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4 Essays on Sustainable Development and Organizations’ Response to Stakeholder’s Expectations
(2024)
As integral part of the society, environment, and economy, the organization’s survival and growth depend on legitimacy which reflects the social support and acceptance of its stakeholders, the institutions and individuals it interacts with. Organizations interact with internal and external stakeholder groups which not necessarily have the same legitimacy expectations. Due to several reasons, such as the adoption of new laws or the invention of new technologies, stakeholders’ expectations of legitimate actions can change in the course of time. Thus, to respond to changing stakeholder’s expectations, as integral part of a changing environment, is complex.
The main objective of this dissertation is to answer the research question: “How do organizations respond to changing stakeholder’s expectations in context of sustainable development?”. Building on two empirical settings with four essays, this dissertation provides insights into organizations’ responses as reaction to changing stakeholder expectations with regard to sustainable development. In particular, it takes a closer look on the interplay between internal stakeholders, such as employees, and external stakeholders, such as politics or customers. The first essay summarizes the organizational factors for the implementation of a research data management (RDM) system within higher education institutes (HEI) and how they interact with each other. Based on Leavitt’s (1965) classical model of organizational change, the essay provides an overview about the interrelation between the individual components that make up an RDM system. The second essay investigates how early career researchers within HEI make use of different respond strategies to the state, market, professional, and community logic in context of RDM. It provides insights how employees deal with changing environmental conditions and the organization’s response to them. The third essay analyses the shift from voluntary to mandatory sustainability reporting and demonstrates different strategies organizations adopt to respond to it. The fourth essay incorporates the findings of the third essay and investigates which factors influence the organization’s strategy
to respond. It focuses on the interface between the top management team and the chief executive officer.
This dissertation makes at least two overall contributions to management and organization studies research. First, it emphasizes the role of different stakeholder groups and their impact on the organizations’ activities. Second, this dissertation shows the value of connecting different theoretical approaches such as institutional logics, upper echelon theory, and organizational transparency research in context of organizational legitimacy and demonstrates that a nuanced view is necessary to understand the concept of organizational legitimacy. This cumulative dissertation is structured as follows. Part A is an introduction to the study organizational legitimacy. Part B contains the four essays.
Business ethics which has been in the focus of applied ethics for the last years has passed through several levels. Based on American socioeconomics first concepts were confirmed by the influence of sociological systems theory guaranteeing the framework for developing terms such as “sustainability” and “corporate social responsibility”. Even the Christian Churches have faced fundamental concepts of business ethics and dealt with them successfully. Considering either the Fair Trade Company GEPA or the certification Xertifix by MISEREOR, Christian Social Ethics and its pastoral work can keep up with any concept of business ethics nowadays.
Der Aufsatz richtet den Blick auf den Zusammenhang zwischen den Konsumenten und dem Grad ihrer ausgeübten Steuerungsfunktion auf den Markt, d.h. auf die Qualität der Waren und Dienstleistungen, wie besonders auch auf die Rahmenbedingungen ihrer Produktion oder Erbringung. Im Hinblick auf ein verantwortungsbewusstes Verhalten als Konsument wird aufgezeigt, inwiefern das Kaufen nicht nur ein wirtschaftlicher Akt, sondern immer auch eine moralische Handlung ist.
Technological advancements and new legal requirements are continuously changing the online data disclosure landscape in terms of both, the quantity and quality of data that firms can acquire. Nowadays, consumers are required to disclose personal data online multiple times a day and in a variety of different contexts, such as creating user profiles, online payment or using location-based services. Despite consumers’ increasing online privacy concerns, firms rely ever more strongly on consumer data that they convert into a competitive advantage through personalized product recommendations and targeted advertising. In an effort to encourage consumer data disclosure, many firms have focused on building trust as a way to counterbalance privacy concerns and mitigate risk perceptions. Correspondingly, marketing literature has continued to examine the interplay of trust and consumer privacy concerns. While the extant research has considerably advanced our understanding of the role of trust in privacy-related decision-making, the majority of studies has mainly focused on single-stage, dyadic disclosure settings and cognitive decision-making processes.
