Exploratory Study of the Attitudinal Effects of Employee Shareholding in Morocco

The authors conducted an empirical study in the form of a questionnaire distributed to Moroccan employees. It was completed by 217 employees and relates to the year 2020. The data collected was analyzed by the method of structural equations. The authors continued the methodology of Anderson and Gerbing. The two authors proposed a two-step analysis method. This first involves performing a confirmatory analysis of the measurement model to improve its convergent validity and discriminant validity. The results of the questionnaire survey show that there is a positive and strong link between employee share ownership on the one hand and work motivation and organizational involvement on the other. Also, the tests carried out show that employee share ownership contributes significantly to reducing the departure intention.

The Agenda Setting Process and its Potential Attitudinal Effects

Agenda setting is a well-documented process in the media effects tradition. It has a strong impact on what issues are perceived as important by the audience. However, there are indications that agenda setting may have an indirect effect on the attitudes. The current study tested the Elaboration Likelihood Model (The ELM) as a possible mechanism of attitude change that may be present in the agenda setting process. The experimental results did not confirm the overall impact of the ELM on attitudes, but it demonstrated separate attitudinal effects of ability operationalized as knowledge. Further, it was also argued that the agenda setting process may have an indirect effect on attitudes through the peripheral route of the ELM.

Attitudinal Effects of Stimulus Co-occurrence and Stimulus Relations: Paradoxical Effects of Cognitive Load

Research suggests that evaluations of an object can be jointly influenced by (a) the mere co-occurrence of the object with a pleasant or unpleasant stimulus (e.g., mere co-occurrence of object A and negative event B) and (b) the object’s specific relation to the co-occurring stimulus (e.g., object A starts vs. stops negative event B). Three experiments investigated the impact of cognitive load during learning on the effects of stimulus co-occurrence and stimulus relations. Counter to the shared prediction of competing theories suggesting that effects of stimulus relations should be reduced by cognitive load during learning, effects of stimulus relations were greater (rather than smaller) under high-load compared with low-load conditions. Effects of stimulus co-occurrence were not significantly affected by cognitive load. The results are discussed in terms of theories suggesting that cognitive load can influence behavioral outcomes via strategic shifts in resource allocation in response to task-specific affordances.

To Blame or to Support? Large-scale Insurgent Attacks on Civilians and Public Trust in State Institutions

While there is a substantial body of literature on the consequences of terror attacks on public attitudes toward state institutions in Western democracies, little is known about the impact that such events have in the context of armed conflict. We address this gap by exploring the attitudinal effects of a 2012 Taliban attack on civilians in Kabul City, Afghanistan. We test two competing hypotheses: the “rally-effect” hypothesis according to which individuals increase their trust in incumbent institutions in the aftermath of violent attacks and the “accountability” hypothesis according to which individuals punish state institutions for their inability to provide security by withdrawing trust. Leveraging a quasi-experiment that compares individuals interviewed before the attack to individuals interviewed thereafter, we find that the attack—in line with the rally-effect hypothesis—increased trust in several state institutions among residents of Kabul City.

Attitudinal Effects of Stimulus Co-Occurrence and Stimulus Relations: Range and Limits of Intentional Control

Research suggests that evaluations of an object can be simultaneously influenced by (a) the mere co-occurrence of the object with a pleasant or unpleasant stimulus (e.g., mere co-occurrence of object A and negative event B) and (b) the object’s particular relation to the co-occurring stimulus (e.g., object A starts vs. stops negative event B). Using a multinomial modeling approach to disentangle the two kinds of influences on choice decisions, three experiments investigated whether learners can intentionally control the relative impact of stimulus co-occurrence and stimulus relations. An integrative analysis of the data from the three experiments ( N = 1,154) indicate that incentivized instructions to counteract effects of stimulus co-occurrence by focusing on stimulus relations increased the impact of stimulus relations without affecting the impact of stimulus co-occurrence. Implications for evaluative learning, intentional control, and public policy are discussed.

