Between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean : the late bronze age around the Tagus estuary (Portugal) : economic, social and cultural aspects

This paper deals with the importance, quantity and diversity of Late Bronze Age sites known around the Tagus estuary. The material culture points out to the existence of cultural stimuli from very different origins: from the Iberian Peninsula inner, the North Atlantic and the Mediterranean basin, related to the social organization and the economy of the populations that inhabited this region between the XIII century BC and the IX century BC, according to the available radiocarbon data. These populations interacted with the first Phoenicians that arrived to the region at the end of this period, after episodic relations of trading with their antecedents, from Central Mediterranean region.

Affecting Factors of Public Employees’ Ganizational Commitment

Purpose – The aim of this chapter is to shed some light on the antecedents of organizational commitment, the mediating role of job engagement and job satisfaction as determinants of organizational commitment within the public sector environment, and the effects that national cultural values may have on these relationships. Approach – This paper presents a review of the works that, from both theoretical and empirical points of view, explore the affecting factors of public employees’ organizational commitment in an international setting. Findings – A comprehensive model has been developed, detailing the expectations on the influence that these factors might have on public employees’ level of commitment, either as mediators or moderators. Research limitations/implications – The main limitation is the paper’s theoretical nature; the subsequent implication is a future empirical research that may prove or disprove these theoretical findings. In addition, there are some other possible mediating factors and antecedents which may be of interest for future researchers. Originality/value – This comprehensive review of the extant literature may provide academics and public managers with a deeper comprehension of how organizational commitment might be achieved, and why some practices may or may not be transferrable from one country to another.

O Comprometimento com o superior hierárquico enquanto determinante do comprometimento organizacional: um estudo de moderação da classe profissional militar na Força Aérea Portuguesa

Dissertação de Mestrado em Políticas de Desenvolvimento dos Recursos Humanos

Determinants of engagement in virtual social networks in Singapore

The use of virtual social networks (VSNs) has been prevalent among consumers worldwide. Numerous studies have investigated various aspects of VSNs. However, these studies have mainly focused on students and young adults as they were early adopters of these innovative networks. A search of the literature revealed there has been a paucity of research on adult consumers’ use of VSNs. This research study addressed this gap in the literature by examining the determinants of engagement in VSNs among adult consumers in Singapore. The objectives of this study are to empirically investigate the determinants of engagement in VSNs and to offer theoretical insights into consumers’ preference and usage of VSNs. This study tapped upon several theories developed in the discipline of technology and innovation adoption. These were Roger’s Diffusion of Innovation, Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA), Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), Conceptual Framework of Individual Innovation Adoption by Frambach and Schillewaert (2002), Enhanced Model of Innovation Adoption by Talukder (2011), Extended Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT2) and the Information Systems (IS) Success Model. The proposed research model, named the Media Usage Model (MUM), is a framework rooted in innovation diffusion and IS theories. The MUM distilled the essence of these established models and thus provides an updated, lucid explanation of engagement in VSNs. A cross-sectional, online social survey was conducted to collect quantitative data to examine the validity of the proposed research model. Multivariate data analysis was carried out on a data set comprising 806 usable responses by utilizing SPSS, and for structural equation modeling AMOS and SmartPLS. The results indicate that consumer attitude towards VSNs is significantly and positively influenced by: three individual factors – hedonic motivation, incentives and experience; two system characteristics – system quality and information quality; and one social factor – social bonding. Consumer demographics were found to influence people’s attitudes towards VSNs. In addition, consumer experience and attitude towards VSNs significantly and positively influence their usage of VSNs. The empirical data supported the proposed research model, explaining 80% of variance in attitude towards VSNs and 45% of variance in usage of VSNs. Therefore, the MUM achieves a definite contribution to theoretical knowledge of consumer engagement in VSNs by deepening and broadening our appreciation of the intricacies related to use of VSNs in Singapore. This study’s findings have implications for customer service management, services marketing and consumer behavior. These findings also have strategic implications for maximizing efficient utilization and effective management of VSNs by businesses and operators. The contributions of this research are: firstly, shifting the boundaries of technology or innovation adoption theories from research on employees to consumers as well as the boundaries of Internet usage or adoption research from students to adults, which is also known as empirical generalization; secondly, highlighting the issues associated with lack of significance of social factors in adoption research; and thirdly, augmenting information systems research by integrating important antecedents for success in information systems.

