New information communication technology is a good opportunity to exchange information and to get feedback from customers shortening the traditional channel of social relationships. In different countries over the time there has been a significant growth of social interactions by social networks...

Understanding the reference potential of mavens seems to be relevant in order to comprehend the implicit economic benefits of a maven in the market place. This study shows that, apparently, maven groups can be clearly distinguished from a non-maven group on the basis of their reference power....

There has been a growing interest in the U.S. to study local and regional food systems with respect to economic, social, and enterprise development. This paper discusses a series of on-going projects funded by the USDA focusing on two aspects of the relationships between social network and food...

Obesity is still on the rise, leading to high costs for the obese individual itself but also for society. We analyze the influence of peer effects on food choices in lunchrooms with posted nutrition facts. Data were collected in a lunchroom at a large U.S. university. Groups of four patrons each...

It is a known fact that stress negatively affects food choices. Consequentially, this paper analyzes three different research questions using a sample of 330 international students in Germany. Firstly, it is observed if stress affects students’ motivations to eat, i.e. if it triggers changes...

Forecasts of differences in growth between countries serve an important role in the justification of governments’ fiscal policy stances, but are not tested for their accuracy as part of the current range of forecast evaluation methods. This paper examines forecasted and outturn growth...

The World Bank has published estimates of sustainability of consumption paths by adjusting saving rates to take account of the depletion of non-renewable resources. During the period of North Sea oil production Scotland has been in a fiscal union with the rest of the UK. The present paper...

The paper proposes a general model that will encompass trade and social benefits of a common language, a preference for a variety of languages, the fundamental role of translators, an emo-tional attachment to maternal language, and the threat that globalization poses to the vast ma-jority of...