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Brief loving-kindness meditation (LKM) is introduced here as a valid social marketing intervention. LKM positively influences prosocial cognitions and affects. However, it remains unclear whether brief meditation interventions can influence prosocial behavior. This study aims to provide evidence of the effects of short LKM on prosocial behavior.

This study reports the results of three experiments examining the effects of brief LKM on donations to unknown others. The results are then integrated with the results of seven other studies testing the effects of brief LKM on prosocial behavior using a meta-analysis (n = 683).

LKM increased love more than the control group (focused breathing) in the three experiments; however, its effects on donations were mixed. The meta-analysis shows that LKM has a small-to-medium significant effect compared to active control groups (d = 0.303); moreover, age and type of prosocial measure used moderate the effects.

Results suggest that LKM can nurture prosocial emotions such as love and lead young individuals to donate. However, these emotions may not be sufficient to lead adult meditators to share their resources with unknown others. This study presents the first meta-analysis of brief LKM and provides insights into the use of meditation in social marketing programs.

Construction professionals (CPs) are often exposed to various challenges and pressures at work including urgent deadlines, high demands, uncertainty in tasks, and complex problems, which may induce stress and affect performance directly. Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) training has been used for several years to reduce stress among various types of people, such as nurses, teachers, and family caregivers, but its application to CPs with highly dynamic environment remains uncertain. This study aimed to investigate the impact of MBSR training on the performance of CPs via an intervention study involving two groups (MBSR and control).

Participants in both groups were assessed using a questionnaire survey and a semi-structured interview at the pre- and post-intervention stage. Multiple research methods were used to derive quantitative and qualitative analyses, including factor analysis, independent t-test, Pearson correlation, and contextual analysis.

The findings overall confirm that MBSR has a direct effect on CPs, improving their mindfulness characteristics and enhancing performance by reducing their stress.

A number of practical recommendations are made such as (1) arranging standard eight-week MBSR training for CPs; (2) giving special leave for attending the full mindfulness training; (3) establishing a suitable environment in the office for meditation;(4) allowing CPs an opportunity to pause at difficult moments to create space to respond instead of simply reacting; and (5) expressing love and kindness through gratitude, recognition, and regular feedback.

This research can be considered as valid evidence to convince construction organizations conducting MBSR to the CPs, which is indeed not too remote to enhance their performance as well as the holistic construction performance.

Mindful consumption is a popular concept that is often associated with mindfulness and religious faith, but nonetheless, its empirical associations to these remain relatively underexplored. Clarifying the impact of mindfulness and religious faith on mindful consumption is important to delineate their effectiveness in influencing consumers to reconsider consumption decisions (e.g. the need for additional products) given the detrimental effects of mindless consumption (e.g. financial debt, environmental degradation and materialistic culture). The concern about mindfulness potentially being a religious matter can also be resolved through empirical validation. Hence, the purpose of this research is to advance the empirical understanding of how mindfulness and religious faith impact on mindful consumption and whether mindfulness and religious faith are interrelated.

The authors adopt a multistudy approach to scaffold the exploration of mindfulness and religious faith as precursors of mindful consumption.

Study 1 carries out an experiment with undergraduates and demonstrates that mindfulness encourages mindful consumption. Study 2 conducts an offline survey with undergraduates and provides evidence that mindfulness and religious faith independently (i.e. without interacting with each other) encourage mindful consumption. Study 3 uses an online survey of consumers for conceptual replication and reaffirms the findings of Studies 1 and 2 across gender, occupations and household incomes (except middle-income households).

The implications of these findings are discussed, wherein mindfulness and religious faith are earmarked as viable avenues for promoting mindful consumption.

This seminal attempt uses multiple studies to empirically validate the nature and generalizability of relationships between mindfulness, religious faith and mindful consumption.

The Industry 4.0 environment is characterized by fast data, vertically and horizontally interconnected systems, and human–machine interfaces. In the middle stands the manager, whose sustained performance is critical to the organization's success. Business disturbances—such as supply chain disruptions during the pandemic—can quickly test the manager's resiliency. While creativity and flexibility are critical for success in these situations, these skills are often not promoted directly. This paper will discuss strategies for enhancing managers' creativity and resiliency and give suggestions for improving professional development training and post-secondary business education.

A synthesis of the literature in business and psychology provides a foundation for creating a conceptual model incorporating strategies to promote managerial creativity and resiliency. While the model focuses on managerial performance under adverse conditions, the tenets of the model also apply during times of relative stability.