Against this background, the overarching goal of this thesis is to shed light on under-researched data disclosure contexts involving trust and to explore additional facets of the underlying decision-making processes. For example, considering pre- and post-disclosure stages when evaluating consumers’ data disclosure decisions allows for a more holistic picture of the decision-making process. Similarly, social media and sharing economy settings challenge the traditional assumption of purely dyadic consumer-firm data disclosure, thus extending traditional conceptualizations of trust. Across three independent essays, this thesis addresses the overarching research question of how the peculiarities of multi-stage and multi-actor settings shape consumers’ trust-based decision-making strategies.
Data has become a necessary resource for firm operations in the modern digital world, explaining their growing data gathering efforts. Due to this development, consumers are confronted with decisions to disclose personal data on a daily basis, and have become increasingly intentional about data sharing. While this reluctance to disclose personal data poses challenges for firms, at the same time, it also creates new opportunities for improving privacy-related interactions with customers. This dissertation advocates for a more holistic perspective on consumers’ privacy-related decision-making and introduces the consumer privacy journey consisting of three subsequent phases: pre data disclosure, data disclosure, post data disclosure. In three independent essays, I stress the importance of investigating data requests (i.e., the first step of this journey) as they represent a largely neglected, yet, potentially powerful means to influence consumers’ decision-making and decision-evaluation processes. Based on dual-processing models of decision-making, this dissertation focuses on both consumers’ cognitive and affective evaluations of privacy-related information: First, Essay 1 offers novel conceptualizations and operationalizations of consumers’ perceived behavioral control over personal data (i.e., cognitive processing) in the context of Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based data disclosure processes. Next, Essay 2 examines consumers’ cognitive and affective processing of a data request that entails relevance arguments as well as relevance-illustrating game elements. Finally, Essay 3 categorizes affective cues that trigger consumers’ affective processing of a data request and proposes that such cues need to fit with a specific data disclosure situation to foster long-term decision satisfaction. Collectively, my findings provide research and practice with new insights into consumers’ privacy perceptions and behaviors, which are particularly valuable in the context of complex, new (technology-enabled) data disclosure situations.
In the ongoing 21st century, low- and middle-income countries will face two health challenges that are thoroughly different from what these countries have been dealing with in preceding centuries. First, they are confronted with surging rates of non-communicable diseases (NCDs), and second, climate change will take its toll and is predicted to cause catastrophic health impairments and exacerbate chronic health conditions further. Both will pose a disproportionate health and economic burden on low- and middle-income countries, which are also the countries least able to cope with them. By threatening individual health and socioeconomic improvements, and by putting an immense burden on already constrained health care systems, they impede the progress in poverty reduction and widen health inequities between the rich and the poor.
Against this background, this thesis investigates the potential of NCD prevention and treatment measures in the context of Southeast Asia, with case studies in Indonesia. Specifically, it seeks to understand what kind of health interventions have the potential to be (cost-)effective considering the cultural background, lifestyle, health literacy and health system capacities in the region. Further, this thesis analyzes the interplay between NCDs and climate change and assesses the financial burden that both might pose in the decades to come. Hence, this thesis contributes to a better understanding of how the two health challenges of the 21st century, NCDs and climate change, can be addressed in the context of Southeast Asia and offers insights into what type of health policies and interventions can play a supportive role.
