Showing papers on "Credibility published in 1991"

Comparative Advertising Effectiveness: The Role of Involvement and Source Credibility

Abstract: Previous research on the persuasive impact of comparative advertising has produced inconsistent results. Consequently, researchers have suggested lack of credibility and the need for higher involvement as two problems which might impede the persuasive impact of comparative advertising. However, virtually no empirical evidence comparing the effects of comparative advertising to non-comparative advertising when different levels of involvement are activated exists. In addition, little research has examined whether source credibility enhances the persuasive impact of comparative advertising. Attribution theory provided the framework for the experiment reported in this paper. Experimental results suggest that when higher involvement is activated and a source of higher credibility is included in the advertisements, comparative advertising for a new brand has a more positive effect on purchase intentions than non-comparative advertising.

Qualitative research and the legitimization of knowledge

Abstract: Reservatinos about qualitative research often center around contentions that, since qualitative methods are so subjective and uncontrolled, the results of qualitative research are not valid and reliable. While many qualitative researchers in education have attempted to improve the trustworthiness of their results by making their methods more systematic, we argue that qualitative researchers cannot establish the trustworhiness of their findings, regardles of the methods they use. Rather, the legitimization of knwoledge requires the judgement of an entire community of stakeholders. In the absence of certainty, knowledge is an ethical matter, one in which the judgement of each stakeholder must count.

Communicating about Environmental Risks: How the Public Uses and Perceives Information Sources

Abstract: Environmental risk communication is examined as a community-based public health issue in this study. It provides data on information dynamics in six communities prior to the implementation of national community right-to-know legislation. It also provides a baseline for measuring changes in knowledge, attitudes, information gathering activities and other behaviors. Respondents (3,129) from six communities, Albuquerque, New Mexico; Cincinnati, Ohio; Durham, North Carolina; Middlesex County, New Jersey; Racine, Wisconsin; and Richmond, Virginia, provided information about recall of environmental risk information and sources, as well as personal knowledge, attitudes and behaviors related to environmental health risks. Local media are the most pervasive source of environmental information. Interpersonal sources were reported by fewer than 12% of the respondents. Credibility appears to be the most valuable attribute of an environmental information source. Credibility and expertise are perceived as independent c...

Credible commitments, contract enforcement problems and banks: Intermediation as credibility assurance

Abstract: We consider contract enforceability problems in credit transactions and justify a bank as an organizational solution to market breakdown due to unenforceable contracts. Specifically, we explain: (i) why loan commitments exist, and (ii) why banks exist to sell such commitments. A loan commitment resolves moral hazard more efficiently than any combination of inside equity and spot credit. However, the market breaks down if commitment sellers are individuals, because their promises to honor contracts are not credible. With a large bank, a perfect sequential equilibrium is obtained in which credibility is restored.

Credit Markets, Credibility, and Economic Transformation

Abstract: This paper focuses on the special role that capital markets play in the transformation of centrally planned economies into well-functioning market economies. We demonstrate that underdeveloped credit markets inhibit the effectiveness of price reform, monetary and credit policies, and trade liberalization. We explore various ways to overcome the difficulties associated with the underdeveloped credit markets. In this regard, we examine the implications of "cleaning" the balance sheets of enterprises and banks from nonperforming loans, as well as ways to enhance credibility. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of sequencing of economic reform measures.

Credibility and Stabilization

Abstract: The paper deals with stabilization as a one-shot problem to ask what "credibility" means in a world where programs will succeed with probability one. A model is spelled out where the equilibrium program has some ex ante probability of failure. The model draws attention to the factors that raise or lower the probability of success of a stabilization program and thus offers a positive theory of stabilization. Reputation that emerges as a central element in repeated games has no role in this model.

Credibility and Stabilization

Abstract: The paper deals with stabilization as a one-shot problem to ask what "credibility" means in a world where programs will succeed with probability one. A model is spelled out where the equilibrium program has some ex ante probability of failure. The model draws attention to the factors that raise or lower the probability of success of a stabilization program and thus offers a positive theory of stabilization. Reputation that emerges as a central element in repeated games has no role in this model.

