Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The small core of the German corporate board network: New evidence from 2010

Milakovic, Alfarano and Lux (2010) have identified a small core of directors who are both highly central to the entire network of German corporate boards as well as closely connected among themselves. While their analysis has been based on data for the management and supervisory boards of a sample of 287 publicly traded companies with high market capitalization as of May 2008, a subsequent study by Milakovic, Raddant and Birg (2010) using somewhat smaller samples from the years 1993, 1999, and 2005 has confirmed that this closely connected core is a persistent stylized fact for the German corporate sector. In this note, we provide an update of our previous results using the composition of management and supervisory boards as of December, 2010. Again, almost all qualitative properties of previous samples are confirmed despite considerable turnover within the group of persons constituting the network core.
Does Industry Size Matter? Revisiting European Mutual Fund Performance

This paper revisits the performance of European mutual funds using a more recent and extensive survivorship bias free database of 16,055 equity funds over the 1992-2006 period. Earlier evidence by Otten & Bams (2002) pointed to an exceptional position of European mutual funds. In sharp contrast to for instance the United States, the authors documented that European mutual funds were able to add value, based on their positive alphas. Otten & Bams (2002) contributed that ability to the relative small size of the European mutual fund industry compared to the total stock market (around 13% in 1998). By 2005 this size has almost doubled to 25%. The main motivation for our study is to examine whether this had an impact on the ability of European mutual funds to beat the market. Our main results are four-fold. First, we indeed find that European mutual funds deliver significantly negative 4-factor Carhart alpha’s during this more recent period. The larger current size of the European mutual fund industry makes it more difficult for managers to add value. These results are now more in line with earlier results for US funds. Second, passive funds perform even worse than active funds, leaving us with a puzzle. It might be that passive funds are not pure indextrackers but active funds in disguise. Third, adding back TER’s and loads make most alphas insignificantly different from zero. Which means that European fund managers are able to follow the market but charge investors too much for this. Fourth, we find strong persistence in performance in all investigated countries over both 6 and 12 month holding periods.
Neural signatures of fairness‐related normative decision making in the ultimatum game: A coordinate‐based meta‐analysis

The willingness to incur personal costs to enforce prosocial norms represents a hallmark of human civilization. Although recent neuroscience studies have used the ultimatum game to understand the neuropsychological mechanisms that underlie the enforcement of fairness norms; however, a precise characterization of the neural systems underlying fairness‐related norm enforcement remains elusive. In this study, we used a coordinate‐based meta‐analysis on functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies using the ultimatum game with the goal to provide an additional level of evidence for the refinement of the underlying neural architecture of this human puzzling behavior. Our results demonstrated a convergence of reported activation foci in brain networks associated with psychological components of fairness‐related normative decision making, presumably reflecting a reflexive and intuitive system (System 1) and a reflective and deliberate system (System 2). System 1 (anterior insula, ventromedial prefrontal cortex [PFC]) may be associated with the reflexive and intuitive responses to norm violations, representing a motivation to punish norm violators. Those intuitive responses conflict with economic self‐interest, encoded in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), which may engage cognitive control from a reflective and deliberate System 2 to resolve the conflict by either suppressing (ventrolateral PFC, dorsomedial PFC, left dorsolateral PFC, and rostral ACC) the intuitive responses or over‐riding self‐interest (right dorsolateral PFC). Taken together, we suggest that fairness‐related norm enforcement recruits an intuitive system for rapid evaluation of norm violations and a deliberate system for integrating both social norms and self‐interest to regulate the intuitive system in favor of more flexible decision making. Hum Brain Mapp 36:591–602, 2015. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Automatic evaluation of flickering sensitivity of fluorescent lamps caused by interharmonic voltages

Recent studies have shown that fluorescent lamps are also prone to light flickering due to the increasing level of inter-harmonics in the power systems. This possibility and the levels of problematic inter-harmonics were confirmed through laboratory tests. These tests were manually conducted, and therefore were laborious and time consuming. It would be convenient to automate the testing by using the advanced features of data acquisition system to save time and manpower. This paper describes the development of an automated flicker measurement and testing system. It consists of a lighting booth, a programmable AC source, photo-sensing circuit, a data acquisition device and automated flicker measurement and testing software. It is developed in accordance to the IEC 61000-4-15 standard. Tests were later conducted on various types of compact fluorescent lamps, confirming their sensitivity to interharominc voltages.
Seasoned equity offerings, quality signalling and private benefits of control.

