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This study aims to examine the association between Iranian auditors' narcissism and the auditors' professional skepticism.

The authors' sample is comprised of 355 professional auditors working in the private and public sectors in Iranian firms in 2022. The authors use cross-sectional multivariate regression as the main methodology, along with the structural equation modeling (SEM) technique.

The authors find that a higher level of narcissism leads to a greater level of professional skepticism among auditors, which ultimately can enhance the quality of the audit process. The results provided via the robustness tests also supported this finding.

The authors' findings further the understanding of the role of narcissistic personality traits in improving professional skepticism among auditors of an Islamic and emerging country. In addition, audit firms and audit partners can also consider the findings of this study and enhance the effectiveness of audit processes by assigning appropriate employees with certain personalities to specific tasks.

The purpose of this study is to examine how informational faultlines on a board affect the management of knowledge owned by directors and the consequences on organizational performance. In this study, informational faultlines are defined as hypothetical lines that divide a group into relatively homogeneous subgroups based on the alignment of several informational attributes among board members.

The study uses unique hand-collected panel data covering 7,247 board members at 106 publicly traded firms to provide strong support for the hypothesized U-shaped relationship. The authors use a fixed effects approach and a system generalized method of moments approach to test the hypothesis.

The study finds that the relationship between informational faultlines on a board and organizational performance is U shaped, with the least optimal organizational performance experienced when boards have moderate informational faultlines. More specifically, informational faultlines within boards are negatively related to organizational performance across the weak-to-moderate range of informational faultlines and positively related to organizational performance across the moderate-to-strong range.

By explaining the mechanisms through which informational faultlines are related to organizational performance, the authors contribute to the literature in a number of ways. By conceptualizing how the management of knowledge plays an important role in the particular setting of corporate boards, the authors add not only to literature on knowledge management but also to the faultline and corporate governance literature.

This study offers a rationale for prior mixed findings by providing an alternative theoretical basis to explain the effect of informational faultlines within boards on organizational performance. To advance the field, the authors build on the concept of knowledge demonstrability to illuminate how informational faultlines affect the management of knowledge within boards, which will translate to organizational performance.

This study aims to explore vocational teachers' perceptions regarding workplace learning that align with students' training models and collaborative teaching involving specialised professionals within the context of industry-university collaboration.

Using a qualitative approach, the study conducted nine semi-structured interviews from three subject areas to better understand how vocational teachers’ work-based learning enhances their pedagogical practice in guiding students’ professional training. Thematic analysis was adopted to identify patterns that emerged from concepts and theories related to coding categories.

The authors identified three key components: vocational teachers’ workplace learning in connection with students’ training models, collaborative teaching with specialised professionals and teachers’ regular interactions with enterprises. The findings demonstrate that vocational teachers’ engagement in workplace learning pertaining to specific subjects provides a valuable avenue for enhancing curriculum design with collaboration with industry experts. This is key for supporting vocational students’ transitions into the workplace and ensuring their knowledge and skills are tailored to the industry-standard practice.

The data are limited to the review of interviews from three vocational subject areas as the representative sector in the study. However, this research implies effective knowledge transfer between workplace settings and vocational institutions, and vocational teachers need to integrate work-based vocational knowledge and skills in a relevant and applicable way across diverse classroom settings.

Fostering collaborative partnerships with local industries and professionals can be a primary way to facilitate authentic learning experiences that are linked to a specific vocational field and bridge the gap between diverse classroom learning and real-world work scenarios.

This study combines contemporary workplace learning theories with the conceptual understanding of vocational teachers’ involvement with industry-specific practice. Connecting teachers’ knowledge to the industry extends the input and collaboration from professionals and field experts to the diverse vocational classrooms.

This study aims to explore consumer motivations to mitigate the contagion effect in access-based consumption after instances of prior customer misbehavior. Reverse contagion, demonstrated through customer citizenship behavior, entails using both firm-provided and personal resources to cocreate value, even in the presence of norm violations by others. The research delves into the influence of empathy, narrative appeal and past misbehavior severity on customer behavior, specifically in the context of reverse contagion.

Two scenario-based studies and a field study were used within the context of scooter-sharing to assess the conceptual model. Study 1 (n = 156) and Study 2 (n = 97) were conducted through surveys. Study 3 (n = 54) was a field study.

