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What kinds of support do interstate rivals provide to domestic actors in ongoing civil wars? And how do domestic actors utilize the support they receive? This chapter answers these questions by comparing Iranian and Saudi military and non-military (mediation, foreign aid and religious soft-power promotion) support to the Houthis and to the Government of Yemen (GoY) during the Saada wars (2004–2010) and the internationalized civil war (2015–2018). It also focuses on the processes through which the GoY and the Houthis have utilized this support for their own strategic purposes. This chapter applies a structured, focused comparison methodology and relies on data from a review of both primary and secondary sources complemented by 14 interviews. This chapter finds that there were less external interventions in the conflict in Saada than in the internationalized civil war. During the latter, a broader set of intervention strategies enabled further instrumentalization by domestic actors, which in turn contributed to the protracted nature of the conflict. This chapter contributes to the literature on interstate rivalry and third-party intervention. The framework of analysis is applicable to civil wars that experience intervention by rivals, such as Syria or Libya.

Effective safety communication facilitates the sharing of relevant knowledge that helps to improve safety behaviours, such as superior hazard identification and compliance. This study aims to explore channels by which construction companies can effectively communicate health and safety (H&S) among communities of their operations.

Based on a quantitative research approach, this study addressed the knowledge gap through a cross-sectional survey of 250 contractors (comprising 155 building and 95 road contractors) involved in various projects in the Ghanaian construction industry. These contractors were selected by using a stratified simple random sampling technique. Data obtained from the survey was analysed through descriptive (i.e. frequencies, mean and standard deviation) and inferential (i.e. exploratory factor analysis) statistical analyses.

The findings from the mean scores revealed that all the 12 communication channels identified in the literature, confirmed through piloting and examined by the respondents, were important channels through which construction companies can effectively communicate H&S amongst communities of their operations. The exploratory factor analysis revealed a clustering of the 12 channels of communication into 5 components: “safety demonstration in the community”; “social media”; “mass media”; “community engagement”; and “opinion leaders”.

This study offers construction project managers the means of managing one of the major stakeholders of a construction project (the community). It provides an actionable opportunity that can be leveraged strategically to integrate community members into projects to promote synergy and local content inclusion while gaining a peaceful atmosphere to achieve their project goals.

Practically, this study provides construction project managers with a means of managing one of the major stakeholders of a construction project (the community) and also demonstrates the integration of community members into projects to promote synergy and local content inclusion. This would give construction organisations a peaceful atmosphere to accomplish their project objectives.

The social implication of this study is that the study offers society a means of creating safer Ghanaian communities by offering them the knowledge of identifying hazards and avoiding risky behaviours, creating a good safety atmosphere in these communities.

This study presents construction organisations with a unique opportunity to transfer and share novel external knowledge within a different social system (the community). It contributes to the state-of-the-art knowledge in H&S communication by providing channels through which H&S can be communicated in a developing country such as Ghana.

In 2022, the Baltimore professional development school (PDS) partner schools, John Ruhruh Elementary/Middle School (JREMS) and Notre Dame of Maryland University (NDMU) received funds through a Maryland Educational Emergency Revitalization (MEER) grant to determine (a) to what extent additional resources and professional development would increase JREMS teachers’ efficacy in technology integration and (b) to what extent NDMU professional development in the form of workshops and self-paced computer science modules would result in greater use of technology in the JREMS K-8 classrooms. Results indicated a statistically significant improvement in both teacher comfort with technology and integrated use of technology in instruction.

Survey data were collected on teacher-stated comfort with technology before and after grant implementation. Teachers’ use of technology was also measured by unannounced classroom visits by administration before and after the grant implementation and through artifacts teachers submitted during NDMU professional development modules.

Results showing significant increases in self-efficacy with technology along with teacher integration of technology exemplify the benefits of a PDS partnership.

This initiative was original in its approach to teacher development by replacing required teacher professional development with an invitation to participate and an incentive for participation (a personal MacBook) that met the stated needs of teachers. Teacher motivation was strong because teammates in a strong PDS partnership provided the necessary supports to induce changes in teacher self-efficacy.

