• STI Policy Review
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.54-86
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• 2015

The study examines the U.S. Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program, with a focus on the recent Reauthorization, and compares, in the political context, the U.S. and East Asian countries-Japan, Korea and Taiwan-that adopted the U.S. SBIR program. For the systematic analysis and cross-country comparison, the study employs Kingdon (2003)'s framework-his political theory and Garbage Can Model-to identify political participants and processes underlying the SBIR Reauthorization and to analyze the differences in problem, policy, and politics streams between the U.S. and East Asian countries. For the cross-country comparison, specifically, the study uses various data sources such as OECD, Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, Hofstede's Cultural Dimensions, and World Value Survey. Based on the analysis outcomes, implications of U.S. practices on East Asian countries are extracted as follows. East Asian countries tend to: Have higher entrepreneurial aspiration while lower entrepreneurial activity and attitude than the U.S.; bear higher long term orientation and uncertainty avoidance while lower individualism than the U.S.; and have greater expectations of technology development and higher confidence in political parties while participating less in political action than the U.S. Drawing on the differences, the following policy recommendations are suggested. East Asian countries should: Improve entrepreneurs' access to resources (in particular, financial resource) in order to link their high entrepreneurial aspiration to actual entrepreneurial activities; cultivate failure-tolerating culture and risk-taking entrepreneurs, for instance, by providing a second chance to SBIR-participating businesses that failed to materialize their innovative ideas; and leverage their high expectations of new technology in order to take bold actions regarding their SBIR programs, and update the programs by drawing out constructive dialogues between SBIR stakeholders.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.34 no.12
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• pp.2022-2038
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• 2010

Our study was designed to provide some insights on positive country image and the mechanisms of influence that Asian fashion industries can draw upon for future benefit. We focused on a country image and fashion products with Asian ethnic influence. Asian traditional costume elements reflected in contemporary fashion products may be important representative tools for national cultural identity. This study qualitatively investigated how and to what extent country image and additional information influence the evaluation of fashion products influenced by Chinese, Japanese, and Korean traditional dress. We conducted four focus-group interviews (FGI) with 30 students from a fashion program at a university in the United States. We analyzed the evaluation of fashion products influenced by Chinese, Japanese, and Korean traditional dress, and their associations with country image. Our qualitative analysis offered more developed empirical evidence for the various paths through which country image affects the evaluation of fashion products influenced by the ethnic dress of Asians. The results of our study showed that the more direct the source of prior knowledge, the larger the influence on product evaluation. This study showed that certain cues in the evaluation of fashion products with Asian ethnic influence induce changes in the affective state (that stem from the psychological and social nature of fashion products) and illustrate the necessity of considering the affective processes involved in the appropriate use of the country image. In the fashion industry, extrinsic properties such as the country image significantly influence the attitude and purchasing decisions of consumers. The significance of this study lies in its verification of the relationship between the country image and additional information. Modular and situational-contextual influences are also revealed as important factors that deserve more attention, as well as considerations regarding the dimensions of the country image described in attitude theory.

• Archives of design research
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• v.19 no.5 s.67
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• pp.233-242
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• 2006

The purpose of this study is to investigate communication efficacy of advertisement text through audience responses. This study approached qualitatively to KT&G TV commercials. The research proceeded as follows: First, as background theory, studies on audience focusing advertisement criticism and the interpretation of advertising texts were reviewed. Secondly, the characteristics of the audiences of the advertisements, analyzed through in-depth individual interviews as well as group interviews, were incorporated into a broad theme and then divided into different dimensions. Finally, the audiences' decoding code and critic reponses in reading ambiguous advertising texts, and the interrelationship between strategic ambiguity were discussed under a unified model. The major findings of this study are as follows: In interpreting the ambiguous advertising texts, the audiences use various decoding codes such as language, visuals, technology and rhetoric, and various critic responses such as linguistic, macroscopic, schematic, non-verbal and socio-cultural factors, in quite comprehensive manner. Also, it was shown that audiences make use of different decoding strategies in terms of their recognition, reliability, emotional attitude, and behavior. It can therefore be concluded that the strategic ambiguity has its limit in explaining its effectiveness in the entire dimensions of recognition, emotional attitude, and behavior, in the sense that the strategic ambiguity is most effective in recognition while it invokes more negativity in the behavioral dimension. Finally, this empirical study, focusing on qualitative analyses, may have its limit as well; however, deeper statistic-qualitative studies in the future could compensate for it.

• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.177-207
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• 2012

Today's consumers perceive consumption as a representation of themselves. It is not simply an act that fulfills a consumer's physical and practical needs. Even in terms of life quality, consumers increasingly want to achieve an emotional and sensible experience through consumption. Consumers now make decisions based on their need to express their position in relation to other people, pursue emotional satisfaction, and try to improve the quality of life. Culture-art products that meet such internal and external demands of consumers have made significant improvements in both quantity and quality, because of the social interest and policy support. The recognition of personal and social values of culture and arts has brought about interest in and need for culture-art products. Businesses have agilely embraced such change and actively implemented various marketing strategies utilizing culture and arts. For example, businesses began to sponsor artists who produce culture-art products while building facilities for cultural and art performances or exhibitions. Businesses have also provided performances and exhibitions free-of-charge or at affordable prices. As a result, the supply in the market has started to exceed its demand as is often the case in many of other markets. However, such imbalance has occurred not because of over-supply but because of a lack of demand. Given these circumstances, the government and culture and art related organizations, which had mainly concentrated on the supply side, started to recognize the importance of creating personal and social values in culture and arts. As a result, the government and various organizations are now creating various strategies that include policy measures to achieve their new found goal. Unfortunately however, such efforts are not meeting the expectations. Focusing on above-mentioned circumstances and problems, this study aims to find measures to create demand for culture-art products in the internal conditions of those who consume culture-art products. In other words, given that the demand for culture-art products has not increased despite all external conditions to encourage consumption, this study aims to find the reasons in consumers' value judgment on culture-art products. Though there were recent studies on culture-art products that applied consumer behavior on marketing theories, most of them focused on peripheral aspects such as people's motivation for or satisfaction from watching culture-art events. Hence, there is a need to understand what kind of value consumers perceive from culture-art products and how such value cognition leads to consumption in a comprehensive manner. This study acts as follow-up to a separate study entitled "Qualitative Study about Value Cognition and Benefits of Consumer on Culture-Art Products". The current study aims to extend practical implications that enhance the effectiveness of marketing strategies among the producing and policy agencies in the industry. The purpose of this study is to investigate dimensions of value cognition, benefits and attributes of culture-art products, and identify the effects of consumer value cognition on benefits and attributes. The questionnaire was developed based on the conceptual structure of qualitative research and previous researches. It was composed of value cognition, benefits, attributes of culture-art products and demographic variables. This survey was conducted on-line and off-line among a total of 662 persons ranging from their teens to their 50's who were living in Seoul, Gyeonggi-do, various metropolitan cities, and small and medium-sized cities. The data collected was analyzed by factor analysis and path analysis using SPSS WIN 18.0 and AMOS 16.0. This empirical study found that the dimensions of value cognition of culture-art products were categorized into personal goods, aesthetic goods and public property. This shows that the consumers perceive culture-art products as products that are worthy enough to pay the costs not just for personal benefits but also for their social values. Also the formation of value cognition for culture-art products requires special conditions unlike that for physical consumer goods and services, which simply require marketing stimuli. The dimensions of benefits pursued by consuming culture-art products were found to be composed of four types - pursuit of aesthetic benefits, pursuit of actual benefits, pursuit of emotional benefits, and pursuit of conspicuous character. This result implies that people consume culture-art products not just to pursue pleasure from emotional and intelligent satisfaction as well as social relations, but also to seek the needs and benefits embodied at a social level. The dimensions of attributes of culture-art products had seven different factors, - environmental, price, evaluation, people, artwork, composition, and personal relations - which is plentiful. This is because the attributes of culture-art products are very complicated compared to other consumer goods or services. Since culture-art products include not just cultural or artistic works but also all physical, human, environmental, and systemic elements of the products in a comprehensive manner, consumers perceive everything they experience in the process of consuming culture-art products as part of the products. The dimensions of value cognition was found to affect attributes of the products, mostly using pursued benefits as a mediating factors. This result is consistent with the result of qualitative research, and proves that applying the means-end chain theory in the reverse direction is reasonable. The result can be interpreted that consumers' value cognitions for culture-art products turns into actual benefits leading to consumers' decisions. Furthermore, this result reveals that when consumers choose culture-art products, they take into account the attributes of culture-art products depending on the benefits they pursue. These results confirm that despite their conceptual and abstract attributes, culture-art products have values that contribute to actual benefits for individual consumers and society. Hence, value cognition generates benefits to be pursued and this in turn affects the consumers' choices of attributes on products. Based on the conceptual structure of consumers' value cognitions on culture-art products and its dimensions, it is possible to find detailed methods to provide opportunities for education and training to form and reinforce positive value cognition on culture-art products. And through those methods, it will be possible to develop attributes of culture-art products according to the dimensions of pursued benefits, and allow conceptual products become the subject to valuable consumption in real life. These results provide theoretical understanding of consumer behavior in culture marketing and useful information to culture-art producers, companies that use culture and art, and government agencies that use culture-art as a mean to improve the public perception of quality of life. As a follow up on this study, there should be experimental studies that can develop criteria visualizing the demands of consumers who purchase culture-art products and identify their detailed attributes. Studies that compare characteristics of different areas within the culture-art product category and in-depth studies on a specific area or genre will also be needed. In order to develop marketing strategies for culture-art products, studies on the formation and reinforcement of positive value cognition on culture-art products and education for the development of consumer demand as well as on the development and differentiation of attributes of culture-art products depending on types of consumer groups should also follow.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.245-276
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• 2008

