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Mixed fermentation with Saccharomyces cerevisiae and non-Saccharomyces yeasts has become an oenlogical tool to improve wines’ organoleptic properties. However, the maximum utilization of this method is dependent upon understanding the influence of mixed cultures on the physiology of S.cerevisiae and non-Saccharomyces yeasts.

In this study, the supernatants from 48 h mixed-culture fermentation were added to the pure cultures of Issatchenkia orientalis and Saccharomyces, respectively. And the authors used RNA sequencing to determine the transcriptome change of I.orientalis and S.cerevisiae in a mixed culture.

The results showed that multiple genes associated with cell growth and death were differentially expressed. Genes related to biosynthesis of amino acids were enriched among those upregulated in the mixed-fermentation supernatant. Meanwhile, the differential expression level of genes encoding enzymes essential for formation of aroma compounds was found in the single and in the mixed fermentation. The high expression level of molecular chaperones Hsp70, Hsp90 and Hsp110 suggests that metabolites of mixed-culture fermentation may lead to aggregation of misfolded proteins. Moreover, upregulation of ethanol dehydrogenase I ADH1 in the mixed-culture fermentations was highlighted.

This is the first time that RNA-seq was used to analyze changes in the transcriptome of mixed cultures. According to the results the authors’ manuscript provided, an integrated view into the adaptive responses of S.cerevisiae and non-Saccharomyces yeasts to the mixed-culture fermentation is benefit for the potential application of S.cerevisiae and non-Saccharomyces yeasts in fruit wine brewing.

Urban community gardens (UCGs) are important sources of community, food and greenspaces in urban environments. Though UCGs in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) of Ontario, Canada, were considered essential during the COVID-19 lockdowns and therefore open to gardeners, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on food security and UCG use among garden members and managers is not fully understood.

This was an exploratory qualitative study. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with seven managers and eight members of nine gardens in the GTA. The data were analyzed using thematic analysis.

The results suggest that UCGs helped participants be resilient to COVID-19 pandemic-related stressors through the provision of cultural ecosystem services. Therefore, this study supports the current literature that UCGs can help foster resilience during crises. While participants in this study did not end up being food insecure, participants did express concern about community food security.

Results contribute to the current body of literature, and can be used to further update and develop UCG policies, as well as help develop UCG infrastructure and management strategies for future crises.

The impacts of the pandemic on Canadian UCGs are not well understood. This research paper investigated the impact of the pandemic on UCG use and food security, as well as the link between UCG use and increased resilience to COVID-19-related stressors.

User behavior in online information evaluation is the result of a multitude of factors related to social, cultural, personal and psychological issues. The present study aimed to examine the effects of three important psychological variables including personality, self-efficacy and attitude on online information evaluation.

Four validated measures were administrated in person and online among 355 postgraduate students at Shahed University, Tehran, Iran. For testing the possible relationships among the variables, the reliability, normality and Pearson correlation tests were performed by using SPSS 24.0. Moreover, to test the ten hypotheses of the research, the structural equation modeling was considered using AMOS 26.0.

The findings confirmed the first five research hypotheses indicating the direct positive relationships among the four variables except for the impact of self-efficacy on attitude. The mediated effects of the variables were not supported except for the mediating role of attitude in the impact of personality on online evaluation behavior. The variable personality was found to be fundamental among the tested paths because it influenced the information evaluation behavior, both directly and indirectly.

The study showed the impacts of the three variables, which demonstrates that online information evaluation is greatly affected by psychological factors.

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether the likelihood that a firm will face financial statement fraud litigation is affected by the disclosure of internal control material weaknesses (MW) and the “busyness” of a firm’s board of directors.

The results are derived from logistic regression models and data are collected from the Audit Analytics database augmented by data from CompuStat, the Stanford Law School website and the SEC Accounting and Auditing Enforcement Releases. The authors also test for endogeneity with a propensity score matching procedure.

