Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Business metaphors'

Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Comunicação e Expressão. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Letras/Inglês e Literatura Correspondente.<br>Made available in DSpace on 2012-10-23T01:10:59Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0Bitstream added on 2013-07-16T20:01:00Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 254495.pdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5)<br>In the introduction of Metaphors we live by, Lakoff and Johnson (1980) highlighted the importance of metaphor and metaphor awareness to the field of applied linguistics based on the assumption that metaphors structure the way we think, act and perceive the world. It is claimed that metaphors are not only a rhetorical flourish of literature texts but actually pervasive even in the most trivial details of our lives. Lakoff and Johnson explain that investigating metaphors may be a way of unveiling how our conceptual system is structured and consequently what we perceive, the way we behave in the world and the way we relate to other people. These assumptions motivated the emergence of a great number of studies regarding metaphors directly or indirectly. Among these studies is the one conducted by Boers (1997) which aimed at shedding some light on how different clusters of metaphors may influence the comprehension and decision making of readers. Boers's study was replicated in the present one, which offers a cognitive semantic analysis of "Health", "Fitness", "Race", "Fight" and "Warfare" metaphors as instantiated in magazine business discourse, and argues that the use of these metaphors may reflect and consolidate certain thought patterns about general business processes. This cognitive semantic analysis was put to test in a problem-solving experiment with university students and revealed that exposure to particular metaphors to describe an business scenario may affect participants' decision-making processes in accordance with the cognitive semantic expectations. The objectives of this study were to: (1) identify what metaphors are more frequently used in magazine texts about business in Brazilian Portuguese and (2) to carry a problem-solving experiment to assess the potential cognitive impact of the metaphors under investigation. The research question that this study intended to answer was: How do different clusters of metaphors influence the comprehension and decision making of EFL readers? The findings of this research tried to show how metaphors may influence our way of thinking and perceiving the world according to our reactions to these metaphors and therefore shaping reality. Explaining this to EFL learners and showing them how it works may help them become aware of this fact and become able to identify and reproduce legitimate metaphorical meanings. Furthermore, learners' awareness may identify underlying ideologies and multiplicity of meanings of metaphorical language in texts. Therefore, this should provide the tools they need to interpret and produce information according to their own beliefs, allowing readers in general to reach their own conclusions about what they read, thus enhancing autonomous literacy. Na introdução do livro Metáforas da vida cotidiana Lakoff e Johnson (1980) ressaltam a importância da metáfora e da consciência metafórica para o campo da Lingüística Aplicada. Baseados na suposição de que metáforas estruturam a forma como pensamos, agimos, e percebemos o mundo, Lakoff e Johnson declaram que as metáforas não são somente um ornamento da retórica presente em textos literários mas sim que elas também estão infiltradas nas atividades mais triviais do nosso dia-a-dia. Investigar essas metáforas pode ser uma forma de desvendar como nosso sistema conceitual é estruturado e como as metáforas estruturam nossa forma de perceber, se comportar no mundo e se relacionar com outras pessoas. Essas suposições motivaram o surgimento de uma série de estudos relacionados direta e indiretamente às metáforas. Dentre esses estudos está o de Boers (1997) que tinha por objetivo fornecer insight de como diferentes grupos de metáforas podem influenciar a compreensão e a tomada de decisão dos leitores. O estudo presente é uma réplica do estudo de Boers e oferece uma análise semântica cognitiva de metáforas relacionadas a noções de "Saúde", "Fitness", "Corrida", "Luta" e "Guerra" no discurso econômico em revistas. Este estudo também discute como o uso dessas metáforas pode refletir e consolidar certos padrões de pensamento sobre processos econômicos em geral. Essa análise cognitiva foi posta A prova em um experimento de solução de problemas com alunos universitários e revelou que a exposição a certas metáforas usadas na descrição de um cenário econômico pode afetar o processo de tomada de decisão dos participantes de acordo com as expectativas semânticas cognitivas dessas metáforas. Os objetivos desse estudo são: (1) identificar que metáforas são mais freqüentemente usadas em textos de revistas sobre economia no Brasil e (2) realizar um experimento de solução de problemas a fim de acessar o potencial impacto cognitivo das metáforas sendo investigadas. A pergunta de pesquisa é: como diferentes grupos de metáforas influenciam a compreensão e a tomada de decisão de leitores de Inglês como língua estrangeira? Os resultados dessa pesquisa mostraram que as metáforas podem influenciar nossa forma de pensar e perceber o mundo de acordo com nossas reações a essas metáforas, e conseqüentemente de estruturar a realidade. Explicar este fato para alunos de línguas estrangeiras, e mostrar como as metáforas funcionam, pode ajudá-los a ter consciência dessa influência e torná-los aptos a identificar e reproduzir significados metafóricos legítimos. Além disso, ter consciência do funcionamento das metáforas pode ajudar os alunos a identificar ideologias subjacentes e a multiplicidade de significados da linguagem metafórica dos textos. Sendo assim, os alunos terão as ferramentas que precisam para interpretar e produzir informações de acordo com suas próprias crenças, o que irá habilitá-los a chegar às suas próprias conclusões sobre o que estão lendo, aumentando assim a sua autonomia.

