This paper presents an empirical investigation on the effect of public attitudes toward the role of arts and cultural institutions for the cultural development of the country. The study performs the study among urban and rural families in city of Esfahan, Iran and all questions are designed in Likert scale of 1-5. Using a sample of 700 people, the study finds that people generally have negative impression toward the role of arts and cultural institutions for the cultural development of the country. In their opinions, the nature and quality of the effects play the most important role, which must be improved. The study also finds the people’s style of living and place of residency are also important issues on the perception toward cultural development.

This paper presents a study on relationship between coping approaches and general self-efficacy scale among 67 teenagers aged 13-15 who attended guided schools in city of Najaf-Abad, Esfahan, Iran using a cluster random selection. Students were requested to fill in two questionnaires of Coping Strategies Scale-Revised (CSSR) and General Self- Efficacy Scale (GSES). The collected data were analyzed using Pearson correlation and stepwise linear regression techniques. The results indicate that effort has a positive correlation re-evaluation, planful problem-solving, Emotion-focused coping (P & LT; 0.01) and Active coping (P & LT; 0.05). In addition innovation maintains a positive relationship with restraint, emotion-focused coping and re-evaluation (P & LT; 0.01) and it has a negative relationship with avoidance coping (P & LT; 0.05). In our study, people with higher level of efficacy use planful problem-solving.

This paper presents an empirical study to measure the effect of training emotional intelligence on communication skills among 32 teenagers who visited counseling center in city of Esfahan, Iran during the year of 2011. The people were divided into two groups of control and witness and using a questionnaire consists of 34 questions we measured the effect of training emotional intelligence on improving communication skills. The questionnaire consists of five groups of questions including the skills of listening, understanding of a message, emotion regulation, Insight into the communication processes and decisive related communication. The results of the investigation indicated that there were some meaningful differences between two groups in terms of the first four components. However, there was not any difference between two groups in terms of decisive related communication.

Previous studies show investors’ overreaction towards firms past performance. In fact, investors overvalue past winners and undervalue past losers. However, when their expectations do not come true, stock prices return to their fair values. This study investigates investors’ overreaction in Tehran Stock Exchange in three steps. Using a five-year period data collected from Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE), we evaluate portfolio performance and analyze them based on a sample of 70 firms selected from this exchange and, using Pearson correlation as well as regression analysis, examine the effects of past performance on price appreciation. The preliminary results indicate that TSE investors normally overreact to sale, quality of sale, operating profit, quality of profit, cash flow and stock return, significantly.

Building a distinguished brand often makes it possible to have sustainable growth in competitive market. It also helps us sell products with higher price; attract reliable customers for long term relationships. This paper presents an empirical investigation to find important factors influencing rubber industry. The proposed study designs a questionnaire in Likert scale consists of 20 questions, distributes it among 300 people and collects 265 filled ones. Cronbach alpha is calculated as 0.756. In addition, Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy and Approx. Chi-Square are 0.75 and 1292.573, respectively. Based on the results of our survey, we have derived six factors including brand transparency, expected quality, brand promises, brand support and brand sustainability.

Supplying car accessory is one of the most important growing industries in the world. Every year, millions of cars are produced and people need to have the access to necessary car accessory. In this paper, we present an exploration study to detect important factors influencing car accessory market. The proposed study designs a questionnaire in Likert scale consists of 16 questions, distributes it among 200 experts and analyses it using factor analysis. Cronbach alpha and Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy are calculated as 0.823 and 0.863, which validate the overall questionnaire. The results indicate that there are three influencing factors including brand capability, brand characteristics and consumers’ believe.

Capital structure plays essential role on financial strength of business units and there are literally many studies to confirm the relationship between capital structure and return growth. In this paper, we re-examine this relationship by investigating on 12 Iranian private banks using structural equation modelling over the period 2005-2011. The proposed study of this paper designs a questionnaire and distributes it among experts and analyse it use LISREL software package. The result indicates that there is a positive and meaningful relationship, when the level of significance is five percent between capital structure and stock return in private banking industry in Iran. The implementation of Pearson and Spearman correlation tests also validate the findings.

The paper investigates the factors influencing customers choice of telecommunication network in Ghana. The survey design was employed to enable the researchers perform statistical analysis. Questionnaire consisting of Likert scale question was used to collect the primary data. Multiple regression analysis was performed to ascertain the factors influencing customers’ choice of telecommunication networks. The study found six factors that influence customers to choose a particular network. These factors include; brand awareness, brand image, perceived quality, price, convenience and brand loyalty. The study concludes that all the six factors contribute to the factors that drive consumer choice of telecommunications service in Ghana.

Packaging is often called as the fifth P of the marketing mix. Chocolate is a product which is loved to be consumed irrespective of any age group. Consumers were asked to imagine that a new chocolate bar has been launched in the market and were yet to sense (sight or taste) it or a chocolate bar which was already launched in the market and were yet to sense (sight or taste) it .The present study explored different chocolate packaging cues that could possibly influence the purchase decision of young consumers in such a scenario. Descriptive research with convenient sampling elicited 240 responses across the age group lying between 11 to 27 years. Results showed that an attractive package design was of paramount significance in first purchase of chocolate bars. The important factors which affected the buying decision were ‘Information’ and ‘Visual aesthetics’. However it was found that chocolate packaging had less influence on subsequent purchase of chocolate bars. It was also inferred that an attractive package along with a strong advertising campaign could bring prospective sales for a newly launched chocolate bar. The study also discussed the influence of chocolate packaging for national and international brands across various demographic variables.