Research Espresso | Jun 2022 Issue 15

ISSUE

15

JUN 2022

Research INSIGHT

It pays to shop around

How Anthropomorphized Service Robots Influence Consumer Satisfaction

Dr. Rocky Chen

Associate Professor Department of Marketing

Prof. Xu Huang

Associate Dean (Research and Postgraduate Studies); Chair Professor, Department of Management

REGISTER NOW

13 July 2022 11:00am-12:00nn Language: Putonghua

In the School's inaugural research webinar, Dr. Rocky Chen will share significant findings from two of his latest projects on how humanoid robots influence consumer satisfaction. Dr. Chen will discuss the implications in two contexts - online coproduction service and creative design service, shedding light on how marketers can leverage AI and humanoid robots to enhance customer experience.

04 Research INSIGHT

It pays to shop around

08 NEWS Economics PhD student awarded highest prize at national academic conference BBA students explore academia with quality research outputs HKBU Reward Management & Innovation Symposium sheds light on reward management in the new normal

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Research

EXCELLENCE

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Upcoming

EVENTS

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Research Espresso / Jun 2022

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Research INSIGHT

ItInternal pays to Audit: It pays to around shop

shop around

Journal of Economic Theory, 192, 105186.

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Research Insight

RESEARCH INSIGHT

Research Espresso / Jun 2022

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s the old saying goes, the devil is in the details. Yet while some of us spend hours agonising over the most minute details of everything we buy – whether it’s a package trip to Thailand featuring a selection of 7 “similar” hotels or 5 different android phones with the same functions – other seem incapable to differentiate whether a car is better than another by any other criteria than its colour. What can a marketer do to drive sales or increase market share if some buyers are incapable to recognise a great deal from a lousy one?

Building on insights about how Americans select between prescription drug plans offered by Medicare, a recent paper led by Prof. Kim-sau Chung investigates how sellers behave when their target consumers have problems identifying – or sometimes caring about – small differences. Noting that people have been known to choose inferior Medicare plans, what appears counter-intuitive is that the odds of selecting an inferior plan decline when consumers are offered an increasing number of objectively inferior plans. How is that possible when some consumers cannot appreciate a good deal when they see one?

Adding choices – especially bad ones – can steer buyers towards a good deal, especially when the actual value of the various options are hard to

calculate, differ across multiple dimensions (like screen size and memory for similar computers) or when consumers are overloaded with hard-to-understand information (what is the clock speed of a computer and why does it matter anyway?) . Thus, while some consumers will still opt for the inferior option, it seems that the mere existence of another deal – sold either by the same seller or by a competitor – is enough to help at least some consumers make a better choice. As the number of bad deals increases, the odds of choosing the better one increases as each lousy offer repels a different group of consumers.

Take personal computers. If Acer proposes two deals, it will strategically position one as the “good” deal, and the other one as the “bad” deal, using the inferior option to help consumers appreciate the better one. However, should Lenovo were to introduce a competing deal for a similar computer, both sellers will naturally free ride on each other,

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Research Insight

So whenever you are looking at buying the next smartphone or a new life insurance policy, remember to take your time, shop around and read the fine print. Caveat emptor!

with one seller emerging as the “good-deal” provider and the other one turning into the “bad-deal” seller. While the “good-deal” seller will be pleased the bad option offered by its competitor will help some consumers appreciate its offer, the firm marketing the bad deal will be content with moving some products.

Prof. Kim-Sau Chung Professor Department of Economics

Research Espresso / Jun 2022

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News

Economics PhD student

awarded highest prize at national academic conference

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UA Sudong, a PhD student in Economics, won a First Class Award (優秀論文一等獎) at the 8th National Academic Conference for Postgraduate Students in Economics (第八屆全國 經濟學研究生學術年會). An award presentation ceremony was conducted on 18 June 2022 in Wuhan with both online and offline participation.

Organised by Huazhong University of Science and Technology and Peikang Chang Research Foundation of Development Economics, the competition received 600+ submissions from over 20 key universities in China.

As one of the only four awardees of the First Class Award, Sudong’s paper, titled “On the Importance of Information Quality and Returns”, sheds light on the importance of information quality and returns in resolving the conflict between information spreading and information acquisition in explaining the welfare effect of information acquisition. His wider research interests are in macro labour, financial economics and micro-econometrics. The other three awardees of the First Class Award were from Renmin University of China, Peking University and Tsinghua University.

Research Espresso / Jun 2022

NEWS

BBA students

explore academia with quality research outputs

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News

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he School of Business launched the BizSpark Business Research Competition for BBA students as a new initiative to celebrate the School’s 65th Anniversary. The Final Conference was held on 11 June, with participation from highly-motivated BBA students and academic faculty.

Prof. Ed Snape, Dean of the HKBU School of Business explained that “BizSpark aims to encourage undergraduate students to sharpen their research skills, and provides a platform to showcase their high-quality research work.”

