Business, Economics and Management

Abstract: Visual design features can activate meanings that extend beyond their immediate perceptual properties. Building on research on visual symbolism, grounded cognition, and conceptual metaphor, we examine whether visual sharpness is associated with intelligence and how this association manifests across different levels of consumer processing. Across four studies, we provide convergent linguistic, perceptual, and associative evidence. Study 1 documents recurring sharpness–intelligence correspondences across 12 languages. Study 2 examines explicit perceptions across consumer products and category-neutral shapes and shows that the association is difficult to detect when competing product cues are available, but becomes more observable when such cues are reduced. Studies 3 and 4 use Implicit Association Tests and demonstrate greater response compatibility between sharp forms and intelligence-related concepts than between sharp forms and unintelligence-related concepts, replicating the pattern across student and general-population samples. Together, the findings suggest that visual sharpness can function as a symbolic cue that activates intelligence-related meaning, while its influence on explicit judgment depends on the informational context. The research extends visual symbolism by demonstrating how a basic geometric property can become connected with an abstract cognitive concept and distinguishes symbolic accessibility from the diagnostic role of visual cues in consumer judgment.

Abstract: Digital marketing budget allocation is difficult when consumer response varies across channels and decision makers must balance revenue, risk, and brand presence. This study develops an Explainable Multi Objective Optimization framework to support budget allocation under response uncertainty. The framework combines Bayesian hierarchical modeling to estimate channel effects and uncertainty, posterior predictive simulation to generate response scenarios, NSGA II to identify Pareto optimal budget allocations, and SHAP to explain channel contributions. The framework was evaluated using 24 months of simulated multi channel marketing performance data across five industry sectors. Results show an 18.4% increase in expected revenue and a 35.8% reduction in allocation risk compared with the baseline allocation, while maintaining a higher brand presence score. The Pareto analysis produced revenue maximizing, risk minimizing, and balanced allocation configurations, allowing decision makers to examine alternative trade offs rather than relying on a single allocation. SHAP analysis identified channel specific contribution patterns, saturation thresholds, and interaction effects. The findings show how uncertainty aware optimization and interpretable explanations can support more informed marketing budget decisions under changing consumer response.

Abstract: The rapid evolution of digital technologies has fundamentally reshaped consumer behavior, emphasizing the influence of digital environment factors on engagement and purchasing decisions. This study investigates the effects of interface design and notifications on online consumer behavior, highlighting their roles in facilitating both planned and impulse purchases. Interface design, encompassing visual aesthetics, navigation structures, and interactive features, directly impacts perceived ease of use, trust, and user satisfaction, thereby promoting engagement and transaction completion. Notifications, including push alerts, emails, and in-app messages, function as contextual cues that capture attention and prompt immediate action, with personalization and timing serving as critical determinants of effectiveness. Employing a mixed-method approach, data were collected from 450 active e-commerce users and analyzed using structural equation modeling to examine the relationships among interface design, notifications, and online purchasing behavior. Findings demonstrate that both interface quality and notification strategies significantly influence purchase intentions, with perceived ease of use and emotional response mediating and moderating these effects. The interaction between interface design and notifications underscores the importance of an integrated digital strategy. These results provide theoretical insights into digital consumer behavior and offer practical implications for e-commerce platforms aiming to optimize user experience, increase conversions, and enhance long-term consumer loyalty.

Abstract: In contemporary competitive markets, customer satisfaction and loyalty are essential drivers of organizational success. While satisfaction reflects the extent to which products or services meet consumer expectations, loyalty encompasses both behavioral and attitudinal commitment to a brand. However, satisfaction alone may not guarantee loyalty, as the underlying mechanisms that translate positive experiences into sustained commitment are complex. This study investigates the mediating roles of trust, perceived value, and emotional engagement in the satisfaction–loyalty relationship. Trust enhances confidence in a brand’s reliability and integrity, reducing perceived risk and fostering relational commitment. Perceived value captures consumers’ evaluation of benefits relative to costs, incorporating functional, hedonic, and social dimensions that reinforce continued engagement. Emotional engagement reflects the intensity of affective connections formed during brand interactions, strengthening advocacy and resilience against competitors. Integrating these mediators provides a holistic framework for understanding how satisfaction converts into enduring loyalty. The findings offer both theoretical insights into consumer behavior and practical guidance for organizations seeking to cultivate trust, enhance value, and foster emotional bonds that sustain long-term customer relationships.

