The paper revisits the author’s previous paper to examine short-run and long-run dynamic relationships between macroeconomic variables and stock prices in Korea. The data is updated to the period for which monthly data are available from January 1986 to June 2018 (390 observations) retrieved from the Bank of Korea. The results of Johansen cointegration test indicate that at least one cointegrating equation exists, confirming there is a long-run equilibrium relationship between macroeconomic variables and stock prices in Korea. The results of vector error correction estimates confirm that: 1) the coefficient of the error correction term is significant with a negative sign, which is, a long-run dynamic relationship is observed between macroeconomic variables and stock prices; 2) for short-run dynamics, the nominal exchange rate of the Korean won per the US dollar is positively related to stock prices, while interest rates are negatively related to stock prices in the short-run; 3) the coefficient of global financial crises is insignificant, that is, the changes of stock prices are determined largely by their own dynamics in the model. The results suggest only that the global financial crises neither cause instability in the cointegrating vector, nor affect significant changes in the endogenous variables in the model.

The study investigates the effects of online instructional facilitator’s qualities on student performance of online class activities. The study explores the roles of instructional facilitators who may influence student performance of online class activities and their academic achievement. The study employs a set of aggregated data from 1,362 subjects and 10 facilitators who participated in multiple online classes. The results of independent samples t-test reveal that the student performance in online classes has no association with facilitators’ educational background or academic degree, as well as demographic characteristics, student evaluation records and instructional achievement. The results of multiple regression analysis show that the facilitator engagement has a positive relation to the enhancement of student interaction, reading discussion messages, and the quality of discussion messages in online discussions. The results of correlation analysis show that the facilitator engagement has a positive impact on both increasing the number of reading discussion messages and enhancing the quality of discussion messages. The facilitator engagement increases the quantity of reading discussion postings and enhances the quality of discussion messages, which would be a substantial contribution to student performance by facilitators. The findings suggest that student performance and academic achievement in online classes are not independent of facilitator engagement.

The paper examines the impact of proctoring environments on student performance in two different exam proctoring environments: online versus offline proctored exams. This study employs a set of aggregated data from 1,762 students over the eight-year period from 2009 to 2016 in a university. Although there were nine courses offered, they could have been counted more than once as students may appear several times to take exams for different courses. This study employs independent samples t-test and regression analysis to compare the means of two independent groups and to test the hypothesis. The results of the independent samples t-test and the regression analysis indicate that there is no difference in the mean scores of exams and, therefore, the findings suggest that the exam proctoring environment is unlikely related to student performance even when students take their exams either in online proctoring or offline proctoring environments. This study concludes that the proctoring environment unlikely results in a statistically significant difference of exam scores and, thus, the exam proctoring environment does not appear to cause any change in student performance. The findings suggest that the exam proctoring environments does not appear to impact on student academic achievements and assessments.

The study examines lagged economic effects of research and development (R&D) investment on the market value of manufacturing firms listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange or the Shenzhen Stock Exchange in China. This study applies panel data analysis methods to address the following issues: 1) There might be an adjustment lag in the impact of R&D investment on corporate market value, and 2) Unobserved firm effects must be taken into account. The balanced panel data includes a total of 1,462 observations with 34 cross-sections of manufacturing firms listed on Chinese stock markets and with 27 time-specific quarterly periods from 2007 to 2017. The results indicate that the R&D investment of Chinese manufacturing firms tends to yield favorable market value of the firm with some adjustments to time. The results show that R&D investment exhibits a strong positive impact on their market value of manufacturing firms in Chinese stock markets. Moreover, R&D investment has a positive time-lag effect on the market value of the firm. Interestingly, the R&D investment of Chinese manufacturing firms generate a relatively constant positive effect on their market value, supporting the notion that the corresponding returns of R&D investment for such firms yield lagged but added market values.

The paper seeks to explore the role of green finance in achieving sustainable development goals through the case of China, and address some issues of sustainable finance and environmental, social and governance concerns of green finance by introducing the episodes of green finance in China. This paper aims to provide some viewpoints about the following questions: 1) What are the latest trends in green finance? 2) What are the main challenges to the development of green finance? 3) What are policy recommendations for the development of green finance? 4) What are the roles of both the public and private sectors in promoting green finance? This paper identifies the mainstream to sustainable bonds, diversification of green finance, transition of corporates’ business models, transparency and disclosure, and harmonizing taxonomy and measurement of green finance for the emerging trends of green finance. As the results, this paper recommends some policy measures for the private sector such as greening the banking system, greening the bond market, and greening institutional investors. This paper also suggests some policy initiatives for the public sector such as developing policies and capacity, promoting market transparency and governance, and promoting private-public partnership for diversifying resources of green finance.