This thesis aims to investigate the impact of visual metaphor advertising on brand image by focusing on the metaphor’s different levels of complexity. The focus is hereby set on visual metaphors with low and medium complexity. To investigate this impact, a quantitative research design comprising a field experiment with 102 participants has been carried out. After conducting a one-way MANOVA, the empirical results suggest that visual metaphors have a positive impact on the consumer’s perception of a brand. The comparison of the two levels of complexity, however, resulted in no significant difference, which shifts the focus of the metaphor creation to the recipients’ comprehension instead of focusing on the ultimate level of complexity to trigger the most positive reaction. In sum, the findings of this thesis provide several practical implications, especially in helping marketers by using marketing metaphors to establish a positive bond between the communicating brand and the observer.

Journalistic business discourse plays an indispensable role in people’s lives. It serves not only to inform the public about ongoing business activities and economic processes, but also influence the public in their strategic decision-making about investment options. Metaphor is a tool employed to help fulfill the communicative and persuasive functions of the popular business discourse, which is the target of this study. Based on two self-compiled corpora of business news articles in English and Chinese, the study laid particular emphasis on the conceptual metaphor of BUSINESS IS WAR and showed that though the use of this conceptual metaphor was common in business discourse across the two languages, obvious differences in terms of the metaphorical lexis’ frequency of occurrence, their specific collocations and unconventional referents were noted. The conceptual metaphor BUSINESS IS WAR was subdivided into more detailed conceptual metaphors based on the subdivision of the domain of war and the mappings and impositions between the subfields of the domain of war and business were analyzed. The two language cultures agree that they have the same origin for human warfare, but they have developed their concept of war under the influence of their own experience. The analysis of the war metaphors in sample English and Chinese news articles demonstrates its emotion evoking functionto convey evaluative judgments and achieve persuasive ends, and the ideological function to construct reality as a means of maintaining or challenging power relations.

Over a thousand English metaphorical business terms collected from Longman Business English Dictionary, Dictionary of Economics, Macmillan Dictionary of Modern Economics and The Encyclopedical Lithuanian-English Dictionary of Banking and Commerce are analyzed in the Master’s thesis. Since often the same English terms can have multiple equivalents in Lithuanian language, it is essential to choose and consistently use the same terminology when translating. However, the analysis of authentic contemporary translations of such terms collected from Translation Memory of the European Commission's Directorate General for Translation and Donelaitis Parallel Corpus demonstrates that this rule is often ignored and various translation strategies are employed. Furthermore, multitude of proposed translations of such terms in the dictionaries shows that Lithuanian business terminology is still under development, but tendency not to preserve metaphoricity can be observed.<br>Magistro darbe nagrinėjama daugiau kaip tūkstantis metaforinių anglų kalbos verslo terminų, surinktų iš Longman Business English Dictionary, Ekonomikos terminų žodyno, Aiškinamojo ekonomikos anglų-lietuvių kalbų žodyno bei Lietuvių-anglų kalbų aiškinamojo bankinių ir komercinių terminų žodyno. Kadangi neretai tie patys angliški terminai lietuvių kalboje gali turėti kelis atitikmenis, verčiant ypač svarbu pasirinkti ir nuosekliai vartoti vienodą terminiją. Tačiau šiuolaikinių tokių terminų vertimų, surinktų iš Europos Komisijos generalinio vertimo direktorato vertimų atminčių bei Donelaičio lygiagrečiojo tekstyno, analizė rodo, kad ši taisyklė dažnai ignoruojama ir taikomos įvairios vertimo strategijos. Be to, žodynuose siūloma tokių terminų vertimų gausa rodo, kad lietuviškoji verslo terminija dar nėra nusistovėjusi, bet pastebima tendencija atsisakyti metaforiškumo.