Abstract: In highly competitive consumer markets, understanding the psychological and emotional determinants of buying behavior is essential for effective marketing. This study investigates the role of advertising appeals and emotional resonance in shaping consumer purchase intentions. Advertising appeals, categorized as rational, emotional, transformational, and hybrid, are strategic tools aimed at influencing consumer perceptions and behavior. Drawing on Affect Transfer Theory and the Elaboration Likelihood Model, the study examines how emotional responses elicited by advertisements mediate the relationship between advertising appeals and buying behavior, while consumer characteristics moderate these effects. A quantitative methodology was employed, with 400 consumers exposed to different advertising stimuli, and measures of emotional resonance and purchase intention were collected using Likert-scale items. Results indicate that emotional and transformational appeals elicit stronger emotional engagement than rational appeals, significantly enhancing purchase intentions. Emotional resonance was confirmed as a key mediator, and the moderating effect of consumer characteristics underscores the importance of audience-specific marketing strategies. These findings provide actionable insights for marketers aiming to optimize campaign effectiveness, foster brand loyalty, and leverage emotional engagement in both traditional and digital media environments.

Abstract: Habit formation is a fundamental driver of consumer behavior, exerting significant influence on brand choice and long-term loyalty. This study explores the mechanisms through which repeated engagement with products or services, environmental cues, and reward systems create automatic behavioral patterns that shape consumption decisions. By reducing cognitive effort and providing predictable outcomes, habitual behavior simplifies decision-making while fostering emotional attachment to familiar brands. The interplay between habit, cognitive efficiency, and affective loyalty underscores its role in stabilizing consumer behavior, enhancing retention, and mitigating susceptibility to competitive pressures. Moreover, habit formation interacts with contextual, social, and technological factors, influencing the strength and persistence of brand preferences. Understanding these dynamics offers valuable insights for marketing strategies aimed at initiating, reinforcing, and sustaining consumer engagement. The findings highlight both opportunities and challenges, emphasizing the importance of ethical considerations and adaptability in habit-based approaches. Overall, integrating habit formation into marketing and consumer research provides a robust framework for promoting enduring brand-consumer relationships.

Abstract: Modern software capable of holding a conversation has quietly become one of the defining tools of contemporary client-facing operations. Built on progress in language understanding models, statistical learning, and computational reasoning, these programs can grasp what a person is asking for, reply in a way that fits the situation, and keep working around the clock across many different platforms at once. Because they can absorb the bulk of repetitive requests, companies rely on them to ease staffing pressure while still offering the kind of tailored response that keeps people coming back. The reach of this shift goes past simple cost savings, it is quietly rearranging how firms store and use institutional knowledge, how choices get made internally, and what staff actually spend their working hours doing, as routine exchanges move to software and people are freed up for work that calls for judgment.Alongside these gains sit real difficulties that cannot be waved away, questions about how personal information is handled, the risk of skewed or unfair replies, the murkiness of how a given answer was produced, and the challenge of building one system that serves wildly different audiences equally well. Tackling these problems calls for oversight put in place ahead of time rather than bolted on afterward, design choices that account for a broad range of users from the start, and evaluation that never really stops. On a more constructive note, the huge volume of exchanges these systems record turns into a genuine resource for understanding what customers actually want, letting firms act before a problem surfaces, sharpen what they recommend, and base choices on observed patterns instead of guesswork.Looking forward, worthwhile lines of inquiry include richer conversational designs, a sharper picture of how people and software negotiate trust, closer ties with neighboring technologies, and studies that track outcomes well beyond a single launch window. The overall picture that emerges is one where raw technical power on its own is not enough, durable value comes from combining that power with attentiveness to the person on the other end of the conversation, which is what turns a support tool into a genuine engine of organizational change rather than a cosmetic upgrade.

