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It is well evidenced that South Africa is characterised by extreme socioeconomic inequality, which is strongly racialised. We offer an original sociological perspective, which departs from established perspectives considering the dynamics of vulnerability and poverty to focus on the structuring of classed and racialised privilege. We map how stocks of economic, cultural, and social capital intersect to generate systematic and structural inequalities in the country and consider how far these are associated with fundamental racial divides. To achieve this, we utilise rich, nationally representative data from the National Income Dynamics Study and employ Multiple Correspondence Analysis to construct a model of South African 'social space'. Our findings underscore how entrenched racial divisions remain within South Africa, with White people being overwhelmingly located in the most privileged positions. However, our cluster analysis also indicates that forms of middle-class privilege percolate beyond a core of the 8% of the population that is white. We emphasise how age divisions are associated with social capital accumulation. Our cluster analysis reveals that trust levels increase with economic and cultural capital levels within younger age groups and could therefore come to intensify social and racial divisions., (© 2024 The Author(s). The British Journal of Sociology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of London School of Economics and Political Science.)

Gambling is commonly associated with social and economic disadvantage. In this paper we examine the impact of gambling on homeownership, using Australian panel data. We find that gambling is associated with a lower probability of homeownership. Specifically, our endogeneity corrected estimates show that an increase in problem gambling is associated with between 1.6 and 1.8 percentage point decrease in the probability of owning a home depending on the model. Our result show that financial stress and social capital are channels through which gambling influences the probability of homeownership., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

The Chinese government has implemented the policies to regulate executive (CEO) pay in state-owned enterprises (SOEs) with the aim of promoting wage equality. This study examines whether these policies affect the motivation of CEOs to engage in green innovation (GI). By analyzing data from Chinese listed SOEs between 2008 and 2017, the study reveals an unintended environmental consequence of regulating CEO pay. We found a negative causal relationship between regulating CEO pay and GI. Moreover, we provide evidence that social capital act as a mitigating factor promotes cooperation and a shared sense of responsibility towards sustainable practices. Additionally, government subsidies provide financial incentives and support for businesses to invest in sustainable practices and technologies, which can offset the negative impact of CEO pay regulation on GI. The results of this study offer policy recommendations to encourage sustainable environmental initiatives; the government should increase its support for GI and introduce new incentives for managers. Overall the study findings are robust and remain valid even after conducting rigorous testing with instrumental variables and other robustness checks., (© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Background: Informal caregivers of older adults play a vital role in improving the degree to which older adults access community and healthcare services in a seamless and timely manner. They are fulfilling important navigation and support roles for their older care recipients. However, there is still little knowledge of the most significant facilitators and barriers to effective and efficient system navigation among caregivers. This paper aims to fill these knowledge gaps through investigation of the key factors (i.e., social capital/cohesion, caregiving supports, and utilization factors) affecting navigation difficulties faced by informal caregivers of older adults., Methods: The Behavioural-Ecological Framework of Healthcare Access and Navigation (BEAN) model is used to frame the study. Using the General Social Survey on Caregiving and Care Receiving 2018, we analyzed 2,733 informal caregivers whose primary care recipients were aged 65 or older. Hierarchical logistic regression was conducted to identify the relationship between system navigation difficulties among informal caregivers and four sequentially ordered blocks of predictors: (1) sociodemographic (2), social capital/cohesion (3), caregiving supports, and (4) healthcare demand., Results: The fully adjusted model showed that the probability of reporting navigation difficulties was lower for caregivers with social capital/cohesion compared to those without social capital/cohesion. In comparison, the probability of reporting navigation difficulties was higher among caregivers with caregiving support and among caregivers whose care receivers use a higher amount of health service use. Several sociodemographic covariates were also identified., Conclusion: Our findings support certain aspects of the BEAN model. This study extends our understanding of potential facilitators and barriers that informal caregivers of older adults face while navigating complex community and health systems. There is a need to implement coordinated schemes and health policies especially for older adults with mental/neurological issues to address the challenges of their caregivers given the specific vulnerability identified in this study. The need for further research using different approaches to examine the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on caregivers' system navigation experience is crucial., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Background: Recovery-oriented systems of care have been a widely supported approach to transforming existing substance treatment programs across different states through developing recovery programs and interagency networks. However, little is known about the facilitators and barriers influencing their development and implementation., Methods: Qualitative study of 5 different recovery-oriented systems of care in Illinois. Nineteen respondents completed individual interviews., Results: A total of 124 codes and 2 themes were identified, reflecting constraints and opportunities. Theme 1 focused on how ROSC programs developed bonding, bridging, and linking social capital. Theme 2 focused on the ROSC coordinator and lead agency's power and accountability., Conclusions: The roles of lead agencies and ROSC coordinators were highlighted in the development and implementation of ROSCs. ROSC membership structures allow for bonding, bridging, and linking social capital. Still, additional technical support is needed to improve accountability, reduce power differentials and turf battles, and ensure greater participation among more diverse stakeholders., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024. Published by Elsevier B.V.)