Is Negative Campaigning a Matter of Taste? Political Attacks, Incivility, and the Moderating Role of Individual Differences

We test how individual differences moderate the attitudinal effects of attack politics in two online experiments among US respondents, surveyed through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk ( N = 1,408 and N = 1,081). Study 1 tests the moderating effect of personality traits (Big Five, Dark Triad) on the effectiveness of character vs. policy attacks. Study 2 investigates the difference between civil and uncivil attacks and explores the moderating effect of Big Five, Dark Triad, tolerance to negativity and conflict avoidance. Results suggest that the effects of negativity and incivility are not uniform across all respondents. For instance, evaluations of the sponsor are more negative after exposure to negative messages for respondents high in conflict avoidance; respondents high in psychopathy are more likely to have a more negative opinion of the target after being exposed to character attacks, whereas incivility worsen the perception of the target for individuals low in conflict avoidance and agreeableness. Harsher campaigns, in other terms, work particularly well for some – and are particularly rejected by others. The implications of these trends are discussed.

Supplier Engagement in Sustainability Programs: A Field Experiment of Enabling Versus Coercive Formalization

Formal, compliance-focused governance for supply chain sustainability initiatives has a mixed empirical track record. We build on classic research on bureaucracy to examine how “enabling” and “coercive” formalization at the buyer–supplier interface affect attitudes, an important precursor to behavioral engagement. We conduct a randomized field experiment with the supplier community of a South African insurance company to directly compare treatment effects of enabling and coercive interventions. We report and discuss the enabling intervention’s positive attitudinal effects and the moderation of these effects by supplier characteristics. Our findings also reveal some notable null effects, especially from the coercive intervention. We believe this work contributes to a more nuanced understanding of formal governance choices in supply chains and their impact on supplier engagement.

Dictators and Their Subjects: Authoritarian Attitudinal Effects and Legacies

This introductory essay outlines the key themes of the special issue on the long-term impact of autocracies on the political attitudes and behavior of their subjects. Here, we highlight several important areas of theoretical and empirical refinements, which can provide a more nuanced picture of the process through which authoritarian attitudinal legacies emerge and persist. First, we define the nature of attitudinal legacies and their driving mechanisms, developing a framework of competing socialization. Second, we use the competing socialization framework to explain two potential sources of heterogeneity in attitudinal and behavioral legacies: varieties of institutional features of authoritarian regimes, which affect the nature of regime socialization efforts; and variations across different subgroups of (post-)authoritarian citizens, which reflect the nature and strength of alternative socialization efforts. This new framework can help us to better understand contradictory findings in this emerging literature as well as set a new agenda for future research.

Media Reinforcement of Architectural Perceptions for Place Branding

Throughout the past, architectural icons including heritage structures are served as references to create visual identity for any place branding which would reach either by books or news to the public. The mechanism of place branding is developed by every nation for its economic growth, social development, and infrastructure. A very strong strategy called media communication or advertisement leads to attitudinal effects of improved tourism, increased investors or citizens by reaching the target market. Recently media has captured our minds and is proved to be a very strong tool in reinforcing perceptions for almost every activity or routine work. However, people are misguided by their perception related to place branding due to the lack of awareness, authentic sources for information gathering and media’s projected influence on their psychology. Media and advertisement has a huge impact in creating perceptions for any place in the world which need not to be proved authentic always. This study intends to address parameters that have an impact on place branding with a larger focus on iconic architectures. Study objectives include, a) proposing a conceptual framework on place branding by synthesizing literature, and b) preliminary empirical analysis to determine negative and positive implications of place branding on travelers’ guided perceptions. The study uses quantitative method for primary data collection through focused group/survey, data analysis is performed in Predictive Analytical Software v. 20. Findings of the study concludes that place branding (iconic architectures) is reinforced by the media, enabling formation of perceptual influences (positive or negative experiences) – significantly correlating with tourists informed (confident) decisions to visit a destination or not.

Democracy and Retribution: Transitional Justice and Regime Support in Postwar West Germany

How harshly should perpetrators of past abuses be punished, to reinforce the legitimacy of a new democracy? Drawing on sociopsychological theories, we hypothesize that prodemocratic mass attitudes are favored by the perception that defendants in transitional justice trials have been punished in a way that is morally proportional to their offenses. This perception is shaped by the social categorization of defendants and the opinions about the certainty of their guilt that predominate in the mass public. When defendants are largely seen as co-ethnics and their guilt is contested, like in the West German case, prodemocratic attitudes are likely to be strengthened by lighter punishments and undermined by harsher sanctions. The analysis of subnational variation in patterns of punishment in postwar West Germany confirms this hypothesis and shows that these attitudinal effects persist in the medium term. Our findings have implications for research on transitional justice and democratization.