Due to their high numbers, refugees’ labour market inclusion has become an important topic for Germany in recent years. Because of a lack of research on meso-level actors’ influences on labour market inclusion and the transcendent role of organizations in modern societies, the article focuses on the German professional chambers’ role in the process of refugee inclusion. The study shows that professional chambers are intermediaries between economic actors, the government and refugees, which all follow their own logics and ideas of labour market inclusion (the state, the market and the community logic). The measures taken by professional chambers mainly reflect a governmental logic (to reduce refugee unemployment) combined with a market logic (to provide human resources to economic actors). A community logic (altruism) only comes into play as a rather unintended consequence of measures addressing the other two logics. The measures of two types of professional chambers are compared. Close similarities between them reveal that the organization type is of theoretical relevance to explain the type of measures organizations opt for.
Die vorliegende Dissertation behandelt die Qualität von Prozessmodellen.
Vor diesem Hintergrund haben Experteninterviews mit Forschungs- und Praxispartnern zur Entwicklung und Evaluierung eines Ordnungsrahmens zur Qualitätsbestimmung von Prozessmodellen beigetragen.
Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass unter anderem die Einsatzzwecke der Prozessmodelle sowie die mit den Prozessmodellen in Berührung kommenden Personengruppen differenziert betrachtet werden müssen, um Auswirkungen auf die Prozessmodellqualität untersuchen zu können.
This dissertation examines the overarching research question of how the suppliers’ brand management in the form of brand identity, brand culture, and brand essence influences buyer-seller relationships in three independent essays.
In Essay 1, I address the structure, capabilities, and outcomes of brand identity from a supplier perspective. Through qualitative interviews with suppliers, I examine how widespread the concept of brand identity is in practice and what exactly practitioners understand by it. Going further, I look at what capabilities and conditions are necessary for brand identity to be successful and what outcomes suppliers hope to achieve. Using an Information-Display-Matrix (IDM) test and a sample of Master of Business Administration (MBA) students, I examine the relevance of brand functions in more detail.
In Essay 2, I use a dyadic dataset with matched buyer-seller dyads to examine the causes and effects of perceptual congruence and incongruence of brand culture strength on the buyer-seller relationship, while considering relationship-specific investments and interaction mechanisms as moderating effects. I show that congruence and incongruence have different effects on customer loyalty and price sensitivity and that these are strongly context-dependent.
In Essay 3, I deal with brand essence strength interactions and their effects on the buyer-seller relationship. I use a dyadic dataset with matched buyer-seller dyads to show how brand essence strength influences customer loyalty and customer profitability, and how it interacts with key customer attitudes and other important buyer-seller relationship closeness indicators.
This dissertation makes a significant contribution to the literature on brand identity, brand culture, and brand essence in buyer-seller relationships. Furthermore, my dissertation offers practical implications for managers at B2B suppliers who (re)shape their brand management with a focus on the inner parts of the brand.
1. IT-Exposure and Firm Value: We analyze the joint influence of a firm’s information technology (IT)-Exposure and investment behavior on firm value. Estimating a firm’s (partial) IT-Exposure allows for distinguishing between firms with a business model that is challenged by IT above and below market average. Hence, we estimate the annual IT-Exposure of a firm using a 3-factor Fama-French model extended by an IT-proxy. Subsequently, we analyze the relationship with Tobin’s Q in a panel data context, accounting for the relationship between IT-Exposure and investments proxied by R&D as well as CapEx. We use more than 48,000 firm-year observations for firms in the Russell 3000 Index covering the period 1990 to 2018. Although IT-Exposure has a negative impact on firm value, this discount can be overcompensated by up to 2.1 times by sufficient investments through R&D and CapEx, giving a firm with an average Tobin’s Q a premium of 14.8% to 19.2%, while controlling for endogeneity.
2. Corporate Social Responsibility, Risk, and Firm Value: An Unconditional Quantile Regression Approach: This paper examines the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) on firm risk, comprising total risk, idiosyncratic risk, and systematic risk, as well as firm value. We focus on analyzing the interrelationships along the entire distribution of the dependent variables, thus estimating an unconditional quantile regression (UQR). The analysis is based on CSR scores from Refinitiv and MSCI, using up to 12,013 firm-year observations over the period 2002 to 2019 for all U.S. companies listed on NYSE, NASDAQ, and AMEX. UQR reveals strongly heterogeneous effects along the unconditional quantiles of the dependent variables, which are reflected in sign changes, magnitude and significance variations. For CSR we find a risk-reducing as well as value-enhancing effect. When applying fixed effects OLS, we can just partly confirm the risk-reducing and value-enhancing effect of CSR shown in the literature.
