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Three essays on REIT board gender diversity
Get PDFThe literature on gender diversity posits that women can benefit organisations through
a monitoring perspective by alleviating agency issues or from a resource-based perspective by
bringing in unique resources. This thesis builds on these theoretical perspectives and
investigates the effects of women on the board on performance, risk, and risk-management
strategies of US equity real estate investment trusts (REITs).
In the first study, we find that an increase in board gender diversity increases firm
performance but also increases firm risk, resulting in no risk-adjusted returns where women
seem to fit the risk-return spectrum. Building on the literature where women are considered
more risk-averse and less overconfident than men, we identify sources of this risk where women
on board seem to make conservative investment decisions, concentrating properties by location
and display a ‘home-bias’. Further evidence of this conservative investment approach is
presented in the second study where women on the board lower a REITs transaction activity,
especially for out-of-state transactions; favouring larger properties. Additionally, women on
boards lower transaction activity in bull market states where overconfident investors increase
activity and lower activity for non-traditional REITs which are considered risky.
Although women on REIT boards increase overall risk, in the third study we find they
lower tail-specific risk, especially for internally managed REITs where the board has more
power to influence decisions. Given the superior monitoring of women, they eliminate the
negative effects of risky concentration strategies which is not the case for REITs which do not
have women on the board, where such strategies increase crash risk. Lastly, in this thesis we
present evidence of over-monitoring, where exposure to highly religious states increases crash
risk when internal monitoring mechanisms are already in place (i.e. women on the board) but
lowers it for REITs which do not have these mechanisms in place
Development of some species of the Anthrenus pimpinellae (Fabricius, 1775) group (Coleoptera, Dermestidae, Megatominae) on feathers and dead insects
Get PDFSome species of Dermestidae (Coleoptera) are pests of stored commodities or natural history museums, or are species of forensic significance. For these species, a lot of research has been carried out into their feeding habits. For the genus Anthrenus Geoffroy, 1762 pest species, we know what they will feed on or how long their development takes under different conditions, but rather less about the growth curves followed during development. For non-pest Anthrenus species, we know hardly anything about their feeding habits, let alone development periods and growth curves. In the current study, adult Anthrenus amandae Holloway, 2019, Anthrenus angustefasciatus Ganglbauer, 1904, and Anthrenus isabellinus Küster, 1848 from Mallorca (Balearic Islands, Spain) were placed on dry feathers and dead insects to assess developmental performance. All species developed on feathers, but only A. angustefasciatus was able to develop through to adult on dead insects. The developmental curves and relative growth rates of the three species on feathers are presented. Anthrenus amandae develops the fastest of the three species, whilst A. isabellinus was the slowest. Pupal weights and weight at adult eclosion from the final larval case were measured. Weight lost by adults whilst quiescent within the final larval case is linearly related to the length of time spent within the final larval case. Quiescing adults lose 0.2% of the weight accumulated during development per day
Time and the ‘temporal turn’ in planning theory and practice: an agenda
No full textThis commentary piece discusses how time and temporalities have, to date, not been paid enough attention or sufficiently understood and researched in planning theory and practice. The article argues that a wider recognition of time in and for planning is needed and highlights the emerging interest and potentials for greater research activity investigating this aspect of planning and urban governance. The main purpose of the article is to set out an agenda for future inquiry
Conceptualising food environments as social activity spaces: insights from lived experience research in Thailand and Laos
Get PDFThe study of food environments helps the understanding of food and nutrition insecurity, but its static, quantitative and physical focus requires complementary research through people's “lived experiences.” Through exploratory qualitative and participatory research, we aimed to capture communities' views of food environments, how they navigate these spaces, and what constitutes inequitable exclusion therein. We conducted participatory mapping and focus group discussions with 90 participants across 16 rural and peri-urban communities in northern Thailand and northern Lao PDR between November 2022 and February 2023. The inductive qualitative analysis resulted in four key themes: i) Diverse and dynamic foodscapes require careful study for dietary diversity assessments; ii) The food environment contains strong relational elements and varied experiences across gender and ethnic groups; iii) Food security had important local expressions of food sovereignty and food solidarity; and iv) Food-related behaviour was deeply embedded in a broader livelihood and human insecurity context. We link these themes to the concept of social and physical “activity spaces,” advancing food environment research towards lived experiences, behavioural dynamics, and invisible forms of exclusion. This approach highlights the limitations of standardised dietary diversity measures; and it can enable research and interventions that are sensitive to local realities and the broader human security context
Designing heterogeneous LLM agents for financial sentiment analysis
Get PDFLarge language models (LLMs) have drastically changed the possible ways to design intelligent systems,
shifting the focus from massive data acquisition and new model training to human alignment and strategic elicitation of the full potential of existing pre-trained models. This paradigm shift, however, is not fully
realized in financial sentiment analysis (FSA) due to the discriminative nature of this task and a lack of prescriptive knowledge of how to leverage existing generative models in such a context. This study investigates
the effectiveness of the new paradigm, that is, using LLMs without fine-tuning for FSA. Rooted in Minsky’s
theory of mind and emotions, a design framework with heterogeneous LLM agents is proposed and applied
to FSA. The framework instantiates specialized agents using prior guiding knowledge from both linguistics
