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Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) has been proven to be efficacious in the treatment of Major Depressive Disorder (MDD). We previously examined the effectiveness of rTMS for MDD in an applied clinical setting, AwakeningsKC Clinical Neuroscience Institute (CNI) and found high remission rates for patients diagnosed with MDD following rTMS treatment. An unexpected relationship with body composition and rTMS unit was discovered. This sub-study extends the previous investigation through a focused analysis of the effects of body composition on response to rTMS in the treatment of MDD. We utilized data collected from a retrospective review of medical records for patients diagnosed with MDD undergoing rTMS therapy at AwakeningsKC CNI. Patient Health Questionnaire 9 (PHQ-9) scores, time to remission status and body mass index (BMI) at baseline were considered while referencing two different rTMS instruments (MagVenture; NeuroStar). We found 23 (9%) of 247 participants met criteria for obese status (BMI?30) with an average baseline PHQ-9 score of 22±4, classified as “severe depression”. Obesity status was differentially impacted by the rTMS instrument used for treatment. Patients with obesity showed a shorter time to remission (mean 2.7±0.27 vs. mean 3.4±0.3 weeks) and proportionately greater remission rate (100% vs. 71%) when treated using the MagVenture relative to the NeuroStar instrument. Clinical response to rTMS therapy for MDD appears to be guided by individual factors including body composition and rTMS parameters such as the unit used for treatment. Further study of these influences could aid in the optimization of clinical response to rTMS.

Damage functions constitute an essential part of the modelling of critical infrastructure (CI) performance under the influence of climate events. This paper aims to compile and discuss publications comprising damage functions for transport assets.

The research included the collection of contemplable literature and the subsequent screening for damage functions and information on them. In conclusion, the derived damage curves and formulae were transferred to a unified design.

Damage functions for the transport sector are scarce in the literature. Although specific damage functions for particular transport assets exist, they mainly consider infrastructure or transport in general. Occasionally, damage curves for the same asset in different publications vary. Major research gaps persist in wildfire damage estimation.

The study scope was restricted to the hazards of fluvial floods and wildfires. Despite all efforts, this study did not cover all existing literature on the topic.

This publication summarises the state of the art of research concerning transport asset damage functions, and hence contributes to the facilitation of prospective research on CI performance, resilience and vulnerability modelling.

The relationships between tourist resorts and transnational crime are rarely analyzed systematically. This paper begins to fill this gap by examining how organized crime groups and individuals linked to them can take advantage of tourist resorts to commit crimes.

This paper aims to review the efficient use of economic and social resources to generate income and, at the same time, reduce the concentration of wealth in the 32 states of the Mexican Republic during the period 1990-2015.

Data envelopment analysis with the inclusion of a bad output was used to diagnose the efficiency of Mexican entities, and the Malmquist–Luenberger index was applied to understand how this efficiency evolves.

The results clearly show that only 3 of the 32 units studied generated and distributed wealth efficiently, while the other 29 must increase their level of income and its distribution.

According to the authors’ knowledge, this is the first work that performs a temporal analysis of the efficiency in the generation of Human Development Index using bad outputs and the Malmquist–Luenberger index.

Vietnam has been actively integrated into a multilateral trading system based on its accession to the WTO and the implementation of a series of ASEAN+1 FTAs. Now Vietnam is negotiating to be a member of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, which is a region-wide FTA in the Asia-Pacific region, and a total of 21 working groups have been negotiating 29 chapters of the TPP. This paper tries to assess major issues of Vietnam’s joining the TPP, and to draw policy implications such as initiatives for Vietnam’s acceleration of its renovation and economic restructuring programs; and domestic measures for facilitating FTA implementation by firms and enhancing the country's implementation capacity.

The purpose of this paper is to advance spatial studies of change interventions by conceptualizing them as liminal spaces and examining how these spaces are conceived, perceived and lived during the intervention process.

The paper explores change interventions as liminal spaces in the empirical context of LEGO serious play workshops through participant observations and interviews.

The study shows that in change interventions an abstract, conceived liminal space is created, maintained and closed down to enable the planned change to take place. While practicing the space, the change participants may indeed perceive this space as liminal, but the space is less manageable because of their both prescribed and unprescribed interpretations. Furthermore, as subjectively experienced, the space may hold a spectrum of liminal, liminoid and everyday (business as usual) notions.

The study contributes to the research on (1) the spatiality of change interventions and (2) artificially created liminal spaces of organizing.

The paper reminds consultants and organizations embarking on change interventions to pay attention to the spatiality of such interventions. The study shows that it is not enough to plan how these spaces are to be used, but also it is equally important to consider how the participants use and experience them.

The study provides a novel insight into change interventions by examining them as liminal spaces that are simultaneously conceived, perceived and lived during the intervention process.

Family governance is a topic of substantial practical relevance that merits much more attention in family business research (Gersick & Feliu, 2014; Suess, 2014). The purpose of this book chapter is to use the framework of a fair process to gain a better understanding of how family governance practices can help an entrepreneurial family firm flourish. Central to the analysis is the case of a 100-year-old entrepreneurial family firm that will serve as a best practice. Interviews with key members of the family and the business were held, and secondary data were gathered and analyzed. The chapter starts with a theoretical outline of the family as strategic resource and the family governance as a mechanism to manage this strategic resource. The principles of fair process are introduced as an underlying framework for the well-functioning of family governance practices. This is followed by the introduction of the case and the discussion of the key findings. This chapter ends with some concluding remarks.

Tourism areas are challenged to become adaptive areas in the context of a dynamic networked society and globalizing economy. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to an enhanced understanding and conceptualization of adaptive tourism areas by drawing attention to “fitness landscapes,” a metaphor that is used in complexity theories to visualize development trajectories of adaptive systems.

Fitness landscapes, and its underlying theories, are useful to conceptualize tourism area development as a stepwise movement through a dynamic landscape with peaks and valleys. Doing so allows us to highlight why adaptation is a crucial property for tourism areas that are embedded in dynamic contexts and offers a frame of thought for how tourism areas can be managed.

The article raises awareness about and draws attention to a set of factors and conditions that support tourism planners and managers in enhancing the capacity of tourism areas to adaptively respond to changing circumstances.

Introducing fitness landscapes contribute to the discussion on adaptive capacity building – a topic that contributes to managing uncertain futures and is likely to gain importance in the dynamic society. Moreover, it helps as well as stimulates tourism scholars to further develop this topic. Finally, it helps tourism planners to build adaptive capacity in practice.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the influence of intellectual capital (IC) on sustainable economic and financial performance (EFP) and value creation (VC) in Brazilian companies.

Based on finance and accounting theories, a quantitative and descriptive long-term study was carried out in the companies listed on the Brazil Stock Exchange and Over-the-Counter Market (B3), covering 20 years period.

The results indicate that IC positively influences profitability, corporate return and organizational value sustainably; the most intangible-intensive Brazilian companies listed on B3 presented more robust results than the least intangible-intensive; and IC contributes to a systematic increase in EFP and VC over time.

Using a well-established metric, the IC-INDEX, the IC and its effects were measured, obtaining theoretical contributions (expanding the understanding of the IC influence in sustainable EFP and VC from a long-term perspective – one subject still unexplored in the literature); and empirical (increasing the understanding of the IC’s role as a driver of competitiveness, performance and organizational value).

This study increases the understanding of the theoretical and practical effects of IC, also providing a competitive benchmarking process to access sustainable EFP and VC of companies and their industries.

The originally applied and validated proposal extends existing theory by offering a set of indicators to scale the contribution of IC to competitiveness from the perspective of long-term (historical) corporate outcomes.