Psychological capital (PsyCap) is a multidimensional concept entailing hope, self-efficacy, optimism, and resilience. This paper argues that it can be considered a form of "capital" explaining social inequality. We test whether PsyCap can be integrated into the Bourdieusian capital framework by assessing its relationship with social, economic, and cultural capital. We also identify different types of social positions based on the volume and composition of psychological, economic, cultural, and social capital. We use cross-sectional data from the European Social Survey of 2012 (N = 35,313 respondents; 29 countries). To test the associations with the Bourdieusian capital types, we calculated multilevel spearman rank correlations and performed confirmatory factor analyses (CFA). Latent Class Analysis identified different types of social positions. We found positive weak correlations between PsyCap and the indicators of cultural capital (r ≤ .14) and positive moderate correlations with the indicators of economic and social capital (r ≤ .24). The results of the CFA showed that the fit of the 4-capital model was superior to that of the 3-capital model. We identified six types of social positions: two deprived types (with overall low capital levels); two well-off types (with overall high capital levels) and two types with high psychological and social capital in combination with varying levels of cultural and economic capital. Including PsyCap in the Bourdieusian capital framework acknowledges the power of positive psychological states regarding processes of social mobility and social inequality on the one hand and calls for understanding PsyCap as a social and group-level phenomenon on the other hand. As such, integrating PsyCap into the Bourdieusian framework can help to address the longstanding issue of understanding the relationship between social and individual differences in the study of social inequalities., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 De Moortel et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

The paper explores the relationship between the Covid-19 pandemic, subjective wellbeing and social capital in the UK. I exploit the pandemic as a quasi-natural experiment of an exogenously induced reduction of social capital as an explanation of the frequently documented reduction in wellbeing during the pandemic period. Differently from the literature, results show that after the onset of the pandemic - when the imposition of restrictions to social interactions occurred - both mental health and life satisfaction substantially decreased, and this decrease was larger for the people who reported having higher pre-pandemic social capital. Results also show however that their wellbeing decrease was not high enough to fully overturn the wellbeing gap usually in their favour. This suggests that the positive effects of social capital for wellbeing are via at least two pathways: in-person social interactions and via the value of having social networks. These results contribute to the literature on the relationship between social capital and wellbeing, as well as the one on the effects of the pandemic for mental health and life satisfaction. Policy implications include investing in social capital to increase overall populations' wellbeing; and, during epidemiological crises, facilitating online psychological support to hamper the negative effects of social isolation, and campaigning to encourage people to keep as much as possible in touch with loved ones and their communities via online social networks and online events to prevent a further degradation of the quantity and quality of social interactions., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