3. Heterogenous Effects of Religiosity on Firm Risk and Firm Value: An Unconditional Quantile Regression Approach: This paper examines the impact of religiosity on firm risk, comprising total risk, idiosyncratic risk, and systematic risk, as well as firm value. We focus on analyzing the interrelationships along the entire distribution of the dependent variables, thus estimating an unconditional quantile regression (UQR). The analysis is based on all U.S. companies listed on NYSE, NASDAQ, and AMEX for the period from 1980 through 2020. UQR reveals strongly heterogeneous effects along the unconditional quantiles of the dependent variables, which are reflected in sign changes, magnitude and significance variations. Overall, the risk-reducing effect of religiosity is more pronounced in the higher quantiles of the distribution. We further observe a value-reducing as well as value-enhancing religiosity effect. When applying fixed effects OLS, we can confirm the risk-reducing and non-existing value effect of religiosity shown in the literature. The robustness of our results is underpinned by a battery of additional tests.
Abstract 1: This paper investigates whether market quality, uncertainty, investor sentiment and attention, and macroeconomic news affect bitcoin price discovery in spot and futures markets. Over the period December 2017 – March 2019, we find significant time variation in the contribution to price discovery of the two markets. Increases in price discovery are mainly driven by relative trading costs and volume, and by uncertainty to a lesser extent. Additionally, medium-sized trades contain most information in terms of price discovery. Finally, higher news-based bitcoin sentiment increases the informational role of the futures market, while attention and macroeconomic news have no impact on price discovery.
Abstract 2: We investigate whether local religious norms affect stock liquidity for U.S. listed companies. Over the period 1997–2020, we find that firms located in more religious areas have higher liquidity, as reflected by lower bid-ask spreads. This result persists after the inclusion of additional controls, such as governance metrics, and further sensitivity and endogeneity analyses. Subsample tests indicate that the impact of religiosity on stock liquidity is particularly evident for firms operating in a poor information environment. We further show that firms located in more religious areas have lower price impact of trades and smaller probability of information-based trading. Overall, our findings are consistent with the notion that religiosity, with its antimanipulative ethos, probably fosters trust in corporate actions and information flows, especially when little is known about the firm. Finally, we conjecture an indirect firm value implication of religiosity through the channel of stock liquidity.
Abstract 3: This study shows that higher physical distance to institutional shareholders is associated with higher stock price crash risk. Since monitoring costs increase with distance, the results are consistent with the monitoring theory of local institutional investors. Cross-sectional analyses show that the effect of proximity on crash risk is more pronounced for firms with weak internal governance structures. The significant relation between distance and crash risk still holds under the implementation of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, however, to a lower extent. Also, the existence of the channel of bad news hoarding is confirmed. Finally, I show that there is heterogeneity in distance-induced monitoring activities of different types of institutions.
This dissertation uses four studies to examine the context-contingent strategic factors that are critical to the success of digital transformation strategies from the perspectives of capital markets, incumbents, and start-ups. It focuses on a better understanding of (1) digital innovations and their quantitative evaluation, (2) power disruptions in digitally servitized supply chains, (3) strategic measures and dynamics in digital B2B platform markets, and (4) strategizing by data-driven start-ups in digitalized business networks.