This study investigates the psychological adoption of technology in relation to employees' mental beliefs about using technology in their workplace, because it is necessary to investigate the direct and indirect effects of information systems (IS) on employees' work-related results that underpin creativity and engagement.

Using a cross-sectional design, data were collected from 153 human resource (HR) employees who used human resource information systems (HRIS) in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Malaysia.

The results show that effective acceptance and adoption of an HRIS enables HR employees and management in SMEs to be creative, balanced and engaged. Facilitating conditions and task-technology fit positively affect the behavioral intention to accept and adopt an HRIS. Additionally, organizational citizenship behavior moderates the relationship between the behavioral intention to accept and adopt an HRIS and employee creativity.

This study significantly advances the fields of human resource management and IS by elucidating the factors influencing employees' adoption of technology. In an effort to address a research gap in existing research, it introduces a unified theory of acceptance and use of technology, which precedes the psychological adoption process by individuals. Furthermore, it offers both empirical and theoretical insights into the interplay between technology adoption factors and their subsequent impact on work-related outcomes.

Big data marketing analytics (BDMA) has been discovered to be a key contributing factor to developing necessary marketing capabilities. This research aims to investigate the impact of the technology and information quality of BDMA on the critical marketing capabilities by differentiating between firms with low and high perceived market performance.

The responses were collected from marketing professionals familiar with BDMA in North America (N = 236). The analysis was done with partial least squares-structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM).

The results indicated positive and significant relationships between the information and technology quality as exogenous constructs and the endogenous constructs of the marketing capabilities of marketing planning, implementation and customer relationship management (CRM) with mainly moderate effect sizes. Differences in the path coefficients in the structural model were detected between firms with low and high perceived market performance.

This research indicates the critical role of technology and information quality in developing marketing capabilities. The study discovered heterogeneity in the sample population when using the low and high perceived market performance as the source of potential heterogeneity, the presence of which would likely cause a threat to the validity of the results in case heterogeneity is not considered. Thus, this research builds on previous research by considering this issue.

This study aims to argue that user’s continued use behavior is contingent upon two perceptions (i.e. the app and the provider). This study examines the moderating effects of user’s perceptions of apps and providers on the effects of security and privacy concerns and investigate whether assurance mechanisms decrease such concerns.

This study conducts a scenario-based survey with 694 mobile cloud computing (MCC) app users to understand their perceptions and behaviors.

This study finds that while perceived value of data transfer to the cloud moderates the effects of security and privacy concerns on continued use behavior, trust only moderates the effect of privacy concerns. This study also finds that perceived effectiveness of security and privacy intervention impacts privacy concerns but does not decrease security concerns.

Prior mobile app studies mainly focused on mobile apps and did not investigate the perceptions of app providers along with app features in the same study. Furthermore, International Organization for Standardization 27018 certification and privacy policy notification are the interventions that exhibit data assurance mechanisms. However, it is unknown whether these interventions are able to decrease users’ security and privacy concerns after using MCC apps.

Practitioners and academics are starting to recognize the benefits of green IT/IS practices. Despite these benefits, this study aims to know more regarding the factors that would drive organizations to use green IT/IS practices within their IT function and across the enterprise. To further understanding in this area, this study applies a strategic cognition framework of firm responsiveness and institutional theory to determine the extent to which an organization uses green IT/IS practices in response to stakeholder concerns. This study investigates the extent to which two organizational logics – expressive and instrumental – and three institutional pressures – coercive, mimetic and normative – jointly affect an organization's use of both green IT practices and green IS practices.

This study tested the hypotheses with survey data collected from 306 organizations. Structural equation modeling was used for data analysis.

Findings support four joint effects: (1) individualistic identity orientation and coercive pressure positively affect green IT practices; (2) collectivistic identity orientation and normative pressure positively influence green IS practices; (3) cost reduction orientation and mimetic pressure positively affect green IT practices; and (4) revenue expansion orientation and normative pressure positively influence green IS practices.

