The aim of this study is to explore social media marketing activities and their impact on consumer intentions. This study also analyzes the mediating roles of social identification and satisfaction. The participants in this study were experienced users of two social media platforms Facebook and Instagram in Pakistan. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect data from respondents. We used an online community to invite Facebook and Instagram users to complete the questionnaire in the designated online questionnaire system. Data were (...) collected from 353 respondents, and structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data. Results show that SMMAs have a significant impact on the intentions of users. Furthermore, social identification mediates the relationship between social media activities and satisfaction, and satisfaction mediates the relationship between social media activities and the intentions of users. This will help marketers how to attract customers to develop their intentions. This is the first novel study that used SMMAs to address the user intentions with the role of social identification and satisfaction in the context of Pakistan. (shrink)

The application of game elements of gamification in online shopping is attracting interest from researchers and practitioners. However, it remains unclear how gamification affects and improves consumer purchase intention on online shopping platforms, which still leaves a gap in our knowledge. To narrow this theoretical gap, a theoretical model has been built in this study. This model adopts cognitive evaluation theory to explain the impact of gamification elements on consumer purchase intention. Data was collected from 322 online shopping consumers who (...) used a flash game to test their purchase intention after playing games. The results show that game rewards, absorption and autonomy of gamification positively enhance sense of enjoyment, and that it helps people meet their psychological needs, which ultimately affects the online purchase intention of consumers. This study is helpful in analyzing the factors involved in the successful introduction of gamification on online shopping platforms in more detail. (shrink)

The novel coronavirus (COVID-19) has imperatively shaken the behavior of the global financial markets. This study estimated the impact of COVID-19 on the behavior of the financial markets of Europe and the US. The results revealed that the returns of the S&P 500 index have been greatly affected by a lockdown in the US owing to COVID-19. However, the health crisis generated due to the novel coronavirus significantly decreased the stock returns of the Nasdaq Composite index. The results also showed (...) that the economic crisis generated from the pandemic in Spain has had more impact on the IBEX 35 as compared to the health crisis itself. On the other hand, in the long-run, Italy’s stock markets are more affected by the health crisis as contrasted with the economic crisis, while, in the short-run, both lockdown conditions and economic instability lower the stock returns of FTSE MIB. The UK stock markets witnessed that in the short-run, deficiency of health management systems imperatively damaged the stock returns of the London Stock Exchange. The investigation revealed that deficiency of health systems and lockdown conditions have imperatively damaged the structure of financial markets, inferring that sustainable development of these nations is at risk due to COVID-19. The study suggested that governments should allocate more of their budget to the health sector to overcome a health crisis in the future. (shrink)

Departing from a critical norm research perspective, the paper first sketches the need to unveil the Eurocentric and secular bias of International Relations (IR) as a discipline in general and its constructivist norm research program in particular. With regard to human rights norms, and religious freedom in particular, the dominant liberal-secular international human rights law understanding of religious freedom marginalizes religious, and especially, Islamic grounds and understandings of this truly global norm. Indeed, it demonstrates both, the dominant ideational perspective of (...) religious freedom as a Western human right grounded by Western-canonical thinkers, and the limits of accommodating religion and religious voices in IR. In contrast, and against the background of a post-secular IR, the paper seeks to unveil alternative and marginalized bodies of Islamic knowledge for the sake of a more comprehensive picture to be painted by IR. By reconstructing reformist Islamic thought and Islamic ideational perspectives and conceptualizations of religious freedom, the paper seeks to let these voices speak for themselves as truly genuine Islamic contributions to IR. The overall aim is threefold: to theoretically connect critical norm research and post-secular approaches with reformist Islamic thought by conceptualizingijtihadas religious norm contestation; to unveil the double marginalized character of critical Muslim voices in IR; and finally to paint a broader and more comprehensive picture of Islam and IR by revealing an alternative Islamic genealogy of universal religious freedom. (shrink)

Social media advertisement is a growing phenomenon designed to reach and engage customers. However, despite their continued adoption, less remains known regarding the effectiveness of social media ads to co-create brand value. In response to this gap, this study aims to deepen the theoretical understanding of consumer value co-creation through social media advertising value. The data were collected using purposive sampling from 286 experienced social-media users, and the model was tested using partial least square -based structural equation modeling. The results (...) indicate that entertainment, aesthetic appeal, interactivity, and trendiness significantly affect the adverting value of social media ads. In turn, ad value affects consumers’ intention for value co-creation. Consequently, our findings suggest the importance of social media advertising value where marketers may enhance consumer-brand engagement by incorporating interesting content, which may encourage the customer’s interaction with the social media ads and strengthen value co-creation behavior. The results further contribute to nascent marketing literature by demonstrating that value co-creation acts as an antecedent to generating positive electronic word-of-mouth on social media platforms to drive consumers’ online brand purchase intention. (shrink)