Digital platforms consist of technical elements such as software and hardware and associated social elements such as organizational processes and standards. When such social or technical elements seem logical individually but inconsistent when juxtaposed they form tensions. Prior research on platforms often focused on individual elements of digital platforms but neglected possible related and conflicting elements which offers limited insight about underlying tensions. While some studies on platforms considered tensions, they largely assumed that centralized platform owners being responsible for responding to tensions, neglecting collective response mechanisms in blockchain-based decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) where decentralized participants typically respond to tensions. The examination of tensions in the context of centralized platforms and decentralized autonomous organizations offers an opportunity to surface conflicting elements that form novel types of socio-technical tensions which require collective and technology-enabled response mechanisms. This thesis explored what tensions exist in centralized and decentralized digital platform contexts and how platform participants can respond to selected tensions. For this purpose, this thesis comprises five essays that employ multiple different research methods including interviews analyzed by using techniques of grounded theory, qualitative meta-analysis of published case studies, and systematic literature reviews. The findings derived from all five essays contribute to a better understanding of tensions in digital platforms. In particular, this thesis (1) offers a lens for analyzing platforms as collective organizations in which tensions arise at the collective meta-organizational level requiring collective responses, (2) identifies new tensions and response mechanisms related to generativity and collectivity, and (3) points to a novel category of socio-technical tensions that are especially salient in digital platforms.
Blockchain technology enables the automated recording of information and execution of contract content – utilizing so-called Smart Contracts – without relying on trusted intermediaries (Beck et al., 2016). A blockchain is best described as a decentralized digital ledger (Atzori, 2015). The decentralized data storage on the blockchain makes the recorded information tamper-proof and creates transparency along the value chain. Therefore blockchain changes fundamentally the way data and information are processed (Al-Jaroodi & Mohamed, 2019; Avital et al., 2016). This has given rise to numerous use cases for blockchain in a wide range of industries.
Fundamentally, blockchain technology can be used at any time when information needs to be stored in an automated and tamper-proof manner (Crosby et al., 2016). In the financial industry, blockchain helps to automate peer-to-peer transactions. This makes middlemen obsolete, which can reduce transaction costs (Cai, 2018). In the public health sector, blockchain is primarily used for decentralized storage of patient records. By using blockchain technology, these patient records are secured against manipulation and unauthorized access by third parties (Mettler, 2016). Another interesting use case can be seen in the electricity market. Blockchain technology makes it possible to integrate micro producers of electricity, such as private households, into the power grid in a cost-efficient way (Cheng et al., 2017). However, blockchain technology also offers several applications in the creative industries to support the daily work of professionals.
The term creative industries encompasses industries and sectors which hold intellectual property at the core of their value creation (Caves, 2000). According to DCMS (1998),creative industries include not only classic art sectors such as fine art, painting or crafting, but also areas such as marketing, game developing, film and video or music. As the main drivers of innovation, the creative industries have a steadily increasing influence on the overall economic impact. Often, ideas, products and services from the creative industries ultimately flow into other areas, such as the automotive sector, and support them in achieving their entrepreneurial goals (Banks, 2010; Jones et al., 2004). In order to continuously maintain the position as an innovation driver, a certain form of organization has prevailed in the creative industries.
For the creative industries to react flexibly to new requirements and a constantly changing environment, work is usually carried out as project-based (DeFillippi, 2015). For this purpose, the teams of the project-based organization are predominantly formed using freelancers who are specialists in the required field. As a result, many recurring organizational activities arise, such as contracting, team finding or onboarding (DeFillippi, 2015; Eikhof & Haunschild, 2006). Therefore, professionals from the creative industries have to spend significant time on activities that do not serve their core task of creating intellectual property. These tasks not only reduce the efficiency of their work, but also hinder their creative flow (Foord, 2009; Hennekam & Bennett, 2016). In this regard, blockchain represents a promising technology to support professionals in the creative industries.