This study aims to explore the structure of the households' social capital of rural Vietnam households with secondary data from 2008 to 2018. This paper applied the fundamental theories (resource and network theories) and the Bayesian network to estimate the interaction of proxies to explore the structure of social capital. Results showed that the triangle structure in household social capital with the core point is organization participation. The connections show the tendency from organization participation, linking to household networks. Alongside that, linking social capital and Organization participation are determinants of social capital indicators (social events, social cost). Therefore, this paper suggests employing proxies such as structured indicators for integrating social capital into the livelihood papers., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 Huynh Ngoc Chuong. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Mobile application (app), with its expansive reservoir of data and content, harbors considerable promise in advancing health outcomes at both the individual and population levels. Nevertheless, there is a paucity of scholars that concretely examine the dynamics of health information acquisition within mobile app. This research presents a conceptual model aimed at investigating the potential ramifications of health information acquisition on both individuals' psychological and physical well-being. Concurrently, this research attempts to illuminate the underlying mechanisms behind these correlations through evaluating the mediating role of bonding and bridging social capital. The obtained results of a web-based survey conducted among 656 college students in mainland China suggest a positive association between health information acquisition and bonding and bridging social capital. Moreover, the study reveals that the impact of health information acquisition via mobile applications on psychological and physical well-being is significantly mediated by college students' bonding and bridging social capital. The cultivation of bonding social capital could exert a direct and positive influence on college students' physical well-being. However, there appears to be no discernible correlation between bridging social capital and physical well-being. Taken collectively, these findings not only complement extant theoretical perspectives within the scholarship concerning mobile app usage for health improvement, but also furnish several pragmatic guidelines for healthcare professionals and mobile app designers., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Smooth interaction with a disaster-affected community can create and strengthen its social capital, leading to greater effectiveness in the provision of successful post-disaster recovery aid. To understand the relationship between the types of interaction, the strength of social capital generated, and the provision of successful post-disaster recovery aid, intricate ethnographic qualitative research is required, but it is likely to remain illustrative because it is based, at least to some degree, on the researcher's intuition. This paper thus offers an innovative research method employing a quantitative artificial intelligence (AI)-based language model, which allows researchers to re-examine data, thereby validating the findings of the qualitative research, and to glean additional insights that might otherwise have been missed. This paper argues that well-connected personnel and religiously-based communal activities help to enhance social capital by bonding within a community and linking to outside agencies and that mixed methods, based on the AI-based language model, effectively strengthen text-based qualitative research., (© 2024 The Author(s). Disasters published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of ODI.)

This paper investigates the role of Islamic faith-based organisations (FBOs) in Indonesia and examines the way in which their disaster recovery aid can be successful or less successful depending on social capital formation in communities affected by a disaster. The paper argues that Islamic FBOs play a prominent role in disaster-affected communities by building new social capital or strengthening existing social capital. Failure to do so may affect a community's recovery and its long-term resilience. Applying a framework that considers three types of social capital-bonding, bridging, and linking-from a comparative perspective, the paper discusses two cases of disaster recovery: one following the earthquake that struck Aceh in 2013; and the other after the Mount Kelud volcanic eruptions in East Java in 2014. In both instances, the findings highlight the importance of the village facilitator, cultural sensitivity, and understanding of local indigenous and religious practices for successful disaster recovery., (© 2024 ODI.)