Análise dos antecedentes das intenções empreendedoras nos estudantes de Reabilitação Psicomotora : estudo com alunos dos primeiro e segundo ciclos do ensino superior

Este estudo pretende (1) analisar os antecedentes das Intenções Empreendedoras (IE) dos estudantes de Reabilitação Psicomotora da Faculdade de Motricidade Humana de ambos os ciclos de ensino e (2) as Intenções Empreendedoras dos estudantes em função das suas características sociodemográficas. A amostra compreendeu um total de 130 alunos, aos quais foi aplicado uma versão adaptada do Questionário das Intenções Empreendedoras (EIQ: Liñán & Chen, 2009) que se baseia na Teoria do Comportamento Planeado (TCP: Ajzen, 1991) e inclui os seguintes fatores: Intenções Empreendedoras (IE), Atitude Percebida (AP), Controlo Comportamental Percebido (CCP) e Normas Subjetivas (NS). Foram realizados testes de regressão linear para identificar quais os fatores da TCP que influenciam as IE. Posteriormente, foram conduzidos testes t-student para comparar os valores médios dos quatro fatores da TCP em função do género, conhecimento de Empreendedores, pática desportiva, experiência profissional, participação na Associação de Estudantes e ciclo de ensino. Os resultados permitiram constatar que os antecedentes mais significativos das IE são a AP e o CCP e que existem maiores IE nos alunos que têm experiência profissional, que praticam/praticaram desporto e nos que conhecem um empreendedor. Estes resultados sugerem que, influenciando alguns destes aspetos, é possível aumentar as Intenções Empreendedoras dos estudantes.

An interaction and network perspective of horizontal relationships in the portuguese pharmaceutical industry

Doutoramento em Gestão

Os efeitos das perceções de instrumentalização da avaliação de desempenho nas respostas face à organização

Doutoramento em Gestão

Marketing channel behaviour and performance

Thesis submitted to University of Manchester for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Business Administration.

Succession Intentions Across the Globe: The Role of Institutional Factors

While succession intentions have received increasing scholarly attention in recent years, there is a lack of knowledge about country-level antecedents and differences. Our paper aims to close this gap by investigating succession intentions of 6,360 students with family business background from 26 countries. More specifically, we blend theory of planned behavior with institutional theory and find that institutional variables such as individualism, uncertainty avoidance, and the level of corruption explain the formation of succession intentions over and above traditional theory of planned behavior elements. In addition, we reveal a U-shaped relationship between a nation's level of economic development and the strength of succession intentions. This indicates the existence of two types of succession intentions: necessity and opportunity succession. These findings add valuable insights to literature on family businesses, succession, theory of planned behavior, and practice.

Analysing intention and action in mobile banking services

Technological advances at the level of mobile devices are transforming the world. Banking users are able to conduct banking services at any place, and at any time, with m-banking. The purpose of this research is to analyse intention and action in m-banking services. A research model was developed and PLS was used to test the causalities in the proposed model. Our proposal extends the existing models with an assessment of the actual usage of m-banking and of how behavioural intention translates into action. This study found that the main determinants of behavioural intention for m-banking are social influence and relative advantage. Furthermore, perceived risk, lack of information and usage barriers have a negative effect on m- banking behavioural intention. Perceived risks, e-banking use, and behaviour intention are found to be significant antecedents of m-banking use. Gender has a positive and significant influence on m-banking usage, but not on the construction of behavioural intention.

Factores relacionados a sépsis neonatal. Unidad de Neonatología Clínica Humanitaria-Fundación Pablo Jaramillo

Se realizó un estudio observacional en recién nacidos sépticos ocurridos en la Unidad de Neonatología de la Fundación Humanitaria Pablo Jaramillo, durante el período de enero de 2009 a diciembre de 2011, con el objetivo de analizar la incidencia de antecedentes maternos y parámetros propios del recién nacido como posibles factores de riesgo para la sepsis, los parámetros de laboratorio que contribuyen a diagnosticar procesos infecciosos en el recién nacido y el desenlace que tuvieron los mismos. Durante este tiempo ingresaron 164 casos con riesgo de sepsis, sospecha de sepsis y sepsis bacteriana (42.62 /1000 nacidos vivos) y la mortalidad fue del 3.04%. Predominó la sepsis de inicio precoz sobre la tardía. Los principales antecedentes maternos fueron la ruptura prematura de membranas seguido de la infección de vías urinarias. En cuanto a los factores del recién nacido prevaleció el sexo masculino, prematurez y de bajo peso al nacer

Características del Ciberbullying en los estudiantes de la Unidad Educativa César Dávila Andrade. Cuenca. Ecuador. 2013

Antecedentes: En la actualidad los adolescentes se desenvuelven a la perfección en el uso de la tecnología de la información y comunicación. El internet y la telefonía móvil se han constituido en instrumentos de primer orden para su formación, desarrollo, socialización y diversión; sin embargo, en ocasiones puede que no hagan un buen uso de la tecnología y más bien algunos adolescentes, con una personalidad agresora, se valen de estos medios para perturbar a sus compañeros y realizar nuevas modalidades de acoso escolar. Objetivo: Determinar las características de ciberbullying en los estudiantes de la Unidad Educativa “César Dávila Andrade”. Metodología: Se realizó un estudio cuantitativo descriptivo, el universo estuvo conformado por todos los estudiantes del ciclo básico, a quiénes se les aplicó un formulario modificado del Protocolo de Actuación Escolar ante Ciberbullying de EMICI (Equipo Multidisciplinar de Investigación sobre Ciberbullying); para la tabulación y procesamiento de la información se utilizó el programa SPSS versión 15; como medidas estadísticas se emplearon: frecuencias, medias, porcentajes; para la presentación de los datos se elaboraron tablas de acuerdo a los objetivos y, para el análisis de la información se utilizó estadística descriptiva. Resultados: El ciberbullying se presenta en el 11% de los alumnos: 9.5% en el sexo masculino y 15% en el sexo femenino; el medio más utilizado para acosar son las redes sociales 52%, seguido de mensajes por celular 21.7%; dentro de las consecuencias académicas el 34.2% tiene deseos de no ir al colegio, el 47.4% ha bajado sus calificaciones; en relación a problemas familiares el 42% tiene problemas con sus padres y hermanos y dentro de los problemas psicológicos cerca del 40% se siente deprimido y, la tercera parte de las víctimas de ciberbullying declaran que “creen que es mejor desaparecer”. Conclusiones: Se detectaron casos de ciberbullying con predominio en el sexo femenino evidenciándose un componente de género

