evidence that outbreaks cause considerable disruption in total consumer expenditures with significant heterogeneity across categories. Our findings strongly imply that customers alter their behaviors to reduce the risk of infection. The estimated effect of an epidemic outbreak is qualitatively different from that of other macroeconomic factors. The implications of this research provide important guidance for policy interventions and marketing decisions aimed at sustaining economic growth.

PurposeThis paper intends to discuss the effect of social and institutional mechanisms in allowing network governance embedded in non‐contractual and social relations to emerge and persist.Design/methodology/approachBuilding on the extant theoretical literature on network governance of varied research strands and drawing empirical observations from research on East Asian network governance, the paper explores the effect of social and institutional mechanisms in allowing network governance embedded in non‐contractual and social relations to emerge and persist.FindingsIt is argued that social and non‐contractual mechanisms reinforce, substitute, or undermine contractual mechanisms, but the degree to which this occurs is contingent on institutional environments in which transaction occurs.Originality/valueThe paper revisits some of the important theoretical concepts such as trust and social capital that have been invoked across divergent literatures so as to illuminate underlying factors of economic governance based on social relations and networks.

This study investigates whether Pilates and yoga lead people to adopt generally health-promoting lifestyle elements and feel better about their physical and mental fitness. To this end, we designed an 8 week exercise program of Pilates and yoga reviewed by veteran practitioners and conducted an experimental study through which we collected the data from 90 volunteered adult subjects between ages 30 and 49 (mean age = 35.47), equally represented by women and men without previous experience with Pilates or yoga. In the 8 week long experiment, we assigned the subjects to three groups, where subjects in the two exercise groups regularly took part in either Pilates or yoga classes, and the control group participated in neither exercise classes. All participants completed two surveys, the Health-Promoting Lifestyle Profile (HPLP II) and the Health Self-Rating Scale (HSRS), before and after their assigned program. In our analysis of pre- and post-treatment differences across the three groups, we ran ANOVA, ANCOVA, and Sheffé test, implemented using SPSS PASW Statistics 18.00. Our results indicate that Pilates and yoga groups exhibited a higher engagement in health-promoting behaviors than the control group after the program. Subjective health status, measured with HSRS, also improved significantly among Pilates and yoga participants compared to those in the control group after the program. The supplementary analysis finds no significant gender-based difference in these impacts. Overall, our results confirm that Pilates and yoga help recruit health-promoting behaviors in participants and engender positive beliefs about their subjective health status, thereby setting a positive reinforcement cycle in motion. By providing clear evidence that the promotion of Pilates or yoga can serve as an effective intervention strategy that helps individuals change behaviors adverse to their health, this study offers practical implications for healthcare professionals and public health officials alike.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore how managers’ evaluation of and reaction to multiple rivals’ actions will be affected by the distributional characteristics of these actions, including the extent to which rivals’ actions are centered on certain firms (actor concentration), concentrated in certain time periods (temporal concentration), and clustered in certain geographic locations (spatial concentration). Design/methodology/approach The analyses are based on panel data on Taiwanese producers of personal computers and peripherals and the investments they made in mainland China after the Asian financial crisis. The authors employ fixed-effect logit regression to test the hypotheses. Findings Rivals’ recent actions in China increase a focal firm’s inclination to act especially when these rivals’ actions are characterized by a high level of actor, temporal, and/or spatial concentration. Originality/value The analytical approach goes beyond a dyad-level conceptualization of interfirm rivalry. Incorporating insights from behavioral decision making, the paper shows how a firm with limited attentive capacity reacts to the aggregate impact of multiple rivals’ actions.