• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.59-69
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• 2010

Green or an environmental consciousness has been a major issue for businesses and government offices, as well as consumers, worldwide. In response to this movement, the Korean government announced, in the early 2000s, the era of "Green Growth" as a way to encourage green-related business activities. The Korean fashion industry, in various levels of involvement, presents diverse eco-friendly products as a part of the green movement. These apparel products include organic products and recycled clothing. For these companies to be successful, they need information about who are the consumers who consider green issues (e.g., environmental sustainability) as part of their personal values when making a decision for product purchase, use, and disposal. These consumers can be considered as eco-sumers. Previous studies have examined consumers' purchase intention for or with eco-friendly products. In addition, studies have examined influential factors used to identify the eco-sumers or green consumers. However, limited attention was paid to eco-sumers' disposal or recycling behavior of clothes in comparison with their green product purchases. Clothing disposal behaviors are ways that consumer can get rid of unused clothing and in clue temporarily lending the item or permanently eliminating the item by "handing down" (e.g., giving it to a younger sibling), donating, exchanging, selling, or simply throwing it away. Accordingly, examining purchasing behaviors of eco-friendly fashion items in conjunction with clothing disposal behaviors should improve understanding of a consumer's clothing consumption behavior from the environmental perspective. The purpose of this exploratory study is to provide descriptive information about Korean eco-sumers who have ecologically-favorable lifestyles and behaviors when buying and disposing of clothes. The objectives of this study are to (a) categorize Koreans on the basis of clothing disposal behaviors; (b) investigate the differences in demographics, lifestyles, and clothing consumption values among segments; and (c) compare the purchase intention of eco-friendly fashion items and influential factors among segments. A self-administered questionnaire was developed based on previous studies. The questionnaire included 10 items of clothing disposal behavior, 22 items of LOHAS (Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability) characteristics, and 19 items of consumption values, measured by five-point Likert-type scales. In addition, the purchase intention of two eco-friendly fashion items and 11 attributes of each item were measured by seven-point Likert type scales. Two polyester fleece pullovers, made from fabric created from recycled bottles with the PET identification code, were selected from one Korean brand and one US imported brand among outdoor sportswear brands. A brief description of each product with a color picture was provided in the survey. Demographic variables (i.e., gender, age, marital status, education level, income, occupation) were also included. The data were collected through a professional web survey agency during May 2009. A total of 600 final usable questionnaires were analyzed. The age of respondents ranged from 20 to 49 years old with a mean age of 34 years. Fifty percent of the respondents were males and about 58% were married, and 62% reported having earned university degrees. Principal components factor analysis with varimax rotation was used to identify the underlying dimensions of the clothing disposal behavior scale, and three factors were generated (i.e., reselling behavior, donating behavior, non-recycling behavior). To categorize the respondents on the basis of clothing disposal behaviors, k-mean cluster analysis was used, and three segments were obtained. These consumer segments were labeled as 'Resale Group', 'Donation Group', and 'Non-Recycling Group.' The classification results indicated approximately 98 percent of the original cases were correctly classified. With respect to demographic characteristics among the three segments, significant differences were found in gender, marital status, occupation, and age. LOHAS characteristics were reduced into the following five factors: self-satisfaction, family orientation, health concern, environmental concern, and voluntary service. Significant differences were found in the LOHAS factors among the three clusters. Resale Group and Donation Group showed a similar predisposition to LOHAS issues while the Non-Recycling Group presented the lowest mean scores on the LOHAS factors compared to the other segments. The Resale and Donation Groups described themselves as enjoying or being satisfied with their lives and spending spare-time with family. In addition, these two groups cared about health and organic foods, and tried to conserve energy and resources. Principal components factor analysis generated clothing consumption values into the following three factors: personal values, social value, and practical value. The ANOVA test with the factors showed differences primarily between the Resale Group and the other two groups. The Resale Group was more concerned about personal value and social value than the other segments. In contrast, the Non-Recycling Group presented the higher level of social value than did Donation Group. In a comparison of the intention to purchase eco-friendly products, the Resale Group showed the highest mean score on intent to purchase Product A. On the other hand, the Donation Group presented the highest intention to purchase for Product B among segments. In addition, the mean scores indicated that the Korean product (Product B) was more preferable for purchase than the U.S. product (Product A). Stepwise regression analysis was used to identify the influence of product attributes on the purchase intention of eco product. With respect to Product A, design, price and contribution to environmental preservation were significant to predict purchase intention for the Resale Group, while price and compatibility with my image factors were significant for the Donation Group. For the Non-Recycling Group, design, price compatibility with the factors of my image, participation to eco campaign, and contribution to environmental preservation were significant. Price appropriateness was significant for each of the three clusters. With respect to Product B, design, price and compatibility with my image factors were important, but different attributes were associated significantly with purchase intention for each of the three groups. The influence of LOHAS characteristics and clothing consumption values on intention to purchase Products A and B were also examined. The LOHAS factor of health concern and the personal value factor were significant in the relationships with the purchase intention; however, the explanatory powers were low in the three segments. Findings showed that each group as classified by clothing disposal behaviors showed differences in the attributes of a product, personal values, and the LOHAS characteristics that influenced their purchase intention of eco-friendly products. Findings would enable organizations to understand eco-friendly behavior and to design appropriate strategic decisions to appeal eco-sumers.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.19-45
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• 2008