NCGIA Research Initiative 7 Visualization of Spatial Data Quality: Scientific Report for the Specialist Meeting (91-26)

Abstract: This report is a summary of the Specialist meeting for NCGIA Research Initiative 7 entitled Visualization of Spatial Data Quality . It presents initial discussions on the role and utility of visualization for understanding and analyzing information about the quality of GIS data. The impetus for the initiative is based on rapid changes in spatial information system technology and a desire to see the technology used more effectively. Technology currently allows us to process and display large volumes of information very quickly. Effective use of this information for analysis and decision making presupposes that the information is correct or reasonably reliable. Information on the quality of data is essential for effective use of GIS data: it affects the fitness of use of data for a particular application, the credibility of data representation and interpretation, and the evaluation of decision alternatives. The credibility of spatial decision support using GIS may indeed depend on the incorporation of quality information within the database and the display.

Credibility, Uncertainty, and Deterrence

Abstract: In this paper the connection between deterrence stability and threat credibility is examined conceptually and theoretically. We formulate as a model of bilateral deterrence a game of incomplete information in which each player is uncertain about its opponent's preferences should it unilaterally alter the status quo. Uncertainty about the preferences of one's opponent leads to uncertainty about the opponent's willingness to retaliate. By identifying the credibility of each player's retaliatory threat with the probability that a player prefers retaliation to capitulation, we maintain consistency with both the traditional strategic literature, where credibility usually means believability, and with game theory, where credibility is usually synonymous with sequential rationality (i.e., subgame perfect equilibrium). We analyze formally the strategic implications of this conception of credibility and thus explore the critical role played by uncertainty in deterrence. By explicitly modeling uncertainty, we are able to understand the role of threats in contributing to, or detracting from, the robustness of a deterrence relationship.

The European Monetary System: Credible at Last?

Abstract: We update tests of the credibility of the EMS exchange rate target zones. Our main methodological innovation is to use a survey of exchange rate forecasts, as well as interest differentials, in measuring exchange rate expectations. We investigate the hypothesis -- suggested by the apparent stabilization of the EMS and by recent institutional developments -- that the EMS target zones have experienced an increase in credibility since their 1987 realignment. The evidence tends to support this hypothesis for most currencies. We also examine the empirical failure of standard target zone models, but find no evidence that it can be attributed to mismeasurement of expectations. Finally, we consider an alternative credibility measure which captures the importance of possible realignments in overall expectations of exchange rate changes.

Credibility and Exchange Rate Management in Developing Countries

Abstract: The paper examines the role of credibility in the conduct of exchange rate policy in developing countries. The analysis is based on a model in which policymakers are concerned about inflation and external competitiveness. Price setters in the nontraded goods sector of the economy adjust prices in reaction to anticipated fluctuations in the domestic price of tradable goods. This type of model is shown to generate a "devaluation bias" which undermines the credibility of a fixed exchange rate. The effect of reputational factors, signaling considerations, and joining a currency union as possible solutions to this bias is examined.

Testing for Credibility Effects

Abstract: This paper examines some recent techniques designed to draw inferences about the credibility of changes in macroeconomic policy regimes. An alternative two-step approach, based on the decomposition between permanent and transitory components of a "credibility variable" is proposed. The methodology is then used to test for the existence of a credibility effect in the Cruzado stabilization plan implemented in Brazil in 1986.

Effects of Clothing as Nonverbal Communication on Credibility of the Message Source

Abstract: The study was designed to investigate the effects on credibility ratings and stated intent to purchase of clothing worn by a message source in an advertising situation. Two levels of dress of the m...

Evaluation bias in the business classroom : evidence relating to the effects of previous experiences

Abstract: We found that teaching evaluations were assigned as a function of the professors' gender and students' previous experience with a female professor. Based on the professor's style of organization, enthusiasm, credibility, and effectiveness, and students' willingness to take a course with the professor, students assigned higher evaluations to male professors than female professors. Previous experience with a female faculty member was found to be a relevant variable influencing perceived credibility, organization, and effectiveness evaluations. The findings imply that exposure to women in positions of responsibility may reduce stereotypical attitudes regarding women's ability to function in gender-atypical roles.