The authors find that an MW report is strongly associated with the likelihood of subsequent financial statement fraud litigation, and that the influence of entity-level MW on litigation likelihood is stronger than that of account-level MW. Moreover, the number of outside board directorships significantly increases the influence of entity-level MW on the likelihood of litigation, indicating that board of directors’ busyness significantly increases the risk of litigation.

Previous research notes that board members holding multiple directorships cannot effectively oversee the financial reporting process and, thus, are associated with poorer governance. The authors extend this implication of board busyness to the association between disclosure of MW type and the filing of subsequent litigation alleging financial statement fraud. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no other research has done so.

Social media enables sport organizations to connect with customers in a dynamic, ubiquitous, and timely manner. Although these organizations routinely use social media, the best practices to improve customer engagement remain elusive. This paper aims to examine National Football League (NFL) teams’ Instagram posts to understand how sport teams can utilize social media to drive customer engagement.

Guided by uses and gratification theory, the author employs a machine learning algorithm to assess the content of NFL teams’ posts from the 2013–2014 season to the 2017–2018 season. The author performs regression analyses to investigate how post topic, together with confounding factors, boost customer engagement.

Results highlight the importance of informational content in eliciting engagement and reveal distinctions in topics deemed “social content” in the literature. The author further identifies variations in how post topics engage sport fans and general customers.

Results provide implications for sport organizations to craft social media content for customer engagement.

This paper aims to fill the governance literature void by answering the seemingly unanswered vintage questions regarding governance reform effectiveness towards ensuring a firm’s financial reporting transparency (FRT) in an emerging country of Malaysia. It involves an assessment of the specific maintained assumption in its governance code (Code) introduced two decades ago that the Code would improve FRT through the direct channel of governance practices improvement.

The measured FRT as proxied by the firm’s accruals quality is examined across different governance regimes of pre- and post-Code periods. This paper conjectures that the firm’s FRT should improve post-Code period, evidencing reform effectiveness towards ensuring enhanced governance practices.

The results indicate that while governance reform improves governance practices, it did not, however, bring improved FRT of firms. The interaction analysis provides evidence of the Code’s ability to favourably moderate the link between the firm’s FRT and several board attributes, suggesting improvement in governance practices in ensuring the firm’s FRT pursuant to the introduction of a formally written and legally backed governance code.

This paper contributes to the extent of governance and FRT literature in developing economies in at least two specific ways. First, the paper presents evidence on public policy implications towards governance practices and the firms’ FRT. Second, it contributes to the public policy debate concerning governance reform effectiveness from the specific angle of the firms’ FRT, thereby confirming the potential conditions upon which the “maintained assumption” would be valid.

This research contributes to the extent of governance and FRT literature in emerging economies by studying the dynamic roles of governance in influencing firms’ FRT across governance regime change, something which governance literature repertoire seems to neglect. It also contributes to the public policy debate concerning governance reform effectiveness from the specific angle of the firm’s FRT by evidencing the strategic role of governance reform in influencing the financial reporting behaviour of Malaysian listed firms.

An applied study using convenience data was conducted to compare the experiences of neurodivergent adults undergoing workplace coaching before and during the pandemic.

The naturally occurring opportunity permitted a comparison of face-to-face and remote coaching in three cohorts, pre-pandemic (100% face-to-face), forced-remote (100% remote) and choice (remote or face-to-face; 85% selected remote). A total of 409 participants self-reported performance before and 12 weeks after completing an average of 11-h coaching.

Significant differences between before and after scores for performance, with large effect sizes, were reported for all three cohorts across six dependent variables: memory, time management, organisational skills, stress management, understanding neurodiversity and concentration. There was no significant difference between the cohorts in terms of the magnitude of the effect. There were significant differences between the cohorts in terms of which topics were chosen as foci for the coaching, with executive functions related topics becoming less popular in the choice cohort.

