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Nienke's dissertation 'Statistical Modeling Approaches for Behavioral and Medical Data', employs modern statistical models in the field of fundamental economic behavior and medical sciences with the aim to generate more reliable inferences and more accurate predictions than would have been the case with established methods.

In his dissertation 'Corporate Bond Markets: Investor Preferences and Intermediary Frictions', Antti Yang demonstrated that sustainable investors may contribute to a more liquid and resilient market. He also identified hedging costs as a friction that is relevant for asset pricing.

In his dissertation 'A Network Perspective on Corporate Entrepreneurship: How Workplace Relationships Influence Entrepreneurial Behavior', Stefan Breet developed and tested a theoretical framework that provides a network perspective on corporate entrepreneurship (the NPCE framework). The NPCE framework shows when and why the social context plays a decisive role in the corporate entrepreneurship process. The results of three empirical studies provide support for the NPCE framework and demonstrate that the social context can evoke entrepreneurial and conservative behavior. The key implication of this finding for future corporate entrepreneurship research is that the omission of the social context leads to an incomplete understanding of the corporate entrepreneurship process.

In his dissertation 'Leading for Performance in Adversity Managing Failure, Negative Emotions, and Self-Threats' Erik Waltré investigated what leaders can do to help followers perform better in adversity, such as failure, negative emotions, and perceptions of self-threat. In jobs with more adverse experiences, working risks coming at the expense of both well-being and – paradoxically – performance. In those situations, leading for performance requires leaders to help followers deal more effectively with adverse experiences, and to minimize the distress that may otherwise be evoked by them. The prevalence of adverse situations inherent to many jobs highlights the importance for leaders in those situations to help followers minimize the negative consequences of adversity. Inspired by this challenge, the aim of this treatise is to investigate the role of leadership in assisting followers exposed to such adversity.

In his dissertation 'Mind the Gap: The role of psychic distance and supplier’s reputation in international buyer-supplier relationships' Silviu Tierean investigated the effects of the psychic distance on supplier selection and quality of the business-to-business relationships, and assessed whether the corporate reputation of the supplier firm can reduce the negative effects of distance.

In her dissertation ‘Managing Successful and Resilient Shared-Interest Communities: The role of digitization technologies and disruptive events’ Martina Pocchiari shed light into the dynamics of shared-interest communities under the influence of changing technologies and external events. Three questions were addressed: (i) What is the impact of digitizing community activities on the participation intentions of community members?; (ii) What is the effect of negative vs. positive shocks to a community's purpose on community dynamics?; (iii) What is the effect of a brand crisis on consumer engagement and patterns of information spread in brand communities?

In her dissertation 'Behavioural and Neural Evidence for Processes Underlying Biases in Decision-Making' Catalina Ratala? provided insights into how certain, seemingly trivial, aspects that pertain to the decision at hand can have a substantial impact on the final outcome, both in social and in consumer contexts.

In his dissertation 'Integration, Decentralization and Self-Organization: Towards Better Public Transport' Rolf van Lieshout sought to improve the planning process of public transport operators by integrating planning steps that are traditionally performed sequentially. Furthermore he investigated decentralized strategies for operating public transport, with a focus on railway systems. Such strategies could be preferable over conventional centralized and schedule-based control in various scenarios. Last, he tested decentralized dispatching of both vehicles and crew in a microscopic railway simulation.

In her dissertation 'Consumers in the Age of AI: Understanding Reactions Towards Algorithms and Humans in Marketing Research' Gizem adopted a nuanced perspective on consumers’ reactions towards algorithms and humans and introduced three contextual factors that impact consumers’ reactions. Specifically, it reveals how consumers’ reactions towards algorithms and humans depends on what the outcome of the decision is, who the consumer is and on what type of complexity the decision possesses.

Congratulations to our full-time and part-time PhD candidates who have successfully defended their dissertations so far this year! Find out more about these candidates’ dissertations and defenses below: Gelly Fu, Ainara Novales, Wilco Legierse, Joydeep Paul, Mark van der Giessen, Jaime Caballero Santin, Max Renault and Jasper Heeren.