This study is to empirically examine the primary dimensions of visual merchandising (VMD) of internet shopping mall, namely store design, merchandise, and merchandising cues, to be a attractive virtual store to the shoppers. The authors reviewed the literature related to the major components of VMD from the perspective of the AIDA model, which has been mainly applied to the offline store settings. The major purposes of the study are as follows; first, tries to derive the variables related with the components of visual merchandising through reviewing the existing literatures, establish the hypotheses, and test it empirically. Second, examines the relationships between the components of VMD and the attitude toward the VMD, however, putting more emphasis on finding out the component structure of the VMD. VMD needs to be examined with the perspective that an online shopping mall is a virtual self-service or clerkless store, which could reduce the number of employees, help the shoppers search, evaluate and purchase for themselves, and to be explored in terms of the in-store persuasion processes of customers. This study reviewed the literatures related to store design, merchandise, and merchandising cues which might be relevant to the store, product, and promotion respectively. VMD is a total communication tool, and AIDA model could explain the in-store consumer behavior of online shopping. Store design has to do with triggering a consumer attention to the online mall, merchandise with a product related interest, and merchandising cues with promotions such as recommendation and links that induce the desire to pruchase. These three steps might be seen as the processes for purchase actions. The theoretical rationale for the relationship between VMD and AIDA could be found in Tyagi(2005) that the three steps of consumer-oriented merchandising are a store, a product assortment, and placement, in Omar(1999) that three types of interior display are a architectural design display, commodity display, and point-of-sales(POS) display, and in Davies and Ward(2005) that the retail store interior image is related to an atmosphere, merchandise, and in-store promotion. Lee et al(2000) suggested as the web merchandising components a merchandising cues, a shopping metaphor which is an assistant tool for search, a store design, a layout(web design), and a product assortment. The store design which includes differentiation, simplicity and navigation is supposed to be related to the attention to the virtual store. Second, the merchandise dimensions comprising product assortments, visual information and product reputation have to do with the interest in the product offerings. Finally, the merchandising cues that refer to merchandiser(MD)'s recommendation of products and providing the hyperlinks to relevant goods for the shopper is concerned with attempt to induce the desire to purchase. The questionnaire survey was carried out to collect the data about the consumers who would shop at internet shopping malls frequently. To select the subject malls, the mall ranking data announced by a mall rating agency was used to differentiate the most popular and least popular five mall each. The subjects was instructed to answer the questions after navigating the designated mall for five minutes. The 300 questionnaire was distributed to the consumers, 166 samples were used in the final analysis. The empirical testing focused on identifying and confirming the dimensionality of VMD and its subdimensions using a structural equation modeling method. The confirmatory factor analysis for the endogeneous and exogeneous variables was carried out in four parts. The second-order factor analysis was done for a store design, a merchandise, and a merchandising cues, and first-order confirmatory factor analysis for the attitude toward the VMD. The model test results shows that the chi-square value of structural equation is 144.39(d.f 49), significant at 0.01 level which means the proposed model was rejected. But, judging from the ratio of chi-square value vs. degree of freedom, the ratio was 2.94 which smaller than an acceptable level of 3.0, RMR is 0.087 which is higher than a generally acceptable level of 0.08. GFI and AGFI is turned out to be 0.90 and 0.84 respectively. Both NFI and NNFI is 0.94, and CFI 0.95. The major test results are as follows; first, the second-order factor analysis and structural equational modeling reveals that the differentiation, simplicity and ease of identifying current status of the transaction are confirmed to be subdimensions of store design and to be a significant predictors of the dependent variable. This result implies that when designing an online shopping mall, it is necessary to differentiate visually from other malls to improve the effectiveness of the communications of store design. That is, the differentiated store design raise the contrast stimulus to sensory organs to promote the memory of the store and to have a favorable attitude toward the VMD of a store. The results that navigation which means the easiness of identifying current status of shopping affects the attitude to VMD could be interpreted that the navigating processes via the hyperlinks which is characteristics of an internet shopping is a complex and cognitive process and shoppers are likely to lack the sense of overall structure of the store. Consequently, shoppers are likely to be alost amid shopping not knowing where to go. The orientation tool enhance the accessibility of information to raise the perceptive power about the store environment.(Titus & Everett 1995) Second, the primary dimension of merchandise and its subdimensions was confirmed to be unidimensional respectively, have a construct validity, and nomological validity which the VMD dimensions supposed to have a positive correlation with the dependent variable. The subdimensions of product assortment, brand fame and information provision proved to have a positive effect on the attitude toward the VMD. It could be interpreted that the more plentiful the product and brand assortment of the mall is, the more likely the shoppers to favor it. Brand fame and information provision as well affect the VMD attitude, which means that the more famous the brand, the more likely the shoppers would trust and feel familiar with the mall, and the plentifully and visually presented information could have the shopper have a favorable attitude toward the store VMD. Third, it turned out to be that merchandising cue of product recommendation and hyperlinks affect the VMD attitude. This could be interpreted that recommended products could reduce the uncertainty related with the purchase decision, and the hyperlinks to relevant products would help the shopper save the cognitive effort exerted into the information search and gathering, which could lead to a favorable attitude to the VMD. This study tried to sheds some new light on the VMD of online store by reviewing the variables mentioned to be relevant with offline VMD in the existing literatures, and tried to link the VMD components from the perspective of AIDA model. The effect size of the VMD dimensions on the attitude was in the order of the merchandise, the store design and the merchandising cues.It is said that an internet has an unlimited place for display, however, the virtual store is not unlimited since the consumer has a limited amount of cognitive ability to process the external information and internal memory. Particularly, the shoppers are likely to face some difficulties in decision making on account of too many alternative and information overloads. Therefore, the internet shopping mall manager should take into consideration the cost of information search on the part of the consumer, to establish the optimal product placements and search routes. An efficient store composition would be possible by reducing the psychological burdens and cognitive efforts exerted to information search and alternatives evaluation. The store image is in most part determined by the product category and its brand it deals in. The results of this study support this proposition that the merchandise is most important to the VMD attitude than other components, the manager is required to take a strategic approach to VMD. The internet users are getting more accustomed and more knowledgeable about the internet media and more likely to accept the internet as a shopping channel as the period of time during which they use the internet to shop become longer. The web merchandiser should be aware that the product introduction using a moving pictures and a bulletin board become more important in order to present the interactive product information visually and communicate with customers more actively, therefore leading to making the quantity and quality of product information more rich.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.15 no.8
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• pp.75-86
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• 2017

