Research

Bill Ross and Co-authors Receive Prestigious Lehmann Award

Posted on by

Bill Ross, ING Global Professor, and his colleagues, Sanjay Puligadda (Miami University) and Rajdeep Grewal (Penn State University) were awarded the coveted Lehmann Award for their article, “Individual Differences in Brand Schematicity,” Journal of Marketing Research (February 2012). The Lehmann Award (in honor of Donald R. Lehmann, Columbia University) is given annually to the best dissertation-based paper (within the past 2 years) in either of the two premier marketing journals, Journal of Marketing and Journal of Marketing Research. The article was Puligadda’s dissertation, which he completed at Penn State with Ross and Grewal as his advisers.

If you had decided to buy a camera, would you focus on which brands the store carried? Or, would you focus on the characteristics of the different cameras the store had in stock?

This paper suggests that if you are high in brand schematicity, you would be more likely to attend to the different brands the store carried, whereas if you were low in brand schematicity you would be more likely to attend to the characteristics of the cameras the store carried.

A schema is a set of expectations a person has about what will happen in a certain situation. Most folks, for example, have a schema for what they will experience in a fast food restaurant. Schematicity is the tendency on the part of consumers to process information using specific schema. People who are high in brand schematicity are likely to process products in terms of brands, not product characteristics, whereas people who are low in brand schematicity are likely to process products in terms of product characteristics not brands.

Don’t confuse brand schematicity with brand loyalty. Someone who is high in brand schematicity does not necessarily have a preference for a certain brand; instead, they have a preference to organize their thinking by brands.

In this article, Ross, Puligadda, and Grewal built a theoretical basis for brand schematicity and report on three studies that develop measures of brand schematicity; three studies that consider brand schematicity in the context of associated constructs and establish its predictive validity; and a final study that reveals that a consumer’s brand schematicity influences brand extension evaluations.

OPIM Research Productivity Ranked Among the Best Worldwide

Posted on by

UConn’s Operations & Information Management Department was recently ranked among the best business schools internationally—and #1 in the Northeast—for information systems research productivity over the last five years.

“These rankings are a clear indicator that we have one of the top research faculty groups in the country and around the world,” said Ram Gopal, professor and department head of OPIM. “Some of the most cutting-edge research in areas such as intellectual property rights, healthcare IT, auction markets, and advanced analytics is going on right here at UConn.”Continue Reading

UConn Real Estate to Present at International Conference on Residential Housing Policy in China

Posted on by Claire Hall

The UConn Center for Real Estate and Urban Economic Studies is playing a key role in the International Conference on Residential Housing Policy in China, taking place at the end of July in Shenzhen. The conference will focus on housing policies and systems in China after twenty years of reform in their housing market system. The UConn Real Estate Center co-sponsored the conference together with the Shenzhen Real Estate Research Center and the Real Estate Research Institute at Tsinghua University.

Two UConn professors are among five guests from the United States invited to make presentations to an audience of Chinese scholars and government administrators. Professor and Center Director John Glascock will be discussing housing markets development and Professor Katherine Pancak will be discussing real estate law issues. The additional U.S. speakers asked to share their expertise in housing policy are Professor Robert Edelstein from the University of California-Berkeley, Dr. Alex Schwartz, author of “Housing Policy in the United States,” and Frank Nothaft, chief economist at Freddie Mac.

Center for Real Estate and Urban Economic Studies Releases Real Estate Markets Update

Posted on by Claire Hall

The Center for Real Estate and Urban Economic Studies at the University of Connecticut School of Business has released its latest update on Connecticut Real Estate Markets.

Connecticut housing markets showed significant signs of improvement according to preliminary numbers for the third quarter of 2012. In a typical town and metropolitan area, prices in the third quarter were virtually unchanged from a year ago. Moreover the number of transactions was up by more than 20%, confirming a pattern of increases.

For more information, access the report here: “CT House Prices 2012 3rd Quarter”

Universitas 21 – Doctoral Research Conference in Business

Posted on by Claire Hall

The University of Connecticut School of Business hosted the Universitas 21 Doctoral Research Conference in Business (DRCB) April 10-13, 2012. Ph.D. students from twelve U21 schools, including UConn, presented research and received feedback regarding their dissertations from their counterparts, faculty from the participating universities, and UConn faculty. The vision of U21 DRCB is to create a global learning and research platform to prepare the next generation of intellectual leaders in the fields of business, commerce and economics.