Nūr Muḥammad is one of the teachings in Sufism that studies the beginning of the creation of the universe. The Sufis discussed Nūr Muḥammad through God's tajallī (manifestation), and they believed that only Insan Kamil (Perfect Humans) possessed the perfection of His tajallī. This Sufi theory can be comprehended through the dhawqi approach. This research will deal with Nūr Muḥammad's theory of Sufism through the perspective of Tijaniyah Tarekat. The data for this study was obtained through library research utilizing a (...) documentary technique. The collected data will be analyzed using the descriptive analysis method. This study finds that the Tijaniyah Tarekat is a Sufism institution that bases its teachings and practices on the concept of Nūr Muḥammad in the form of ṣalawāt al-fātiḥ and ṣalawāt jawharah al-kamāl. This Tarekat's elucidation of Nūr Muḥammad is also built on and consistent with the explication of authoritative Sufis in Islam's intellectual and spiritual tradition. (shrink)

Relational bullying is a form of indirect bullying that often occurs in schools, involving acts of exclusion, neglect, spreading negative rumors, gossip, and social manipulation. This research aims to develop a theoretical model of relational bullying and determine the influence of extraversion personality, peer conformity, and school climate on it in boarding students. This research uses a quantitative approach. The study involved 210 madrasah tsanawiyah students boarding at Makrifatul Ilmi and Al Quraniyah Islamic boarding schools in South Bengkulu Regency. The (...) results showed that theoretical models of influence can influence relational bullying among students. The R square value was 0.68, indicating that personality variables extraversion, peer conformity, and school climate can explain relational bullying by 68%. Extraverted personality had a positive effect on relational bullying, peer conformity had a positive effect, and school climate had a positive effect. This research contributes to the development of a more specific relational bullying theory model in psychology and suggests a holistic approach that includes guidance and counseling for teachers, collaboration between parents and the school, socialization and education for interventions to overcome relational bullying behavior. (shrink)

This study adds to business ethics research by examining how employees’ religiosity might enhance their propensity to engage in change-oriented citizenship behavior, as well as how this effect may be invigorated in adverse organizational climates with respect to voluntarism. Two-wave survey data collected from employees in Pakistan show that change-oriented citizenship activities increase to the extent that employees can draw on their personal resource of religiosity and perceive little adversity, measured in this study with respect to whether voluntarism is encouraged. (...) Further, the relative usefulness of religiosity for spurring change-oriented citizenship behavior is particularly strong when employees experience high levels of this organizational adversity, because employees with high religiosity tend to believe that such behavior is more needed in these organizational contexts. For organizations, these results demonstrate that the energy derived from religiosity may stimulate voluntary efforts that invoke organizational change, and the perceived value of such energy allocation is greater when employees perceive organizational environments that provide little encouragement to go beyond formal job duties. (shrink)

Using the assumptions of Sternberg Duplex Theory of Hate, the present study reveals the combined effects of similar competitor offer and narcissistic personality on brand equity through the underlying mechanism of brand hate. Specifically, we hypothesize that brand hate mediates the relationship between similar competitor offer and brand equity. Moreover, we propose that similar competitor offer and brand hate relationship are stronger for narcissistic individuals. By employing a multi-wave time-lagged research design, we collected data from a sample of dairy product (...) consumers in Pakistan. The findings of moderated-mediation regression analyses indicate that Brand hate mediates the relationship between similar competitor offer and brand equity; and Narcissistic personality moderates a similar competitor offer and brand hate relationship such that a high similar competitor offer led to greater brand hate when narcissism was high. Furthermore, conditional indirect effects reveal that brand hate mediates the relationship between similar competitor offer and brand equity only with individuals exhibiting narcissistic personality traits. The current study offers great insights to managers that by managing similar competitor offer, they can manage the development of brand hate, which can subsequently effect brand equity. Moreover, by profiling customers on the basis of their personalities, marketing managers can effectively invest only in customers with positive tendencies. The current study is unique in that it highlights new avenues in existing research by extending the nascent domain of brand hate in consumer–brand relationships. (shrink)

The importance of the hidden curriculum is recognised as a practical training ground for the absorption of medical ethics by healthcare professionals. Pakistan’s healthcare sector is hampered by the exclusion of ethics from medical and nursing education curricula and the absence of monitoring of ethical violations in the clinical setting. Nurses have significant knowledge of the hidden curriculum taught during clinical practice, due to long working hours in the clinic and front-line interaction with patients and other practitioners.