The results emphasize the crucial role of empathy in breaking the cycle of misbehavior contagion. Specifically, the findings suggest that narrative appeals have the potential foster greater empathy, encouraging customers to counteract the contagion. However, the intensity of prior misbehavior lessens the efficacy of narrative appeals in triggering reverse contagion, thereby moderating the mediating effect of empathy.

This study investigates reverse contagion stemming from customer misbehavior in accessed-based consumption. It delves into the impact of empathy, narrative appeal and previous misbehavior on the dynamics of value codestruction and cocreation. This comprehensive examination of these factors within a unified framework represents a new contribution to the literature. The results illuminate this intricate phenomenon, offering valuable insights for managers to address adverse customer behavior and harness the positive aspects of reverse contagion.

The purpose of the current study was to examine university students' knowledge, confidence and experience of popular graduate employer selection tests.

A cross-sectional self-report survey was administered to gather a sufficient number of quantitative responses from undergraduate students. A total of 241 students completed the survey with most of them being psychology students from Swansea University. Four key variables were examined: (1) students' experience, (2) confidence and (3) knowledge of selection tests and (4) their desire for more information about selection tests as part of their degree. An audit of selection tests used by the Times Top 100 graduate employers was also conducted.

Students tended to misjudge how often selection tests were used by employers, and generally lacked experience with these tests. Students' confidence in completing each test varied as a function of the selection test; however, prior experience with these tests positively predicted confidence. Additionally, over 70% of students reported a desire for further information about selection tests as part of their degree.

These novel findings suggest that students could benefit from further information about selection tests as part of their degree programme which would be of benefit to both students and universities.

These findings are, to the authors knowledge, the first to explicitly assess second- and third-year undergraduate students' knowledge, experience and confidence with popular graduate employer selection tests and demonstrate that students would like more information about these tests on their programme.

This study aims to investigate how companies’ understanding of the business network influences the creation of value in business-to-business relationships. The authors do this by analysing dimensions in actors’ “network pictures” and illustrating how value perception and network understanding influence actors’ mutual effort to create value. Approaching relationship value from the point of actors’ cognitive understanding of their business network has so far been largely overlooked in relationship value research.

This study applies a qualitative case study methodology whereby dyadic data from a well-established business-to-business relationship is collected from 18 company representatives through personal interviews and group interviews supplemented by participant observations and company data.

The findings contribute with new insight into how companies’ understanding of their surrounding network influence (facilitates or limits) relationship value creation. The authors find that companies continuously reflect on changes in their networks and the related changes in partners’ value perceptions. Through value articulations, companies seek to explicitly express their value perception. Value reflections and value articulations create a dynamic process formed not only by the individual actor but also through their relationship and engagement in their network environment. This requires companies to develop their networking capabilities.

This paper presents findings, insights and contributions limited to a case study of a particular business relationship within an industrial setting. Although the findings and contributions are valid and in line with the criteria for rigorous qualitative research, the authors advocate and call for additional studies that investigate relationships value creation and address the interplay between actors’ network understanding and their actions and behaviour. One way to approach this would be to test the four propositions derived and presented as part of the present study.

The findings imply that management needs to be aware not only of the value created and delivered to a specific partner but also of how the partner’s understanding of the wider network will influence the value delivering and capturing process.

This study contributes to the growing literature on relationship value creation by outlining a dynamic process where relationship partners reflect upon and articulate value. Such activities are influenced by the partners’ network understanding and form the basis of the mutual relationship value creation effort. The findings also contribute to the network pictures literature by emphasizing insights into the formation of value perceptions through actors’ understanding of their surrounding networks.

Although the study of factors that promote employee well-being is not a new research area, the impact of managerial caring and perceived insider status on subjective employee well-being is a relatively new and unexplored area within the management literature. Therefore, this study examined the relationship between managerial caring and subjective employee well-being while considering the mediating effect of perceived insider status. Based on social identity theory, the study hypothesized that perceived insider status mediates the link between managerial caring and subjective employee well-being.

The study analyzed data from 193 employees working across various industries in the United Arab Emirates using Process Macro Model 4.

The findings revealed a positive relationship between managerial caring and employee well-being, which was influenced by the mediating effect of perceived insider status.

The study’s results, which shed light on the process by which managerial caring positively affects employee well-being, provide valuable insights for developing a caring workplace. The findings make a significant contribution to the literature on managerial caring by explaining how the mediating role of perceived insider status influences the relationship between managerial caring and subjective employee well-being.

The goal of this research is to analyse the obstacles to the implementation of mobile health (mHealth) in India and to gain an understanding of the contextual inter-relationships that exist amongst those obstacles.

