Available Research Projects

Social robots in business

Supervisor: Dr Aila Khan; Dr Michael Lwin School/Institute: School of Business

Social robots are humanoids which have been designed to socially interact with people. While industrial robots have been assisting us in manufacturing and transportation for decades, social robots are a fairly recent development. These robots have mostly been used by researchers in the areas of health (e.g. in aged care homes) and education (e.g. teaching of a language to primary school students).

More recently, these robots have been employed by businesses as ‘greeters’ (at hotel/airport concierges), information-providers (e.g. product location in a retail outlet) and even as entertainers (e.g. singing, dancing or telling jokes in a mall. It is expected that the number of robots will increase as organisations have found them a useful tool in engaging with stakeholders, especially clients.

In Australia, there is a limited number of social robots currently available. Most of these are with universities or research institutes. Researchers in the field of Human-Robot Interaction have been working with social robots for a decade now. Australians, unlike the Japanese are cautious of this new form of technology. There are concerns voiced around loss of jobs, safety, trust and generally, ethics in the use of social robots. Nevertheless, it is agreed that the use of such machines is on the rise.

It is, therefore important to evaluate how people perceive these robots. Moreover, it is also important to understand if such robots impact an employing-organisation’s image? Since technology is well-recognised to cause anxiety in some segments of the population, we would also be interested in evaluating people’s anxiety levels with reference to the robot. Previous research in Human-Robot Interaction has mostly been conducted from the viewpoint of the Engineering and Computing discipline. This study will provide an opportunity to report results from the perspective of marketing and business domains.

Labelling of fruits and vegetables

Supervisor: Associate Professor Felicitas Evangelista; Associate Professor Dilupa Nakandala; Dr Aila Khan School/Institute: School of Business

An ever increasing amount of fruits and vegetables are being imported in Australia. Imports of fresh fruit increased by 19 per cent to $389 million in 2016-17. New Zealand and the United States accounted for more than 80 per cent of fresh fruit supply to Australia. Similarly, the import bill for vegetables has also increased with imports of fresh asparagus and garlic (from Peru and China) increasing by more than 250 per cent in recent years.

The increase in fresh produce imports has been of concern to a number of agricultural stakeholders. While imported fruits and vegetables provide consumers with cheaper, out-of-season, novel varieties, there have been questions raised about these items. Unregulated production methods, use of pesticides and contaminated water supplies in overseas farms have all been highlighted as potential threats to the fresh-produce quality.

The recent introduction of mandatory country-of-origin (COO) labelling provides a mechanism to ensure that Australian consumers are informed about the origins of fruits and vegetables they intend on purchasing. Previous research has shown that COO is regarded as an extrinsic cue for product quality. In the absence of more detailed information (e.g. production methods) consumers make judgments about a product’s quality from a country’s image which they may hold. This image may be formed of beliefs not just about a country’s products but also its more general characteristics including economy, workforce and culture.

However, consumer purchase of imported fresh produce is not just determined through cognitively assessing the foreign country’s image and resulting evaluation of the product’s quality. Researchers suggest that consumer ethnocentrism has a role to play as well. Consumer ethnocentrism refers to beliefs held by consumers about the appropriateness and morality of purchasing foreign products. Ethnocentric consumers view purchase of imported produce as wrong because they believe that it hurts the domestic economy, causes job losses and is outright unpatriotic. Non-ethnocentric consumers, on the other hand, evaluate the product on its own merit and do not let the COO alone, to negatively bias their opinion.

This research project will determine Australian consumers’ likelihood of purchasing imported fresh produce by factoring in the effects of COO. We will also model the impact of ethnocentrism on consumer purchase decisions.

Contact the Graduate Research School for more information about this project: grs.enquiries@westernsydney.edu.au

Sugar-Reduction

Supervisor: Associate Professor Felicitas Evangelista; Dr Aila Khan School/Institute: School of Business

Over the past 50 years, consumption of sugar has tripled worldwide (Lustig, Schmidt and Brindis 2012). Sugar consumption is linked to a rise in non-communicable diseases (such as heart disease, cancer and diabetes), which the United Nations has now declared as posing a greater health burden worldwide than infectious diseases. There are three central risk factors associated with non-communicable diseases – tobacco, alcohol and diet. While tobacco and alcohol have been successfully regulated by many governments around the world, controlling people’s diet (or food) is more complicated and there have been no easy solutions.