Det finns mycket forskning inom ledarskap då det är ett relevant fenomen att studera. Det finns dock inte mycket forskning kring hur ledarskap kommer till uttryck i e- handelsföretag. Vi ville, genom en kvalitativ studie, öka vår förståelse för hur ledarskap kommer till uttryck i e-handelsföretag. Detta gjorde vi genom användningen av ledarskapsmetaforer som ett tolkningsverktyg för att få en ökad förståelse för det komplexa fenomenet. Vi utförde fyra semistrukturerade intervjuer där ledare på tre e- handelsföretag fick berätta om sina erfarenheter, tolkningar och synsätt på ledarskap. Vi upptäckte att samtliga ledare hade en likartad syn på vilka egenskaper som är viktiga och att ledarskap kommer till uttryck på ett snarlikt sätt i de olika företagen. Vi fann även att våra intervjupersoners ledarskap kan tolkas med hjälp av två nya metaforer som uppkom under studiens gång.

The purpose of this mixed-methods research is to determine the effectiveness of the Kingdom Marketing (KM) intervention for improving Israeli SME marketing knowledge among managers and employees of Israeli small and medium-sized business. The secondary objective of the study was to portray the process of change in participating organisations. The newly developed KM intervention programme was designed to enhance Israeli SMEs’ marketing knowledge and marketing strategy, imparting new marketing skills and allowing SMEs to operate with better marketing knowledge. The intervention uses a metaphoric story-line approach to teach participants in mediator-led sessions to understand and use important marketing concepts, such as the difference between sales and marketing. Although the intervention has been used in business settings, it has not yet been empirically validated using rigorous methods. This study was conducted using a mixed methods paradigm with an embedded experimental design. Five Israeli based SMEs were recruited to take part in the training programme. The research consisted of three phases. In Phase 1, I administered a preintervention evaluation to measure five variables: awareness of marketing processes, mistaken marketing attitudes, incorrect marketing process beliefs, organisational marketing skills, and marketing need awareness. Participants were also interviewed during Phase 1. In Phase 2, I administered the KM intervention and collected qualitative data in the form of daily open-ended feedback and a researcher diary. In Phase 3, I administered a postintervention evaluation to assess change in the five quantitative variables, and I conducted a second round of interviews. The findings indicated that the KM intervention programme (a) increased awareness of marketing processes, (b) reduced mistaken marketing attitudes, (c) reduced incorrect marketing process believes, and (d) increased marketing need awareness. However, the intervention had no significant effect on organisational marketing skills. Qualitative analysis confirmed that, although the KM intervention empowered participants with marketing knowledge and skills, it did not result in broad organisational changes. I conclude that the KM intervention programme is valid and worthy of wider use for promoting the survival of SME businesses through marketing knowledge and skill improvement. However, the intervention should be used in conjunction with internal efforts to translate increased knowledge into lasting organisational change.

<p>Through nine experiments, this research advances knowledge about the influence of metaphors grounded in the visual sensory system on creative cognition by showing that perceiving ostensibly task-unrelated visual images that carry metaphoric meaning alters consumers&rsquo; creativity. While the results of Experiments 1a, 1b, and 2 provide convergent evidence that positive visual metaphors representing ideas like &ldquo;<i>I just had a light go on</i>&rdquo; increase consumers&rsquo; creative output, Experiments 3a and 3b reveals that a negative visual metaphor conveying ideas like &ldquo;<i> I am burnt out</i>&rdquo; decrease it. Experiments 4a and 4b show that aptness and familiarity moderate the metaphor creativity link, and Experiment 6 shows that the metaphor&ndash;creativity link is moderated by analogical reasoning skills. Experiment 5 uncovers the mediating role of creative intent. In addition to implying that marketers can use metaphors to enhance consumers&rsquo; creative feedback in areas like new product development, this research also makes important theoretical contributions by showing (1) that grounded visual metaphors (in addition to tangible objects or physical exercises) can not only raise but also lower creative output, (2) that the cognitive relationship to the metaphor alters the metaphor-creativity link, (3) that a unique cognitive skill alters the metaphor&ndash;creativity link, and (4) that consumers&rsquo; intentions explain that relationship. </p>

Few studies have attempted to operationalize metaphor or measure its effect on receivers. This thesis suggests that the language used to frame information has a powerful impact on receivers. The experiment following the literature review shows that the use of a {family, plant, biology} metaphor cluster produces significantly greater donations of money to an organization. Better, though nonsignificant, results on other dependent measures were also obtained using the {family, plant, biology} cluster rather than the {war, machine, death} cluster. Theoretical implications and organizational applications of these findings are discussed and new research directions are proposed.