The paper aims to facilitate a discussion around how big data technologies and data from citizens can be used to help public administration, society, and policy-making to improve community’s lives. This paper discusses opportunities and challenges of big data strategies for government, society, and policy-making. It employs the presentation of numerous practical examples from different parts of the world, where public-service delivery has seen transformation and where initiatives have been taken forward that have revolutionized the way governments at different levels engage with the citizens, and how governments and civil society have adopted evidence-driven policymaking through innovative and efficient use of big data analytics. The examples include the governments of the United States, China, the United Kingdom, and India, and different levels of government agencies in the public services of fraud detection, financial market analysis, healthcare and public health, government oversight, education, crime fighting, environmental protection, energy exploration, agriculture, weather forecasting, and ecosystem management. The examples also include smart cities in Korea, China, Japan, India, Canada, Singapore, the United Kingdom, and the European Union. This paper makes some recommendations about how big data strategies transform the government and public services to become more citizen-centric, responsive, accountable and transparent.

The study examines the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) activity on the firm market value, in particular, market capitalization of tour operators listed on Chinese stock markets. This study employs panel data analysis methods to examine endogeneity concerns in observational data. The balanced panel data includes a total of 1,296 observations with 27 cross-sections of tour operators listed on Chinese stock markets and with 48 time-specific periods from March 2006 to December 2017. The results indicate that CSR activity has a negative impact on the market value of the firm for the concurrent period, but from one-period time lag and afterwards CSR activity has a strong positive impact on the market value and sustains its positive impact on the market value even for a two-period time lag. The findings suggest that the economic effect of CSR activity on the firm market value tends to take some degree of lagged effects to be fully showcased in the market capitalization of tour operators and travel companies listed on Chinese stock markets. The findings suggest that, though CSR activity may carry some financial risk for an immediate short-term, tour operators must put a lot of time and effort into making CSR actions effective.

The paper aims to test long-term and short-term causality from four exchange rates, the Korean won/$US, the Korean won/Euro, the Korean won/Japanese yen, and the Korean won/Chinese yuan, to the Korea Composite Stock Price Index in the presence of several macroeconomic variables using monthly data from January 1986 to June 2018. The results of Johansen cointegration tests show that there exists at least one cointegrating equation, which indicates that long-run causality from an exchange rate to the Korean stock market will exist. The results of vector error correction estimates show that: for long-term causality, the coefficient of the error correction term is significant with a negative sign, that is, long-term causality from exchange rates to the Korean stock market is observed. For short-term causality, the coefficient of the Japanese yen exchange rate is significant with a positive sign, that is, short-term causality from the Japanese yen exchange rate to the Korean stock market is observed. The coefficient of the financial crises i.e. 1997-1999 Asian financial crisis and 2007- 2008 global financial crisis on the endogenous variables in the model and the Korean economy is significant. The result indicates that the financial crises have considerably affected the Korean economy, especially a negative effect on money supply.

The paper aims to investigate relationships between technology and innovation management, total factor productivity and economic growth in China. By comparing the trends in total factor productivity growth of industrialized economies (i.e. OECD), this study intends to showcase the importance of total factor productivity progress in the Chinese economy. The study employs time series data of an annual basis for the period from 1977 to 2016 retrieved from the World Development Indicator. The study employs unit root test, cointegration test, fully modified least squares estimation method, canonical cointegrating regression and dynamic least squares estimation method to test the hypotheses. The results of the cointegrating regression analysis show that manufacturing growth leads to an increase of total factor productivity in the short-run in China. The findings of the study suggest that manufacturing (i.e. technology and product innovation) is positively related to the increase of total factor productivity in the short-run and total output growth in the long-run. The findings suggest that promoting technology and innovation management and supporting R&D subsidies may reduce the marginal cost of conducting R&D and increase the rate of technology and innovation management and R&D activity and therefore, the total factor productivity growth rate.

The paper examines critical factors affecting consumer behavioral intentions in accepting online health communication through social networking sites. Unlike recent research under this topic, the paper assimilates some components of service quality dimensions and consumer behavior theories. The paper employs factor analysis and structural equation modelling analysis with latent variables to identify critical factors from the survey data collected from Korean consumers. The results of the study identifies three major constructs: consumer needs for health information, the perceived value of tangible attributes of health information providers, and the perceived value of intangible attributes of health information providers. The results show that consumer needs for health information and the tangible and intangible attributes of health information providers should be considered as important antecedents of accepting online health communication through social networking sites. The findings suggest that the success of online health communication via social networking sites largely depends on the tangible and intangible attributes of health information providers.

The paper deals with the impact of the product distribution and information technology sectors on energy resource use, carbon emissions and economic growth by examining the long-run equilibrium relationships and Granger causal relationships among these variables in South Korea. The quarterly time series data from the first quarter of 1970 to the third quarter of 2010 (163 observations) are collected and retrieved from the Bank of Korea database. The paper examines the long-run equilibrium relationships using cointegration techniques and Granger causality using vector error correction models. Test results indicate a long-run equilibrium relationship exists among these variables. In testing directional causality, both the product distribution and the information technology sectors show direct effects on economic growth but only marginal effects on carbon emissions.