Opportunism in Capital Budget Recommendations: The Effects of Past Performance and Its Attributions*

This study uses an experiment to examine the separate and combined effects of managers' loss aversion and their causal attributions about their divisions' performance on tendencies to make goal‐incongruent capital budget recommendations. We find that managers' recommendations are biased by their loss aversion. In particular, managers of high‐performing divisions are more likely than managers of low‐performing divisions to propose investments that maximize their division's short‐term profits at the expense of the firm's long‐term value. We also find that managers' recommendations are biased by their causal attributions. In particular, managers are more likely to propose investments that maximize their division's short‐term profits at the expense of the firm's long‐term value when they attribute their division's performance to external causes (e.g., task difficulty or luck) rather than to internal causes (e.g., managerial ability or effort). Further, the effects of causal attributions are greater for managers of high‐performing divisions than for managers of low‐performing divisions. The study's findings are important because loss aversion and causal attributions are often manifested in firms. Thus, they may bias managers' decisions, which in turn may be detrimental to the firms' long‐term value.     

Decision Models for Robot Selection: A Comparison of Ordinary Least Squares and Linear Goal Programming Methods

The profusion of robot designs, the cost of testing, and the fact that robot operational parameter maximums are often mutually exclusive are factors that create a complex selection decision for the potential user. While formal robot testing standards are now in place, formal techniques to select robots for the testing process have not been addressed. A linear goal programming model is an effective tool for the decision maker for optimizing the robot selection process in terms of requirement priorities. It is also shown that this model provides a more stable result than the ordinary least squares estimator in the presence of statistical outliers of robot parameters. The methodology is illustrated through the use of current robot specifications.     

“曹学”与《红楼梦》研究的关系

“曹学“应分为两个部分,对《红楼梦》研究有价值、有意义的部分要深入研究探讨;而对《红楼梦》研究无任何直接关系的另一部分则由谱牒学家研究可也。以知人论世为原则,探讨曹雪芹“为何“与“如何“写《红楼梦》,是“曹学“同“红学“共同的终极目标。     

中国财政支出结构优化的制度性约束与目标导向

公共财政体制是中国政府职能向有限型、服务型、高效型政府转变的客观要求,同时,政府职能转变和公共财政体制共同构成了对财政支出结构优化的一个制度性约束.在该制度约束下,财政支出结构的调整优化必须明确其目标导向,以适应社会公共需要的发展.     

谈谈艺术解读中的“辩证生命还原”——从顾城的诗《弧线》说起

要领略艺术内在的生命力和魅力,方法之一就是必须对艺术实行"辩证的生命还原",即以人性的追问和反思为核心,以艺术中对生命活动的描写和表现作为艺术解读的对象,既重视其个别具体性,更注重其运动变化的辩证性,从艺术与人生的关系上感悟艺术对人生境界和精神境界的终极追求.     

终极控制人对内部控制有效性的影响——基于中国深市上市公司的一项实证研究

文章选取2007年深市所有上市公司为样本,从终极控制人性质、控制权、现金流权以及两权分离度角度分析终极控制人对内部控制有效性的影响。通过实证数据检验发现,当两权分离时,终极控制人的现金流权越大,上市公司的内部控制有效性越高;相对于民营终极控制人,当终极控制人为中央政府时,上市公司的内部控制有效性较低。因此,建立适当的控制权约束机制,能够有效地提升上市公司内部控制质量,保护中小投资者利益,促进资本市场健康发展。     

An Analysis of Pedagogical Effects of Alternative Teaching Approaches of Goal Programming

Lee, Shim, and Lee [12] suggested the superiority of the signal flow graph (SFG) method over the modified simplex method in enhancing students' learning of goal programming (GP). The present study empirically investigated this claim by analyzing the effect of the SFG method of GP on students' learning. In the process, this study also developed an effective tool for measuring GP knowledge. The findings showed that students who learned the SFG method understood GP better and more easily than those who learned the concept through the modified simplex method. The students who learned the SFG method of GP were also less dependent on rules or formulas than the students who learned the modified simplex method.     

Concepts,Theory, and Techniques DISTRIBUTED COMPUTER SYSTEM DESIGN: A MULTICRITERIA DECISION-MAKING METHODOLOGY*

The design of distributed computer systems (DCSs) requires compromise among several conflicting objectives. For instance, high system availability conflicts with low cost which in turn conflicts with quick response time. This paper presents an approach, based on multi-criteria decision-making techniques, to arrive at a good design in this multiobjective environment. An interactive procedure is developed to support the decision making of system designers. Starting from an initial solution, the procedure presents a sequence of non-dominated vectors to designers, allowing them to explore systematically alternative possibilities on the path to a final design. The model user has control over trade-offs among different design objectives. This paper focuses on the details of the mathematical model used to provide decision support. Accordingly, a formulation of DCS design as a multicriteria decision problem is developed. The exchange search heuristic used to generate nondominated solutions also is presented. We argue that multicriteria models provide a more realistic formulation of the DCS design problem than the single-criterion models used widely in the literature. While obtaining a clear definition of design objectives (single or multiple) is an important activity, by explicitly acknowledging the trade-offs among multiple objectives in the design process, our methodology is more likely to produce a better overall design than methods addressing a single criterion in isolation.     

A PREEMPTIVE VALUE-FUNCTION METHOD APPROACH FOR MULTIOBJECTIVE LINEAR PROGRAMMING PROBLEMS

Many common decision-making situations require integration of a number of objectives or goals into a single objective function to be optimized. A number of techniques for performing this analysis are presented in the literature. These procedures generally require a tradeoff between realism and tractability. The present approach uses the idea of preemptive priority levels with an approximate value function at each level. An efficient experimental design is used to assess directly a quadratic approximation of the multiattribute value functions. An existing algorithm is then used to solve the resulting problem. This procedure is shown to give good results when compared to both the value-function method and goal programming.     

太极诗学——老庄艺术精神

本文论述老庄诗文中的艺术精神及其太极诗学的内容范畴、体式表达、知识系统等方面对传统诗论的成功突破。论证了老庄在中国古典诗学中的杰出贡献。