This cross-disciplinary qualitative research identifies the hidden dynamics, mechanisms and structures forming the core process of leadership, employing an equine-herd metaphor to exclude the complexities generated by the workplace environment. To determine the equine metaphor's suitability, the research commenced with a literature review of accepted academic leadership and followership theories for humans and animals. Thereafter, this original research employed a qualitative methodology of twenty-six semi-structured interviews, eliciting peoples' experiences and interpretations of workplace leadership, and in parallel, equine specialists' observations and interpretations of equine leadership. Over forty hours of interviewing, reflects a combined total of over five hundred year's workplace experience and over three hundred years of equestrian experience. Employing a phenomenological approach, these observations and reflections are interpreted through code and theme based template analysis of the interview transcripts. The 'raw' interview tape-recordings are then analysed by identifying notable expressions, emotions and emphasis, to identify underlying stories. These emergent stories and template data are subsequently 're-storied' as two separate narratives for human leadership and equine leadership, providing a vehicle for comparing and contrasting the leadership process interviewees described. The resultant information was viewed through the lens of critical realism, to seek the underlying dynamics, mechanisms and structures driving the leadership:followership process. The contribution to practice is a new understanding of how the leadership process actually works. Furthermore, striking similarities between human and animal leadership processes introduce the possibility of parallel evolution of leadership in equines, humans and many other socially-grouping species. The results also suggest that organisations led by one individual, (appointed outwith their team), followed by an essentially linear subordinate hierarchy is an un-natural leadership process and potentially flawed. Far from leadership being something leaders do to followers, this research suggests that leading is something followers permit and empower leaders to do. Simplified, the process identified in natural leadership is as follows: 1) A confident, experienced socially-dominant individual has a vision or need and decides to take action. 2) They become a leader only when a quorum of other socially-dominant individuals choose to follow them. 3) When the quorum of social dominants start to follow, it triggers consensus focussed decision-making by the remaining team. The process is effectively 'team appointed' leaders being 'primus inter pares' (first amongst equals in the socially dominant group) with the strongest dynamic being the choice to follow not the choice to lead. This dynamic operates within a non-linear social structure, based on a mechanism of dyadic relationships, to form the leadership process that delivers effective leadership outcomes. This research, combined with previous scientific studies also overturns the myth that aggression-based 'alpha-male' dominance drives leadership in nature - in fact it normally represents crisis leadership, or dysfuctional behaviour more typically observed in captivity. It generates dysfunctional behaviours potentially detrimental to team performance - in humans, generating negative business outcomes. This cross-disciplinary research brings together the business and scientific worlds to provide new insights into leadership and, in defining the core process, provides a contextual framework to enhance understanding of existing leadership theories and assist organisations in reviewing and improving their leadership processes.

Research on emerging adulthood has increased over the past decade, including further investigation of the five features of emerging adulthood: (a) exploring identity, (b) instability, (c) focus on self, (d) feeling in-between, and (e) possibilities (Arnett, 2004). Despite an increased focus on this age period (i.e., 18 -- 29 year olds), research has not addressed the context of free time and leisure. Trends among European emerging adults include increased delay of marriage, decreased childbirth, and general postponement of adult markers. Both the high cultural valuation of leisure and the apparent change in patterns of external markers (i.e., sustained low fertility rates, delayed age of first marriage, declining national populations) in Europe, made Europe a prime setting for studying the leisure of emerging adults. This case study reviews the features of emerging adulthood in a leisure context across European cultures. Using data collected in interviews, the content analysis illustrates the prominence of identity exploration in emerging adults of Europe compared to the four other features of emerging adulthood in a leisure context. Further cultural discourse analysis highlights leisure as a resource for accessing opportunity and a space for freely making choices. The discourse analysis also includes the reconstruction of the cultural schema regarding leisure and each of the five features of emerging adulthood.