This paper navigates the relationship between the growing influence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the foundational principles of academic integrity. It offers an in-depth analysis of how key academic stakeholders—publishers and universities—are crafting strategies and guidelines to integrate AI into the sphere of scholarly work. These efforts are not merely reactionary but are part of a broader initiative to harness AI’s potential while maintaining ethical standards. The exploration reveals a diverse array of stances, reflecting the varied applications of AI in (...) academic settings. These range from conservative approaches emphasizing the need for stringent AI regulations to more progressive strategies that seek to leverage AI’s capabilities. The paper accentuates the importance of guidelines that are adaptable, transparent, and culturally sensitive, acknowledging the global context of academic research. It also highlights the pressing need for effective implementation and enforcement of these guidelines to ensure that the integration of AI into academia does not compromise the integrity of scholarly work. The conclusion emphasizes the dynamic balance required between embracing AI’s transformative potential and upholding the timeless values of academic rigor and ethical research. This comprehensive analysis aims to provide a detailed perspective on the evolving role of AI in academia, fostering a dialog on how best to navigate this new technological frontier while preserving the sanctity of academic scholarship. (shrink)

This paper is a philosophical reflection on how the development of science and technology can be studied better through the tradition of Islamic philosophy. This is attempted because the approach that has been used to study science and technology in the Islamic world is still centered on the process of assimilation or Islamization of Knowledge. In a critical reading of the two approaches, the problems that arise from the study of contemporary science and technology become something that is difficult to (...) anticipate. In fact, the development of science and technology is also moving very fast. This raises the question of the need for alternative approaches in the study of contemporary science and technology in the arena of Islamic Philosophy. To solve this problem, the author conducted an initial experiment that could elaborate Irfani's approach on the one hand with studies of contemporary science and technology on the other. This becomes possible with the reinterpretation of the concept of emanation that exists in the discourse of Yazdiyah's Hudhuri Science. Based on this interpretation as well as the perspective that Mishbah Yazdi has made about the help of Irfan in philosophy, the application of the Irfani approach in the study of science and technology becomes possible as part of the practice of Hudhuri Science. On a more practical level, the author also uses this Irfani approach in a scenario format to read the vision of contemporary science and technology in the NBIC discourse. (shrink)

Impostor syndrome or Impostor phenomenon is a belief that a person thinks their success is due to luck or external factors, not their abilities. This psychological trait is present in certain groups like women. In this paper, we propose a neutrosophic trait measure to represent the psychological concept of the trait-anti trait using refined neutrosophic sets. This study analysed a group of 200 undergraduate students for impostor syndrome, perfectionism, introversion and self-esteem: after the COVID pandemic break in 2021. Data labelling (...) was carried out using these neutrosophic trait measures. Machine learning models like Support Vector Machine(SVM), K-nearest neighbour (K-NN), and random forest were used to model the data; SVM provided the best accuracy of 92.15%. (shrink)

Discussions about politics and human power, including discussions about the concept of the state, have been a discussion that has been going on since Greek times until the time of the growth of Islamic philosophy. The overemphasis on the power of reason led early modern Western societies to reject religion in all political discourse. At this stage, all views of man, power, the constitution, and the state eventually ceased to be associated with God. On the other hand, especially among Muslims, (...) religion is still connected with discussions of politics and human power. This paper will reveal how secularization in political thought grew and developed through principles such as the state of nature and the social contract. Then, based on the thought of one of the influential Muslim scholars, Syed Muhammad Naquib Al-Attas, the author tries to provide a critique of the views of Western thinkers such as Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and other philosophers, by presenting the concept of the ideal state form derived from the concept of tamaddun formulated by Al-Attas. This research is literature review research using the descriptive method. The findings of this research show that secularization is a product purely born by Western secular thinkers and not taken from any religious teachings, so Western political concepts cannot always be applied, especially in Muslim societies. (shrink)

