Cognitive abilities,self-efficacy,and financial behavior

This paper investigates the effect of cognitive abilities on financial behavior among older adults. Using the U.S. Health and Retirement Study, I find that cognitive abilities significantly affect financial behavior through two channels: ability and self-efficacy. People with higher cognition scores achieve better financial outcomes. This positive association is especially strong in tasks having high demand of cognitive abilities, which confirms the ability channel of the cognitive ability effect. In addition, there is evidence for the self-efficacy channel as a secondary source of cognitive influence. Lower cognitive abilities decrease people’s sense of self-efficacy, which, in turn, significantly decreases financial management efficiency. The findings have important policy implications, specifically that more effort is needed to assist the growing older population through the cognitive aging process and that noncognitive skills, as a secondary source of influence, also warrant attention.     

论《世说新语·贤媛》之"贤"

通过分析《世说新语.贤媛》中女性的特征,指出了“贤”之一字不同于封建礼教所要求的新的内涵,并阐述了产生这种变化的原因,以及这种新的审美理想的意义。     

Unmanaging public relations: Reclaiming complex practice in pursuit of global consent

Globalisation raises numerous problems for contemporary public relations theory. In a world where the geographic reach of organisations routinely spans cultures and nation states and where issues of culture, economics and politics are inseparably intertwined, the discipline of public relations has established a distance from the immediacy of the marketplace, failed to fully engage with discussions of culture. By taking a relentlessly managerialist approach, theorists have also failed to recognise the true complexity of public relations practice and this has marginalised aspects of practice that, though nebulous and intangible, are none the less real. This paper argues that attention needs to shift towards the complexities of practice, in order to recapture and theorise a distinctive occupational field with the aim of better understanding the relationship between universal humanising principles, on the one hand, and the purposive demands of capital, on the other; the attempt to theorise how public relations makes profitable sense in society. The paper was prompted by the author's reflections on auto-ethnographic research into the public relations field, part of an ongoing research project.     

Leveraging middle managers’ brokerage for corporate entrepreneurship: The role of multilevel social capital configurations

Building on recent efforts to bring a socio-political perspective to social capital research, we develop and test a multilevel framework that explains why middle managers who occupy brokerage positions differ in their ability and willingness to engage in entrepreneurial behavior. More specifically, we provide a contextualized understanding of the links among middle managers' brokerage, their political-support ties, and their personal initiative. Results derived from data on 383 middle managers and 72 top managers in 34 business units indicate that political-support ties with top managers strengthen the relationship between middle managers’ brokerage and personal initiative. However, this positive effect depends on the social capital resources available in the focal business unit. It is attenuated in business units with a supportive and trusting social context and amplified in business units with high levels of internal connectedness. By uncovering these incompatibilities and complementarities, our study demonstrates the value of accounting for different social capital configurations and the interplay of their inherent social capital resources when examining the effects of brokerage on corporate entrepreneurship.     

从俞平伯晚年自省和“李希凡自述”想到的(之三)——回应俞平伯晚年的红学研究反思

俞平伯先生晚年的红学自省是真实可信的,应引起红学界高度重视,他的红学研究思想的重大变化同1954年那场对他的批评有内在的因果关系。对当年那场"批俞评红"不能全盘否定,不能只讲负面问题,全面否定其正确性和必要性。现在红学研究的一些乱象正是当年批判过了的错误研究思想、研究方法的泛滥。这种泛滥同对当年的全盘否定不无关系。     

What is Mentoring?

What is mentoring? Is it just a buzz word or is this really valuable? How can mentoring help one to grow and advance personally and professionally? How and where does one even begin? Many of us have these questions. In this article, I will share my perspective and provide some reflections on these questions based on my own personal and professional journey.     

Personal networks typologies: A structural approach

Building typologies allows to compare networks on multiple dimensions, and to approach a generalization grounded on empirical data. In this article, we present a typology of personal networks only based on indicators related to the structure of relations between alters. It is designed from very detailed data on young French people who were involved in a longitudinal study. Our typology mobilizes a small number of indicators to discriminate the types that compose it. In so doing, we intend to make it applicable to various surveys.     

Social capital of entrepreneurs in a developing country: The effect of gender on access to and requests for resources

This paper addresses gender differences in the social capital of entrepreneurs in a developing country. Social networks are often an important asset for accessing resources; however, they may also be a liability in developing countries, since entrepreneurs are often expected to support their contacts. Using a recent survey among urban and rural Ugandan entrepreneurs, we focus on the financial resources that entrepreneurs can obtain from their contacts on the one hand, and requests for financial support made to the entrepreneurs from these contacts on the other hand. Our results show that there are gender differences associated with access to, and requests for, financial resources.     

"百苗图"源流考略--以《黔苗图说》为范本

“百苗图”是历史背景较为复杂的一种反映贵州古代少数民族的地方文献,其版本众多。据考,它们是源自清人陈浩著的《八十二种苗图并说》。关于其母本的产生历史,学术界纷争不一。《黔苗图说》是贵州省博物馆收藏的一部较为典型的百苗图册页。本文以它为例,试对“百苗图”的源流做一些考证。并认为其母本并非某一时代实地调查的第一手资料,而主要是利用许多地方文献的相关材料编纂成册。     

The Impact of Personal Finance Education Delivered in High School and College Courses

This study investigates the impact of personal finance education delivered in high school and college. Outcomes of interest were investment knowledge and household savings rates measured years after the financial education was delivered. A web-based survey with questions about participation in financial education, financial experiences, income and inheritances, and demographic characteristics was administered to 1,039 alumni from a large midwestern university. Participation in a college level personal finance course was associated with higher levels of investment knowledge. Experience with financial instruments appeared to explain more of the variance in both investment knowledge and savings rates. No significant relationship between taking a high school course and investment knowledge was found. Financial experiences were found to be positively associated with savings rates.