Findings based on a synthesis of the literature on creativity in business and psychology provide the foundation for a conceptual model to identify potential elements in training and curriculum design to further managers' creativity and resiliency. This model recommends clear, actionable training and program-level curriculum design suggestions for improved managerial performance.

This paper identifies a conceptual model to enhance managerial creativity leading to increased resiliency through professional development programs and suggestions for educators in post-secondary business education. This model provides tools for managers to deal with adverse and rapidly changing conditions flexibly, promoting employee productivity and satisfaction.

The paper discusses how the management of a sports and fashion company, which we refer to as NULMA, successfully applied the neo/normative control technology “karma organisation” and gained employee engagement. Whereas other studies have documented employee resistance to organisational cultures when used for managerial control, our case demonstrates resistance to management practices that employees find inconsistent with the dominant karma culture.

The study is based on a six-year longitudinal organisational at-home ethnography conducted by one of the authors using methods of both participant and non-participant observation, semi-structured interviews and collaborative production of secondary data in the case organisation.

While our research shows that management can successfully apply neo/normative control which employees accept and support, we further show that employees mobilise the same values to resist management when it fails to deliver on the commitments and promises of the organisational culture.

The study contributes to the literature on organisational culture and, in particular, neo/normative control by theorising employee resistance as being by “accident”, by which we mean an inherent negative potentiality co-invented and released by managers establishing a “karma organisation”. Our theorising culminates in a discussion of the study’s implications for research and practice.

World Health Organizations (WHO) (2023) states that governments and employers have a responsibility to uphold that right by providing work that simultaneously prevents workers from experiencing excessive stress and mental health risks. The business environment continues to produce a lot of stress on workers, which includes internal pressures to achieve results and employees suffer the consequences. Some companies have turned to mindfulness as a technique that helps mitigate these consequences and have joined Kaizen as a process improvement technique in the work environment. Therefore, this study has a research purpose: “to comprehend the possible linkage between Kaizen philosophy from an individual perspective, with Mindfulness ZEN Buddhism technique to understand the individual benefit (well-being) of each employee in organizations.” The answer to this represents the research gap in this article. The research questions governing this study are as follows: RQ1: Does Mindfulness is used as Kaizen technique of personal-individual improvement in 21st-century organizations? RQ2: What elements and characteristics of Kaizen and mindfulness can be found working together? And RQ3: Which qualitative impact of mindfulness and Kaizen in the workplace outcome (well-being, performance of the job (process)) and relationships with other employees)?

This research used a qualitative approach due to the recent phenomenon studied. In a certain way, it was used a mixed-method (combination of qualitative data – web search secondary data analysis and qualitative research-Convergence Model). First, it was done an intensive web search with the aim to identify companies' corporate mindfulness programs, along with companies which have applied mindfulness and Kaizen programs. It was identified a group of big companies with global and international presence (“famous” for their products and services) in diverse industrial and service sectors, country of origin and business locations; with the purpose of getting a holistic vision of all organizations which have practice Kaizen and mindfulness. Therefore, this study explored secondary data related to both practices, analyzing reports or briefings published in management magazines and official WEB pages and/or business magazines.

As a result of the triangulation of the data with its secondary data convergence model and qualitative research, a theoretical framework was reached that shows the benefits of the two combined twin techniques of Kaizen and mindfulness. The worker experiences a path that goes from concentrating on the execution of their processes, following their operating standards (Standardize, Do, Check, Act [SDCA] cycle), going through the evolution to continuous improvement or Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) cycle, experiencing work with concentration-awareness and reducing your daily stress, maintaining high sensitivity to the work process and your environment and finally, discovering an essential life purpose. Finally, worker experiences benefit when there is wide application of both with the SDCA and PDCA cycles such as high motivation, constant learning from your mistakes, day-to-day learning and the Munen Musso (not using the mind).

The main limitation is the qualitative methodological bias and secondary data research. In addition, to have a theoretical sample. However, the richness of the data helps to overcome this limitation. On the other hand, the qualitative research interviews are for a certain geographical area, therefore, the results cannot be generalized.

The results of this research can shed light on operations managers in the use of techniques for continuous improvement and improvement of people's quality of life, such as mindfulness. In Mexico, they are beginning to be used jointly (twin techniques) to comply with Regulation 035 of psychosocial risk, the researchers are sure that in other countries it will be used in the same way to comply with regulations. However, the research findings show the benefits that can be provided to workers in organizations by applying Kaizen and Mindfulness together.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, according to the literature review, this is the first article that explores the relationship between Kaizen and Mindfulness as twin techniques that help improve the individual quality of life of employees in organizations.