Objectives: This paper aims to examine the psychometric properties of social capital indicators, comparing Black and White respondents to identify the extent of measurement invariance in social capital by race., Study Design: We used data from the longitudinal study Midlife in the United States (MIDUS), waves 1 through 3 (1995-2016)., Methods: Data were from 6513 respondents (5604 White and 909 Black respondents). Social capital indicators were social cohesion, contributions to community, and community involvement. We used Structural Equation Modeling and Item Response Theory methods to test for measurement invariance in social capital by race., Results: We observed violations of longitudinal and multi-group measurement invariance (MI) at configural and metric levels on two scales. Factor structures and indicator loadings were inconsistent over time. In IRT analysis, 'Many people come for advice' exhibited Differential Item Functioning (DIF), indicating a consistent advantage for White respondents on the contributions to community scale. Despite similar social capital levels (P(χ2,2) = 0.00), DIF was found in all contributions to community items and some community involvement items when examining race and education interaction., Conclusions: Invariance issues in social capital items suggest potential biases in comparing Black and White respondents. Recognizing these biases is essential. Future social capital research should assess existing data assumptions and involve stakeholders from diverse communities in creating new items., (Copyright © 2024 The Royal Society for Public Health. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Social capital, defined as the nature of the social relationship and the resources embedded within the social network of an individual or community, influences how individuals within a group interact and collaborate within their communities or organizations. While it is acknowledged that social capital can be drawn from as a coping strategy to mitigate financial stress, there is a notable absence of the lived experience in the literature on how social capital influences households to tap resources from their social network. We have investigated the role of social capital in healthcare financing in rural Uttar Pradesh, India, highlighting the challenges faced by households in managing healthcare expenses. We took a qualitative research approach, conducting in-depth interviews with 24 households in the Hardoi District of Uttar Pradesh in August 2017 to explore participants' lived experience of accruing support from their community during their healthcare crisis. Data analysis followed a thematic content analysis approach. The study finds that households leverage social capital for both financial and non-financial support during health crises. Social networks, trust, and community cohesion play critical roles in resource acquisition. However, overreliance on social capital can be coercive, leading to inequity, privacy invasion, and dependency. Though social capital serves as a crucial resource of support in healthcare emergencies, its unequal distribution and potential for misuse highlight the need for more structured health financing policies in India. The findings underscore the importance of integrating community-driven resources into broader health financing strategies, considering local social structures and community dynamics., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors of this paper declare no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Background: While health inequality has been the focus of past scholarly discussions, COVID-19's outbreak and spread have provided a new arena for discussing health inequality, particularly in the context of urban-rural disparities in China. This paper explores the impact of COVID-19 on urban-rural health inequality, and the roles played by socioeconomic status and social capital., Methods: A cross-sectional observational collected data on demographics, mental health, socioeconomic status, and social capital. An online survey was administered from August 27 to August 30, 2020, and, 1936 valid samples were received. Mental health was measured using the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI-18). This study applied the ordinary least squares regression (OLS) model, and data analysis was performed using STATA., Results: There were 1936 participants, with an equal distribution of genders. Multiple regression analysis showed that the mental health levels of rural youth were superior to those of urban youth ( p  = 0.049), especially when the epidemic was not severe ( p  = 0.013). Socioeconomic status had a significant positive promotion effect on mental health ( p  = 0.008), but the interaction effect between socioeconomic status and the urban-rural divide indicated that the promotion effect of socioeconomic status on the mental health of urban youth was greater than that of rural youth ( p  = 0.04). Social capital had a significant positive promotion effect on mental health ( p  = 0.000), and the interaction effect indicated that this promoting effect did not differ between urban and rural areas ( p  > 0.05)., Competing Interests: The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Xiao.)

This study explores the impact of farm households' social capital characteristics and local government policies on the selection of farmland transfer contracts in China's rural industrial revitalization context. Utilizing field research data from 1,979 households in ethnic areas of Hunan Province, this paper constructs an econometric model to assess how farm households' social capital and local governments' involvement in rural industrial revitalization influence farmland transfer contract selections. The findings indicate that, lacking government program support, farmers' social capital significantly affects contract type and duration, but not the rent. Specifically, farmers possessing extensive social capital prefer verbal and short-term contracts (coefficients of 0.525 and 0.643, significant at the 5% level), whereas their influence on rent (coefficient of 2.418, significant at the 5% level) manifests under government program support. These results challenge the conventional theory of farmland transfer contracts and offer substantial empirical support for the development of local government policies in rural industrial revitalization, underlining the critical role of government guidance and social capital in enhancing farmland transfer., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 He, Huang. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Enhancing green innovation for business sustainability represents a pressing global challenge. In the context of the manufacturing industry, the relationship between proactive green innovation (PGI) and structural social capital (SSC) remains a profoundly under-researched area. Drawing upon the theories of social capital and dynamic capability (DC), this study investigated the relationship between SSC and PGI within manufacturing enterprises via three individual and sequential mediating factors, namely cognitive social capital (CSC), relational social capital (RSC), and DC. Adopting a cross-sectional quantitative design, this study collected survey data from 485 manufacturing sector employees in China using purposive sampling. Structural equation modeling analysis of the data revealed no significant direct impact of SSC on PGI, but a strong indirect impact through the sequential mediating influences of CSC, RSC, and DC. The findings suggests that PGI within manufacturing enterprises is not wholly shaped by SSC; rather, firm-level dynamic capabilities, characterized by a sequential mechanism, plays a crucial role in achieving PGI within these enterprises. This paper offers both theoretical and practical contributions and provides recommendations for future research based on its limitations., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 Xinxiang Gao. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