Experts agree that similar to tobacco and alcohol, sugar has clear potential for abuse. Similar to the other two, sugar acts on the brain to encourage subsequent intake. There are a number of studies which have examined the dependence-producing properties of sugar in humans (e.g. Garber and Lustig 2011). Sugar dampens the suppression of a hormone which signals hunger to the brain. It also interferes with the normal signaling of the hormone leptin which helps to produce the feeling of satiety. Moreover, it reduces dopamine signaling in the brain’s reward center, thereby decreasing the pleasure derived from food, compelling the individual to consume more (Lustig 2010).

The link between ‘added sugar’ intake and negative health outcomes is widely recognized. This link is explained in two major ways: First, greater sugar consumption leads to an increased energy intake which is associated with weight gain, diabetes and dental decay. Second, consumption of higher levels of added sugars as a percentage of energy is usually accompanied with a lower intake of vitamins and minerals (Lewis et al. 1992). Intakes of calcium, a nutrient currently viewed as a particular health concern were especially low. Thus, a sugar-laden diet may also cause health problems due to the accompanying issue of a low-quality diet.

In view of health concerns associated with high sugar intake, recommendations have been made to industries to take steps to reduce the amount of sugar in processed foods (Barclay et al. 2008). This is in response to the now-accepted view that any societal intervention for reducing sugar consumption will not be successful without active engagement of all stakeholders. However, this task poses a major challenge for businesses, and their consumers. First, in some parts of the world, sugary soft drinks are often cheaper than potable water or milk. Also, consumers like the taste of sugar as research across all age groups demonstrates that consumers generally prefer foods with higher concentration of sucrose. Finally, the biggest challenge for businesses is to invest in reformulating their brands with less sugar, while also maintaining their market share (Chollet et al. 2013) and revenues.

Sugar-sweetened beverages are one of the main contributors to increased intake of ‘added sugar’. In Australia, almost half of kids aged between 2 and 16 years consume a sugar-sweetened beverage everyday (ABS 2016). According to Diabetes Australia (2016) this could mean an additional weight gain of more than 6kg per person in one year. In view of these alarming statistics, different health bodies have strongly recommended the implementation of sugar tax, which would result in a higher price for the sugar-sweetened beverage products (ABC News 2016). It is argued that a higher price would influence public’s behaviour towards sugar consumption. Up till now, such a suggestion of an added tax is not supported by any of two major political parties.

The current project’s main aim is to motivate consumers to undertake ‘behaviour-change’ by encouraging them to move away from sugary soft drinks and adopt a sugar-free option. There are a number of behavioural change theories which attempt to explain the process. The most frequently cited theories include learning theories, self-efficacy theory, and theories of reasoned action and planned behaviour. Learning theories propose that complex behaviour is learnt gradually through the modification of simpler behaviours. Imitation and reinforcement play important roles in these theories which state that individuals learn by duplicating behaviours they observe in others. ‘Rewards’ are essential to ensure a repetition of the desirable behaviour.

Parental Leave and Gender Equality

Supervisor: Dr Sarah Duffy; Dr Aila Khan School/Institute: School of Business

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (2017) reveals that just one in 20 fathers take primary parental leave, with 95% of all primary leave taken by mothers. This statistic signals that within Australia barriers exist for men to share caring responsibilities. Inequality in caring responsibilities can have a range of consequences including dissatisfaction with work-family balance, organisations operating at diminished capacity and a reduction in women’s long-term career advancement. More than non-parents, parents have a gendered division of labour, with the burden of unpaid domestic labour and caring responsibilities largely falling to women. Research into parenthood, gender and work-family time across the United States, Denmark, France and Australia found that Australia was the country where the presence of children was associated with the greatest increase in a gendered division of labour. Although formally Australia has equal opportunity legislation, social policy and norms tend to reinforce traditional gender roles. Fathers in Denmark spent the closest amount of time caring for children as mothers do, which is believed to be the result of institutional support for mothers to work, policy encouragement for fathers to be involved in childcare and positive social attitudes supporting gender equality. This may explain why mothers in Nordic countries report higher rates of satisfaction with work-family balance then mothers elsewhere.

