Chrisovaladis Malesios

Social Capital in Greece: Measurement and Comparative Perspectives

The primary aim of this article is to analyze components of aggregate social capital in Greece. Through the comparison with other European countries, it is concluded that social capital in the country may be characterized as weak. In addition, similarities among South European countries are underlined. Finally, an index of social capital scores across Greek regions is created and presented. The need for further research is emphasized, regarding mainly the impacts of social capital on several aspects of Greek society, along with the formulation of the appropriate policies for strengthening it.

Exploratory factor analysis for the Hirsch index, 17 h-type variants, and some traditional bibliometric indicators

The purpose of this article is to come up with a valid categorization and to examine the performance and properties of a wide range of h-type indices presented recently in the relevant literature. By exploratory factor analysis (EFA) we study the relationship between the h-index, its variants, and some standard bibliometric indicators of 26 physicists compiled from the Science Citation Index in the Web of Science.

The influence of social capital on willingness to pay for the environment among European citizens

ABSTRACT Social capital has been recognized as one of the most influential concepts in social and political sciences. It is assumed that it has significant influence on several issues such as health status, educational achievement and environmental attitudes. In the present article we attempt to investigate the influence of social capital on the tendency of European citizens to contribute money for the environment using data from EVS 1999/2000. Firstly, an estimation of individual social capital is calculated for European citizens with the use of Confirmatory Factor Analysis. Secondly, the relation between individual social capital and willingness to pay (WTP) is examined. Thirdly, further evidence is provided by introducing in the analysis the influence of other factors such as income, age, gender and educational level. In addition, the influence of contextual factors on WTP is explored. Through the results of the study it is observed that most European citizens are willing to pay for the environment and their decision is influenced significantly from elements of social capital. Furthermore, on a contextual level only some of the factors investigated explain the tendency to contribute money for the environment.

The role of NIMBY in opposing the siting of wind farms: evidence from Greece

This paper aims to assess the relative importance of a NIMBY (‘Not-In-My-Back-Yard’) stance on an individuals opposition to the siting of a wind farm vis-à-vis other predictors, such as perceived effects (costs, risks and benefits associated with the project), perceived fairness of the siting decision and societal trust. Data originate from two case studies, a small wind farm of just two wind turbines in southern Greece and a mega-project of 153 turbines on the Greek island of Lesvos (aggregate N = 334). We use structural equation modelling (SEM) for testing the theoretically-suggested relations between the various constructs. We find that NIMBY is not the most important predictor of opposition while it is strongly correlated with other predictors, such as the perceived unfairness of the siting decision as well as the risks and costs associated with the wind farm. These latter findings undermine the common-sense idea that wishing a wind farm out of ones vicinity (‘Not-In-My-Back-Yard’) is an example of mere ‘free-riding’. Since the fit of the SEM models was found to be moderate, we discuss the limitations of our study and the implications of our findings as well as suggesting pathways for future research.

Categorizing h-index variants

Utilizing the Hirsch index h and some of its variants for an exploratory factor analysis we discuss whether one of the most important Hirsch-type indices, namely the g-index, comprises information about not only the size of the productive core but also the impact of the papers in the core. We also study the effect of logarithmic and square-root transformation of the data utilized in the factor analysis. To demonstrate our approach we use a real data example analysing the citation records of 26 physicists compiled from the Web of Science. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.

The influence of economic affluence and environmental conditions on an individual's concern for the environment: a Greek case study (2005–2007)

This paper tests the impact of economic affluence and objective environmental conditions on an individuals concern for the environment across Greek regions and over time. Our data originate from three nation-wide surveys conducted in Greece between 2005 and 2007 (N = 3592 individuals). By employing a multilevel hierarchical modelling technique, we are able to check for the influence of micro-level and macro-level predictor variables simultaneously. We find that an individuals environmental concern is largely influenced by micro-level variables and, in particular, positively influenced by family income. Macro-level variables, such as community affluence and objective environmental conditions, turned out to be statistically non-significant. Furthermore, we find that the effects of the various predictors on an individuals concern for the environment vary significantly over time and across regions.

