The Journal of Consumer Affairs articles from June 2003

The Journal of Consumer Affairs archives from June 2003

The information content of mutual fund print advertising.
June 22, 2003... The mutual fund industry has experienced tremendous growth in recent years. During this time period mutual funds have become somewhat of a commodity with many funds using advertising to attract investors. The current study uses content analysis...

Minorities in children's television commercials: new, improved, and stereotyped.
June 22, 2003... Mass media is one means by which consumers learn how to behave as consumers. Consumers' beliefs about minorities as consumers are also influenced by mass media, and the impact is likely highest among young children. A content analysis of 813...

Contributing to the delinquency of borrowers.
June 22, 2003... What contributes most to borrower delinquency-"excessive" borrowing that results in greater financial stress or unforeseen negative income and wealth shocks? Using data from the 1998 Survey of Consumer Finances, this paper provides evidence...

The U.S./EU beef controversy and a proposed framework for resolving standards disputes in international trade.
June 22, 2003... While world trading institutions such as GATT and its successor, the WTO, have made significant progress in addressing tariff barriers as well as some non-tariff barriers, trade disputes over product standards appear to be increasing in number...

Older self-employed workers and planning for the future.
June 22, 2003... This study examined retirement expectations of the older self-employed utilizing two theories: the normative anticipation of retirement and cumulative advantage theory. Two-thirds of the older self-employed had no retirement plans. Multinomial...

Diet choice and the role of time preference.
June 22, 2003... Economic theory related to time preference and health may be useful as a means of understanding the predictors of diet choice. The willingness to subvert present for future utility is hypothesized to influence the process of sacrificing time,...

Diagnostic screener for compulsive buying: applications to the USA and South Korea. (Bits, Briefs, and Applications).
June 22, 2003... Compulsive behavior is an important topic for social scientists. One form of this behavior is compulsive buying. Using data sets from two countries, the USA and South Korea, the Diagnostic Screener for Compulsive Buying (DSCB) (Faber and...

Product recalls: gaping holes in the nation's product safety net. (Bits, Briefs, and Applications).
June 22, 2003... On the morning of May 12, 1998, Linda Ginzel left her 17-month-old son Danny at Sweet Tots daycare, just as she did most weekday mornings. When Linda said goodbye to Danny, he was laughing as his daycare provider, Anna, tickled him under the...

Crashing the Party. (Review Essay).(Book Review)
June 22, 2003... Nader: The Life of the Party A Review of Crashing the Party by Ralph Nader (New York: Thomas Dunne Press, 2002, 383 pp.) As a zealous muckraker and guardian of consumer and citizen rights, Ralph Nader has made a career of exposing crime and...

Surviving in a Material World: The Lived Experience of People in Poverty. (Review Essay).(Book Review)
June 22, 2003... Challenges of Material Sufficiency Surviving in a Material World: The Lived Experience of People in Poverty by Ronald Paul Hill (South Bend, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2001, 168 pages) The subtitle of Ronald Paul Hill's Surviving...

Convenient abusive research. (Editorial Postlude).(Editorial)
June 22, 2003... Comedian and filmmaker Woody Allen is often credited with having said that "Life is 90 percent showing up." In the introductory psychology class I took as a 1960s undergraduate, it was 5 percent. As is still a common practice at many research...