Wellness tourism offers opportunities for consumers to explore the self. This paper aims to explore how identity transitions occur in a liminal tourism space – a holistic wellness retreat.

The authors adopt a qualitative methodology, including in-depth semi-structured interviews supplemented by various projective techniques. Following an interpretivist approach, eight consumers were interviewed at the commencement and the completion of a holistic wellness retreat stay. Participant observation was also undertaken during the retreat programme.

The paper shows an identity transition is facilitated by the liminal space of the holistic wellness retreat and further shaped by self-work during the retreat. As participants gain new knowledge on the self and start living “consciously”, they gain a sense of vision, clarity and direction to a new self, wherein identity transition is a starting point and a process of change rather than an end goal.

While much past research views tourism activities as mainly “play”, the findings reveal the holistic wellness retreat experiences as both identity play and identity work. This paper provides theoretical insights into the process from identity play to identity work and what makes this process effective for identity transition.

The purpose of this study was to empirically investigate the role of e-service quality factors in predicting e-satisfaction. The study context was spirituality and well-being over-the-top services. The e-service quality factors consisted of perceived functional completeness, perceived performance, perceived quality of interface and interaction, perceived quality of content and information and perceived quality of customer support. The study goal was to ascertain over-the-top services customers’ behavioral intention toward upgrading to premium subscription and the spread of electronic word of mouth.

This study was based upon the integrated stimulus-organism-response framework where e-service quality represented the stimulus, e-satisfaction the organism, behavioral intention and electronic word of mouth as the response. The study used a moderated-mediation approach with e-satisfaction as the mediator and the price value of a premium subscription as the moderator. To empirically test the model, the authors collected data from 312 spirituality and well-being over-the-top services users in India. Partial least squares-structured equation modeling was used to analyze the collected data.

The findings of the study supported the association between e-service quality factors and e-satisfaction while using spirituality and well-being over-the-top service. The results furthermore indicated that satisfied spirituality and well-being over-the-top customers were willing to upgrade to the premium subscription and spread favorable electronic word of mouth. The moderated-mediation study results revealed that the price value of premium subscriptions moderated the relationship between e-service quality and e-satisfaction but did not moderate the relationship between e-satisfaction and behavioral intention, and e-satisfaction and electronic word of mouth.

This study offered a comprehensive stimulus-organism-response theoretical model by using the five e-service quality measurement factors as “stimuli” for motivating the internal state of spirituality and well-being over-the-top subscribers. This was toward sustained usage in over-the-top services subsequent to the end of the freemium period. Furthermore, in this study, both e-service quality theory and user satisfaction theory were integrated into the stimulus-organism-response model. This helped to better comprehend the impact of e-service quality factors in driving e-satisfaction among spirituality and well-being over-the-top service users.

This study revealed the significance of differentiating premium over-the-top subscriptions based on price value. To ensure a high level of e-satisfaction from a premium subscription, a greater emphasis on the e-service quality dimensions was required. This study provided insights to managers regarding the role of favorable electronic word of mouth in fostering effective customer acquisition.

This was one of the first studies which concurrently integrated perceived value of the premium subscription and e-satisfaction with customers’ behavioral intention and electronic word of mouth through the theoretical lens of stimulus-organism-response.

Following the increasing trend of artificial intelligence (AI) research in hospitality literature, this critical reflection paper aims to identify AI-assisted mindfulness as a critical yet under-investigated issue and to contribute feasible directions for future research.

The authors first conceptualize a framework explaining the effects of mindfulness design in AI interventions on improving human mindfulness. The authors then identify opportunities for interventions in AI-assisted mindfulness for the tourism, hospitality and events industries. Finally, the authors propose potential themes for AI-assisted mindfulness research.

This study contributes three major conceptual works. First, we conceptualize a framework of AI-assisted mindfulness, showcasing that the scope of AI-assisted mindfulness spans from AI interventions to state mindfulness and then to trait mindfulness. Second, the authors offer two approaches to strategic thinking, one from mindfulness (i.e. mindfulness-focused niche markets and activities) and one from AI applications (i.e. AI-facilitated devices and platforms), to identify opportunities for AI-assisted mindfulness interventions. Third, for both management- and marketing-oriented AI-assisted mindfulness research, the authors propose 18 themes.

This critical reflection paper offers directions for future knowledge creation in AI-assisted mindfulness in the tourism, hospitality and events industries.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this critical reflection paper serves as the first in hospitality and tourism literature to systematically propose the research issue of AI-assisted mindfulness, offering directions and themes for future research.