Marketing professionals use Twitter extensively for communicating with and monitoring customers, for observing competitors, and for analyzing chatter concerning brands, products, and company image. Can professors use Twitter to engage students in conversation about a marketing course? The authors argue that Twitter has many benefits for marketing educators who are interested in engaging students in experiential learning. In a real-time environment for student learning, professors may use Twitter for direct communication with students to generate discussion and interest in the course topics and examples. Just as marketers use Twitter to generate interest, discussion, and brand image, educators can use Twitter to generate this interest in a course through social media. Furthermore, Twitter is a fast, easy method for making announcements, solving student issues, and performing course-related administrative duties. In three studies, both quantitative and qualitative data suggest that when students engage in Twitter use with the professor, students feel better prepared for future careers. In addition, students indicate that Twitter facilitates achieving traditional educational goals. The qualitative data offer insights into potential problems. Suggestions for educators interested in using Twitter are offered.

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BackgroundIncreased ambient temperature has been implicated in increased physical aggression, which has important practical consequences. The present study investigates this established relationship between aggressive behavior and ambient temperature in the highly aggressive context of professional football in the National Football League (NFL).MethodsUsing a publicly available dataset, authors conducted multiple hierarchical regression analyses on game-level data (2326 games).ResultsThe analysis revealed that temperature positively predicted aggressive penalties in football, and that this relationship was significant for teams playing at home but not for visiting teams.ConclusionThese results indicate that even in the aggressive context of football, warmer weather contributes to increased violence. Further, the presence of the heat-aggression relationship for the home team suggests that the characteristics of interacting groups may influence whether heat would have an adverse effect on the outcome of those interactions.

Purpose The paper seeks to establish the effectiveness of social media advertising and participation by brands through incidental exposure. Using experimental design, in a social media environment, this paper aims to extend incidental exposure research in the context of social media. Design/methodology/approach This paper uses an experimental design with controlled image durations using MediaLab and DirectRT, allowing for precise image display times and randomization of screens. Participants were split between high-involvement and low-involvement product categories, and the brand choice exercise was administered in an on-screen experiment. Findings The paper provides support that incidental exposure influences brand choice. Further, it indicates that for low-involvement product categories, the type of social media exposure does not influence brand choice significantly between types. For high-involvement product categories, ads perform better than sponsored story executions; consumer-generated brand messages perform better than brand-generated messages; and the influence of reference group affects brand choice. Research limitations/implications This paper tests one social media environment using a desktop Web environment. Additional studies would be needed to test other social media environments and mobile technology. Practical implications The paper provides evidence that brands benefit by simply participating and advertising in social media, but the execution style matters to a greater extent for high-involvement product categories in influencing brand choice. Social implications Mere exposure to a brand message may influence consumers unknowingly. Repeated exposure as short as 5 s per viewing is related to increases in brand choice. Originality/value This paper extends research on incidental exposure and establishes a key positive brand outcome for practice and research, and it provides the first exploration on the outcome of incident exposure to brand messages in social media. The results suggest that social media and advertising by brands have positive impacts beyond traditional measures of success online.

Previous research demonstrates the dysfunctional consequences of high levels of role stressors (role ambiguity and role conflict) in boundary-spanning positions. These consequences include higher levels of burnout and lower levels of satisfaction and performance. Although marketing researchers have investigated external mechanisms for coping with role stressors, research to date has not investigated the inherent capability of boundary spanners to cope with role stressors. This research examines optimism as an internal characteristic that facilitates coping with role stressors in boundary-spanning positions. The research findings reveal that optimists are able to anticipate and respond proactively to stressors, resulting in less burnout and higher levels of performance and satisfaction.