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Soil quality is in decline in many parts of the world, in part due to the intensification of agricultural practices. Whilst economic instruments and regulations can help incentivise uptake of more sustainable soil management practices, they rarely motivate long-term behavior change when used alone. There has been increasing attention towards the complex social factors that affect uptake of sustainable soil management practices. To understand why some communities try these practices whilst others do not, we undertook a narrative review to understand how social capital influences adoption in developed nations. We found that the four components of social capital – trust, norms, connectedness and power – can all influence the decision of farmers to change their soil management. Specifically, information flows more effectively across trusted, diverse networks where social norms exist to encourage innovation. Uptake is more limited in homogenous, close-knit farming communities that do not have many links with non-farmers and where there is a strong social norm to adhere to the status quo. Power can enhance or inhibit uptake depending on its characteristics. Future research, policy and practice should consider whether a lack of social capital could hinder uptake of new practices and, if so, which aspects of social capital could be developed to increase adoption of sustainable soil management practices. Enabling diverse, collaborative groups (including farmers, advisers and government officials) to work constructively together could help build social capital, where they can co-define, -develop and -enact measures to sustainably manage soils.

This paper is one of the first studies to examine specificities, including limits of mindfulness at work in an African organisational context, whilst dealing with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. It specifically addresses the role of organisational and managerial support systems in restoring employee wellbeing, social connectedness and attachment to their organisations, in order to overcome the exclusion caused by the ongoing pandemic.

The study uses a qualitative research methodology that includes interviews as the main data source. The sample comprises of 20 entrepreneurs (organisational leaders) from Ghana and Nigeria.

The authors found that COVID-19-induced worries restricted the practice of mindfulness, and this was prevalent at the peak of the pandemic, particularly due to very tough economic conditions caused by reduction in salaries, and intensified by pre-existing general economic and social insecurities, and institutional voids in Africa. This aspect further resulted in lack of engagement and lack of commitment, which affected overall team performance and restricted employees’ mindfulness at work. Hence, quietness by employees even though can be linked to mindfulness was linked to larger psychological stress that they were facing. The authors also found leaders/manager’s emotional intelligence, social skills and organisational support systems to be helpful in such circumstances. However, their effectiveness varied among the cases.

This paper is one of the first studies to establish a link between the COVID-19 pandemic and mindfulness limitations. Moreover, it is a pioneering study specifically highlighting the damaging impact of COVID-19-induced concerns on leader–member exchange (LMX) and team–member exchange (TMX) relationships, particularly in the African context. It further brings in a unique discussion on the mitigating mechanisms of such COVID-19-induced concerns in organisations and highlights the roles of manager’s/leader’s emotional intelligence, social skills and supportive intervention patterns. Finally, the authors offer an in-depth assessment of the effectiveness of organisational interventions and supportive relational systems in restoring social connectedness following a social exclusion caused by COVID-19-induced worries.

The retention and success of engineering undergraduates are increasing concern for higher-education institutions. The study of success determinants are initial steps in any remedial initiative targeted to enhance student success and prevent any immature withdrawals. This study provides a comprehensive approach toward the prediction of student academic performance through the lens of the knowledge, attitudes and behavioral skills (KAB) model. The purpose of this paper is to aim to improve the modeling accuracy of students’ performance by introducing two methodologies based on variable selection and dimensionality reduction.

The performance of the proposed methodologies was evaluated using a real data set of ten critical-to-success factors on both attitude and skill-related behaviors of 320 first-year students. The study used two models. In the first model, exploratory factor analysis is used. The second model uses regression model selection. Ridge regression is used as a second step in each model. The efficiency of each model is discussed in the Results section of this paper.

The two methods were powerful in providing small mean-squared errors and hence, in improving the prediction of student performance. The results show that the quality of both methods is sensitive to the size of the reduced model and to the magnitude of the penalization parameter.

First, the survey could have been conducted in two parts; students needed more time than expected to complete it. Second, if the study is to be carried out for second-year students, grades of general engineering courses can be included in the model for better estimation of students’ grade point averages. Third, the study only applies to first-year and second-year students because factors covered are those that are essential for students’ survival through the first few years of study.

The study proposes that vulnerable students could be identified as early as possible in the academic year. These students could be encouraged to engage more in their learning process. Carrying out such measurement at the beginning of the college year can provide professional and college administration with valuable insight on students perception of their own skills and attitudes toward engineering.