For the creative industries, blockchain is primarily used to automate formal processes and secure intellectual property rights (O’Dair, 2018). Blockchain technology enables artists and creatives more freedom for their own creative activities. By automating repetitive activities, professionals from the creative industries are freed from typical management tasks (Arcos, 2018; Cong & He, 2019). Furthermore, for the first time, intellectual property can be secured in a cost- and time-efficient way by utilizing blockchain technology. This is made possible by the decentralized nature of the blockchain, which makes subsequent manipulation of the contents of the intellectual property impossible (Avital et al., 2016; Beck et al., 2016; Regner et al., 2019). Ultimately, the use of so-called Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) create the opportunity for artists and creatives to sell unique digital art (Regner et al., 2019). Thus, blockchain generates entirely new ways for creative industries to organize their projects and opens new markets to sell their work. While several use cases of blockchain technology can be identified in the creative industries, the widespread use of blockchain is still lacking.
So far, no Blockchain service or blockchain application has managed to take a dominant market position in the creative industries. At first sight, this seems surprising since artists and creatives could fundamentally benefit from this technology. At the same time, professionals from the creative industries would not be dependent on middlemen or central entities. This circumstance gave the impulse for the research presented in this thesis. I was able to identify that professionals from the creative industries are still underutilizing blockchain technology for three main reasons: (1) When using blockchain technology, professionals from the creative industries experience strong resistance from their stakeholders, who want to prevent the use of blockchain. (2) The perceived constraints by artists and creatives in using blockchain still deter many from using this technology extensively. (3) Several blockchain applications lack a persuasive design, resulting in many artists and creatives continue to prefer conventional services and products.
Over the last decades, ongoing advancements in information technology (i.e., Internet and mobile devices) have expanded a firm’s ability to communicate and interact with consumers and hence, create the potential of building sustainable relationships. Tailoring offerings through (1) consumer-initiated customization and (2) firm-initiated personalization is considered a key driver of long-term consumer relationships. As technologies continue to evolve, the opportunities for tailored marketing expand and enable new technology-driven business models that help to leverage customization and personalization and strengthen customer relationships in the era of the digital economy.
Across three independent essays, the purpose of this dissertation is to answer the overarching research question of how innovative technology-driven business models versus traditional business models in the domains of customization and personalization influence consumer behavior. Thereby, this dissertation contributes to an understanding of challenges and opportunities of innovative customization and personalization business models with the ultimate goal of enabling their successful diffusion in the marketplace.
Specifically, in Essay 1 and Essay 2, I investigate an innovative business model located in the realm of customization, that is, internal product upgrades (i.e., offering fee-based access to originally built-in, but deliberately restricted, optional features). Using a conceptual approach, Essay 1 provides a framework for understanding how internal product upgrades will likely influence consumers’ responses. As such, it outlines evolving challenges and opportunities of internal product upgrades and derives questions for future research. In Essay 2, I use an empirical approach to examine pitfalls of internal product upgrades in the product usage phase. Drawing on research on normative expectations and perceived ownership, this essay reveals that consumers respond less favorably to internal (vs. external) product upgrades and investigates managerially relevant boundary conditions.
Finally, Essay 3 creates novel insights into a business model in the domain of personalization. This essay examines how the increasingly prevalent data disclosure practice of firms engaging in a network with other firms to exchange consumer data, which we denote as Business Network Data Exchange (BNDE), influences consumers’ privacy-related decision-making. In particular, this essay shows that consumers are less likely to disclose personal data in BNDE (vs. traditional dyadic) data exchange settings and that immediate affective reactions are crucial in explaining consumers’ privacy-related decision-making.
Within this dissertation, I make substantial contributions at a more general level to literature on customization and personalization by comparing innovative business models to established ones. At the individual essay level, I extend existing research in the domains of product feature modifications, norm violations, and privacy-related decision making. Moreover, this dissertation provides actionable implications for managers who are facing the decision to transform their established business model into an innovative technology-driven one.