Purpose - The online-to-offline (O2O) business model has brought considerable changes to the traditional Chinese business model. The main difference between O2O and pure online consumption is that O2O offers a richer experience and word-of-mouth. it is easier to trigger online word-of-mouth. However, few scholars have been concerned about the impact of experiential value on customer satisfaction and online word-of-mouth (e-WOM) in the study of O2O. This study takes the O2O business model in China's catering industry as its research object and uses structural equation modelling to analyze the impact of online and offline experiential values on customer satisfaction and e-WOM. Research design, data, and methodology - According to previous researches, consumer experiential value is mainly divided into return on investment (economy and efficiency), service excellence, playfulness and aesthetics. According to the characteristics of O2O in China's catering industry, this study divides the online experience value into efficiency and economy (return on investment). The offline part is divided into return on investment (economy and efficiency), service excellence, playfulness and aesthetics. Using a web-based survey, we collected 303 valid samples. Structural equation modelling was used to create the research model. Results - The results show that efficiency (online) and service excellence (offline) have a significant effect on customer satisfaction. Economics (online) and playfulness (offline) have a positive impact on customers' e-WOM. In addition, the higher the customer satisfaction, the greater the positive impact on the spread by word of mouth. However, aesthetic(offline) and return on investment(offline) have no significant impact to customer satisfaction and e-WOM. Conclusions - The study findings show that the key to boost customer satisfaction in the catering industry is to improve product quality and service. Although traditional competitive strategies such as online discount have been questioned by many scholars about their decreasing effectiveness, they are indispensable means to attract online traffic and trigger e-WOM. The traditional enterprises can reconstruct traditional business processes through the O2O model to effectively improve customer satisfaction and word of mouth by improving the experiential value of economy and efficiency. Additionally, it can be used as the natural advantages of online communication to induce customers to engage in word of mouth and attract more potential customers.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.197-208
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• 2020