This study employs the KAB model as a comprehensive approach to the study of success predictors. The implementation of two new methodologies to improve the prediction accuracy of student success.

The aim of the research is to identify the factors that create an authentic company's corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement and to investigate whether an authentic CSR engagement influences the purchase intention. In addition, the study attempts to provide insights into the mediation role of attitude toward the company and frequency of purchase on purchase intention.

In this study, a theoretical framework is developed in which major antecedents of authentic CSR are identified. A specific example of a brand and its corporate social responsibility activities was used for the study. An online questionnaire was used to collect the data. To verify the hypothesis, structural equation modeling with the partial least squares method was used. A total of 240 people participated in the study.

The results of the study confirmed that CSR authenticity positively influences consumer purchase intention. Furthermore, the hypothesized impact of CSR authenticity on attitudes toward the company and frequency of purchase could be verified.

Although there is research on the antecedents influencing the consumer's perceived authenticity of CSR, it has not addressed differences in impact and has not presented a full picture of influencing antecedents. In addition, CSR proof as a new antecedent is investigated in the study. Moreover, research on outcomes of perceived CSR authenticity still lacks depth. The study therefore addresses this research gap by providing an extensive research framework including antecedents influencing CSR authenticity and outcomes of CSR authenticity.

This paper aims to investigate cross-gender effects of gender stereotypes in advertising. More specifically, it proposes that the negative effects found in studies of women’s reactions to stereotyped female portrayals should hold across gender portrayal and target audience gender.

In two experimental studies, the effects of stereotyped portrayals (vs non-stereotyped portrayals) across gender are compared.

The results show that advertising portrayals of women and men have a presumed negative influence on others, leading to higher levels of ad reactance, which has a negative impact on brand-related effects across model and participant gender, and for gender stereotypes in terms of physical characteristics and roles.

Whereas previous studies have focused on reactions of women to female stereotypes, the current paper suggests that women and men alike react negatively to stereotyped portrayals of other genders.

The results indicate that marketers can benefit from adapting a more mindful approach to the portrayals of gender used in advertising.

The addition of a cross-gender perspective to the literature on gender stereotypes in advertising is a key contribution to this literature.

Drawing on paradox theory, this study explores how ambidextrous sustainability relates to organisational performance in hybrid organisations represented by Swedish municipal housing corporations, and how this relationship is contingent on the organisational structure of these organisations.

The study relies on the data collected from Swedish municipal housing corporations. These data sources consist of a survey sent to the management team members in Swedish municipal housing corporations, financial and non-financial archival data on these corporations, interviews with the management team and board members, and observations of meetings involving the management team and board of directors at a Swedish municipal housing corporation. Quantitative data of the study were analysed using descriptive statistics, correlation analysis and linear multiple regression analysis. Qualitative data were analysed employing deductive thematic analysis and were used to illustrate and discuss the results of the quantitative analysis.

The quantitative findings show that ambidextrous sustainability, i.e. the alignment between an explorative orientation and an exploitative orientation towards sustainability, has a weakly positive relationship with financial performance and a positive relationship with social performance in hybrid organisations represented by Swedish municipal housing corporations. The study further shows that a high level of the structural element “connectedness” weakened the relationship between the ambidextrous sustainability and financial performance of the organisation in the study. In contrast, a lower level of connectedness reinforced and strengthened this relationship. Our qualitative material illustrates how the quantitative findings could be explained by the interaction between the board of directors and the management team of these hybrid organisations.

The study shows how ambidextrous sustainability, employed for conceptualisation of the sustainability strategy in hybrid organisations, represented by Swedish municipal housing corporations, can impact on facets of performance (i.e. financial, social and environmental) differently. The study further highlights the importance of organisational structures in these relationships in a hybrid context.

This study aims to examine the associations of social networks with the sense of community (SOC) construct and spatial colocation or having an office. The study site was an institute for health-care policy research formed in 2011 by bringing together scientists from more than 20 different university units. Only 30% of the scientists were had an office or physical presence at the institute. Therefore, the institute was an ideal site to examine whether SOC was correlated with different dimensions of network position – connectedness, reachability and brokerage – even when the authors account for the lack of spatial colocation for the off-site scientists.

