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Consumer behavior differs from country to country, which may implicitly influence the financial performance of e-commerce companies. The paper’s objective is to study the characteristics of the companies from the Romanian e-commerce market for sustainable competitiveness. The empirical analysis was a quantitative and qualitative one. For the qualitative analysis of the studied sample, variables that represent the specific characteristics of companies were taken into account, the most relevant of which will be included as control variables in econometric models. Research results highlight that the recognized companies registered lower values of financial performance, they influence each other and for the company to improve the customer relationship, they have to invest in brand consolidation. The practical implications can be for managers to focus on companies’ branding, improving customer relations, disclosing more information about the company, the products they sell online, and sustainability actions to have sustainable competitiveness.

Although employee green creativity is recognized as the key to the innovation in green enterprises, few studies explores the measurement of green creativity for employees. To address the gap, the present study identifies the major dimensions of employee green creativity and develops a comprehensive, reliable, and valid measurement instrument. According to the 4P&rsquo, s model of creativity, four core dimensions of employee green creativity are identified, namely, green creative motivation, thinking, behavior, and outcome. Strictly adhering to the process of scale development, employee green creativity scale (EGCS) is constructed and validated. We first develop the items of employee green creativity based on literature review and expertise from academics and practitioners. Next, we examine the validation of EGCS through exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis using a sample from three large-scale green enterprises (N = 460). Further, we also check the nomological validity of EGCS by testing the effects of determinants (e.g., green transformational leadership, shared vision, and green self-efficacy) on employee green creativity using a new sample from another two green enterprises (N = 169). Results reveal that EGCS is a reliable and valid instrument for capturing employee green creativity in multiple contexts. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

This paper analyzes the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) of a sample of wineries in Spain and its effect on the companies&rsquo, performance. We used a questionnaire created with a validated scale that includes environmental and social dimensions. The final sample was made up of 127 firms that participated in the National Wine Fair (FENAVIN) in 2019, and this was analyzed using a cluster analysis and means contrast to verify whether a CSR-performance relationship exists. The performance was measured using the average return on assets (ROA) for the prior three years. The results obtained do not support the general opinion that enterprises involved with CSR achieve better results. On the contrary, we found that wineries that are more environmentally responsible are the least profitable and that those with more socially responsible behavior do not have a significant CSR-performance relationship.

Corporate investment efficiency (CIE) is an imperative factor influencing the smooth functioning and financial sustainability of an enterprise. The role of a firm life cycle on risk and performance fundamentals has been extensively explored in the literature. However, it remains unclear as to whether the life cycle stages of a firm have any impact on corporate investment efficiency. This paper investigates the role of firm life cycle stages (FLCS) in determining the investment efficiency of 351 Pakistani non-financial listed firms over the course of 12 years (2005&ndash, 2016). It used panel data fixed effects and ordinary least squares (OLS) techniques to empirically examine the proposed relationship. By employing Dickinson&rsquo, s FLCS measure, we found that CIE was lower during the introduction and decline stages and higher at the growth and maturity stages of a firm&rsquo, s life cycle. Moreover, the results of regression analysis revealed that mature firms enjoyed the highest level of investment efficiency followed by the growth firms. Overall, CIE exhibited an inverted U-shaped trend across FLCS. In addition, the findings corroborated the idea that the sample firms could not sustain their investment efficiency when they moved along different stages of the life cycle. Thus, policymakers are suggested to customize their investment policies for each stage of FLC to attain sustainable financial performance throughout the life of a firm.

Pakistan has been blessed with rich tourism potential because of its rich history, culture, biological and geographical diversity. Travelers have for quite some time been attracted to Pakistan to encounter a nation that flaunts rugged natural beauty, cultural richness, and unparalleled hospitality. Pakistan has various tourist destinations in the northern areas of Pakistan. Kumrat Valley has become a tourist hotspot in recent times after the prime minister of Pakistan, Mr. Imran Khan, visited the valley. To reduce the negative effects on these tourist destinations due to the accelerating increase in tourists, the present study used a quantitative approach to uncover whether there is an environmental awareness–behavior gap among the tourists, with their level of environmental awareness outweighing pro-environmental behavior. Using a sample of 426 tourists who have visited the valley, the analysis of the results indicates that the pro-environmental behavior is positively and significantly affected by the components, environmental awareness, environmental concern, and environmental attachment. Environmental attachment is added as a moderator between environmental awareness and pro-environmental behavior. This study suggests that environmental awareness must be promoted among tourists to ensure that they exhibit pro-environmental behavior.