Abstract: This study investigates the effects of music on consumer behaviour and spending, and how different music genres influence consumer responses in a fashion retail environment. Data were collected via an online survey and analysed using SPSS Statistics to conduct variance analyses across demographic groups. The results indicate that in-store music exerts a generally positive influence on consumer behaviour (up to 68%), with instrumental music most effective at creating an inviting atmosphere (up to 65%). Gender differences were observed: 65% of male respondents preferred instrumental tracks, whereas 55% of female respondents favoured pop music. These findings have practical implications for retail managers seeking to optimise music selection to improve customer satisfaction and the overall shopping experience. In-store music plays a pivotal role in shaping consumers’ moods and behaviours, yet research examining its differential effects across genders within fashion retail contexts in Hong Kong remains limited.

Abstract: This study investigates the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in consumers’ food-related decision-making and its relationship with established social-media-mediated practices in e-commerce. A cross-sectional survey was conducted in Algeria in 2025 and generated 223 valid responses. 39.5% of respondents reported using AI, with ChatGPT making up 87.5% of applications reported by AI users. AI users experienced greater satisfaction with AI-related food experiences than non-users (Mann–Whitney U = 7,840.00, p < .001). However, AI use was not significantly associated with food purchasing after social-media exposure (p = .987). Social-media-mediated food discovery and purchasing practices remained prevalent, with no evidence of displacement by AI in the present sample. The findings conceptualize AI-assisted food choice as an additional layer of digital mediation in an established multi-source consumption environment and contribute evidence on AI-augmented consumer behavior to the under-researched Algerian context.

Abstract: The rapid advancement of digital technologies has fundamentally transformed contemporary marketing practices, shifting the focus from traditional, one-way communication toward interactive and experience-driven approaches. Among these technologies, Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) have emerged as powerful tools capable of reshaping consumer engagement and decision-making processes. By enabling immersive, multisensory interactions, AR and VR extend beyond conventional digital interfaces and allow consumers to actively explore, evaluate, and interact with products and brand narratives. This paper provides a comprehensive conceptual analysis of the role of AR and VR in marketing and examines their multidimensional effects on consumer behavior. Drawing on established theories of consumer behavior, technology adoption, and experiential marketing, the study explores how immersive technologies influence cognitive, affective, and behavioral responses. The analysis highlights the distinct yet complementary mechanisms through which AR and VR operate, emphasizing differences in contextual integration, perceived presence, interactivity, and experiential intensity. While AR enhances decision-making by embedding digital content within real-world environments, VR facilitates deep emotional engagement through fully immersive and narrative-driven experiences. Furthermore, the paper discusses the psychological and experiential mechanisms underlying immersive marketing, including perceived presence, interactivity, cognitive load, and consumer engagement. It also addresses key implementation challenges related to technological complexity, consumer heterogeneity, and strategic integration within the broader marketing mix. By synthesizing insights across technological, psychological, and managerial perspectives, this study contributes to a deeper theoretical understanding of immersive marketing. Overall, the paper advances the marketing literature by offering an integrative framework that explains how AR and VR reshape consumer engagement and decision-making processes. The findings provide valuable implications for scholars seeking to refine existing marketing theories and for practitioners aiming to design effective, experience-centric marketing strategies in an increasingly immersive digital environment.

Abstract: This study investigates the influence of ESG message strategies on purchase intention in new energy vehicle (NEV) advertising. Grounded in advertising message strategy, speech act and consumer behavior theories, the research examines strategy presence, directness, and boundary conditions. Two experiments (N=604) were conducted: Study 1 (n=204) used a control design to test ESG message strategy presence, while Study 2 (n=400) employed a 2 (Direct vs. Indirect) × 2 (Luxury vs. Affordable) between-subjects design. Results indicate that ESG messaging significantly enhances purchase intention, with direct strategies outperforming indirect ones. Psychological responses (brand trust, image, and attitude) partially mediate this relationship. Furthermore, brand type moderates the effect: while direct messaging increases purchase intention for both categories, the impact is significantly stronger for affordable brands. These findings extend speech act theory to sustainability marketing and provide strategic guidance for NEV advertisers.

