Economic and Cultural Influences on the Theatrical Consumption of Foreign Films in Singapore

This study investigates audience acceptance of foreign movies in an import-dominated exhibition market—Singapore. The characteristics of home cinema markets and the cultural distances of the film-exporting countries are operationalized in an empirical model to explain the highly varied demand in this import market for international films from various sources. We show that during 2002–2004 release frequencies and box-office performance for films originating in different countries are significantly accounted for by both economic and cultural factors. Films from countries with larger domestic markets and from countries culturally more similar to Singapore experience greater box-office success. Furthermore, an individual foreign film's Singapore box-office performance is explained by its box-office success in its home market and the intercountry cultural distance.     

Financial Accounting Standards Board Accounting Standards Codification: Implications for Access

On July 1, 2009, the Financial Accounting Standards Board officially adopted the Accounting Standards Codification as the sole source of generally accepted accounting principles. The codification is available online, and users may either subscribe to the free Basic View or purchase the Professional View. Although both views provide access to the same content, the Professional View contains more features than the Basic View and provides a significant increase in usability. This article compares the features within the Professional and Basic Views and discusses the implications of access for librarians, researchers, faculty, and students.     

Profiles of Classroom Practices in U.S. Public Schools

In this research, we consider how the instructional strategies of public school teachers interact with the achievement levels of their students. Slightly more than 1,000 teachers in schools broadly representative of public schools in the USA responded to a school climate survey. Of this number, data from 426 teachers were subjected to Rasch scaling analysis, resulting in profiles of classroom instructional activities interrelated to the skill levels of students. Analyses revealed interesting "uncommonalities" in instructional emphasis, in number as well as kind. Instruction in low achieving classrooms generally was less coordinated than in classes of average achieving students. Instructional strategies and lesson focus in classes of high achieving students were linked in ways that resulted in more continuity and greater productivity.