Social enterprises are entities to pursue solving societal problems with maintaining commercial viability. In order for a social enterprise to achieve commercial viability, it must be able to provide products that consumers can satisfy, to make social enterprise trustable, and to establish a lasting relationship with customers. This study suggests that perception of value congruence, price fairness and service quality will affect customer performance such as trust, satisfaction and customer loyalty. And this structural relationship was confirmed through structural equation modelling. The empirical results show that customer trust and satisfaction can be improved when the value congruence is high and service quality is high. Meanwhile, the perception of price fairness has a negative effect on customer trust. However, considering the influence of price fairness on customer satisfaction, the total effect of price fairness on trust is not significant. This result implies that customers are less sensitive to social enterprise product prices than general companies. And customer satisfaction for the social enterprise is positively affecting trust and loyalty, and customer trust is also positively affecting customer loyalty. After the empirical analysis, this study suggests implications for social enterprises to improve customer performance and secure commercial viability.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.15 no.11
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• pp.6646-6651
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• 2014

This study was carried out to find the social welfare effects of agricultural outlook information service for fruit in Korea. The goals of an agricultural outlook information service are to improve the efficiency of the agricultural product market, and stabilize the farmer's income and consumer price. This paper introduces the results of econometric analysis for the effects of social welfare benefits. According to the results of econometric analysis for the citrus industry, the effects of the social welfare benefits were estimated to be 15,228 million KRW on apples (ratio of the total revenue, 1.5%), 3,154 million KRW on pears (ratio of the total revenue, 1.8%), 1,936 million KRW on peaches (ratio of the total revenue, 0.9%), 5,211 million KRW on grapes (ratio of the total revenue, 1.0%), 44,976 million KRW on citrus (ratio of the total revenue, 5.4%), and 2,590 million KRW on sweet persimmon (ratio of the total revenue, 0.8%) in 2012.

• Journal of Korean Library and Information Science Society
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• v.28
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• pp.447-475
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• 1998

We are seeing a shift of the focus of information service from system-centered(data-centered or intermediary-centered) a n.0, pproach to user-centered a n.0, pproach. Sense-making theory is one of the user- centered a n.0, pproaches. This study focused on user-centered information service paradigm concepts of Dervin's sense-making theory and interpreting sense-making theory in the practical context of library services. The sense-making theory is basically a cognitive a n.0, pproach to information-seeking, in that it recognizes information as something that involves internal cognitive processes. The user of information becomes the focus in this sense-making model. The sense-making theory sees information as subjective, situational, and cognitive. It focuses on understanding information within specific contexts and on understanding how information needs develop and how they are satisfied. It regards the user not as a passive receive of external information but as the center in a active, ongoing process of change. It related to the information needs of users. Dervin's method for studying information needs employs the 'situation-gap-use' metaphor. All information needs stem from a discontinuity or 'gap! in one's knowledge. Dervin believes that information needs can be addressed by understanding the process that each individual goes through in experiencing a gap, in trying to resolve it, and in gaining something (especially new knowledge) from the experience. Sense-making is a process; 'sense' is the product of this process. Sense includes 'knowledge'. However, it includes a host of other subjective factors that reflect an individual's interpretations of a situation including intuitions, opinions, hunches, effective responses, evaluations, questions, etc. For several reasons, however, difficulties are encountered if one attempts a more substantial assessment of the theory. First, it has not yet crystallized into a well-defined theory. Secondly, though the theory has aroused general interest, e.g. within LIS, detailed discussion of its strong and weak points is still lacking. A third source of difficulty is that the basic assumptions of the theory have been explicated metaphorically. If sense-making theory is to be really useful, it needs to be interpreted for library settings. But we have found no attempt to construct an information service based on the theory. Because the research tradition is still relatively young, there are many unanswered questions connected, e.g. with the design of information systems. In any case, e.g. intermediary access systems would be more efficient and effective it their planning could be founded on the user-centered a n.0, pproach.