Seasoned equity offerings (SEOs) in the UK provide valuable choices to the issuer in terms of renounceability and control dilution. This is especially the case following the removal of the size restriction of £15 m on share placements to institutional investors in January 1996. We formulate a set of hypotheses from a quality-signalling perspective, affording an analysis of the key interrelations between renounceability, control dilution, shareholder takeup, and subscription price discount. We analyze SEOs from two perspectives: market reaction to the announcement, and identification of the factors driving the choice of issue type. Generally, we find strong support for our predictions—most notably that: high-quality firms signal quality via lower discounts and/or pre-renouncements; high-quality issuers have lower idiosyncratic risk; firms with widely dispersed ownership structures and firms with the largest market capitalizations will choose standalone placements with book-building; and firms with higher (lower) ownership concentration and lower (higher) shareholder takeup will choose fixed-price placements (rights offerings). JEL classification code: G14, G32
Investment Spike Financing

This is one of the most comprehensive studies to date to employ filtering techniques to distinguish between routine and "investment spike'' financing. It records marked differences in how US publicly traded firms finance the two types of investments. The funding of investment spikes depends particularly on external, predominantly debt, finance. Smaller, less profitable firms with greater growth opportunities, fewer tangible assets, and larger R&D expenditures use more equity finance. Results are consistently observed across industries, but vary over business cycles, by firm types, and between acquisitions and capital expenditures. The results have important implications for existing corporate finance theories.
'ISO-lating' Corporate Social Responsibility in the Organizational Context : A Dissenting Interpretation of ISO 26000

Sustainable development is frequently an object of standardization, and over 100,000 organizations hold ISO 14001 certificates proving they have legitimate environmental management systems. Guidelines for social responsibility are now the object of standardization, resulting in the upcoming ISO 26000 standard. This paper examines the rationale behind developing ISO 26000, highlighting the tendency to decouple complex CSR issues in the organizational context. This is relevant to current problems of poor working conditions, weak regulatory compliance, and corruption often encountered in the production context in low-income countries. In addition, existing codes of conduct are frequently decoupled from actual organizational performance. We highlight how CSR standardization risks isolating complex and contested social issues, more radical attempts at change conflicting with striving for legitimacy. Like the decontexualizing tendency proceeding from the standardized treatment of complex sustainable development issues in organizations, CSR issues also risk becoming decontextualized with the application of standardized approaches such as the ISO 26000 standard.
Enhanced Delivery of Bifidobacteria and Fecal Changes after Multiple Oral Administrations of Bifidobacteria-loaded Alginate Poly-l-lysine Microparticles in Human Volunteers

Enhanced delivery of bifidobacteria and fecal changes were compared following multiple oral administrations of protected bifidobacteria-loaded alginate poly-l-lysine microparticles (bap-microparticles) and unprotected bifidobacteria cultures over a period of 1 month to healthy human volunteers as preliminary in vivo studies. When bap-microparticles were orally administered, enhanced delivery of bifidobacteria was achieved. The viability of the bifidobacteria was significantly increased ∼ 11.5–30 times (1.06–1.48 log cycles) during the ingestion period when compared with the bifidobacteria culture group (p < 0.05). However, other gut microflora such as bifidobacteria, enterobacteriaceae, lactic acid bacteria, and staphylococci in feces were not significantly different between the two groups. Encapsulated bifidobacteria resulted in more frequent defecation and decreased fecal viscosity.
Foreign Direct Investment-Led Growth Hypothesis: Evidence from the Greek Economy

In this paper, authors explore the Foreign Direct Investment-Led Growth hypothesis for the Greek economy in the Post-War era. In doing so, they engage in testing the cointegration of the series and explore the causal dimension between Foreign Direct Investment and GDP growth through Granger Causality tests and VAR models. The empirical findings cast serious doubts on the FDI-led growth hypothesis permeating the existing academic literature.
When the Recipe Is More Important Than the Ingredients

Service innovation is a primary source of competitive advantage and a research priority. However, empirical evidence about the impact of innovativeness on new service adoption is inconclusive. A plausible explanation is that service innovation has thus far been studied using new product frameworks that do not fully capture the complexity of new service assessments by customers. We propose a different, holistic framework, which posits that new service adoption does not depend on individual service attributes, but on specific configurations of such attributes. We investigate this framework in a luxury hotel service context, using qualitative comparative analysis, a set-membership technique that is new to service research and suitable for configuration analyses. Results confirm that individual service attributes have complex trade-off effects and that only specific combinations of attributes act as sufficient conditions for new service adoption. Moreover, the composition of such combinations differs according to the different coproduction requirements. Our findings contribute to managerial practice by providing new insights for improving the service-development process and the launch strategy for new services. They also augment extant service knowledge by demonstrating why interdependencies among various innovation attributes are important to consider for gaining an accurate understanding of new service adoption.
SEO Timing, the Cost of Equity Capital, and Liquidity Risk