Could some social kinds be natural kinds? In this paper, I argue that there are three kinds of social kinds: 1) social kinds whose existence does not depend on human beings having any beliefs or other propositional attitudes towards them ; 2) social kinds whose existence depends in part on specific attitudes that human beings have towards them, though attitudes need not be manifested towards their particular instances ; 3) social kinds whose existence and that of their instances depend in (...) part on specific attitudes that human beings have towards them . Although all three kinds of social kinds are mind-dependent, this does not make them ontologically subjective or preclude them from being natural kinds. Rather, what prevents the third kind of social kinds from being natural kinds is that their properties are conventionally rather than causally linked. (shrink)

Modern technology plays an important role in our daily lives. Many people use technology for their works, interactions, and special interests such as art. Art as a discipline, which expresses human emotion and creative side, takes a new form for its contextualization with the help of information technology. A neologism for this discipline is “digital art.” Some experts who employ a traditional value in their aesthetical perspective consider this new approach unlikely. Walter Benjamin, an eminent figure from this group, stated (...) that art must have an aura in its production as is the case in paintings. With this aura, the work of art and not artwork has uniqueness of value. However, the problem arises when information technology becomes a predominant tool for the work of art. Digital art does not consider the aura as the core value in defining something as a work of art. Furthermore, digital artists think that art can exist within a digital object and maintain its uniqueness. Parallel with the latter, this article will describe the dispute and make a clear statement that a work of art in the digital age does not require aura. (shrink)

نسبی‌انگاری اخلاقی یکی از مکاتب کهن فرااخلاقی است که به وجود ویژگی‌های اخلاقی، و صدق و توجیه احکام اخلاقی می‌پردازد. با این حال، بخشی از بحث‌های مربوط به نسبی‌انگاری متوجّه معناشناسی جملات نسبی است. نظریات نسبی‌انگارانۀ سنّتی زمینه‌گرا هستند، به این معنا که احکام اخلاقی را دارای عنصری می‌دانند که به نحوی ارجاع به گوینده دارد. این دیدگاه نسبی‌انگاری را با چالش‌هایی مواجه می‌کند، از جمله این‌که اختلاف نظر که یکی از اسباب عمدۀ گرایش به نسبی‌انگاری است، به سوء تفاهم (...) فروکاسته می‌شود. برخی نسبی‌انگاران اخیراً تلاش کرده‌اند تا نظریاتی ارائه دهند که با ثابت دانستن محتوای احکام، دچار مشکلات زمینه‌گرایی سنتی نباشد. یکی از این تلاش‌ها، نظریۀ نسبی‌انگاریِ دربارۀ خود (de se relativism) اندی ایگن است. ایگن با ترکیب نظریۀ دیوید لویس درباب محتوای باور، نظریۀ رابرت استالنیکر درباب اظهار، و نظریۀ استعدادی دیوید لویس درباب ارزش، بر آن است که نظریه‌ای نسبی‌انگارانه دربارۀ ارزش ارائه کند که با طبیعی‌انگاری، درونی‌انگاری احکام اخلاقی، و شناختی‌انگاری سازگار باشد، و از اشکالات دیگری که خودِ او بر زمینه‌گرایی وارد می‌کند مبرّا باشد. در این مقاله نظریۀ ایگن بررسی می‌شود و نشان داده می‌شود که نظریۀ او نه‌تنها از اشکالات وارد بر زمینه‌گرایی رها نیست، بلکه به دلیل پذیرش نظریۀ لویس در باب محتوای باور بار بیشتری بر دوش دارد که آن را نسبت به دیگر نظریات نسبی‌انگارانه مرجوح می‌سازد. -/- . (shrink)

Features new to the second edition include a foreword by Tynnetta Muhammad, wife and student of Elijah Muhammad; opening comments by world renowned mathematician Dr. Abdulalim Sahabazz; a new chapter co-authored with Dr. Dorothy Blake Fardan; plus guided questions and power point notes to stimulate discourse around Elijah Muhammad's educational ideas.

