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Over the summer, there have been many changes in the ERIM Office. We have said goodbye to Prof. dr. Kirsten Rohde, Dr. Frank Wijen, Bep Klop, Felicia Mok, and Dr. Phoebe Mui. On the other hand, we warmly welcome Prof. dr. Pilar Garcia-Gomez, Dr. Rebecca (Bex) Hewett, Silvija Prancane-Verhoef, and Vusala Guliyeva.

In his dissertation, 'Asymmetric Information in Programmatic Advertising.
Three studies on adverse selection, mechanism choices, and fee structures.', ERIM's Francesco Balocco delved into the world of programmatic advertising supply chain, where he investigated the role of asymmetric information in the relationships between advertisers (buyers), publishers (sellers), and Ad Exchanges (auction platforms). Through three studies, Francesco’s research addressed the complexities of asymmetric information, conflicting incentives, and mechanism choices existing within programmatic advertising - opening up new avenues for improving the programmatic advertising supply chain, fostering greater trust, and shaping the future of digital advertising.

In her inaugural address, The Reality of a Virtual World Creating Value for Companies, Consumers, and Society, ERIM’s Yvonne van Everdingen delved into how virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) can create value for companies, consumers, and society, by providing several examples from business practice. The increasing adoption of VR and AR in the business realm has propelled these technologies to gain more traction in the field of marketing, both as a focus of studies and as a new research tool. Yvonne's research has sparked some insights into how consumers’ application of AR in online shopping may potentially reduce product return rates and provided initial evidence suggesting the possibility of VR experiences to substitute real-life experiences. She also addressed how VR could enhance existing research methodologies and showed three ways of conducting research with VR at the Erasmus Behavioural Lab.

In her dissertation, 'Exploring the Role of Context and Interpretative Dynamics in Large-Scale Cross-Cultural Collaborations', ERIM’s Chuqiao Zhou explored how contexts and interpretative dynamics affect the processes of large-scale cross-cultural collaborations. Going against the majority of organizational research approaching the same topic, Chuqiao argued that organizations do not operate in a vacuum. Different kinds of context can give rise to different organizational activities and have further implications for research. In particular, hostile contexts include societal criticisms towards certain groups of organizations and can further impact the decision-making processes of these organizations. The role of context is still insufficiently studied in the field of cross-cultural management. Chuqiao's dissertation contributes to the existing literatures by underscoring the significant yet neglected role of contexts and their interactions with actors’ interpretations.

In his dissertation, 'An Indigenous Perspective on Institutions for Sustainable Business in China', ERIM’s Wenjie Liu built endemically Chinese theoretical explanations on how institutions shape businesses' ability to simultaneously contribute to economic expansion, environmental protection, and social equity through three findings. First, he provided insights into how to fit classic Western management theories with Chinese institutional contexts more tightly. Second, he found that collaboration with foreign MNEs presenting an opportunity structure to these NGOs is crucial to predict their effectiveness. Yet local governments’ own level of commitment to the natural environment substitutes for the main effect. Finally, he discovered that state political ideology can be used to impose clan-like control on corporations, but its effectiveness depends on the central state’s ability to intervene in local governments. These findings together shaped an integrated framework for understanding institutional arrangements that promote sustainability among Chinese businesses.

In his dissertation, 'A New Frontier for the Study of the Commons: Open-Source Hardware', ERIM’s Pascal Carpentier explored, in three studies, the role commons play in helping Open-Source Hardware communities deliver and scale up end products. Commons have existed since antiquity and have structured the use, protection, and consumption of shared resources, usually subject to social dilemmas. Recently, commons have been highlighted as inspirational governance models to help face the combined threat of COVID-19 and the environmental crisis. Pascal's dissertation offers fresh insight into the Open-Source Hardware movement, stating that it has more complexity than previously realized and requires a constantly evolving governance.

In her dissertation, 'Wait for Others? Social and Intertemporal Preferences in Allocation of Healthcare Resources', ERIM’s Merel van Hulsen studied the joint effect of peoples' social and intertemporal preferences on allocation decisions, focusing on decision-making in healthcare. Most countries' budgets for healthcare is limited; therefore, decisions must be made on how to spend this budget, who receives treatment, and when, which may have significant temporal and social consequences.

In her dissertation, 'Unringing the Stigma Bell: Investigating Informational and Social Mechanisms Behind Boards of Directors’ Appointments', ERIM’s Ilaria Orlandi focused on how people make decisions when a lot of information is unknown or kept hidden. Ilaria examined this by exploring the appointment of directors by board members: How do board members gather information, evaluate it, and make their decisions?

In his dissertation, 'Vulnerability Through Vertical Collaboration in Transportation: A Complex Networks Approach', ERIM’s Camill Harter showed that vulnerability in collaborative transport networks is strongly influenced by the market structure of carriers; systems with mainly similar-sized carriers are robust to targeted disruption, whereas the total magnitude of potential failure is very large; systems with a few dominating players have a lower magnitude of failure but are highly susceptible to targeted disruption; moreover, there is an optimal level of collaboration where the increasing risk of disruption cascades outweighs the decreasing marginal added benefits of additional collaboration.

In her dissertation, 'Behavioural Insights from the COVID-19 Pandemic. Studies on Compliance, Vaccination, and Entrepreneurship', ERIM’s Annelot Wismans studied the understanding of behaviour during the COVID-19 pandemic. She covered three themes: Compliance with COVID-19 measures, COVID-19 vaccination, and entrepreneurship during the pandemic.