Research has shown that early involvement in caring responsibilities can establish greater involvement over time. The flow on effect might be that men taking less parental leave could reduce women’s long-term, paid labour. Additionally, taking parental leave negatively affects employers’ perceptions of hire-ability and career commitment of mothers but not of fathers, potentially hampering women’s career development. Best practice recommendations for parental leave policies specify that benefits must be equally available to all employees, regardless of their gender and/or caregiver status.

Generally speaking, gender bias in the context of promotion, performance evaluation, hiring and pay often works to the advantage of men. However, globally men are less eligible for and take parental leave less often than women (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development [OECD], 2016; The Council of Economic Advisors, 2014). Men’s use of parental leave is significantly affected by organizational culture including the company's commitment to caring values, the company's level of 'father friendliness', the company's support for women's equal employment opportunity, fathers' perceptions of support from top managers, and fathers' perceptions of work group norms that reward task performance vs. long hours at work. This suggests that organisations have a pivotal and positive role to play in working towards gender equality. For this reason, this research project is focused on understanding the attitude of employees to parents (of both genders) who are employees who access either parental leave at the time of birth or flexible working conditions and other types of leave available to parents on an ongoing basis.

Mental health and social media

Supervisor: Dr Sarah Duffy; Dr Aila Khan School/Institute: School of Business

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (2017) reveals that just one in 20 fathers take primary parental leave, with 95% of all primary leave taken by mothers. This statistic signals that within Australia barriers exist for men to share caring responsibilities. Inequality in caring responsibilities can have a range of consequences including dissatisfaction with work-family balance, organisations operating at diminished capacity and a reduction in women’s long-term career advancement. More than non-parents, parents have a gendered division of labour, with the burden of unpaid domestic labour and caring responsibilities largely falling to women. Research into parenthood, gender and work-family time across the United States, Denmark, France and Australia found that Australia was the country where the presence of children was associated with the greatest increase in a gendered division of labour. Although formally Australia has equal opportunity legislation, social policy and norms tend to reinforce traditional gender roles. Fathers in Denmark spent the closest amount of time caring for children as mothers do, which is believed to be the result of institutional support for mothers to work, policy encouragement for fathers to be involved in childcare and positive social attitudes supporting gender equality. This may explain why mothers in Nordic countries report higher rates of satisfaction with work-family balance then mothers elsewhere.

Research has shown that early involvement in caring responsibilities can establish greater involvement over time. The flow on effect might be that men taking less parental leave could reduce women’s long-term, paid labour. Additionally, taking parental leave negatively affects employers’ perceptions of hire-ability and career commitment of mothers but not of fathers, potentially hampering women’s career development. Best practice recommendations for parental leave policies specify that benefits must be equally available to all employees, regardless of their gender and/or caregiver status.

Generally speaking, gender bias in the context of promotion, performance evaluation, hiring and pay often works to the advantage of men. However, globally men are less eligible for and take parental leave less often than women (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development [OECD], 2016; The Council of Economic Advisors, 2014). Men’s use of parental leave is significantly affected by organizational culture including the company's commitment to caring values, the company's level of 'father friendliness', the company's support for women's equal employment opportunity, fathers' perceptions of support from top managers, and fathers' perceptions of work group norms that reward task performance vs. long hours at work. This suggests that organisations have a pivotal and positive role to play in working towards gender equality. For this reason, this research project is focused on understanding the attitude of employees to parents (of both genders) who are employees who access either parental leave at the time of birth or flexible working conditions and other types of leave available to parents on an ongoing basis.