A two-part (sociometric and workplace) internet survey instrument was administered in 2014 to the institute’s population of 411 individuals. The sociometric data were used to create an undirected interaction network and the following dependent variables (DVs) or network centralities: normalized degree to measure connectedness; average reciprocal distance to capture reachability; and normalized betweenness to proxy brokerage. Separate node-level network regressions were then run with random permutations (N = 10,000) and listwise deletion for each of the DVs with SOC and spatial colocation as the independent variables, and variables that controlled for gender, organizational affiliation and job category.

SOC and spatial colocation are both positively and significantly correlated with network connectedness and reachability. The results suggest that both SOC and spatial colocation have a larger impact on reachability than connectedness. However, neither SOC nor spatial colocation are significantly associated with network brokerage. Finally, the findings show that SOC and spatial colocation are more reliable predictors of network connectedness and reachability than are key individual- and unit-level control variables, specifically the individual’s sex, job category and organizational affiliation. The controls were not significantly associated with any of the three network centralities, namely, connectedness, reachability and brokerage.

This exploratory study used social network analysis and node-level network regressions to examine the associations from SOC and spatial colocation to dimensions of network position. SOC is positively and significantly associated with network connectedness and reachability, suggesting that SOC is an important consideration when individuals are disadvantaged from the absence of spatial colocation. The findings have implications for work in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic as they imply that interventions based on the SOC construct could potentially lessen the negative effects of remote work on workplace social networks due to factors such as the reduction of social contacts.

How can social presence, participation and a sense of community be formed in an online setting without compromising on social connectedness through physical distancing? Under consideration of the goals for an Education for Sustainable Development, transformative science and the social techniques of Theory U, developed by Otto Scharmer (2016), an online Community of Inquiry of researchers, practitioners and learners was to be developed, followed and observed to discuss the question whether and how it was possible to create an awareness-based, future-oriented and socially committed online community that would enrich social transformation processes.

Methods of 1st, 2nd and 3rd person research were applied, as well as group discussions, one Mentimeter survey and one standardised questionnaire with an open question.

Results indicate that it is not only possible to create a feeling of community in an online setting, but also point to the terms and conditions which act as enablers and influencers, like seeing each other face-to-face, collective check-ins and check-outs as well as small group break-out sessions. Video conferencing and the practicing of rules of conduct and communication, also referred to as netiquette, enable a transcendence of the physical distance to reach a feeling of belonging and social presence in the perception of the participants.

In line with global sustainable development, the study also sets an example for how to reduce personal emissions when planning an international conference. Also, it shows how to create online spaces to connect people worldwide, which will support to take over responsibilities as world citizens.

Video games are often thought of as trite activities for younger generations. However, research in game studies over the last few decades have revealed that games can be valuable tools for growth and connection, particularly among older generations. Exploring the ways digital games can be used as tools for connection has gained increased attention in recent months with global quarantines as a result of COVID-19. This article reviews the research that has examined the utility of digital games for older adults, focusing specifically on the ways in which games can be tools for social connectedness and psychological healing for older adults and intergenerationally. Special focus will be placed on the role games can play for post-traumatic stress among first responders.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on ethical and judicial themes related to technology and the older adults.

Different consecutive phases in technology design and allocation will be discussed from a range of perspectives.

Longevity is one of the greatest achievements of contemporary science and a result of development of social relations. Currently, various non-communicable diseases affect older adults and impose the greatest burden on global health. There is a great emphasis across Europe on caring for the older person in their own homes. Technology has a mediating role in determining the possibilities for good quality of life (QOL). The concept of assisting the older adult through the use of technology so as to access healthcare services has enormous potential. Although the potential of technology in healthcare is widely recognised, technology use can have its downsides. Professionals need to be aware of the risks, namely, those related to the privacy of the older person, which may accompany technology use.

By 2050, there will be more people aged over 65 than there are children. This phenomenon of global ageing constitutes a massive challenge in the area of health protection.

Professionals need to be aware of the risks, for example, related to the privacy of the older person, that may accompany technology use.

There is a great emphasis across Europe on caring for the older person in their own homes. Technology has a mediating role in determining the possibilities for QOL.

The concept of assisting the older adult through the use of technology to avail of healthcare has enormous potential. Assistive technology, social media use and augmentative and alternative communication can have a positive effect on the QOL of older people, as long as they are supported enough in use of these technologies. However, ethical and juridical considerations are at stake as well.