Brand equity is one of the most important concepts in business practice as well as in academic research. Successful brands can allow marketers to gain competitive advantage (Lassar et al.,1995), including the opportunity for successful extensions, resilience against competitors' promotional pressures, and the ability to create barriers to competitive entry (Farquhar, 1989). Branding plays a special role in service firms because strong brands increase trust in intangible products (Berry, 2000), enabling customers to better visualize and understand them. They reduce customers' perceived monetary, social, and safety risks in buying services, which are obstacles to evaluating a service correctly before purchase. Also, a high level of brand equity increases consumer satisfaction, repurchasing intent, and degree of loyalty. Brand equity can be considered as a mixture that includes both financial assets and relationships. Actually, brand equity can be viewed as the value added to the product (Keller, 1993), or the perceived value of the product in consumers' minds. Mahajan et al. (1990) claim that customer-based brand equity can be measured by the level of consumers' perceptions. Several researchers discuss brand equity based on two dimensions: consumer perception and consumer behavior. Aaker (1991) suggests measuring brand equity through price premium, loyalty, perceived quality, and brand associations. Viewing brand equity as the consumer's behavior toward a brand, Keller (1993) proposes similar dimensions: brand awareness and brand knowledge. Thus, past studies tend to identify brand equity as a multidimensional construct consisted of brand loyalty, brand awareness, brand knowledge, customer satisfaction, perceived equity, brand associations, and other proprietary assets (Aaker, 1991, 1996; Blackston, 1995; Cobb-Walgren et al., 1995; Na, 1995). Other studies tend to regard brand equity and other brand assets, such as brand knowledge, brand awareness, brand image, brand loyalty, perceived quality, and so on, as independent but related constructs (Keller, 1993; Kirmani and Zeithaml, 1993). Walters(1978) defined information search as, "A psychological or physical action a consumer takes in order to acquire information about a product or store." But, each consumer has different methods for informationsearch. There are two methods of information search, internal and external search. Internal search is, "Search of information already saved in the memory of the individual consumer"(Engel, Blackwell, 1982) which is, "memory of a previous purchase experience or information from a previous search."(Beales, Mazis, Salop, and Staelin, 1981). External search is "A completely voluntary decision made in order to obtain new information"(Engel & Blackwell, 1982) which is, "Actions of a consumer to acquire necessary information by such methods as intentionally exposing oneself to advertisements, taking to friends or family or visiting a store."(Beales, Mazis, Salop, and Staelin, 1981). There are many sources for consumers' information search including advertisement sources such as the internet, radio, television, newspapers and magazines, information supplied by businesses such as sales people, packaging and in-store information, consumer sources such as family, friends and colleagues, and mass media sources such as consumer protection agencies, government agencies and mass media sources. Understanding consumers' purchasing behavior is a key factor of a firm to attract and retain customers and improving the firm's prospects for survival and growth, and enhancing shareholder's value. Therefore, marketers should understand consumer as individual and market segment. One theory of consumer behavior supports the belief that individuals are rational. Individuals think and move through stages when making a purchase decision. This means that rational thinkers have led to the identification of a consumer buying decision process. This decision process with its different levels of involvement and influencing factors has been widely accepted and is fundamental to the understanding purchase intention represent to what consumers think they will buy. Brand equity is not only companies but also very important asset more than product itself. This paper studies brand equity model and influencing factors including information process such as information searching and information resources in the fashion market in Asia and Europe. Information searching and information resources are influencing brand knowledge that influences consumers purchase decision. Nine research hypotheses are drawn to test the relationships among antecedents of brand equity and purchase intention and relationships among brand knowledge, brand value, brand attitude, and brand loyalty. H1. Information searching influences brand knowledge positively. H2. Information sources influence brand knowledge positively. H3. Brand knowledge influences brand attitude. H4. Brand knowledge influences brand value. H5. Brand attitude influences brand loyalty. H6. Brand attitude influences brand value. H7. Brand loyalty influences purchase intention. H8. Brand value influence purchase intention. H9. There will be the same research model in Asia and Europe. We performed structural equation model analysis in order to test hypotheses suggested in this study. The model fitting index of the research model in Asia was $X^2$=195.19(p=0.0), NFI=0.90, NNFI=0.87, CFI=0.90, GFI=0.90, RMR=0.083, AGFI=0.85, which means the model fitting of the model is good enough. In Europe, it was $X^2$=133.25(p=0.0), NFI=0.81, NNFI=0.85, CFI=0.89, GFI=0.90, RMR=0.073, AGFI=0.85, which means the model fitting of the model is good enough. From the test results, hypotheses were accepted. All of these hypotheses except one are supported. In Europe, information search is not an antecedent of brand knowledge. This means that sales of global fashion brands like jeans in Europe are not expanding as rapidly as in Asian markets such as China, Japan, and South Korea. Young consumers in European countries are not more brand and fashion conscious than their counter partners in Asia. The results have theoretical, practical meaning and contributions. In the fashion jeans industry, relatively few studies examining the viability of cross-national brand equity has been studied. This study provides insight on building global brand equity and suggests information process elements like information search and information resources are working differently in Asia and Europe for fashion jean market.

