Purpose: The supply of and demand for medical services continue to increase as the current social environment changes. Consequently, competition among medical institutions is intensifying and hospitals must establish appropriate management strategies to improve the medical services they provide. This study suggests that the authenticity of doctors is a factor in improving medical-service quality and examines the effect authenticity has on the affective trust and satisfaction of patients. Design, methodology, and approach: The study utilized previous studies to examine the significance of potential variables, established hypotheses and used a questionnaire to confirm these hypotheses. The questionnaire was distributed to patients who had visited a hospital in the previous six months. Responses were analyzed empirically using structural equation modeling. Findings: The analysis found that a physician’s authenticity has a significant impact on the affective trust of patients. While patients’ affective trust does not have a similar strong impact on patient satisfaction, physician authenticity does have a significant impact on patient satisfaction. Conclusion and implications: This study examined the roles of authenticity, affective trust, and patient satisfaction in doctor-patient relationships in the medical services field. The implication of the findings is that physician authenticity is a prerequisite for patient satisfaction of medical services.

As environmental concerns continue to grow, green supply chain management (GSCM) is attracting attention as an element of competitive advantage for companies. This study examined internal GSCM practices to show how they influenced the end-point of the supply chain from the perspective of the end-consumer. It identified the effects of environmental concerns on consumer purchasing behavior mediated by the company image of internal GSCM practices. Data were collected through an email survey of Korean consumers. Reliability and validity were verified using SPSS 18.0. Cronbach’s alpha, and confirmatory factor analysis. The results showed that environmental concerns had a positive impact on such practices, and the image of internal GSCM practices was found to have a significantly positive effect on consumer purchasing behavior. Companies will have to actively reflect environmental factors in their operational activities, and GSCM implementation will become a necessity. A positive image of internal environmental management and eco-design, which are key elements of internal GSCM practices, strengthened the company’s eco-friendly image and ultimately affected consumer purchasing behavior. This suggests that it is important for companies to evaluate their environmental attitude and make eco-friendly products from a consumer’s perspective, making it a differentiation strategy for a company in building an eco-friendly corporate image.

This study explored the impact of interactional justice on supply-chain collaboration and sustainable supply-chain performance. Accordingly, it classified interactional justice of supply-chain management (SCM) into interpersonal and informational justice, and empirically classified the effects of these subordinate concepts on supply-chain collaboration and sustainable supply-chain performance. To this end, 700 questionnaires were distributed, and 201 final valid responses were used for the statistical analysis which revealed the significant positive influence of interpersonal justice on informational justice. This indicates that courtesy, respect, and proper words are important in the relationship between buyers and sellers. Both interpersonal and informational justice had a significant positive relationship with supply-chain collaboration. The results suggest that a fair-trade environment should be cultivated to encourage and facilitate seller-buyer collaboration. Lastly, supply-chain collaboration had a positive influence on sustainable supply-chain performance. This implies that if justice is not perceived in the seller-buyer relationship, collaboration can be hindered, which negatively impacts corporate performance. These findings also helped to understand the importance of interactional justice and to propose a new relationship between interpersonal and informational justice.