David B. Meinert

Privacy Policy Statements and Consumer Willingness to Provide Personal Information

Consumers’ concerns about information privacy are a primary obstacle to the success of e-commerce. The adoption of privacy policy statements is a direct response to this concern. This exploratory study examined the willingness of graduate students (who, by virtue of age, education, and income, are representative of typical Internet consumers) to provide various types of personal information given varying degrees of protection offered by privacy policy statements. The results demonstrated that the willingness to provide information to Web merchants increased as the level of privacy guaranteed by the statements increased. More importantly, the level of privacy promised by the statements interacted with respondents’ prior familiarity with policy statements in terms of their willingness to provide personal information. The results also demonstrated that while most individuals were aware of privacy policy statements, less than half of the respondents had ever read a privacy statement.

Consumer trust: privacy policies and third‐party seals

Purpose – This study aims to compare the effectiveness of third‐party seals with self‐reported privacy policy statements with regard to the willingness of potential e‐commerce customers to provide web sites with various types of personal information.Design/methodology/approach – A survey was administered to 374 graduate business students at two Midwestern universities in the USA.Findings – The results indicated that third‐party seals were not as effective as self‐reported privacy statements with a strong guarantee of security.Research limitations/implications – This study did not provide any evidence to support the necessity for small enterprises to incur the added costs in terms of money and time required to obtain a third‐party seal. Rather the results suggest small enterprises may increase consumer trust more effectively through strong privacy policy statements.Originality/value – This study provides useful information on the effectiveness of third‐party seals with self‐reported privacy policy statemen...

Business Communications: A Highly Valued Core Course in Business Administration

Abstract Our purpose in this research was (a) to determine whether the business communications course, a traditionally important required core course for college and university business graduates, continues to be perceived as a highly valued component of the core business courses and (b) to assess its perceived level of difficulty and instructional effectiveness. The results of this research suggest that business communications is the most important course of all core business courses. Though perceived to be the easiest, it is also perceived to have more effective instruction than five of the other core business courses. Therefore, if changes are forthcoming in the core business curriculum as a result of the recent AACSB accreditation standards, the business communications course should certainly continue to be an integral part of the core.

The Domain of Marketing: How Are the Boundaries of the Marketing Discipline Established?

This article examines, from a conceptual perspective, the establishment, evolution and impact of boundaries and definitions on research in marketing. A conceptual model highlighting the key issues and constructs involved in the development and evolution of marketing thought and the boundaries of marketing is presented. Particular attention is given to the relationship between societal trends and research in marketing. The impact of environmental trends and current research directions on the formation of “new” journals in marketing is also examined. In addition, the roles of academicians, practitioners and “gatekeepers” are all discussed, as is their impact on research in the discipline. Three distinct categories of research are identified along with their roles in advancing marketing thought and establishing boundaries for marketing. Finally, the potential implications of “artificial” definitions and boundaries for research in the discipline are examined.

Anticipated Use of EMR Functions and Physician Characteristics

Despite the numerous purported benefits of Electronic Medical Records (EMR), medical practices have been extremely reluctant to embrace the technology. One of the barriers believed to be responsible for the slow adoption of EMR technology is resistance by many physicians who are not convinced of the usefulness of EMR systems. This study used a mail survey of physicians associated with a multi-specialty clinic to examine potential characteristics of physicians that might help identify those individuals that are most likely to pose a threat to the successful EMR implementation. Age and gender of the physicians was generally not associated with anticipated use. However, an analysis of variance indicated self-rated computer knowledge and area of medical specialty were highly related to expected use of EMR functions. Results indicating that anticipated use of various EMR functions depend on medical specialty denotes one of the many difficulties of developing EMR systems for multi-specialty clinics.

Purchasing Intelligence Systems In Small Manufacturing Firms: Present Status and Future Direction

Information obtained from a Purchasing Management Intelligence System (PMIS) can provide the valuable input into a firms strategic planning process. Because of scarce resources and the criticality of market mistakes, it is even more essential that small firms take advantage of this information resource. This articles reports the results of a study undertaken to determine the status of purchasing intelligence systems in small manufacturing firms. The results indicate that while purchasing intelligence systems exist in most small manufacturing organizations, their focus is on conventional rather than strategic activities. The results also indicate that numerous obstacles limit the effectiveness of purchasing intelligence systems. In addition to a lack of preparedness respondents identified procedural problems, a lack of resources and a weak effort/outcome relationship.

Would Regulation of Web Site Privacy Policy Statements Increase Consumer Trust

Proponents of e-commerce have known for some time that limited participation by consumers partially reflects their concern over the privacy of personal information. To address consumer concerns, web site operators have employed security mechanisms, including privacy policy statements to increase their perceived trustworthiness. While empirical evidence is limited, there is some question regarding the ability of privacy policy statements to engender significantly greater levels of trust. The limited effectiveness of such statements may reflect their voluntary implementation, self-enforcement, and\or significant variance (protection and enforcement) from one web site to another. One possible remedy would be the imposition of legally mandated statements. This study examined the efficacy of legally mandated privacy policies vis-a-vis both voluntary statements of varying degrees of protection and the absence of any such statement. The results were mixed, as legally mandated privacy policy statements were found to be comparable to strong voluntary statements, but superior to none, weak or moderate policies. Perhaps more important, the nature of the privacy policy statement interacted with type of information requested.