Abstract: Virtual influencers are used to communicate luxury-brand meanings, but the process by which source attributes become purchase intention remains insufficiently established. This study integrates source credibility, meaning-transfer, and parasocial perspectives and tests paths from virtual-influencer attributes through parasocial interaction and brand attitude to purchase intention, including theory-driven serial indirect effects. Online data were obtained from 631 Chinese Generation Z respondents and after the filtering of those without virtual influencer exposure, the database retained 511 with prior virtual-influencer experience. PLS-SEM in SmartPLS 4 and artificial neural networks in R were combined. PER4, PSI3, and PSI5 were removed after first-run loadings of 0.569, 0.509, and 0.583. The final model explained 34.3% of parasocial interaction, 42.6% of brand attitude, and 44.3% of purchase intention. All specific indirect effects were positive; three serial paths were supported, while the expertise chain was equivocal because its percentile interval excluded zero but p = 0.055. Anthropomorphism strengthened the brand attitude–purchase intention relationship, while emotional engagement did not moderate the parasocial-interaction path. Repeated nested validation produced predictor rankings consistent with PLS-SEM, but ANN errors did not differ significantly from matched linear benchmarks. Relational and attitudinal conversion, rather than widespread direct persuasion or strong nonlinearity, was central to virtual luxury influence.

Abstract: This article examines seasonal population redistribution across 3,214 mobility areas in Spain on four dates in 2021. Five non-redundant indicators capture resident retention, outbound mobility, inbound pressure, and the diversity of mobility connections. Horn's parallel analysis retained two principal components, which together explained 77.58% of the variance: connected resident dispersal and receiving connectivity. A repeated-measures multivariate test revealed a large joint seasonal effect, F(15, 3194) = 1630.85, p < 0.001, partial eta-squared = 0.885. K-means clustering of complete 20-variable trajectories identified 1,606 connected-emitting areas and 1,603 seasonal-receiving areas. The classification was highly stable under subsampling (mean adjusted Rand index = 0.971), although the clusters were only moderately separated (silhouette = 0.247). Area fixed-effects models showed that the association between heritage concentration and both components varied by date. In a partial redundancy analysis, heritage concentration accounted for an additional 0.69% of trajectory variance after resident population and autonomous community were controlled (999-permutation p = 0.001). The conclusion remained unchanged after rank transformation, exclusion of sparse heritage-score extremes, and winsorization of the outcomes. Heritage concentration matters, but it is not the main driver of seasonal reception. By distinguishing connectivity, population emission, and temporary receiving pressure, the framework supports more targeted regional tourism planning.

Abstract: Background: Marketing through social media is turning out to be a significant part of the economy for Bangladesh, as one of the fastest growers in economy in one of the largest markets of the world; South Asia. Bangladeshi social media-based marketing adapted AI-generated content as a marketing tool-kit, this study aims to measure the impact it has on the perspectives of the consumers as it grows as a popular choice amongst marketeers. The sentiment was measured through surveys and observing real sentiments of the comment sections of the ads and try to identify a pattern rather than a generalizable conclusion. Objectives: This study examines three holistic questions that tries to assess this overall situation: can Bangladeshi consumers tell AI-generated advertising apart from conventional work; does that recognition alter trust and purchase intention; and which internal factors (trust, perceived risk, aesthetic judgment) plus external factors (language, income, platform behavior) explain any of the difference observed. Methods: Two complementary datasets were gathered for the project. The first comprises 563 unsolicited comments taken from the public social-media pages of 25 Bangladeshi brands. The second is a survey of 131 respondents that captured AI detectability, trust and purchase intention on seven-point Likert scales. Comments received manual coding for sentiment, theme and language or dialect. Survey answers were summarized with descriptive statistics and then cross-tabulated by gender, age and income. Results: Participants place their own detection skill at 5.02 out of 7, yet assign AI-generated content a trust score of only 2.85—almost identical to the 2.82 baseline they give ordinary social-media brand claims. Average purchase intention for social-media advertising sits at 3.92 and drops to 3.30 once respondents believe the advertisement was produced by AI, a reduction of 0.62 points or 15.8 percent (p < .01). Inside the comment corpus only 2.8 percent of posts name AI directly, but 62.5 percent of those posts are negative. The negative reactions cluster among code-mixed Bangla-English commenters and among mid-to-upper-income respondents. Conclusions: These patterns underwrite a four-principle, risk-tiered framework that brands can use when they deploy generative AI in advertising creative.

