Search results

The continuing development of digital technologies creates expanding opportunities for information transparency. Consumers use social media to provide online reviews that are focused on changing levels of consumer trust. This study examines the effect of perceived risk that prompts consumers to search for online reviews in the context of food safety.

Commitment-trust theory forms the theoretical lens to model changes in consumer trust resulting from online reviews. Consumer-based questionnaire surveys collected data to test the structural model, using structural equation modelling (SEM).

The findings show when consumers perceive high levels of risk, they use social media to obtain additional product-related information. The objective, unanimous, evidential and noticeable online reviews are perceived as informative to consumers. Perceived informativeness of positive online reviews is found to increase consumers trust and, in turn, increase their purchase intentions.

The findings contribute to the knowledge of online review-based trust literature and provide far-reaching implications for information system (IS)-practitioners in business.

With increasing wine consumption in Armenia, both residents and inbound tourists have become attractive target groups for wine sales, which are stimulated by wine tourism activities. The objective of this explorative study is to shed light on the potential of wine tourism for rural development in Armenia.

The paper starts with a structured and interdisciplinary literature review. Based on qualitative surveys among local tour operators and wine producers, and complemented by three expert interviews, the offer of wine tourism activities in Armenia will then be analyzed.

Each of the surveyed wine producers offers wine tourism activities. Foreign tourists know little about the Armenian wine industry, however, and are interested in cultural experiences and Armenia’s breathtaking nature. Armenian wine producers need to understand the expectations of their target groups to develop or adapt their offers successfully.

Due to the explorative nature of this study, the sample size of the surveyed wineries and tour operators is small and hence not representative. In addition, only local tour operators were surveyed. The sample should be extended to include foreign tour operators and more wineries in future research projects.

Whereas first studies on the structure and competitiveness of the Armenian wine sector exist, there is no survey on the general wine tourism in Armenia and its potential to foster rural development.

This pilot study aims to examine the prevalence of test anxiety and its interplay with attitudes, confidence, efficacy, academic performance and socio-demographic factors within the domain of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) courses.

The authors employed a quantitative, cross-sectional design with 549 sixth-grade students from public lower secondary schools in Prishtina, Kosovo, using the Student Attitudes Toward STEM Survey (S-STEM) for middle/high schools and the test anxiety questionnaire.

Over 70% of Kosovo's sixth-grade students reported moderate to severe test anxiety. The age of students was found to be inversely related to academic performance in STEM. The father's employment was associated with favorable STEM attitudes, confidence, efficacy and academic performance. Having a personal study environment was connected with favorable STEM attitudes, confidence and efficacy in STEM, whereas access to technology was associated with positive academic performance. Test anxiety, academic performance and personal study space predicted students' attitudes, confidence and efficacy in STEM and 21st-century learning.

Educational institutions should prioritize student well-being. By addressing test anxiety, these institutions can create supportive learning environments that improve attitudes, confidence and efficacy in STEM fields. These efforts are crucial for STEM career development and student success in the 21st-century workforce.

The current study findings contribute to a deeper understanding of the factors influencing STEM student engagement and performance, highlighting the importance of addressing test anxiety for positive learning outcomes while emphasizing the need to consider socio-economic and contextual factors in education.

We explore the relationship between urbanicity and police officers’ perceptions of changes in their reactive and proactive work during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Using the 2021 survey of 1,262 Croatian police offices (436 police officers from a large urban community, 471 police officers from small towns and 155 from rural communities), we examine the perceived changes in their reactive activities (e.g. responses to the calls for service, arrests for minor crimes) and proactive activities (e.g. community policing activities, directed patrols) during the peak month of the pandemic compared to before the pandemic.

The majority of police officers in the study, regardless of the size of the community where they lived, reported no changes before and during the pandemic in reactive and proactive activities. Police officers from urban communities and small towns were more likely to note an increase in domestic violence calls for service. Police officers from urban communities were also more likely than the respondents from small towns and rural communities to report an increase in the responses to the disturbances of public order. Finally, police officers from small communities were most likely to observe a change in the frequency of traffic stops during the pandemic.

This study is the first one to explore the differences in perceptions of COVID-19-related changes in reactive and proactive police activities in a centralized police system.

Food sector supply chains have significant negative environmental impacts, including the expansion of global food commodity production, which is driving tropical deforestation – a major climate and biodiversity problem. Innovative supply chain monitoring services promise to address such impacts. Legislation also designates “forest-risk commodities”, demanding supply chain due diligence of their provenance. But such data alone does not produce change. This study investigates how theory in performance measurement and management (PMM) can combine with sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) and decision theory (DT) via case study research that addresses paradoxes of simplicity and complexity.

Given existing relevant theory but the nascent nature of the topic, theory elaboration via abductive case study research is conducted. Data collection involves interviews and participatory design workshops with supply chain actors across two supply chains (coffee and soy), exploring the potential opportunities and challenges of new deforestation monitoring services for food supply chains.

Two archetypal food supply chain structures (short food supply chains with high transparency and direct links between farmer and consumer and complex food supply chains with highly disaggregated and opaque links) provide a dichotomy akin to the known/unknown, structured/unstructured contexts in DT, enabling novel theoretical elaboration of the performance alignment matrix model in PMM, resulting in implications for practice and a future research agenda.

The novel conceptual synthesis of PMM, SSCM and DT highlights the importance of context specificity in developing PMM tools for SSCM and the challenge of achieving the general solutions needed to ensure that PMM, paradoxically, is both flexible to client needs and capable of replicable application to deliver economies of scale. To advance understanding of these paradoxes to develop network-level PMM systems to address deforestation impacts of food supply chains and respond to legislation, a future research agenda is presented.