Priorities and perceptions of corporate social responsibility: Insights from the perspective of Greek business professionals

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to inform the business management literature that focuses on the perceptions of business professionals towards the multidimensional and highly complex concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Design/methodology/approach – This study is based on a sample of 118 Greek business executives/middle managers having different functional positions. A questionnaire based on the works of Quazi and O’Brien (2000) and Welford et al. (2007) was designed and used for data collection. Findings – Key findings denote occupational health and safety, benign environmental management as well as responsible production methods as the top CSR priorities. Two different CSR viewpoints emerged from the factor analysis reflecting a pragmatic and a more socially responsive interpretation of corporate responsibility. Cluster analysis confirmed such contrasting perspectives allowing the partition of data in distinctive groups according to the relative inclination on either of the identifie...

Influential Engineers: Where Do They Come From and Where Do They Go? [Trends]

The objective of this paper is to examine the intercontinental movement of highly cited researchers (HCRs) in the field of engineering. We use the data on HCRs available from the Thomson Scientific database covering a 20-year period (1981-1999), combined with information collected from the Internet and the researchers themselves, to examine the movement in engineering around the world of the HCRs from birth to their present affiliation. There is a steady movement of engineers from Europe and the rest of the world to the U.S.

Commentary on Ruscio et al.: “Measuring Scholarly Impact Using Modern Citation-Based Indices”

There is currently a surge of interest in comparing research impact and performance at various levels, for instance ranking countries, universities, departments, programs, journals, and even individual scientists. These rankings are typically based on certain simple bibliometric measures, such as impact factors, the h index, and so forth. This interest is not purely academic; it is part of a more general ongoing political debate at international, national, and institutional levels since rankings have caught the attention of policy makers. The findings of these measures have caused serious concern in some countries, and new policies have been put in place to improve on their lagging performance. Even in Europe, the apparent lagging of performance compared to the United States has generated policy discussions. The lagging of Europe has been established in a number of studies for different disciplines (see, e.g., Panaretos & Malesios, 2012, for mathematics). Among the modern citation-based indicators devised to compare research impact, the h index and its modifications have had major influence. Besides its basic use as a measure of quantity (and quality) of the work of a single researcher, the h index has been applied to assess the productivity of journals, departments, and universities, among others (see, e.g., Rousseau, 2007; Braun, Glänzel, & Schubert, 2005; Kinney, 2007). Besides having great popularity, the h index has raised a lot of criticism. There is a vast literature of articles that stress the disadvantages of the index (see, e.g., Adler, Ewing, & Taylor, 2008; Vinkler, 2007), while a large number of modifications and generalizations of it have appeared in the literature intended to correct its insufficiencies. For certain fields of research, with special characteristics such as mathematics, where we usually find low citation counts, the accuracy of citation statistics based on bibliometric measures such as the h index has been questioned (Adler et al., 2008). In their article Ruscio et al. (Ruscio, Seaman, D’Oriano, Stremlo, & Mahalchik, this issue) present a comparative study of some of the different variants of the h index. The study evaluates a total of 22 metrics, including the h index and h-type indices, as well as other conventional measures. The novelty of their work is to a large extent based on the proposed criteria presented for evaluating the bibliometric measures. Specifically, the authors evaluate the various indices using five criteria, ranging from their ease of understanding to their validity. Although there are

A Population-Modulated Bibliometric Measure with an Application in the Field of Statistics

We use Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) to derive a unifying measure of comparison of scientists based on bibliometric measurements, by utilizing the h-index, some similar h-type indices as well as other common measures of scientific performance. We use a real data example from nine well-known Departments of Statistics (Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon, Chicago, Duke, Harvard, Minnesota, Oxford, Stanford and Washington) to demonstrate our approach and argue that our combined measure results in a better overall evaluation of a researchers’ scientific work.