This paper uses a simple approach to capture time-varying risks surrounding seasoned equity offerings to shed further light on SEO timing and post-issue underperformance. We find that a steady decline in issuing firms’ cost of equity capital to its lowest point prompts them to file SEOs. The decline is largely due to (1) market-wide improvements in both market risk and liquidity risk, starting about six months prior to SEO filing, and (2) an additional decrease in SEO firms’ liquidity risk just prior to SEO filing. Liquidity risk of SEO firms rebounds but stays relatively low in the filing month, and remains relatively low at issuance and thereafter for two to three years, while their market risk are not significantly different from that of their matched firms. Controlling for the (lower) liquidity risk, along with the market risk, is sufficient to show no post-issue abnormal returns. We also find that the lower liquidity risk allows issuing firms to reduce their offering price discount and mitigate the negative SEO announcement effect. Our findings imply that, instead of exploiting market inefficiency, managers time SEOs by following the improvements in market conditions and in their own stocks’ liquidity environment in order to minimize their firms’ cost of equity capital.
The Disadvantage of Incomplete Performance Feedback: Evidence from Private Equity–Backed Buyouts

We develop and test a theory of how organizations learn from performance feedback in the context of strategic decisions, where delayed outcomes result in performance feedback that is incomplete. In this context, firms facing a focal decision observe performance feedback for only a subset of their previous decisions. Using a sample of 7,223 private equity buyout investments, we find that incomplete performance feedback has a negative impact on the performance of a subsequent decision. Our results also suggest that incomplete performance feedback creates challenges when firms engage in problemistic search, reducing the well-established benefits of search for firm future performance. Moreover, this mitigating effect of incomplete feedback is stronger when performance falls below rather than exceeds aspirations.
The Effects of X-Ray and Proton Irradiation on a 200 GHz/90 GHz Complementary $(npn + pnp)$ SiGe:C HBT Technology

We investigate the effects of both X-ray and proton irradiation on a novel 200 GHz/90 GHz (npn/pnp) complementary SiGe:C HBT technology. The DC forward mode total dose tolerance of the pnp HBTs is shown to exceed that of the npn HBTs by a significant margin after being subjected to both 63-MeV proton and 10-keV X-ray sources, while the AC characteristics of both devices exhibit no degradation up to X-ray doses as high as 1.8 Mrad(SiO2). Pre- and post-irradiation results from a current feedback operational amplifier implemented in this technology and irradiated up to a dose of 1.8 Mrad(SiO2) are presented, showing no degradation in performance metrics under two low current density bias configurations.
Correlation between Colposcopy and Histologic Findings in Cervical Intraepithelial Neoplasia

Introduction very year an estimated 13 000 women are diagnosed with cervical cancer and 6600 die from the disease in Bangladesh. Cervical cancer is the second most common gynecologic cancer worldwide, accounting for 13% of all female cancer in developing countries The important reasons for higher cervical cancer incidence in developing countries are lack of resources, lack of effective screening programs and poorly organized health system aimed for detecting precancerous condition before they progress to invasive cancer. So, there is a need of low cost approach for effective cervical cancer screening programs. Cervical cancer is a disease that can be prevented through both primary prevention and early detection. So in developed countries the incidence of cervical cancer has decreased due to screening, early detection and treatment. However, in developing countries, 80% of cervical cancers are incurable at the time of detection due to their advanced stage.
The influence of international human resource management of Korean multinational corporations in China

To examine international human resource management (IHRM) configurations and their explanatory variables, this study generated conceptual frameworks and tested them with data collected from Korean multinational corporations (MNCs) in china. To test the hypotheses, data is collected from 319 Chinese and Korean employees of three study Korean MNCs in China. From the data, The study derived three different IHRM configurations:(1) high earnings, working conditions, job security, cooperation and career development influence Chinese employees more than Korean employees; (2) The Korean employees, compared to the Chinese employees, prefer “fortress-style” and “club-style” of corporate cultures; (3) Both the Chinese and the Korean find money to be a working-reward.
Measuring the New Zealand transaction sector, 1956–98, with an Australian comparison

This paper uses a modification of the Wallis and North (1986) method to generate estimates of the size of the transaction sector in New Zealand from 1956 to 1996, encompassing the pre‐1984 period of unusually stringent (by OECD standards) restrictions and controls on the extent of market activity, followed by the liberalisation reforms of 1984–91. The ratio of transaction to ‘transformation’ (production) employees increased quite slowly for the first twenty five years, then increases sharply in the 1980s, before stabilising in the 1990s at about 0.68, implying two workers in five occupied in transaction activities. The most striking increase is in the number of managers, which more than quadrupled. Because of this, the share of transaction employment is by now higher than in Australia.
Price Versus Nice? How Unfavorable Price Comparisons Help Retain Customers