This study contributes to the literature by providing evidence for joint drivers of green IT and green IS practices. Green IT and IS practices represent organizations' different levels of commitment to environmental sustainability and responsiveness to stakeholders (i.e. green IT/IS practices). Organizations of different expressive and instrumental orientations are attuned to institutional pressures to various degrees, which leads to different green IT/IS practices.

The supply chain (SC) of the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector in India witnessed a significant change soon after introducing the Goods and Services Tax (GST). With the initiation of this tax, companies started moving from individual state-wise warehouses to consolidation warehouses model to save costs. This paper proposes a model that frames a mathematical formulation to optimize the distribution network in the downstream SC by considering the complexities of multi-product lines, multi-transport modes and consolidated warehouses.

The model is designed as mixed-integer linear programming (MILP), and an algorithm is developed that works on the feedback loop mechanism. It optimizes the transportation and warehouses rental costs simultaneously with impact analysis.

Total cost is primarily influenced by the critical factor transportation price rather than the warehouse rent. The choice of warehouses at prime locations was a trade-off between a lower distribution cost and higher rent tariffs.

The study enables FMCG firms to plan their downstream SC efficiently and to be in line with the recent trend of consolidation of warehouses. The study will help SC managers solve complexities such as multi-product categories, truck selection and consolidation warehouse selection problems and find the optimum value for each.

The issues addressed in the proposed work are transporting products with different sizes and weights, selecting consolidated warehouses, selecting suitable vehicles for transportation and optimizing distance in the distribution network by considering consolidated warehouses.

Ostracism is a common challenge in the workplace, but little is known about the behaviours of those who trigger it. The authors examined how leader favouritism can drive coworkers to ostracise one another, given that leadership is a key factor in shaping employee attitudes and behaviour. Invoking social comparison theory, the authors assessed a model of how perceived favouritism affects ostracism through jealousy, moderated by organisation-based self-esteem (OBSE).

The authors surveyed 294 non-managerial employees from several service organisations in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and analysed the data with partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) using SmartPLS 3 software.

Unexpectedly, leader favouritism did not directly affect ostracism but only indirectly through the mediation of jealousy. OBSE was found to moderate this relationship, suggesting that higher levels of OBSE can weaken the impact of leader favouritism on employee jealousy.

These findings explain the intricate dynamics and underlying reasons as to how leader favouritism can instigate employee-to-employee ostracism.

This study aims to understand and analyze the aspects influencing students’ attitudes and behavior toward the use of metaverse in education. The metaverse is currently viewed as technology with immense prospects. However, the practice of the metaverse for educational motives is rarely deliberated.

To assess the effect of the metaverse on students' knowledge and use of resources, general interests and attitudes toward the metaverse in education, a survey was conducted. The collected data were analyzed using a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in the first phase to address the various validity parameters. In the second phase, path analysis of the model was performed using structural equation modeling (SEM).

The study investigated how students intended to behave while using the metaverse for learning. The attitude toward adopting metaverse as technology is influenced by perceived utility and simplicity of use. This leads to behavioral intention as well. Studies reveal that the aspect of perceived usefulness is considered to be more significant in assessing the intention of use.

This quantitative study contributes to the literature on metaverse, which is in the growing stage. In the educational sector, the existing studies are scarce; hence, the addition to the literature on metaverse is quite significant in the education domain.

The study benefits the students and the academicians because metaverse is largely considered an integral part of technology platforms, which has to be included in the learning systems eventually. There are few courses where the use of metaverse is already initiated at an introductory level, thus opening a broad spectrum of opportunities at all levels. It can provide scholars access to a massive array of resources, including multimedia presentations, interactive objects that support the delivery of lessons, videos, images and audio recordings.

This study adds to the existing literature by examining the impact of metaverse in education. The research focused on the students pursuing higher education who were mostly aware of metaverse and were open to the idea of learning and understanding through technology inclusion.