A cultura de uma empresa influencia, sobremaneira, o comportamento e o comprometimento dos funcionários e, por consequência, na produtividade e também nos seus resultados financeiros. Neste cenário, o Jornal Interno é um canal de comunicação que tem a função de disseminar a cultura da empresa, seus programas, entre outras informações, estabelecendo-se como um elo de ligação entre a direção, seus funcionários e com alguns segmentos do público externo. O objeto de investigação dessa dissertação são Informativos Internos de duas empresas multinacionais, com suas sedes em Caxias do Sul, com um corpus constituído a partir de segmentos discursivos das edições do ano de 2003. Para dar conta desse estudo, desenvolvem-se, no capítulo um, questões sobre Cultura Organizacional. No capítulo dois, dá-se ênfase a definição e caracterização do Jornalismo Empresarial. Em seguida, no capítulo três são revisados aspectos centrais da Teoria dos Modelos Cognitivos Idealizados, com foco na Teoria da Metáfora Conceitual, centrada, mais especificamente, no Sistema da Metáfora Moral e na Metáfora da Contabilidade Moral. O capítulo quatro trata da metodologia da pesquisa e, nele, procede-se à análise do corpus. Nesse espaço é realizado um estudo quantitativo sobre a estrutura dos informativos em suas opções de pauta, destacando-se os temas mais frequentes, assim como o uso do espaço gráfico. Esses dados servem de base para determinar quais são os segmentos discursivos relevantes para análise semântica (cognitiva) posterior. Como resultado, verifica-se que o Sistema da Metáfora Moral e a Metáfora da Contabilidade Moral de fato ajudam na compreensão das culturas organizacionais, de forma diferenciada em cada Informativo. Os dados quantitativos e qualitativos levantados no corpus, por meio de recortes (47 na E1 e 107 na E2), permitem constatar a presença das metáforas, elegê-las e justificá-las, dando subsídios para a análise embasada no Sistema da Metáfora Moral e da Contabilidade Moral, e possibilitando o levantamento de dados e também dando sustentação a uma conclusão acerca do nosso problema.<br>Submitted by Marcelo Teixeira (mvteixeira@ucs.br) on 2014-05-29T16:35:43Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao Maria Inez G Perico.pdf: 3152013 bytes, checksum: b6b97c3abd946d87eecc050fe0d7d616 (MD5)<br>Made available in DSpace on 2014-05-29T16:35:43Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao Maria Inez G Perico.pdf: 3152013 bytes, checksum: b6b97c3abd946d87eecc050fe0d7d616 (MD5)<br>A company´s culture deeply influences the employees´ behavior and commitment; as a consequence, it also influences productiveness and financial results. In this scenery, the Internal Journal is a communication mean with the objective of disseminating the company´s culture, its programs, among other information, linking direction and employees with other segments from the external public. The investigation object of this dissertation are Internal Journals of two multinational companies based in Caxias do Sul (South of Brazil), with a corpus constituted from discursive segments from editions made in 2003. To accomplish this study, in chapter one we discuss about Organizational Culture. In chapter two, we emphasize on the definition and characterization of the Business Journalism. Next, in chapter three we review the central aspects of the Idealized Cognitive Models Theory, focusing the Conceptual Metaphor Theory and, more specifically, the Moral Metaphor System and the Moral Accountability Metaphor. Chapter four is structured to present the research methodology and corpus analysis. In this space, we carry out a quantitative study about the journals´ structure on their subject options, highlighting the most frequent themes and the use of the graphic space. These data serve to determinate what are the discursive segments that are relevant for a posterior semantic (cognitive) analysis. As a result we could verify the Moral Metaphor System and the Moral Accountability Metaphor in fact help for the comprehension of these management models, which is different in each Journal. Quantitative and qualitative data from the corpus, by means of selection (47 in E1 and 107 in E2), allowed us to verify the presence of metaphors, elect and justify them, to base the analysis on the Moral Metaphor System and Moral Accountability Metaphor, what made possible to raise data and support a conclusion about our problem.