Die Spuren Al-Batlajusis in der judischen Religionsphilosophe ist ein unveranderter, hochwertiger Nachdruck der Originalausgabe aus dem Jahr 1880. Hansebooks ist Herausgeber von Literatur zu unterschiedlichen Themengebieten wie Forschung und Wissenschaft, Reisen und Expeditionen, Kochen und Ernahrung, Medizin und weiteren Genres. Der Schwerpunkt des Verlages liegt auf dem Erhalt historischer Literatur. Viele Werke historischer Schriftsteller und Wissenschaftler sind heute nur noch als Antiquitaten erhaltlich. Hansebooks verlegt diese Bucher neu und tragt damit zum Erhalt selten gewordener Literatur und historischem Wissen auch fur (...) die Zukunft bei. (shrink)

Firms have traditionally responded to environmental violations by increasing information disclosure and/or communication to manage stakeholder perceptions. As such, these approaches may be symbolic in nature, with no genuine intention to improve the environment. We draw from restorative justice grounded in stakeholder theory and explore a relatively new approach in the form of supplemental environmental projects aimed at restoring the environment, and empirically examine the role of corporate governance in firms’ decisions to undertake reparative actions. Using environmental violations and SEPs (...) data from the US Environmental Protection Agency between 2002 and 2015, we find that firms with smaller boards are more likely to undertake SEPs. We also find that firms with higher board independence and CEO duality undertake SEPs more frequently; however, board gender diversity and the existence of a sustainability committee appear to have no impacts. These results are robust to propensity score matching and an alternative data source. We extend the scope of stakeholder theory by emphasizing a new approach—restorative justice—by which corporations can repair damaged relationships and also improve the environment. We also contribute to corporate governance and environmentalism literature by identifying governance structures that promote environmental restorative justice. Thus, our study will inform different stakeholders, including regulators, shareholders, and boards of directors, and will open new avenues for business ethics scholarship. (shrink)

Substituted judgment assumes adequate knowledge of patient’s mind-set. However, surrogates’ prediction of individual healthcare decisions is often inadequate and may be based on shared background rather than patient-specific knowledge. It is not known whether surrogate’s prediction of patient’s integrative life-story narrative is better. Respondents in 90 family pairs rank-ordered 47 end-of-life statements as life-story narrative measure and completed instruments on decision-control preference and healthcare-outcomes acceptability as control measures, from respondent’s view and predicted pair’s view. They also scored their confidence in (...) surrogate’s decision-making and familiarity with pair’s healthcare-preferences. Life-story narratives’ prediction was examined by calculating correlation of statements’ ranking scores between respondent-personal and respondent-surrogate Q-sorts and between respondent-surrogate and pair-personal Q-sorts before and after controlling for correlation with respondent-personal scores, and by comparing percentages of respondent-surrogate Q-sorts co-loading with pair-personal vs. respondent-personal Q-sorts. Accuracy in predicting decision-control preference and healthcare-outcomes acceptability was determined by percent concordance. Results were compared among subgroups defined by intra-pair relationship, surrogate’s decision-making confidence, and healthcare-preferences familiarity. Mean age was 35.4 years, 69% were females, and 73 and 80% reported ≥ very good health and life-quality, respectively. Mean surrogate’s decision-making confidence score was 3.35 and 75% were ≥ familiar with pair’s healthcare-preferences. Mean projection, simulation, and adjusted-simulation correlations were 0.68, 0.42, and 0.26, respectively. Out of 180 respondent-surrogate Q-sorts, 24, 9, and 32% co-loaded with respondent-personal, pair-personal, or both Q-sorts, respectively. Accuracy in predicting decision-control preference and healthcare-outcomes acceptability was 47 and 52%, respectively. Surrogate’s decision-making confidence score correlated with adjusted-simulation’s correlation score. There were significant differences among the husband-wife, parent-child, and sibling-sibling subgroups in percentage of respondent-surrogate Q-sorts co-loading with pair-personal Q-sorts and percent agreement on healthcare-outcomes acceptability. Despite high self-reported surrogate’s decision-making confidence and healthcare-preferences familiarity, family surrogates are variably inadequate in simulating life-story narratives. Simulation accuracy may not follow the next-of-kin concept and is 38% based on shared background. (shrink)

The aim of the present study was to examine the mediation effects of resilience and stress, two perceived opposite constructs, in the relationship between mindfulness and happiness. Mindful Attention Awareness Scale, Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale, Subjective Happiness Scale, Depression Anxiety Stress Scales short version-21 were administered to 523 undergraduate university students in India. Structural Equation Modeling with bootstrapping was applied to test the mediating effects of resilience and stress. Results showed that resilience and stress partially mediated the mindfulness-happiness relationship. In addition, (...) resilience partially mediated the relationship of mindfulness to stress. Findings suggest that mindfulness may play an influential role in enhancing happiness through the mediating effects of resilience and stress. (shrink)

