Category Archives: Research

Seamless integration of Papers and DEVONthink

Posted on by
1

Two of my favorite programs on the Mac are Papers and DEVONthink Pro Office. Papers provides a terrific interface for storing and organizing journal articles, and DEVONthink Pro Office offers powerful indexing and searching of PDF files.

Recently I was thrilled to find an easy way to use the two programs together. If Papers is configured to store your PDF files in its library (the default), DEVONthink can index these without duplicating them in its database. To configure:

  • Launch DEVONthink
  • Open an existing DEVONthink database or create a new one
  • Choose “Index…” from the “File” menu
  • Locate and select the folder where your Papers library is stored (by default the folder is called “Papers” and it’s stored in the “Documents” folder in your home directory)

If you have a large number of papers, it may take a while for DEVONthink to index them. Once indexing is complete, you’ll see a folder structure that mimics the structure of your Papers library. You can now search your PDF files in DEVONthink!

To update your DEVONthink index (e.g., after adding articles to your Papers library), click on the “Papers” folder in your DEVONthink database and choose “Synchronize” from the “File” menu.

Society for Consumer Psychology 2008 Winter Conference

Posted on by
Reply

I just returned from SCP 2008, which was held in New Orleans. What a great conference! The two keynote speakers, Russel Fazio and John Cacioppo, were simply amazing; it was inspiring to hear them talk about their research.

Joann Peck and I presented our working paper, In Search of a Surrogate for Touch: The Effect of Haptic Imagery on Psychological Ownership and Object Valuation, at the working paper session. We received a number of helpful questions and suggestions. The session also provided a welcome opportunity to interact with the other participants and learn about their research.

Incidentally, here’s the abstract from our working paper:

Previous research has shown that consumers value objects more highly if they own them, a finding commonly known as the endowment effect. This effect extends beyond legal ownership to psychological ownership, which can arise simply from touching an object. In this research, we explore the possibility of using touch (haptic) imagery as a surrogate for actual touch. An experimental study demonstrates that an increase in psychological ownership and valuation can be obtained by having consumers close their eyes and visualize touching an object; moreover, this increase is similar in magnitude to that obtained from having consumers actually touch the object.

If you’d like a copy of our paper, let me know and I’ll be happy to send it to you when it’s available.

Okay, now that I’m all invigorated it’s time to get back to work!

The Evolution and Persistence of Dominant Roles in Interorganizational Relationships

Posted on by
Reply

Just returned from Agent 2007: Complex Interaction and Social Emergence at Northwestern University, where I presented my paper The Evolution and Persistence of Dominant Roles in Interorganizational Relationships. Here’s the abstract:

Recent application of role theory to economic behavior (Montgomery 1998) has provided new insights into interorganizational relationships (Heide and Wathne 2006). In particular, role theory offers a framework for investigating the source of seemingly contradictory accounts of economic exchange, including Uzzi’s (1997; 1996) finding that embeddedness enhances firm survival in the apparel industry and Wathne, et al.’s (2001) discovery that embeddedness does not insulate a firm from price competition in the commercial banking industry. The key to understanding these discrepancies lies in the divergent evolution of dominant relationship roles. This paper investigates the evolution and persistence of roles in interorganizational relationships from a role-theoretic perspective using agent-based modeling.

If that sounds interesting, you’re welcome to read it when it’s published in the conference proceedings.