This inaugural event was created as a model for future international conferences to be sponsored with Universitas 21. Participants were welcomed at an opening reception at the Hartford Hilton by Robert Bird, Program Chair; Gary Powell, Ph.D. Program Director; and Michele Metcalf, Program Manager. Interim Dean Karla H. Fox greeted the group at the Graduate Business Learning Center the following morning where presentation sessions were held throughout the day. All presentations were video recorded with copies of tapes being provided to presenters. That evening, a Gala Dinner was held at the Hartford Society Room featuring Mr. Jonas Haertle, UN PRME Secretariat. The final day of the conference was held at the Storrs campus at the School of Business and the Alumni Center. Two panel sessions were held on “Finishing the Dissertation” and “From Dissertation to Publication”- which were also recorded and will be available on the website soon. Participants also enjoyed lunch at the School of Business Café, dinner at the Alumni Center as well as a tour of the campus. An optional trip to Boston was also available to participants on Friday.

Attendees at the event included faculty and Ph.D. students from the National University of Singapore, Tecnológico de Monterrey, University College Dublin, University of Amsterdam, University of Auckland, University of Birmingham, University of Delhi, University of Glasgow, University of New South Wales, University of Nottingham, and University of Queensland.

The tracks included International Business, Exchange Rates, Advertising and Branding, Knowledge, Accountability, Investment, Consumer Behavior, Leadership, Management Information Systems, Economics, Corporate Finance, Creativity, Strategy, Taxation and Auditing, Strategies, Markets and Products/Services, and Cognitive Theory.

Photo: Attendees of the Universitas 21

Annual Faculty Awards

Posted on by Claire Hall

At the beginning of this month, the Teaching and Research Committee met and evaluated nominations for the annual Faculty Awards.  A total of nine winners, a runner up, and two honorable mentions were awarded.

Under the Research category the winners are Sarah Rice and David Weber for Best Paper.  Their paper is titled “How Effective is Internal Control Reporting under SOZ 404? Determinants of the (Non-) Disclosure of Existing Material Weaknesses.” Continue Reading

Paper Received Best IS Publication of the Year Award 2010

Posted on by Claire Hall

A paper co-written by faculty members of the University of Connecticut School of Business Department of Operations and Information Management has been nominated as the best ACM TMIS paper of 2010 and is also one out of five recipients of the Best IS Publications of the Year Awards 2010.  The paper, titled “Why Give Away Something for Nothing? Investigating Virtual Goods Pricing and Permission Strategies,” was co-written in December 2010 by Dr. Sulin Ba, Professor; Dr. Dan Ke; Dr. Jan Stallaert, Associate Professor; and Zhongju Zhang, Associate Professor.

The Best Publications Awards were established to recognize the breadth of high quality work that is being published in the Information Systems discipline. This award was designed to bring outstanding papers across a range of journals to the attention of the IS community, and to give due credit to the journals in which they are published. Each year journal editors nominate the best paper published in their journal in the preceding year. A committee composed of Senior Scholars reviews the nominations from journal editors and selects five papers as the recipients of this prestigious award.

“Why Give Away Something for Nothing? Investigating Virtual Goods Pricing and Permission Strategies” is about the world of virtual goods.  The question of how a creator sets prices for a virtual good, as to maximize their profit, is discussed.  The major difference with virtual goods is that many times consumers will want to use multiple copies of the same good, which results in an increase in the consumer’s utility.  The focus of the research is on the copy permission of virtual goods.  An economic model is developed and examined under different conditions, to find which setting is best for the copy permission that leads to the highest profit, as well as how subsequent pricing strategies are affected.  Both theoretical and practical implications of researched are discussed within the paper.

Three Management Professors and a Ph.D. Student Receive a Scholarly Impact Award for their research

Posted on by Claire Hall

The Journal of Management (JOM) reviews all articles published in JOM five years prior and awards the top five highest impact papers . All JOM papers published in 2006 were considered for the 2011 Scholarly Impact Awards. A committee of four Associate Editors considered each paper according to the following criteria:

  • Number of citations (both with and without self-citations)
  • The breadth and quality of the papers/journals citing each paper
  • Total downloads
  • Perceived quality and potential for continued impact

The committee explored who cited each paper–whether the papers are being cited by top journals, as well as whether the papers are having wide penetration. Then the committee considered the strength of each paper and its potential for continued contribution.

The University of Connecticut School of Business is honored to have a paper written by three of its professors and a Ph.D. graduate recognized by the JOM. The paper, titled “Ambidexterity and performance in small- to medium-sized firms: The pivotal role of top management team behavioral integration” was written by: Michael Lubatkin, Thomas John & Bette Wolff Family Chair in Strategic Entrepreneurship and Professor, Management Department; Zeki Simsek, Associate Professor and Ackerman Scholar, Management Department; Yan Ling, UConn Ph.D. graduate; John Veiga, Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor and Northeast Utilities Chair in Business Ethics, Management Department.

Sage, SMA, and JOM will be recognizing this achievement at their annual board meeting at the Academy of Management conference. At this event, a Best Paper Prize will be awarded. The Best Paper Prize comes with a cash honorarium.