In step with rapid advancements in computer vision, vehicle classification demonstrates a considerable potential to reshape intelligent transportation systems. In the last couple of decades, image processing and pattern recognition-based vehicle classification systems have been used to improve the effectiveness of automated highway toll collection and traffic monitoring systems. However, these methods are trained on limited handcrafted features extracted from small datasets, which do not cater the real-time road traffic conditions. Deep learning-based classification systems have been proposed to incorporate the (...) above-mentioned issues in traditional methods. However, convolutional neural networks require piles of data including noise, weather, and illumination factors to ensure robustness in real-time applications. Moreover, there is no generalized dataset available to validate the efficacy of vehicle classification systems. To overcome these issues, we propose a convolutional neural network-based vehicle classification system to improve robustness of vehicle classification in real-time applications. We present a vehicle dataset comprising of 10,000 images categorized into six-common vehicle classes considering adverse illuminous conditions to achieve robustness in real-time vehicle classification systems. Initially, pretrained AlexNet, GoogleNet, Inception-v3, VGG, and ResNet are fine-tuned on self-constructed vehicle dataset to evaluate their performance in terms of accuracy and convergence. Based on better performance, ResNet architecture is further improved by adding a new classification block in the network. To ensure generalization, we fine-tuned the network on the public VeRi dataset containing 50,000 images, which have been categorized into six vehicle classes. Finally, a comparison study has been carried out between the proposed and existing vehicle classification methods to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed vehicle classification system. Consequently, our proposed system achieved 99.68%, 99.65%, and 99.56% accuracy, precision, and F1-score on our self-constructed dataset. (shrink)

On the discourse of Islamic ethics and its relation to contemporary modern societies based on the thoughts of Tariq Ramadan, a prominent Muslim scholar.

Design problems in structural engineering are often modeled as differential equations. These problems are posed as initial or boundary value problems with several possible variations in structural designs. In this paper, we have derived a mathematical model that represents different structures of beam-columns by varying axial load with or without internal forces including bending rigidity. We have also developed a novel solver, the LeNN-NM algorithm, which consists of weighted Legendre polynomials, and a single path following optimizer, the Nelder–Mead algorithm. To (...) evaluate the performance of our solver, we have considered three design problems representing beam-columns. The values of performance indicators, MAD, TIC, NSE, and ENSE, are calculated for a hundred simulations. The outcome of our statistical analysis points to the superiority of the LeNN-NM algorithm. Graphical illustrations are presented to further elaborate on our claims. (shrink)

This study examines the R&D investment behaviour of different types of family-controlled firms with the moderating role of ownership discrepancy between cash-flow rights and excess voting rights by using the sufficiency conditions’ theoretical framework of ability and willingness developed by De Massis. It uses data from family firms that have issued A-shares from 2008 to 2018. They used pooled OLS regression for data analysis and Tobit regression for robustness checks. This study classifies family firm types into two categories, namely, the (...) lone-controller family firms (LCFFs) and the multi-controller family firms (MCFFs), with each being further classified as “excess” or “no excess” voting rights. Both LCFFs without excess voting rights and MCFFs with excess voting rights have the “ability” and “willingness” toward R&D investment. LCFFs with excess voting rights and MCFFs without excess voting rights only have the ability but low willingness to invest in R&D. The study also establishes that Chinese family-controlled firms are heterogeneous toward risky investment. To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to differentiate Chinese family firms by their unique ownership structure characteristics in investigating the effect of the family firm structure on R&D investment. The study is a novel attempt to test the willingness and ability framework of LCFFs and MCFFs. Previous studies based on agency theory have tacitly assumed that ability and willingness exist in family-controlled firms. However, this study challenges this implicit assumption. (shrink)

Includes an introd. of 49 p. by S. G. Abbas.

This paper examines the phenomenon of ‘interactive kinds’ first identified by Ian Hacking. An interactive kind is one that is created or significantly modified once a concept of it has been formulated and acted upon in certain ways. Interactive kinds may also ‘loop back’ to influence our concepts and classifications. According to Hacking, interactive kinds are found exclusively in the human domain. After providing a general account of interactive kinds and outlining their philosophical significance, I argue that they are not (...) confined to the human realm, but that they can also occur elsewhere. Hence, I conclude by arguing that interactive kinds pose a challenge to scientific realism about kinds by making it difficult to make a distinction between real and non-real kinds. (shrink)