The competition welcomed two streams of submissions: academic research papers and company-based consultancy projects. A total of 23 submissions were received across different BBA concentrations, from Year 2 to Year 4, covering various topics such as the impact of the worldwide pandemic on digital banking, HR management, and machine learning; and the study of cloud gaming strategy, green loans, and the trade war.

Seven finalists were shortlisted to present their research to the judges at the Final Conference. The judges were impressed by the impeccable presentation and creative ideas. Ma Hejian/ Max (BBA Information Systems and e-Business Management, Year 4), and LAW Ming Yiu, Sam (BBA Marketing, Year 4) were crowned the Gold Prize in the academic research paper and company-based consultancy project categories, respectively.

The former awardee’s project, entitled “An Empirical Study of Optimal Combination of Algorithms for Prediction-Based Portfolio Optimization Model using Machine Learning over Covid-19 Period”, found that the stock portfolio built up with algorithms during the COVID period had higher return with higher risks. The codes developed in this research will become open source on GitHub and available for further research and industry usage.

The latter awardee’s project, “Cloud Gaming Service for HKBN to Target Young Audience”, identified cloud gaming’s attractiveness for young people, and provided a marketing strategy for launching and long-term development for the company.

Joining the judging panels were: • • • • • •

Dr. Zach LEE, Associate Professor Department of Management & Marketing, Durham University Mr. Alvin Leung, Regional Head of Learning Academy, APAC, Persolkelly Consulting Ltd. Prof. Samson Tai, Professor of Practice, Department of Finance and Decision Sciences Dr. Ting CHEN, Associate Professor, Department of Economics Dr. Yanju LIU, Assistant Professor, Department of Accountancy and Law Dr. Lucia Fung, Associate Director BBA (Hons), School of Business

Visit https://bba.hkbu.edu.hk/student-life/business-competitions for the full list of awardees and more details.

Research Espresso / Jun 2022

HKBU Reward Management & Innovation Symposium

sheds light on reward management in the new normal

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News

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he Department of Management and the Centre for Human Resources Strategy and Development of the HKBU School of Business co-organised the “HKBU Reward Management & Innovation Symposium 2022” on 2 June 2022. The webinar attracted around 200 participant, including academia and practitioners, for an inspiring discussion.

The symposium featured Prof. Randy Chiu, Professor Emeritus of the HKBU Department of Management, delivering a keynote speech on analytics for improving employee rewards. Prof. Chiu shared his insights on Human Resources Analytics for Reward Management, and provided examples on how to utilise HR data analytics to improve organisational performance and enhance employee health and wellbeing.

Following Prof. Chiu’s sharing, Dr. Man-Nok Wong, Assistant Professor of Sun Yat-sen University, and Dr. Rongjun Yu, Associate Professor of HKBU Department of Management, presented their latest research findings on the pay transparency taboo and the connection between neuroscience and reward management. The symposium was concluded with a dialogue session on “Reinventing reward management in the new normal”, gathering industry professionals to share insights and exchange ideas on best practices. Joining the conversation were Ms. Sarah Cheuk, HR Director of Fano Labs, Mr. Gabriel Kung, Chief Commercial Officer of Bowtie Life Insurance Company, Mr. John Lee, Head of Performance, Rewards and Benefits, Hong Kong Cluster & Greater Bay Area of Standard Chartered Bank, and Ms. Felicity Ting, Managing Director, Human Resources of China International Capital Corporation (Hong Kong) Limited.

The symposium aims to engage academics and human resources management leaders in sharing insights and the latest research to strengthen the connections between research and practice. The global outbreak of the COVID-19 has brought about tremendous changes in the various aspects of HR and has pushed organisations to be adaptive and innovative in reward management in order to remain competitive.

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Research Espresso / Jun 2022

Research EXCELLENCE

Prof. Kimmy Chan Professor Department of Marketing

How firms can create delightful customer experience?

Contrasting roles of future reward uncertainty Journal of Business Research http://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2022.04.031

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Upcoming Events

Upcoming EVENTS Research Seminars Date

Speaker

Topic

Economics 6 July 2022 9:00 -10:30

Prof. John MUELLER Ohio State University

The Stupidity of War

Centre for Business Analytics and the Digital Economy 14 July 2022 16:00 -17:30

Dr. Katrin ASSENMACHER European Central Bank

Monetary Policy and the Digital Euro

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The Research Espresso, a bimonthly e-publication covering everything you need to know about the latest research developments at the HKBU School of Business, focuses on four key areas: Research Insights (the main research topic of the month), Research Excellence (recognition of faculty members’ research achievements), News (research-related updates), and Seminars (sharing research skills and knowledge).

The idea is to provide business practitioners with faculty. We want to build links between research and practice and to ensure that the School's research has

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