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This study examines how U.S. business college students evaluate the attractiveness of potential job opportunities by making trade-offs among important job attributes. Using a conjoint approach, we examine the relative importance of industry type, starting salary, five-year salary, training, benefits, and work-life balance in job choice decisions. We also examine the effects of job applicants' career expectations and core competencies on their job choice determinants. An analysis of 162 business students' evaluations of 27 job profiles indicates that five-year-salary outweighs all other attributes. Their career expectations and core competencies have a substantial influence on their ensuing job choice. We suggest recruitment strategies to target recent college graduates with consideration of individuals' different career expectations and core competencies.

Virtual environments (VEs) offer unique opportunities enabling users to experience real-time interactive objects and environments. Due to its dynamic three-dimensional (3D) presentation capability on two-dimensional screens, research has addressed the VE in relation to users’ spatial cognitive factors. However, little is known about users’ preferred cognitive modes for processing visual information and factors that affect visual cognitive processing in experiencing VEs. Research on gender differences in human–computer interaction has developed as a subfield approached from an interdisciplinary perspective that encompasses fields such as information science, marketing, neuroscience, and education. This study aims to investigate whether different visual cognitive styles influence the sense of presence (i.e., simulated experience in VEs) and how visual cognitions and presence affect user satisfaction of the 3D integrated system, as well as to uncover empirical evidence of gender influence on those relationships. A total of 181 college students (90 men, 91 women) in diverse disciplines participated in an experiment using a VE stimulus and were given a questionnaire. The questionnaire was adapted to measure participants’ tendencies to use object versus spatial visualization, their sense of presence, and user satisfaction in the VE. Using multigroup structural equation modeling, we examined 3D visual information processing and gender effects. The results identify the relationship among visual cognitions, presence, and user satisfaction in VEs. We find it interesting that the results demonstrated significant gender differences in satisfaction as well as in processing visual information that influences user experience of the 3D VR embedded interface. Whereas women’s object visualization style was found to affect their sense of presence in VEs; for men, it was spatial visualization. This result supports and further explains findings of previous studies suggesting that gender effects account for differences in processing visual information.

To address the prevailing issue of high turnover and low employee commitment in the retail industry, this study explores the role of newcomers’ individual differences and proactive socialization tactics in developing employee organizational commitment and reducing employee turnover. Based on data collected from 239 employees in a major U.S. retail store chain, this study found that individual differences, such as goal orientation and proactivity, are significantly related to employees’ choices of different socialization tactics, including inquiry, observation, and networking. The three tactics are associated with organizational commitment and furthermore employees’ actual turnover mainly through role clarity and attitudes toward a retail career. Among the three proactive socialization tactics, observation plays the most important role in the socialization process.

Store window displays play important roles in influencing shoppers' store entry decisions and their perceptions of brand/store image. The purpose of this study is to explore how shoppers' perceptions of window displays interact with situational variables in making their store entry decisions. We conducted experimental studies by using merchandise-focused versus artistic storefront window displays under situations comprising of shopping motive types (purchase versus recreational) and cognitive load levels (low versus high). Our results demonstrate the effectiveness of these window displays bounded by the interplay between shopping motives and cognitive loads.