Interdependencies in Corporate Development: Relationship between Strategic Alliance and Acquisition Activities

A substantial amount of work in the field of strategic management has attempted to explain the antecedents and outcomes of organizational learning. Though multinational corporations simultaneously engage in various types of tasks, activities, and strategies on a regular basis, the transfer of organizational learning in a multi-task context has largely remained under-explored in the literature. To inform our understanding in this area, this dissertation aimed at synthesizing findings from two parallel research streams of corporate development activities: strategic alliances and acquisitions. Structured in the form of two empirical studies, this dissertation examines: 1) the strategic outcomes of alliance experience of previously allying partners in terms of subsequent acquisition attempts, and 2) the performance implications of prior alliance experience for acquisitions. The first study draws on the relational view of inter-organizational governance to explain how various deal-specific and dyadic characteristics of a partnership relate to partnering firms’ post-alliance acquisition attempts. This model theorizes on a variety of relational mechanisms to build a cohesive theory of inter-organizational exchanges in a multi-task setting where strategic alliances ultimately lead to a firm’s decision to commit further resources. The second study applies organizational learning theory, and specifically examines whether frequency, recency, and relatedness of different dimensions of prior alliances, beyond the dyad-level experience, relate to an acquirer’s superior post-acquisition performance. The hypotheses of the studies are tested using logistic and ordinary least square regressions, respectively. Results analyzed from a sample of cross-border alliance and acquisition deals attempted (for study I) and/or completed (for study II) during the period of 1991 to 2011 generally support the theory that relational exchange determines acquiring firms’ post alliance acquisition behavior and that organizational routines and learning from prior alliances influence a future acquirer’s financial performance. Overall, the empirical findings support our overarching theory of interdependency, and confirm the transfer effect of learning across these alternate, yet related corporate strategies of alliance and acquisition.

Employee engagement in the public sector:a narrative evidence synthesis

It has been claimed that employee engagement can harness public service motivation in ways that lead to better improve functioning and positive organizational outcomes, and can help address the increasingly complex challenges associated with public service in an era of austerity. Despite this, there has not yet been a systematic review of the literature that would enable researchers to understand more about the antecedent factors and the outcomes of engagement in the public sector. To address this issue, we undertook a systematic narrative synthesis of the empirical research on engagement that yielded 5111 published studies, of which just 59 were conducted in public sector settings and met our inclusion criteria. Studies generally found that motivational features of jobs (such as autonomy), group (such as social support), management (such as leader consideration), and organizations (such as voice mechanisms) as well as psychological resources were key antecedents of engagement within the public sector; and that engagement was associated with positive employee health/morale and enhanced performance behaviors. The evidence was far from conclusive, suggesting a need for much more rigorous research focused on the specific challenges of public sector settings. We make recommendations for further research on this important topic, particularly with regards to understanding the connection between public service motivation and engagement and the need to examine engagement across different public sector/service contexts.

Acceptance of smartphone-based mobile shopping:mobile benefits, customer characteristics, perceived risk and the impact of application context

Despite their generally increasing use, the adoption of mobile shopping applications often differs across purchase contexts. In order to advance our understanding of smartphone-based mobile shopping acceptance, this study integrates and extends existing approaches from technology acceptance literature by examining two previously underexplored aspects. Firstly, the study examines the impact of different mobile and personal benefits (instant connectivity, contextual value and hedonic motivation), customer characteristics (habit) and risk facets (financial, performance, and security risk) as antecedents of mobile shopping acceptance. Secondly, it is assumed that several acceptance drivers differ in relevance subject to the perception of three mobile shopping characteristics (location sensitivity, time criticality, and extent of control), while other drivers are assumed to matter independent of the context. Based on a dataset of 410 smartphone shoppers, empirical results demonstrate that several acceptance predictors are associated with ease of use and usefulness, which in turn affect intentional and behavioral outcomes. Furthermore, the extent to which risks and benefits impact ease of use and usefulness is influenced by the three contextual characteristics. From a managerial perspective, results show which factors to consider in the development of mobile shopping applications and in which different application contexts they matter.