The authors abductively reasoned the results to suggest a positive relationship between personalised environments and cognitive demands for this client group. They call for further, theoretically grounded research exploring the role of coaching and environment in understanding the work performance of neurodivergent adults at work.

The study contributes to the emerging knowledge on the different experiences of in-person and video-mediated coaching. The focus on neurodivergent employees, which are heretofore less well researched within the workplace, provides essential data to support practitioners in maximising opportunity for a marginalised group.

Drawing upon a contractarian lens of corporate social responsibility (CSR), this study aims to explore community construals of happiness and evaluates conceptual boundaries of CSR for happiness.

Using a mixed-methods design, natural language processing and thematic analysis techniques were used to analyse large volumes of textual survey data collected from over 1,000 research participants through an online survey.

Results indicated that lay construals of happiness were primarily defined in terms of socioeconomic conditions and psychoemotional experiences. In explicating the boundary conditions, community perceptions regarding the extent of businesses’ social responsibilities for happiness were evidenced in five themes: that businesses have a responsibility not to harm happiness, a responsibility to enable conditions for happiness to occur, a responsibility to exercise awareness of happiness implications in decision-making, a responsibility for happiness that is limited by strategic purpose and resource capability and a responsibility for happiness that is limited by stakeholder proximity.

This study contributes to the theoretical and empirical foundation of CSR for happiness while simultaneously developing and applying a novel approach for processing and analysing large volumes of qualitative survey-based data.

This paper aims to determine the impact of perceived virtuality on team dynamics and outcomes by adopting the Input-Mediators-Outcome (IMO) framework. Further, it also investigates the mediating role of team processes and emergent states.

The authors collected survey data from 315 individuals working in virtual teams (VTs) in the information technology sector in India using both offline and online questionnaires. They performed the analysis using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM).

The authors investigated two sets of hypotheses – both direct and indirect (or mediation interactions). Results show that psychological empowerment and conflict management are significant in managing VTs. Also, perceived virtuality impacts team outcomes, i.e. perceived team performance, team satisfaction and subjective well-being.

The interplay between the behavioural team process (conflict management) and the emergent state (psychological empowerment) was examined. The study also helps broaden our understanding of the various psychological variables associated with teamwork in the context of VTs.

Findings from this study will aid in assessing the consequences of virtual teamwork at both individual and organisational levels, such as guiding the design and sustainability of VT arrangements, achieving higher productivity in VTs, and designing effective and interactive solutions in the virtual space.

The study examined the interplay between behavioural team processes (such as conflict management) and emergent states (such as psychological empowerment). The study also theorises and empirically tests the relationships between perceived virtuality and team outcomes (i.e. both affective and effectiveness). It may serve as a guide to understanding team dynamics in VTs better.

This exploratory study attempts to enhance the current understanding of the research and practice of VTs within a developing economy.

The rich qualitative study builds on 11 semi-structured interviews with nine neurodivergent employees and two business professionals supportive of neurodiversity to understand the lived experiences of dealing with crisis in a remote working environment.

The purpose of the reported research is to understand how neurominorities experience remote working in the times of crisis and what the implications of this are for human resource (HR) professionals.

Moving to remote work resulted in a lack of routine, distractions and working long hours, which can all be difficult for line managers to monitor. Further problems with communication in a virtual environment and lack of understanding by others were found to be particularly burdensome to neurodivergent individuals. On the positive note, remote working in the times of crisis allowed for avoiding sensory overwhelm and was seen as an important step in creating a healthy work–life balance (WLB).

The findings of this study point HR practitioners' attention towards building a more neurodiversity friendly post-pandemic workplace and prompt employers to offer working arrangements, which better suit employees' domestic and personal circumstances.

This study addresses the lack of research on the impact of the Covid-19 crisis on neurominorities. In doing so, it answers recent calls to move away from universal HR as a route to positive employee outcomes and facilitates a more accurate reflection of organizational reality for disadvantaged members of society.