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Due to the rapid ageing of the continent's population, a significant surge in long-term care expenses for the elderly is expected across Europe in the coming years. Could a potential solution to this challenge involve the increased informal care provided by adult children? In this context, we examined a general view or moral duty of European citizens regarding whether adult children should assume responsibility for providing long-term care to the elderly.

Our multilevel analysis draws on individual-level data from the 2017 European Value Study and country-level data from various European sources encompassing participants from 21 member countries of the European Union.

The findings reveal that in nations where public long-term care services are sufficiently available and of superior quality, there is a negative sentiment towards the notion that adult children should bear the responsibility for elderly care. In total, 71% of the country-level variance in our dependent variable was explained by the availability and quality of formal long-term care in a country. Furthermore, various individual-level attributes contribute to shaping attitudes towards care-giving responsibility. We observed that women, middle-aged individuals, those without religious affiliations, those with modern gender role attitudes and non-immigrants tended to hold unfavourable attitudes towards the responsibility of adult children in long-term care provision.

There are relatively many studies on the general attitude of the population towards filial obligation. However, so far there have been very few studies available that examine the population's attitude towards the obligation of adult children to commit to their parents' long-term care. Our research explains the variation of the phenomenon in Europe with both country-level and individual-level factors.

This chapter focuses on the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on the recognition through discourses of essentiality, of low-status workers and more specifically of care aides as an occupational group that performs society’s ‘dirty work’. The pandemic appears as a privileged moment to challenge the normative hegemony of how work is valued within society. However, public recognition through political discourse is a necessary but insufficient element in producing social change. Based on the theory of performativity, this chapter empirically probes conditions and mechanisms that enable a transition from discourse of essentiality to substantive recognition of the work performed by care aides in healthcare organizations. The authors rely on three main sources of data: scientific-scholarly works, documents from government, various associations and unions, and popular media reports published between February 2020 and 1 July 2022. While discourse of essentiality at the highest level of politics is associated with rapid policy response to value the work of care aides, it is embedded in a system structure and culture that restrains the establishment of substantive policy that recognizes the nature, complexity, and societal importance of care aide work. The chapter contributes to the literature on performativity by demonstrating the importance of the institutionalization of competing logics in contemporary health and social care systems and how it limits the effectiveness of discourse in promulgating new values and norms and engineering social change.

To facilitate the reception and care of discharged patients, streamlining processes at the University Hospital and promoting a seamless transition to continuity of care services post-discharge.

Hospitalised patients undergo the Blaylock risk assessment screening score (BRASS), a screening tool identifying those at risk of complex discharge.

Pre-pandemic, patients with a medium-to-high risk of complex discharge were predominantly discharged to their residence or long-term care facilities. During the pandemic, coinciding with an overall reduction in hospitalisation rates, there was a decrease in patients being discharged to their residence.

The analysis of discharges, with the classification of patients into risk groups, revealed a coherence between the BRASS score and the characteristics of the studied sample. This tool aids physicians in decision-making by identifying the need for a planned discharge in a systematic and organised manner, preventing the loss of crucial information.

This study applies Garfinkel’s (1967) concept of ‘breaching experiment’ to explore the impact of COVID-19-induced disruptions on the ‘emotion management’ practices of residential care workers in the United Kingdom and Germany. It examines the influence of professional feeling rules on workers, emphasizing the prescribed importance of displaying affective, empathetic concern for residents’ health and well-being. Findings demonstrate that authenticity and adherence to professional feeling rules in relation to emotional management are not mutually exclusive. The authors underscore how adherence to professional feeling rules upholds authentic care by reinforcing a professional ethos, which acts as a cornerstone motivating residential care workers. Ultimately, the study showcases how a professional ethos substantiates altruistic motivations, guiding proficient emotion management practices among care workers. It highlights how these workers drew upon their personal understanding and experiences to determine the appropriate emotions to express while providing care for residents amid the unprecedented challenges of the pandemic.

Social media played an irreplaceable role in young people’s online social life and information consumption during the COVID-19 pandemic. This research focuses on the impact of excessive information on social media about COVID-19 vaccines on Generation Z's (Gen Z) associated psychological states and long-term vaccine advocacy.

The research conducted structural equation modeling analysis with online survey data from 409 Gen Z citizens in the UK.

The findings suggest that excessive information increased Gen Z social media users' ambivalence and conspiracy beliefs around COVID-19 vaccines, which, in turn, reduced their long-term vaccine advocacy in terms of vaccine acceptance, vaccination intention and vaccine promotion. Importantly, Gen Z’s confidence in government and in the healthcare systems during COVID-19 was effective in helping them overcome the detrimental effects of conspiracy beliefs and ambivalence about long-term vaccine advocacy, respectively.

This research reveals the “dark side” of social media use in the post-pandemic period and highlights the significant roles played by social institutions in mitigating the detrimental effects of Gen Z’s support in social decisions. Beyond the context of COVID-19, this research has important implications for facilitating the civic engagement of Gen Z and boosting their confidence in social institutions in terms of social cohesion.