The unprecedented turbulence and uncertainty experienced in global economic and financial markets because of the 'credit crunch' has had a damaging impact on consumer confidence. Trust and credibility have been eroded as many customers feel let down by the banks suggesting the need for banks to rebuild constructive dialogue and long-term, meaningful relationships with their customers again. Though financial service, in this case, is considered a utilitarian service, based on the fact that money is needed to support people‘s daily activities, the present state of financial service has suggested the need for banks to appeal to consumers‘ emotions with the aim of improving their reputation. Also, the competition within the industry also could suggest the need to adopt an emotionally appealing advertisement strategy as emotions are known to play an influential role in building robust brand preference. This study builds on the communication theory, meaning transfer theory and consumer involvement theory, to understand the messages the banks are sending out and to elicit consumers‘ emotional reaction. One thousand, two hundred and seventy-four UK bank advertisements in nine national newspapers were content-analysed to identify the emotional appeals presented by the banks. The perception of these appeals and their associated meanings were sought through semi-structured interviews with 33 participants in London and Luton. The results of the analysis indicated that UK Banks are utilising emotional appeal in their advertisements to reach out to the consumers to convince them to upgrade their account, to open an additional account or switch their account. The most predominantly used appeals were relief and relaxation followed by excitement and happiness or satisfaction with the bank, and finally, security and adventure. However, variations were found in different financial products that employed emotional appeals. It was found that high-involvement products such as mortgages and loans used fewer emotional appeals. Both bank groups - high street banks, including the big four (Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds and RBS) and non-high street banks, such as the new entrants, supermarket brands, and online banks were using emotional appeals. However, it is acknowledged that the communication strategies between these banks could be different as the non-high street banks are more likely to repeat and publish the same messages across many newspapers, instead of publishing different emotionally appealing advertisements. Though consumers acknowledged these emotional appeals in the advertisements, they were more concerned about their relationship with the banks as they don‘t rely on advertisements to make a financial decision. Rather, recommendations from families, friends and associates and also branch location are more important when deciding on which bank to choose. The lack of congruency between financial services and emotional appeals in advertisements is also observed as customers are more likely to be persuaded by rational appeals however this study has not completely ruled out emotional appeals in bank advertisements as the use of both types of appeals is recommended. The study provides important theoretical and managerial contributions to understanding how the consumers understand meaning-embedded advertisements produced by the banks. Managers will be able to consider the implications of advertisements in enhancing their brand equity and building relationships with customers in anticipation that, by word of the mouth and established relationship, their bank‘s reputation will be enhanced. Limitations of the study and opportunities for future research are identified.

Yes<br>In this paper we introduce Morgan’s (1986, 1997) eight metaphors for making sense of entrepreneurs’ motives and their view of ‘reality’. Employing Burrell and Morgan’s (1979, 2003) four paradigms for the analysis of organisational theory, we propose a methodology to capture the ‘longitudinal’ journey of minority ethnic entrepreneurs’ original motives for setting up business; and, current and future perceived image. We use a deductive approach by developing a multiple-choice questionnaire based on eight metaphors. The data is collected from 30 small business owner managers/entrepreneurs based in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Our initial findings show that the assumptions of most of the respondents conform to the “functionalist” paradigm that place emphases on order, objectivity, rationality and tangible view of ‘reality’. Accordingly most of the respondents selected the functionalist metaphors like ‘Brain’, ‘Machine’ and ‘Psychic Prison’. Interestingly, most of the respondents selected and re-selected functionalist paradigm to indicate their past and future aspirations, perhaps due to their need for business stability and to subside any insecurity feelings with regards to their future. However, interestingly many respondents selected “radical Humanist” or “interpretivist” paradigms to map their current situation. These paradigms portray relatively more entrepreneurial and explorative mindset, perhaps mimicking unease with the current situation and a desire by the respondents to introduce some kind of a change in their current business and social settings. We believe that their metaphorical assumptions could determine their decision making, policy and strategy setting, and, actions. In our view our research instrument is appropriate for conducting ‘longitudinal’ studies for eliciting past, current and future assumptions of entrepreneurs.

碩士<br>國立屏東科技大學<br>農企業管理系所<br>97<br>The operation of Taipei-Yilan Highway successfully decline the time and distance to connect the north Taiwan, but the also reduce demand of lodging and influence the home-stay industry. This study uses the Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET) to discover the perception and impacts of home-stay business in Yilan area. The major finding show the interviewee's mental model and their influence. All of interviewee administer their home-stay business in same area, but they have opposite point of view on the Taipei-Yilan Highway depend on time they had operated.This conclusion can provide to the man who wants to manage home-stay business in Yilan area a reference.