College student's perceptions of sources of information about AIDS.

Abstract: Public communication campaigns and social marketing literature identify principles for developing effective AIDS education and prevention efforts. Planners need to know the audience, identify salient audience segments, and understand the characteristics of information sources that the particular audience finds believable and is likely to use. In this study, the authors investigated college students' perceptions of (1) the credibility and likelihood of using a variety of interpersonal, media, and institutional sources of information about AIDS; (2) the sources that have provided them with the most information about AIDS; and (3) the relationships among those perceptions. They also investigated potential gender differences in perceptions of sources of AIDS information. Respondents to a larger probability sample survey rated 35 sources of information about AIDS. Although mass media sources clearly provided the greatest amount of information, they were conspicuously less prominent in their acceptabil...

Credibility Models with Time-Varying Trend Components

Abstract: Traditional credibility models have treated the process generating the losses as stable over time, perhaps with a deterministic trend imposed. However, there is ample evidence that these processes are not stable over time. What is required is a method that allows for time-varying parameters in the process, yet still provides the shrinkage needed for sound ratemaking. In this paper we use an automobile insurance example to illustrate how this can be accomplished.

Newspaper Column Readers' Gender Bias: Perceived Interest and Credibility

Abstract: This article reports results of an experiment designed to test effects of gender on perceived credibility of a newspaper columnist and on subjects' interest in a newspaper columnist's writing. Quantitative methods—factor analysis and analysis of variance—enabled the authors to draw these conclusions: gender does affect the perceived interest level of newspaper columns, with males preferring columns written by men and females preferring columns written by women; gender did not have an effect on columnist credibility.

Trade Reforms, Credibility, and Development

Abstract: This paper analyzes the role of investment policies in regimes undergoing trade liberalization with policy makers of uncertain credibility. We consider an economy producing exportable and importable goods. The economy is liberalized, and tariffs are eliminated. The public views the reform credibility as questionable, and expects the possibility of future policy reversal. The policy maker sets policies and public investment as to maximize the expected utility of a risk averse representative agent. We identify the need to tax private investment in the importable sector, and to subsidize private investment in the outward-oriented sector. We show that the signaling effect of public investment nay generate a positive externality for public investment in the outward sector, and a negative externality for public investment in the inward-oriented activity. We demonstrate that the elimination of sectorial private investment policies call for a rise in the public/private capital ratio in the outward-oriented activities, and a drop in that ratio in the inward-oriented activities. In the presence of an external credit ceiling, a higher degree of risk aversion increases the magnitude (without changing the nature) of the policies.

The role of credibility for the effects of a change in the exchange-rate policy

Abstract: This paper analyses the real and monetary effects of a shift in the exchange-rate policy in an economy where the private sector is uncertain about the true intentions of the government. In a repeat ...

Modern Creationism and Scientific Authority

Abstract: Much of modern creationist thought is obviously generated by fundamentalist theology, but there is another major influence at work — namely, the cultural-historical dynamics of the social role of scientific authority in American life. This paper describes a variety of modern creationist positions on the merits and credibility of scientific authority, and then analyzes that situation in terms of the history of three cultural models of science that circulate in American popular culture. It concludes, first, that creationist attitudes about scientific authority represent an interesting problem in their own right; and, second, that the social role of scientific authority is both varied and complex.

Resistance to change—A monitor of new technology

Abstract: This paper examines the credibility of the deficit model of resistance to change in a case study on office automation. A functional analysis of resistance to change is conducted using narrative interviews and documentary analysis. Resistance to change is shown to occur and to affect the implementation process: resistance is identified as a useful source of information, directing the attention of the change agency to improve hardware, software, and the organization. User attitudes were found to change: global skepticism developed into critical acceptance of the office system. The decision-making criteria changed during the 3-year period of the case study. More criteria were used, with user-friendliness becoming more prominent in the decision criteria. The case highlights some limitations of Lewinian field theory in studying resistance to change. Systems theory may provide a more useful framework, organized around the principle that resistance to change is a functional selfmonitoring subsystem guiding the internal adjustment of the changing organization and thus securing effectiveness. This approach may have wider implications for the analysis of social change.