This study seeks to estimate union wage effect in the public and private sectors of Ghana, respectively. It also seeks to ascertain whether the union wage effect in the two sectors varies.

The authors use data from the Ghana Living Standards Survey 6 (GLSS 6, 2012/2013) and Ghana Labour Force Survey (GLFS, 2015). In terms of estimation technique, the authors employ the Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition technique to estimate union wage effect in public and private sectors, respectively.

The findings indicate that union wage effect in the public sector is positive and higher relative to that of the private sector.

The findings imply that strict enforcement of Section 82 of Labour Act 2003 (Act 651) will curb the political influence of public sector unions over their employer (Government).

This research paper has not been presented to any journal for publication and it is the authors' original work.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-01-2023-0045

The marketisation of higher education fosters the notion of students as consumers, highlighting the shifting dynamics of student–teacher relationships. This paper aims to contribute to ongoing discussions about students as consumers and their involvement in pedagogical practices. We explore students’ experiences in short-term study abroad (SA) programmes that involve collaborative learning, examining how a consumerism-oriented approach affects students’ perceptions of their pedagogical identities and student–teacher pedagogical relationships.

A qualitative exploratory study was conducted to capture students’ rich and subjective perceptions and experiences. The data were gathered through semi-structured interviews with 15 Chinese undergraduate students who participated in a short-term SA programme at a UK university. Following data translation and transcription, a thematic analysis approach facilitated our exploration.

Chinese students engage in SA programmes as a strategic investment in personal growth and transformation, with their consumer-oriented identity fostering a mutually beneficial relationship with educators and group members. This consumer mindset appears to enhance active student engagement and, to some extent, create reciprocal student–teacher interactions through power sharing and collaborative involvement.

This study presents empirical data exploring the impact of consumer identity on the dynamics of student–teacher relationships in the SA context. It provides recommendations for implementing pedagogical approaches designed to mediate the influence of consumerism on student engagement, particularly in shaping collaborative student–teacher relationships. This study offers insights for future research on the effects of consumerism in higher education within cross-cultural contexts.

Internationalization has been a paramount objective for higher education institutions (HEIs) for decades. However, the landscape of education underwent significant transformation due to the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to altered contexts, challenges and opportunities for HEI internationalization. This paper aims to critically evaluate the dimensions of internationalization strategies in HEIs and the opportunities within each dimension. Adopting a reflexive approach, the study focused on non-Western HEIs, recognizing the diverse approaches to internationalization within higher education contexts.

Using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) methodology, this paper covered 74 articles published in Web of Science database from January 2019 to December 2023.

The study organized dimensions related to internationalization strategies in non-Western HEIs, offering a comprehensive framework comprising six dimensions: students, programs, faculty, research, international ventures and other sources; and nine internationalization facilitators: international partnerships, funding, government education, international policies, technology, internationalization culture, diversity and inclusion, staff competence and attitude, student/faculty engagement, intercultural experience and satisfaction, English as a medium of instruction (EMI), and knowledge transfer mechanisms. Furthermore, the study delineated strategies within each dimension and highlighted prevalent performance indicators utilized by HEIs.

The study’s primary contribution is a conceptual framework designed to assist HEI directors and academics. This framework delves into dimensions, strategies and indicators of internationalization particularly relevant in the post-pandemic era.

This paper aims to provide an overview of South African perspectives on preventing, monitoring and combating hate victimisation, towards informing international understandings.

Using a general review approach, this paper provides a historical examination of measures proposed by the South African Government and civil society since 1994, to prevent, monitor and combat hate crime, hate speech and intentional unfair discrimination.

Regardless of a constitutional commitment to social inclusion, diversity and minority rights, significant progress remains lacking after almost three decades of related advocacy, lobbying and limited government intervention. Findings of the South African Hate Crimes Working Group (HCWG) longitudinal Monitoring Project emphasise the need for decisive legal responses to hate victimisation.

A Bill, recognising hate crime and hate speech as distinct criminal offences, has been in development for almost 15 years and will soon serve before Parliament. Enactment of this legislation will be ground-breaking in Africa.

This paper contributes to the field of hate studies by providing an overview of the journey towards current conceptual understandings of hate in (South) Africa. It sets the stage for evaluating the potential of the redesigned HCWG monitoring tool, which holds promise for early identification and intervention in hate hotspots and targeted sectors. This instrument can establish trends not only in South Africa but also across the African continent.

Institutional abuse is a worldwide phenomenon with the UK also subject to several high-profile abuse scandals perpetuated on people with learning disabilities and/or mental health conditions living within institutional settings. This study aims to provide a broad perspective of safeguarding practices within institutional care to inform practice and service development in this area.

A narrative overview was undertaken of a range of empirical evidence, discussion papers, enquiry reports, reports from regulatory bodies and professional guidance to explore safeguarding practices within institutional care for individuals with learning disabilities and/or mental health conditions.

A range of literature was identified that exposed and explored abuse in this context. Three key themes were identified: failings within institutional care; safeguarding issues and concerns; and good practice within institutional care. Whilst guidance is available, standards are explicit and protocols facilitate improvement potential in this area, a consistent message was that statutory recommendations for reform have not been effective.

This paper provides an important resource for practitioners and service providers involved in institutional care. An accessible overview of both the empirical evidence and grey literature on adult safeguarding within institutional settings is provided, along with a range of standards and resources that specify practice in these settings.