Who is an evangelist? Food tourists’ positive and negative eWOM behavior

Purpose This study aims to examine food tourists’ engagement in positive and negative electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) by considering the following questions: Do satisfied customers engage in advocacy, and do dissatisfied customers make the same effort to spread their negative experiences? Which restaurant experience attributes influence eWOM behavior? What demographic and psychographic characteristics contribute to advocacy? Design/methodology/approach Using data from an online survey of 456 consumers with restaurant experience in the tourism context, this study applied simultaneous Tobit estimation to examine the research hypotheses. Findings Engagement in negative eWOM because of poor experiences was stronger than engagement in positive eWOM because of positive experiences. Food taste was a critical attribute for both positive and negative eWOM. Authenticity was influential for positive eWOM only, and value was influential for negative eWOM only. Atmosphere, service and location were found to be insignificant, indicating that they are ‘indifferent’ factors for eWOM in the food tourism context. Female customers were more active in negative advocacy, while Generation Y customers were more active in positive advocacy. Food involvement was significantly related to both positive and negative eWOM. Research limitations/implications The results of this study provide useful marketing and service insights for restaurant managers in the digitally connected world, enabling them to formulate services based on factors critical for restaurant eWOM in the tourism context. Originality/value To fill a gap in the current literature in the era of digital marketing, this study takes a comprehensive yet industry-specific perspective on eWOM engagement by examining demographic factors and the food involvement of consumers as well as restaurant experience attributes. By investigating both positive and negative eWOM, this study presents meaningful practical and theoretical implications.

Synthesis of Polylactic Acid (PLA) by Polycondensation Method

The Polylactic acid (PLA) is compostable and natural renewable sourced plastic type. Its mechanical properties quite similar to the PET, therefore the PLA is a good alternative for strongly ruled food industrial application. The PLA only has one critical attribute – the relatively low glass transition temperature. According to the relevant literature the glass transition of PLA is in the range of 40-70°C. In light of this fact, this material can be used only in that segments of food industrial field where the packaging process temperature are under of the lower limit of Tg range. The actual Tg of a material is highly depends on the molar mass and material structure, therefore the molar mass and the structure of material should be designed according to the future requirements of application and procedures.

Engaging Young Children with Mathematical Activities Involving Different Representations: Triangles, Patterns, and Counting Objects

This paper synthesises research from three separate studies, analysing how different representations of a mathematical concept may affect young children’s engagement with mathematical activities. Children between five and seven years old engaged in counting objects, identifying triangles and completing repeating patterns. The implementation of three counting principles were investigated: the one-to-one principle, the stable-order principle and the cardinal principal. Children’s reasoning when identifying triangles was analysed in terms of visual, critical and non-critical attribute reasoning. With regard to repeating patterns, we analyse children’s references to the minimal unit of repeat of the pattern. Results are discussed in terms of three functions of multiple external representations: to complement, to constrain and to construct.

Hospitality industry and the service culture in Europe

The purpose of this article/research is to explore and analyze three most important factors that directly can affect the Culture of service in European Hospitality Industry. The paper of this study showed that relationship between the quality of education in Hospitality and Leisure, the poor recruitment and especially the lack of continuing education influence the guest’s service and its quality. The findings reveal that the employee’s culture of service is a critical attribute; while unsatisfactory recruitment, low education and the most critical element lack of continuing education influence negative the guest satisfaction and expectations.

Incorporating lakes in stream fish habitat models: are we missing a key landscape attribute?

Although lakes and rivers are intimately connected, more effort is needed to develop conceptual approaches accounting for lake–stream interactions within the drainage network. Lakes can buffer the impacts of environmental variability in streams and facilitate stream fish recolonization processes. However, lakes have rarely been incorporated in habitat models for stream fish. We examine whether including the presence of lakes in habitat models can improve our understanding of brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis) abundance in streams. We quantified brook trout relative abundance in 36 streams over 3 consecutive years by single-pass electrofishing. Relative abundance of brook trout in streams was greatest when lakes were present in the stream network. Lakes had greater influence on relative abundance in headwater streams than in larger streams. These results emphasize the importance of considering lakes as a critical attribute in landscape fish habitat models, many of which focus on terrestrial landscape variables. We discuss potential gains from incorporating the presence of lakes in (i) multiscale habitat models, (ii) analyses of spatiotemporal distribution of thermal refuges, and (iii) metrics of habitat connectivity in lake–stream networks.

Investigating students' similarity judgments in organic chemistry

Organic chemistry is possibly the most visual science of all chemistry disciplines. The process of scientific inquiry in organic chemistry relies on external representations, such as Lewis structures, mechanisms, and electron arrows. Information about chemical properties or driving forces of mechanistic steps is not available through direct perception, and thus looking beyond the respresentation is challenging for learners. In this study, we investigated the categorization behavior of undergraduate students enrolled in an organic chemistry course when engaged in various categorization tasks involving electrophilic addition reactions to alkenes. The critical attribute a student chose to make a category out of a set of reactions was classified as perceptual or relational and gave insights into how students process and store information about reactions at an early level of expertise. Our results support the notion that students are prone to the surface level of representations and make sense of reactions depicted in a very minimalistic fashion. Implications for approaching this phenomenon in teaching are discussed.

Becoming a Culturally Competent Educational Leader

Cultural competency is a critical attribute for effective leadership. The journey of becoming culturally competent begins with an understanding of one's own cultural background and how it impacts interactions with students, colleagues and families. Through examination of the literature, reflection, conversation and diverse experiences, leaders can gain the knowledge, skills and dispositions to embrace diversity and more effectively serve students and families. With the ultimate goal of serving all students and families to capitalize on diversity, the journey toward cultural competency is life-long, informed by cultural backgrounds and supported through experience and dialogue.

Maximizing The Impact Of Improvement Efforts On Customer Satisfaction

When a customer satisfaction survey consists of a large number of attributes (questionnaire items), determination of critical attributes that would make the biggest impact on customers overall satisfaction could be important, but very tedious and time-consuming process. Even though the critical attributes are identified, the improvement efforts toward these attributes are often misdirected and wasted because of the mismatch between the improvement efforts and the critical needs of the affected customer group. This paper introduces a method with which improvement efforts can be tailored to the needs of the customer group who could bring the most impactful influence on improving customer satisfaction. For the critical attribute considered, the percentage of customers who assigned a specific satisfaction rating is obtained, and the cumulative percentages of customers are examined and the target group of customers to whom the improvement efforts would be tailored is identified. The piecewise linear approximation method is also discussed to estimate the non-linear relationship of the attribute, which also may help determine the target customer group. The overall shape of the piecewise function and the slopes at the line segments may be used in determining which attributes are satisfaction-maintaining or satisfaction-enhancing, and where and how the improvement efforts should be focused in order to maximize the effectiveness of the improvement efforts.