Abstract: This paper explores the role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in shaping consumption, and the contribution AI might make to transitioning to a responsible consumption and production regime, in line with Goal 12 of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The paper draws on Practice Theory, an established framework for studying sustainable consumption practices. Based on this framework, the Authors suggest that whilst in traditional consumption, the expertise required to consume resides in human subjects, in AI shaped consumption this expertise resides in AI algorithms. This may have implications for consumers’ agency and can put them at disadvantage. Indeed, the EU has proposed regulations to control the use of AI by providers. The paper draws on two case studies, Ant Forest, a Chinese app which prompts consumers to adopt responsible consumption practices and Mobility as a Service, a platform-based mobility offering. We find that whilst the former contributes to establishing consumers’ expertise in sustainable behaviour, for example through gaming, the latter may remove consumers’ choice by performing some of the consumption practices itself, such as selecting sustainable means of transportation. Our contribution is the formulation of a version of Practice Theory which is adapted to AI

Abstract: This study examines how AI-generated product images and original photographs shape user engagement in C2C second-hand fashion e-commerce. While generative artificial intelligence increasingly enables sellers to improve the aesthetic quality of product presentation, little is known about how synthetic imagery affects actual platform behavior rather than stated consumer preferences. Drawing on signaling theory and the stimulus–organism–response model, the study reports a field experiment conducted on Vinted across two seasonal waves. The experimental design compared paired listings using original photographs and AI-generated product images, with engagement measured through views, likes, inquiries and transactions. The findings reveal a seasonal reversal: AI-generated images produced more favorable attention-related indicators in the autumn–winter wave, whereas original photographs performed more favorably in the spring–summer wave, especially for conversion-related indicators. The results suggest that the effectiveness of AI-generated imagery is conditional rather than universal and depends on the balance between aesthetic refinement, visual authenticity, perceived risk and product-verification needs. The study contributes to electronic commerce research by showing how AI-generated visual content operates as both an aesthetic and trust-related signal in C2C markets. It also provides implications for sellers and platform operators regarding transparent and responsible use of synthetic product imagery.

Abstract: This study presents DynRFM-Hazard, a transparent framework for prioritizing manual review of historical customers at a medical-aesthetic institution. Continuous RFM values and seven exponentially decayed category-specific purchase-memory variables define a ten-variable customer state. Three regularized logistic models estimate first positive-payment probabilities in days 0-30, 31-90, and 91-180, and their survival-product combination yields internally consistent cumulative probabilities. Chronologically separated data included 67,106 item-level records from 9,412 customers. In the chronologically separated evaluation with a 23 July 2024 cutoff, the ten-variable representation, selected by validation AUPRC only, achieved AUROC 0.7999, AUPRC 0.3230, Brier score 0.0846, ECE 0.0585, and Top-10% precision 0.3667. It exceeded classical quintile RFM by 0.0644 AUPRC (1,000 customer-level paired bootstrap draws; 95% CI: 0.0460-0.0849). A cutoff-safe histogram-gradient tree achieved AUPRC 0.3231; the DynRFM-minus-tree difference was -0.0001 (95% CI: -0.0176-0.0169), so the data did not distinguish their ranking performance. A complementary retrospective rolling assessment at six earlier, fully mature time origins found mean AUPRC 0.4276 for the fixed ten-variable model versus 0.3516 for quintile RFM; the customer-clustered macro-origin difference was 0.0760 (95% CI: 0.0653-0.0875). This analysis reuses the same authorized dataset and cannot replace independent validation on newly collected or external data. Later-window probabilities were optimistic at the high end, so the framework supports relative manual-review ranking rather than fixed-threshold decisions. It is not a causal marketing, automatic-contact, or clinical-recommendation system.