This paper examines how a retailer can influence shopping behavior (in its favor) by providing consumers with information about its competitors' offerings. We propose that the provision of such information encourages the simultaneous evaluation of competing options such that consumers' purchasing decisions will be driven by the comparative assessment of the retailers' trustworthiness and of their price position. The results of a simulated-shopping experiment show that a retailer can benefit from encouraging consumers to compare its offerings to those of a superior competitor. Furthermore, the provision of competitor information on one purchase occasion also influences which retailer is chosen on future occasions. However, these effects are contingent upon consumers' willingness to reexamine relevant product information and the level of decision ambiguity present.
Cooperative Effects of Exercise Training and Genistein Administration on Bone Mass in Ovariectomized Mice

We reported that genistein, a soybean isoflavone, prevents bone loss caused by estrogen deficiency, without undesirable effects on the uterus. In this study, we examined cooperative effects of genistein administration and running exercise on bone mass in ovariectomized (OVX) mice. Female mice aged 7 weeks were either sham‐operated or OVX and divided into six groups: (1) sham; (2) OVX; (3) OVX, treated with genistein at a submaximal dose (0.4 mg/day) subcutaneously (G); (4) OVX, exercised on a treadmill daily for 30 minutes/day at 12 m/minute on a 10° uphill slope (Ex); (5) OVX, given genistein and exercised (ExG); and (6) OVX, treated with 17β‐estradiol (0.03 μg/day) in the same manner as genistein (E2). Four weeks after intervention, bone mass was estimated by dual‐energy X‐ray absorptiometry (DXA) and peripheral quantitative computed tomography (pQCT). Bone mineral density (BMD) of the whole femur measured by DXA was higher in both the G and the Ex groups than in the OVX group. Furthermore, BMD in the ExG group was significantly higher than that in the groups receiving either intervention alone. Bone area in distal region of the femur was significantly higher in Ex and ExG groups as compared with those in the OVX and G groups. pQCT analysis showed that the cross‐sectional areas (CSAs) and periosteum perimeter at midshaft of the femur did not differ in the sham and OVX groups but were significantly higher in Ex and ExG groups. Histomorphometric analysis showed that bone formation rate/bone surface (BFR/BS) was significantly higher in both Ex and ExG groups as compared with that in non‐exercised groups. The bone volume (BV/TV) in the distal femoral cancellous bone was lower in the OVX than that in the sham group, and it was restored completely in the ExG group, as in the E2 group. Thickness of the trabecular bone (Tb.Th) was higher in Ex and ExG groups than that in the OVX and G groups. These results indicate that the combined intervention of moderate exercise and the submaximal dose of genistein administration show a cooperative effect in preventing bone loss in OVX mice.
Impact of Promotional Items on Business Outcomes in Pharmaceutical Industry

Pharmaceutical companies are using different strategies to develop relationship with employees and customer. CRM is one tool which is used for developing relationship with customers. Present research seeks the opinion of medical representatives and medical practitioners regarding use of promotional tools and its impact on business outcomes. Researcher has collected data by using structured schedule from 103 medical practitioners and 90 pharmaceutical company and analyzed using mean, S.D. and hypothesis is tested using independent sample 't' test resulted positive impact of promotional tools on business outcomes.
What is Comorbidity and Why Does it Occur

Introduction:Comorbidity can be defined most generally as the co-occurrence of two or moremental health problems. It has emerged as a major clinical, public health andresearch issue over the past few decades. This is due in part to changes in psychiatricnomenclature, in which there is a greater focus upon elucidating any number ofmental health problems with which an individual might present, rather thandiagnosing one problem to the exclusion of others.Currently, mental health problems are conceptualised as patterns of behaviour orthought that are associated with significant disability, distress, loss of individualfreedom, or adverse events such as death; and which arise from dysfunction withinthe individual (Neugebauer, 1999). These problems can encompass a wide range ofbehaviours including substance use, mood disturbances, anxiety, and disturbances inthought and perception.According to current classification systems in psychology and psychiatry, mentaldisorders are diagnosed according to operationalised diagnostic criteria, and thediagnosis of one disorder does not necessarily preclude the diagnosis of another(American Psychiatric Association, 1994;World Health Organisation, 1993). Insome cases, more than one mental disorder is diagnosed — such comorbidity isexamined in this chapter. Specifically, this chapter will define the concept ofcomorbidity; discuss the implications of comorbidity for theories of mental health,treatment and prevention; give a brief overview of epidemiological research intocomorbidity; and examine the reasons why comorbidity might occur.