A firm's entrepreneurial orientation (EO) is its propensity to act proactively, innovate, take risks, and engage in competitive and autonomous behaviors. Prior research shows that EO is an im-portant factor for new ventures to overcome barriers to survival and fostering growth, measured by annual sales and employment growth rates. In particular, individual-level EO (IEO) is an important driver of a firm’s EO. The firm’s ability to exploit opportunities appearing in the mar-ket and to achieve superior performance depends on the employees’ skills and experiences to act and think entrepreneurially. The main objective of this dissertation is to investigate how and when employees engage in entrepreneurial behaviors at work. Building on three essays, this dissertation takes an interdisciplinary approach to employee entrepreneurial behaviors in new ventures, encompassing both entrepreneurship and gamification research. The first main contri-bution proposed in this field is a more nuanced understanding of how employee entrepreneurial behaviors help young firms cope with growth-related, organization-transforming challenges (i.e., changes in organizational culture that accompany growth, the introduction of hierarchical structures, and the formalization of processes). When new ventures grow, employees’ IEO tends to manifest in introducing technological innovations and business improvements rather than in actions related to risk-taking. Second, this dissertation reveals the relevance of self-efficacy for entrepreneurial behaviors and explores how gamification can enhance employee entrepreneurial behaviors in new ventures. Based on these findings, this dissertation contributes to EO research by highlighting the role of IEO as a building block for EO pervasiveness. This research further develops our knowledge on the use of gamification in new ventures. This cu-mulative dissertation is structured as follows. Part A is an introduction to the study of entrepre-neurial behaviors. Part B contains the three essays.
In three essays, this dissertation examines the past, present and future of branding in an international context, contributing to the research area of global/local brands, while also offering managers valuable insights for their branding strategies.
The first essay provides scholars and practitioners a detailed state of the art of global/local brand research and proposes promising angles for future research, especially considering major
challenges for our societies.
The second essay incorporates the segment of cosmopolitan consumers into perceived brand globalness/localness research. Theoretically grounded in the concepts of social identity theory and complexity, the essay builds on perceived brand globalness/localness to analyze how cosmopolitans arrange both their global and local orientations. Aside offering scholars a new theoretical lens regarding consumer cosmopolitanism, managers can benefit from the gained insights, if cosmopolitans are a particular target group in their business strategy.
The third and final essay meta-analytically investigates how the variables perceived brand globalness and localness materialize on various key outcome variables. At heart of this essay is a comparison of both perceived brand globalness and localness, offering scholars and practitioners valuable empirical insights on similarities and differences between their effects on outcomes such as brand quality.
The identification and estimation of trends in hydroclimatic time series remains an important task in applied climate research. The statistical challenge arises from the inherent nonlinearity, complex dependence structure, heterogeneity and resulting non-standard distributions of the underlying time series. Quantile regressions are considered an important modeling technique for such analyses because of their rich interpretation and their broad insensitivity to extreme distributions. This paper provides an asymptotic justification of quantile trend regression in terms of unknown heterogeneity and dependence structure and the corresponding interpretation. An empirical application sheds light on the relevance of quantile regression modeling for analyzing monthly Central England temperature anomalies and illustrates their various heterogenous trends. Our results suggest the presence of heterogeneities across the considered seasonal cycle and an increase in the relative frequency of observing unusually high temperatures.
The described secondary data provide a comprehensive basis for modeling conditional mean nitrogen dioxide (NO2) concentration levels across Germany. Besides concentration levels, meta data on monitoring sites from the German air quality monitoring network, geocoordinates, altitudes, and data on land use and road lengths for different types of roads are provided. The data are based on a grid of resolution 1 × 1 km, which is also included. The underlying raw data are open access and were retrieved from different sources. The statistical software R was used for (pre-)processing the data and all codes are provided in an online repository. The data were employed for modeling mean annual NO2 concentration levels in the paper "Agglomeration and infrastructure effects in land use regression models for air pollution - Specification, estimation, and interpretations" by Fritsch and Behm (2021).