• Smart Media Journal
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.60-66
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• 2020

In this paper, the FIDO (Fast IDentity Online) transaction certification platform was proposed for applying the DID (Decentralized ID) of blockchain with home shopping channels to the IPTV service providers based on the Remocon (Remote Control). In this case, the DID based smart remocon applies biometric identification techniques for personal identification. These individual DID smart remote controls apply distributed ID blockchain, enabling home shopping viewers to conduct reliable ratings surveys through the detection of channel changed information. In addition, this smart remocon utilizes the product purchased information history on home shopping channels, allowing IPTV's home shopping viewers to compare the same broadcasted production information on all channels by blockchain technique and their production characteristics. IPTV service providers can process home shopping order/authorization informations in one-stop service via a number of home shopping broadcasting companies, and DID smart remote controls for home shopping viewers with the checking results of their real-time online access to confirm the FIDO2.0 transaction certification homepage. Thus, the FIDO transaction authentication platforms of IPTV service provider(Telecommunication company) can be expected to improve the benefits of home shopping customers, and to reduce the broadcasting companies' burden of payment, too.

• Culinary science and hospitality research
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.105-119
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• 2009

The elevated standard of living and increased interest in health and well-being have caused customers to expect a role. Consumers are more and more interested in food service merchandise development. The purpose of this paper is to perform a discriminant analysis of merchandise development policies based on customer participation strategies. Statistical techniques employed included the reliability analysis and the discriminant analysis. The current thesis is based on the 350-questionnaire-survey conducted from July 1 to July 31, 2008 at five food service companies in Seoul and Gwangju. The data collected for this study was analyzed with frequency analysis, reliability analysis, validation analysis, factor analysis, and discriminant analysis using the SPSS 12.0 package program. The results of the test of the hypotheses can be summarized as follows: the analysis shows that there is significant difference between the active groups and the passive groups in all the merchandise development related factors, market directivity, and customer satisfaction directivity. Thus, food service management needs to apply customer participation strategies aggressively.

• Journal of Navigation and Port Research
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• v.40 no.1
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• pp.35-41
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• 2016

Port congestion has been recognized as one of the critical factors for port service competitiveness and port selection criteria. However, congestion ratio, the congestion index currently used by Korea, plays a very limited role in shipping companies' and shippers' selection of port and port authorities' decision making regarding port management and development. This is mainly due to the fact that this ratio is only calculated as the ratio of the number of vessels by each port. Therefore, this study aims to measure service level related to vessel entry and departure in Korea ports by evaluating waiting ratio(WR) according to terminals and vessel types. The results demonstrate that the waiting ratio of containerships and non-containerships is less than 4% and 15% respectively, which satisfies the reasonable level suggested by the UNCTAD and OECD. Port of Pohang is revealed to have the highest WR of 57% and among the terminals, No. 1 Terminal of the Shinhang area has the highest WR. In terms of ship types, WR of Steel Product Carrier is highest, followed by General Cargo Ship and Bulk Carrier at the Pohang Shinhang area. In addition to WR, berth occupancy ratio as well as the number and time of waiting vessels can be utilized to evaluate service level by ports and terminals from port users' perspective, and furthermore, to improve the port management and development policy for port managers or authorities.

• Journal of Korea Technology Innovation Society
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.362-381
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• 2019

The purpose of this study is to examine how two factors among various affecting factors of technological innovation, i.e. sectoral system of innovation and R&D support service, were actually applied in the case of NUC Electronics. This company has achieved high level of innovation performance through change of injection port and improvement of extracting rate. This was possible because each component of sectoral system of innovation system was matched with the innovation activity. The improvement of the performance in NUC Electronics was attributable to its own innovation efforts and R&D support service of government research institute. In the process of technological innovation, the company could receive high-level services in areas such as product design and virtual experiments that companies can not solve themselves. It can be said that the role of government and public institutions to support the shortage of SMEs was important. In terms of each component of sectoral system of innovation, we found that there were many opportunities of new technology; sustainability was low; imitation was easy; appropriability was low but it has dualily; accumulation of technology was relatively high, availability of external knowledge was high. At the same time, both of the company and the network played an important role, and market conditions were very favorable. In terms of R&D support services, it is a direct effect that a great deal of time and cost savings have been achieved through virtual experiments on the material and shape of the screw. As an indirect effect, the core competence of the company has been greatly strengthened by utilizing the momentum of technology development through external support, hence the company could establish the structure of virtuous circle of innovation.