• Journal of architectural history
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.83-99
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• 1994

Ch'ang-Ts'al-Ts'un is a rural Village near Lung-jing City in Yen-pien Korean Autonomous Province of China. It was formed about 100 years ago by Korean Immigrants and has been developed maintaing the characteristics of traditional Korean architecture. Therefore investigating the spatial structure of this village is a meanigful work to confirm and explore one branch of Korean architecture. This study aims at analyzing the spatial structure of the village using direct data collected from the field work and indirect data from books and maps. The field work consists of on-the-site survey of the village layout, interviews of residents, observation notes and photography. Ch'ang-Ts'ai-Ts'un is located 360-370 m high above the sea level and at the side of a long valley. A river flows in the middle of the valley and relatively flat arable land exists at the both sides of the river. The location of the village related to the surrounding river and mountains suggests that the site of the village was chosen according to Feng-Shui, Chinese and Korean traditional architectural theory. The main direction of the house layouts is South-western. The village has been growing gradually until today. Therefore it is meaningful to make the village layout before Liberation(1946 A.D.) because the characteristics of Korean architecture prevailed more in that period. The area of the previous village is limited to the west side of the creek. New houses were later added to the east of the creek, forming a 'New Village'. Previously the village was composed of 3 small villages: Up, Middle and Down. Also the main access roads connecting the village with the neighboring villages were penetrating the village transversely. Presently the main access road comes to the village longitudinally from the main highway located in front of the village. The retrospective layout shows the existence of well-formed Territory, Places and Axes, thus suggesting a coherent Micro-cosmos. The boundary of imaginery territory perceived by present residents could be defined by linking conspicous outside places sorrounding the village such as Five-mountains, Front-mountain, Shin-dong village, Standing-rock, Rear-mountain and Myong-dong village. Inside the territory there are also the important places such as Bus-stop, Memorial tower of patriots, Road-maitenance building and the village itself. And inside it 5 transverse and 1 longitudinal axes exist in the form of river, roads and mountains. The perceived spatial structure of the village formed by Places, Axes and Territory is geometrical and well-balanced and suggests this village is fit for human settlement. The administrative area of the village is about 738 ha, 27 % of which is cultivated land and the rest is mountain area. Initially the village and surrounndings were covered with natural forest But the trees have been gradually cut down for building and warning houses, resulting in the present barren and artificial landscape with bare mountains and cultivated land. At present the area of the village occupied by houses is wedge-shaped, 600 m wide and 220 m deep in its maximum. The total area of the village is $122,175m^{2}$. The area and the rate of each sub-division arc as follow. 116 house-lots $91,465m^{2}$ (74.9 %) Land for public buildings and shops $2,980m^{2}$ (2.4 %) Roads $17,106m^{2}$ (14.0 %) Creek $1,356m^{2}$ (1.1 %) Vacant spaces and others $9,268m^{2}$ (7.6 %) TOTAL $122,175m^{2}$ (100.0 %) Each lot is fenced around with vertical wooden pannels 1.5-1.8 m high and each house is located to the backside of the lot. The open space of a lot is sub-divided into three areas using the same wooden fence: Front yard, Back yard and Access area. Front and back yards are generally used for crop-cultivation, the custom of which is rare in Korea. The number of lots is 116 and the average size of area is $694.7m^{2}$. Outdoor spaces in the village such as roads, vacant spaces, front yard of the cultural hall, front yard of shops and spacse around the creek are good 'behavioral settings' frequently used by residents for play, chatting, drinking and movie-watching. The road system of the village is net-shaped, having T-junctions in intersections. The road could be graded to 4 categories according to their functions: Access roads, Inner trunk roads, Connecting roads and Culs-de-sac. The total length of the road inside the village is 3,709 m and the average width is 4.6 m. The main direction of the road in the village is NNE-SSE and ESE-WNW, crossing with right angles. Conclusively, the spatial structure of Ch'ang-Ts'ai-Ts'un village consists of various components in different dimensions and these components form a coherent structure in each dimension. Therefore the village has a proper spatial structure meaningful and appropriate for human living.