Potential barriers and their interrelationships in their respective contexts have been uncovered. Using MICMAC analysis, the categorization of these barriers was done based on their degree of reliance and driving power (DP). Furthermore, an interpretive structural modeling (ISM) framework for the barriers to mHealth activities in India has been proposed.

The study explores a total of 15 factors that reduce the efficiency of mHealth adoption in India. The findings of the Matrix Cross-Reference Multiplication Applied to a Classification (MICMAC) investigation show that the economic situation of the government, concerns regarding the safety of intellectual technologies and privacy issues are the primary obstacles because of the significant driving power they have in mHealth applications.

Promoters of mHealth practices may be able to make better plans if they understand the social barriers and how they affect each other; this leads to easier adoption of these practices. The findings of this study might be helpful for governments of developing nations to produce standards relating to the deployment of mHealth; this will increase the efficiency with which it is adopted.

At this time, there is no comprehensive analysis of the factors that influence the adoption of mobile health care with social cognitive theory in developing nations like India. In addition, there is a lack of research in investigating how each of these elements affects the success of mHealth activities and how the others interact with them. Because developed nations learnt the value of mHealth practices during the recent pandemic, this study, by investigating the obstacles to the adoption of mHealth and their inter-relationships, makes an important addition to both theory and practice.

Most educational institutions worldwide have suddenly switched to online instruction due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, and English language teaching took its part in this transition. The immediate transition from face-to-face to fully online instruction affects its effective implementation, especially in developing countries like Ethiopia where online learning is in its early stage. Therefore, the main purpose of this study is to investigate postgraduate EFL students’ perceptions and practices of online learning.

This study uses a descriptive survey design. Using simple random sampling, 91 postgraduate EFL students were selected from four universities. Online questionnaires were employed to collect data. To analyze the data, both descriptive (mean and standard deviation) and inferential (one sample t-test) statistics were used.

The findings of the study indicate that the students had favorable perceptions of online learning. Despite the students' positive perceptions, the results of the study showed that the practice of online learning in the universities was limited; especially the practice of synchronous online learning was low.

The results suggest that the concerned bodies at the universities should consider implementing a blended (both synchronous and asynchronous) learning system to deliver an online learning approach.

This is one of the first studies in a higher education context in Ethiopia, which tries to investigate the postgraduate EFL students' perceptions and practices of online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. The paper is original because it investigated the status of online learning during the pandemic in a developing country like Ethiopia; it provides a real and convincing idea of a new way of learning in the post-COVID-19 context. The study can also be useful for related future research in the context of a pandemic-like COVID-19.

The purpose of this paper is to systematically analyze the literature around regulatory compliance and market manipulation in capital markets through the use of bibliometrics and propose future research directions. Under the domain of capital markets, this theme is a niche area of research where greater academic investigations are required. Most of the research is fragmented and limited to a few conventional aspects only. To address this gap, this study engages in a large-scale systematic literature review approach to collect and analyze the research corpus in the post-2000 era.

The big data corpus comprising research articles has been extracted from the scientific Scopus database and analyzed using the VoSviewer application. The literature around the subject has been presented using bibliometrics to give useful insights on the most popular research work and articles, top contributing journals, authors, institutions and countries leading to identification of gaps and potential research areas.

Based on the review, this study concludes that, even in an era of global market integration and disruptive technological advancements, many important aspects of this subject remain significantly underexplored. Over the past two decades, research has lagged behind the evolution of capital market crime and market regulations. Finally, based on the findings, the study suggests important future research directions as well as a few research questions. This includes market manipulation, market regulations and new-age technologies, all of which could be very useful to researchers in this field and generate key inputs for stock market regulators.

The limitation of this research is that it is based on Scopus database so the possibility of omission of some literature cannot be completely ruled out. More advanced machine learning techniques could be applied to decode the finer aspects of the studies undertaken so far.

Increased integration among global markets, fast-paced technological disruptions and complexity of financial crimes in stock markets have put immense pressure on market regulators. As economies and equity markets evolve, good research investigations can aid in a better understanding of market manipulation and regulatory compliance. The proposed research directions will be very useful to researchers in this field as well as generate key inputs for stock market regulators to deal with market misbehavior.

This study has adopted a period-wise broad-based scientific approach to identify some of the most pertinent gaps in the subject and has proposed practical areas of study to strengthen the literature in the said field.