Abstract: This study examines how green marketing and sustainability information overload shape consumers' perceptions of greenwashing and behavioral intentions toward green hotels in Vietnam. Integrating Stimulus-Organism-Response theory and Media Richness Theory, the study models green marketing and information overload as external stimuli, perceived greenwashing, green trust, and green attitude as organism states, and intention to stay, word of mouth, and willingness to pay as behavioral responses. Data were collected from 248 Vietnamese consumers aged 20 years and above after exposure to a simulated green hotel website video. Green marketing reduced perceived greenwashing, whereas information overload increased it. Perceived greenwashing did not affect green trust or green attitude but had a positive direct effect on behavioral intention. Green attitude and green trust significantly strengthened behavioral intention, and perceived greenwashing mediated the information overload-behavioral intention relationship. The findings highlight the need for concise, verifiable, and credible sustainability communication in green hospitality marketing.

Abstract: This conceptual paper re-imagines the application scenario of immersive technologies not merely as promotional add-ons or experiential devices, but as integral components of a hotel’s service communication and distribution architecture. Drawing upon information richness theory, signaling theory, information asymmetry, and transaction cost economics—with expectation-confirmation logic providing the link to during- and post-purchase outcomes—the paper conceptualizes hospitality digital twins as data-connected interfaces that illustrate heterogeneous offers, reduce pre-purchase uncertainty, support direct bookings, and align marketing communication with service-quality management through expectation calibration. An illustrative review of current immersive-technology providers reveals that commercial offerings predominantly remain limited to basic visualization or promotional gimmicks with minimal connections to booking engines, CRM systems, analytics, or quality-management processes. In contrast, the theoretical analysis demonstrates that the true value of a hospitality digital twin extends far beyond visual realism toward a combination of richer information, verifiability, and deep system integration. By distinguishing visualization-only virtual tours from data-enriched interfaces and fully integrated digital twins, this paper highlights expectation calibration as the core mechanism through which pre-purchase transparency enhances trust, channel choice, booking quality, and post-purchase service outcomes. Consequently, hotel managers should approach digital twins as next-generation customer journey infrastructure rather than isolated promotional novelties, while future empirical studies across laboratory and field settings are encouraged to test how varying levels of interface integration affect guest satisfaction, complaint reduction, and direct distribution performance.

Abstract: Climate emotions are associated with sustainable and unsustainable consumption, but the processes underlying these associations remain unclear. This study examines how climate-change anxiety and eco-grief relate to self-reported consumer outcomes through moral disengagement and moral obligation, and whether these associations vary with solastalgia. A mixed-methods design was used. Quantitative data were collected from 582 adult consumers in Türkiye via a two-wave survey administered 2 weeks apart; measures included climate-change anxiety, eco-grief, moral disengagement, moral obligation, affective impulsive buying, eco-conscious behavior, and solastalgia. The hypotheses were tested using PLS-SEM with bootstrapping and predictive assessment. Semi-structured interviews with 26 participants were analyzed through codebook thematic analysis to explain the modeled paths. Climate-change anxiety was positively associated with moral disengagement and weaklier, with moral obligation. Eco-grief was positively associated with moral obligation and negatively associated with moral disengagement. Moral disengagement was positively associated with self-reported affective impulsive-buying tendency, whereas moral obligation was positively associated with self-reported eco-conscious consumption. The solastalgia interaction terms were small but significant: the CCA–MD association was stronger and the EG–MO association was weaker at higher levels of place-based distress. The findings support an outcome-specific moral-regulatory conflict model while positioning solastalgia as an incremental contextual influence. The findings indicate that climate emotions are associated with concurrent variation in moral disengagement and moral obligation, each of which is differently associated with self-reported consumer outcomes. These findings suggest that interventions could strengthen agency, reduce moral-disengagement cues, and make repair-oriented actions more visible in affected places.