and finance. Then, a summative agent reasons on the aggregated agent discussions. Comprehensive evaluations using six FSA datasets show that the framework yields better accuracies compared to many alternative
multi-LLM agent settings, especially when the discussion contents are substantial. This study contributes to
the design foundations and paves new avenues for LLMs-based FSA and potentially other tasks. Implications
for business and management have also been discussed
Driving voluntary reduction of single-use plastic consumption: capability, opportunity, and motivation
Get PDFThe excessive use of single-use plastic (SUP), especially SUP tableware, has caused a global plastic waste crisis. Understanding the factors that drive consumers to reduce SUP tableware usage is essential for addressing this issue. Current studies often use simplistic models that fail to capture the complexity of human behavior in reducing SUPs, indicating a need for more comprehensive approaches. Grounded in the robust COM-B model and the Theoretical Domains Framework (TDF), this study aims to understand the factors influencing individuals' behavior to reduce SUP tableware. These frameworks offer a solid basis for our research, viewing complex SUP consumption behavior as an interplay of capability (psychological and physical), opportunity (social and environmental support), motivation (people’s thinking and feeling), and outcome behaviors. Two online surveys were administered to 354 (Study 1) and 644 (Study 2) Chinese participants. Results showed that capability and opportunity are associated with SUP tableware reduction behavior, fully mediated by motivation. The model explains 70% of motivation in SUP tableware reduction. Motivation predicts approximately 48% of actual SUP tableware reduction behavior. Capability, opportunity, and motivation are higher-order constructs measured by lower-order constructs. Capability is predicted by action control, action planning, action skills, decision-making, and habits. Behavioral Opportunity is associated with social norms, social support, and environment. Motivation is affected by identity, reinforcement, goals, and self-efficacy. Finally, theoretical and practical contributions inspiring more consumers to protect our environment were discussed
Key action areas for transforming the UK food system: insights from the Transforming UK Food Systems (TUKFS) Programme project portfolio
Get PDFThe UK food system is a driver of the public health crisis of non-communicable disease, is linked to the cost-of-living crisis, and contributes to climate change, biodiversity loss and soil degradation. The economy relies strongly on the health of its people and food businesses, while also impacting the livelihoods of food system actors. However, action towards more resilient, equitable and regenerative food systems remains too slow and unambitious to adequately address these challenges. The Transforming UK Food Systems Programme comprises a wide range of research projects which address these challenges in a novel place-based, co-produced and action-oriented way. We provide 27 suggested action areas for supporting food system transformation, grouped in five themes spanning production, manufacturing, supply chain and consumption. Among the suggestions, there is a strong emphasis on the importance of co-production with food system actors and affected citizens. We highlight the vital role of governance and policy in supporting these action areas in both a structural and financial way, noting that this needs both national policy and regional approaches to take into account geographically varying cultural circumstances and values, and to allow the high level of co-production necessary
Capacity-building outside the state-building framework? A post-Afghanistan analysis
Get PDFState-building has been severely criticized over the past two decades for being an externally led intervention based on a liberal democratic blueprint that has led to top-down centralized state institutions with little to no buy-in from local actors. The rapid collapse of the internationally
backed Afghan state to the Taliban in 2021 came to epitomize the failures of international state-building. The answer, many have argued, is to support bottom-up and locally led state-building which is far more likely to galvanize its citizens. Although for many areas of capacity-building this may indeed be a much-improved approach, it remains unclear what this
local turn means for defence-related activities and in particular military capacity building. This research paper, based on documentary analysis and interviews with officials in relevant UK government and international institutions, examines what locally focused military capacity building
initiatives may look like. It argues that such interventions are likely to result in capacity-building interventions with non-state armed groups that do not promote and may indeed directly oppose state-building. What does military capacity building outside of state-building logics imply and
what are the principal risks and benefits of adopting such an approach
A repeated cross-sectional study of a biophilic building's effects on workers' perception of indoor environmental quality, health, well-being and productivity
Get PDFThe study aimed to investigate the sustained effects of a case study biophilic designed building, The Enterprise Centre (TEC) in the UK, on its permanent workers' satisfaction with the indoor environmental quality (IEQ) and their health, well-being and productivity. A repeated cross-sectional research design, following the Building Use Studies (BUS) Methodology, was used with two data collection periods 12 and 24 months after building occupation with participation rates of 86 % and 97 % respectively. Results showed high and sustained satisfaction with IEQ, including thermal comfort, acoustics, lighting, and air quality. Workers consistently reported improved health and well-being, with productivity gains of 12.98 % amongst the 12-months cohort and 9.17 % for the 24-months cohort. This study contributes novel insights by: (1) providing evidence of biophilic design's sustained impact over time, an area with limited existing research; (2) evaluating combined biophilic strategies at full-building scale (including natural materials and colours, connection with nature, outdoor views, natural light and air, and climate-aligned indoor conditions) rather than isolated biophilic interventions; and (3) establishing new insights into the effects of biophilic design on occupant health, well-being, and productivity. The positive outcomes suggest that biophilic design could be successfully integrated into future buildings and spaces to improve satisfaction with IEQ and enhance workplace health and performance