Common challenges for healthcare systems worldwide are population ageing, rising therapy spending and reduced economic resources. In response, AI can play a crucial role in facilitating managerial and economic objectives within a holistic vision of care and improve the experience of patients and professionals. AI may change the delivery of services and the demand for them as well. This raises questions of how to balance the supply and demand sides of healthcare services, how to leverage competitive positioning and how to differentiate strategies specific to the public and to the private sector.

The purpose of this study is to examine how former K-12 teachers’ perceptions of psychosocial support led to their decision to leave the profession.

The researcher conducted eight interviews with former teachers who had been in the profession for 1.5–26 years and asked them about their thoughts on mental health interventions, leadership and collegial support and the stressors of teaching. The data were analyzed by qualitative analysis.

Former teachers had varying responses, and some of the biggest takeaways were the importance of strong leadership support, the request for more time and overall changes to the system and how teachers are supported overall. Results indicate the ultimate impetus for exiting the profession was not directly the result of mental health support or the lack thereof, yet support for well-being did play a role in job dissatisfaction with the teaching role.

Teacher attrition is a significant issue in many countries. This study focuses on teachers in South Carolina, USA, yet the literature indicates similar problems across the USA and globally. The focus on former teachers was compelling, as most studies focus on current teachers.

The purpose of this paper is to explore two financial inclusion measures adopted within the local welfare context of the city of Milan, Italy, examining their functioning and underpinning representations. The aim is also to understand how such representations take concrete shape in the practices of local actors, and their implications for the opportunities and constraints regarding individuals' effective inclusion. To this end, this paper takes a wide-ranging look at the interplay between the rise of financial inclusion and the individualisation and responsibilisation models informing welfare policies, within the broader context of financialisation processes overall.

This paper draws on the sociology of public action approach and provides a qualitative analysis of two case studies, a social microcredit service and a financial education programme, based on direct observation and semi-structured interviews conducted with key policy actors.

This paper sheds light on the rationale behind two financial inclusion services and illustrates how the instruments involved incorporate and tend to reproduce, individualising logics that reduce the problem of financial exclusion, and the social and economic vulnerability which underlies it, to a matter of personal responsibility, thus fuelling depoliticising tendencies in public action. It also discusses the contradictions underlying financial inclusion instruments, showing how local actors negotiate views and strategies on the problems to be addressed.

The paper makes an original contribution to the field of sociology and social policy by focusing on two under-researched instruments of financial inclusion and improving understanding of the finance-welfare state nexus and of the contradictions underpinning attempts at financial inclusion of the most vulnerable.

The European funded project ADLIFE focuses on the application of digitally enabled integrated care for people with advanced chronic diseases. The implementation of the ADLIFE intervention required a robust practical tool that would be common to all pilot sites while allowing flexibility for local variations as well as the ability to adapt to unanticipated changes and problems.

The ADLIFE project combined the concepts of implementation research and formative evaluation with the standardized operating procedures (SOP) methodology. The ADLIFE project significantly modified the SOP approach and used it as a means to not only to define and organize the tasks that needed to be performed in preparing and implementing the ADLIFE intervention but also to create a deeper understanding of the unique challenges faced in each site, as well as a method for achieving a consensus.

The ADLIFE SOPs were developed by a dedicated working group, and they encompassed the preparatory phase leading up to implementation of the intervention. The SOP was also the basis for monitoring the implementation, and this created a structure for the dynamic ongoing tactical and even strategic changes necessitated by local diversity as well as many unanticipated changes.

The SOP methodology was useful in supporting the development of the ADLIFE SOP, which was a consensus-based approach to guide for managing the implementation process, both at project and local levels. It has supported continuous improvement and learning throughout the project. Both the process and the SOP produced by the process can be readily adapted and used in other similar projects.

This paper aims to appraise the effectiveness of gender quotas in breaking the glass ceiling for women on boards (WoBs) in companies that are legally obliged to comply with quotas (listed companies and state-owned companies, LP) and in those that are not (unlisted companies and nonstate-owned companies, NLNP). Furthermore, it investigates the glass cliff phenomenon, according to which women are more likely to be appointed to apical positions in underperforming companies.

A balanced panel data of the top 116 Italian companies by total assets, which are present in both 2010 and 2017, is used for estimating ANOVA tests across sectors and fixed-effects panel regression models.

WoBs significantly increased in both the LP and the NLNP companies, and this increase was greater in the financial sector. Furthermore, the relationship between the percentage of WoBs and firm performance is not linear but depends on the financial corporate health. Specifically, the situation in which a woman ascends to a leadership position in challenging circumstances where the risk of failure is high (glass cliff phenomenon) is only present in companies with the lowest performance in the sample, in other words, when negative values of Roe and negative or zero values of Roa occur together.

These findings have relevant policy implications that encourage the adoption of gender quotas even in specific top positions, such as CEO or president, as this could lead to a “double spillover effect” both vertically, that is, in other job positions, and horizontally, toward other companies not targeted by quotas. Practical interventions to support women in glass cliff positions, on the other hand, relate to the extent of supervisor mentoring and support to prevent women from leaving director roles and strengthen their chances for career advancement.

The authors explore the ability of gender quotas to break through the glass ceiling in companies that are not legally obliged to do so, and to the best of the authors’ knowledge, for the first time, the glass cliff phenomenon in the Italian context.