The values that people hold are linked to their economic performance. These links can be either direct or indirect, operating through moderating variables such as social network participation, interpersonal trust, trust in institutions, human capital, managerial skills and hours worked. In this paper these effects are studied using structural equation modelling (SEM) methodology applied to European Social Survey data from 28 European countries in 2018. Schwartz classification of values is used, distinguishing between Self-Enhancement (Power, Achievement), Openness to Change (Self-Direction), Conservation (Tradition, Security, Conformity) and Self-Transcendence (Universalism, Benevolence) values. It is found that Power has the strongest positive direct effect on economic performance, further strengthened by a positive indirect structural effect through hours worked. Self-Direction is indirectly positively linked to economic performance through higher managerial skills and hours worked. Tradition has a strong negative direct effect on economic performance. Security is indirectly negatively linked with economic performance, owing to its negative effects on interpersonal trust, management skills and hours worked. Some of the identified effects are context-dependent and vary across European welfare state regimes. For example, Power is statistically significantly linked to economic performance only in the liberal and conservative regime. Values promoted by respective welfare state regimes are not necessarily associated with higher incomes within those regimes, e.g., Tradition and Security values promoted in the conservative and Mediterranean regime are associated with lower incomes. These findings may lead to a range of policy implications, particularly in relation to the policies on immigration, demographics, the labor market, and work-life balance. Unfortunately, due to the cross-sectional character of the dataset, causal relations among the variables of interest could not be identified., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 Growiec et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Prior to the pandemic, studies demonstrated the mainly protective role of structural social capital on all-cause mortality, less evidence had been found for a protective role for cognitive social capital. However, some findings from the early stage of the pandemic suggest that civic participation and group affiliation may be associated with more COVID-19-related deaths, as was interpersonal trust. Thus, the study aimed to verify indicators of individual social capital as risk factors for 7.6-year all-cause mortality before COVID-19 pandemic and 1.6-year all-cause mortality during of the pandemic among men and women aged 50+ years in Poland. The Polish part of the COURAGE in Europe cross-sectional baseline study was conducted in 2011. The analysis included 2913 face-to-face interviews with randomly selected community-dwelling individuals. Information about deaths was obtained from the State Systems Department on Oct 7, 2021. Various aspects of structural and cognitive social capital were measured. The Cox proportional hazard models were used. Before the pandemic, a protective effect of structural (formal and informal social participation) and cognitive social capital (trust in family, trust in co-workers) on the risk of death was observed in women. However, a negative effect of cognitive social capital (trust in strangers) was found for women and men. No positive effect of social capital during the pandemic after controlling for the health-related characteristics was found. A negative effect of generalized trust on all-cause mortality during the pandemic was discerned for men, a negative effect of the level of one's social network was found in women. The observed patterns of relationships were totally different for analyzed periods of time, and different for men and women. Consequently, planning of social interventions directed towards middle and older age groups should consider various actions for men and women separately. The need for continuous evaluation of implemented social interventions was emphasized., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)