Environmental damage or health concerns related to diet are some alarming consequences of our behaviour in the near future. Consumers can make a difference depending on their eating behaviour and conscientiousness about minimizing environmental damage. One way to make children more aware of the environment and induce them to eat healthier food in the future might be educational games where they could learn the importance of the environment and the effect of the food they eat on their health status. In this study, we investigated parental behaviour when feeding their children and their willingness to pay for a game product with educational and eating functions. The sample consisted of 300 parents of children aged from 4 to 12. A hypothetical choice experiment has been used and a latent class model estimated the parents’ preferences for a plant‐based product game carrying two attributes, namely, the price and narrative context of the game The results indicated that parents were willing to pay more for a product with a storybook related to healthy eating habits or recycling than one with no storybook. Moreover, two dominant feeding styles in households were found: indulgent parents and uninvolved parents. This alternative approach is oriented toward educating people from the early stages of their lives, creating a favourable environment for the development of preferences for healthier food. © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. Published

This paper specifically outlines an investigation of the influence of sustainability education and study abroad coursework on levels of a key component of academic success, student engagement. A quasi-experimental design compared pretest and posttest levels of engagement (measured by the Deep Learning Scale) among undergraduate students enrolled in four types of courses). Data were analyzed using a repeated measures MANOVA and supported two significant 2-way interactions (Sustainability * Time and Study Abroad * Time) suggesting that student engagement (Deep Learning) is more likely to increase with sustainability (than non-sustainability) courses and with study abroad (than non-study abroad/campus courses). Findings provide empirical support for university initiatives that seek to incorporate sustainability coursework and study abroad opportunities into the undergraduate curriculum as means to enhance students’ overall engagement and academic success. The paper provides insights into where sustainability education and study abroad courses have broad potential to promote engagement and, as such, should be considered part of the general learning requirement of university education. In terms of study limitations, the sample is drawn from one university and self-selection bias is possible for students choosing to enroll in study abroad and sustainability-focused courses.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, digital technology has been used in all aspects of the agricultural field. How to seize the opportunity to achieve the production-marketing connection is increasingly becoming a top concern for green agri-food enterprises. Based on the theory of a task–technology fit, this study analyzes the fitness between livestreaming e-commerce and green agri-food. More specifically, the task characteristics cover the seasonality, locality, and eco-friendliness of green agri-food, and the technology characteristics cover the responsiveness, interactivity, and entertainment of livestreaming e-commerce. Using data of a sample of 574 green agri-food entrepreneurial firms collected through a web-based questionnaire, we preform structural equation modeling (SEM) analysis and find that the locality and eco-friendliness of green agri-food, the responsiveness, interactivity, and entertainment of livestreaming e-commerce have a positive effect on the fit of green agri-food livestreaming e-commerce. Moreover, the fit of green agri-food livestreaming has a positive effect on firm performance and the intention to adopt livestreaming e-commerce. This study also demonstrates that perceived corporate social responsibility has a moderating effect on the relationship between the fit of livestreaming of green agri-food and the intention to adopt livestreaming e-commerce. This study extends prior research on the task–technology fit into livestreaming e-commerce companies and provides insights into our understanding of successful adoption of livestreaming e-commerce.

The purpose of this study was to understand the factors that attract consumers to small businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic to assist with small businesses. Factors of interest included emotional (positive and negative) and cognitive experiences (resilience, optimism) during the pandemic and demographic characteristics (gender, generation, education, income, and employment status). Using a convenience survey sample in U.S. (N = 315), this study found that positive and negative emotions, active resilience, and demographic characteristics (generation, education, income, and employment status) can explain consumer shopping frequency and number of services used with small businesses during a pandemic. Small businesses may seek to trigger active resilience and emotions (negative and positive) in their marketing/advertising avenues to attract consumers’ sustainable consumption practices and may consider pivoting to attract particular consumer segments that are more likely to lend favorable actions toward sustainable consumption.

For promoting pedestrian mobility, the quality levels of pedestrian paths should be increased. Many researchers suggest methodologies for determining the pedestrian level of service. Among these, some studies consider both paths’ physical characteristics and users’ perception about the walkways. Investigating users’ perceptions represents a good strategy for implementing interventions aimed at increasing the quality of service. The aim is recording pedestrians’ perceptions about the characteristics of the path and detecting the choices they would make in a hypothetical scenario. This work proposes the design of a Stated Preferences survey and the analysis of the preliminary results. A questionnaire was sent out to a sample of 240 pedestrians, prevalently students, about a walkway located in the University Campus of Rende (Italy). The collected data were analyzed by means of a discrete choice model for assessing the importance assigned by pedestrians to each aspect included in the analysis. The results showed that the environment can be considered as the most important aspect for young pedestrians, while the width of the path is not significant. The outcomes also highlighted the aspects it is necessary to change in order to make pedestrian paths increasingly attractive and to encourage users towards active mobility.

Producción Científica, Urban sustainability has been revealed as one of the key elements in achieving global sustainability. There is a wide range of indicators in this field; however, sustainability indicators have not been exempt from criticism, in both their formal aspects and practical usefulness. If measuring sustainability is “measuring the immeasurable”, then the objective of this article is to propose a composite indicator that evaluates only the deficits of sustainability or, which is the same thing, the unsustainability of cities. This focus has the advantage of showing up the particular deficiencies and thus the priorities that each city must attend to. For this purpose, only unsustainability, defined as the distance to a sustainability target, was considered. Aggregation was carried out through generalized means, which lead to a proper balance between compensatory and non-compensatory aggregation. The results emerging from the application of our methodology to a sample of fifty different cities suggest that all cities should attend to some aspect concerning sustainability, and that no city is sustainable, but only less unsustainable, showing both significant differences between cities in terms of the degree of unsustainability and a common underlying structure of unsustainability in which the environmental dimension contributes the most.

Business sustainability has become obligatory in small and medium enterprises (SMEs). To remain competitive and survive in the market, sustainable innovation is the key. However, SMEs, especially in food processing in emerging markets, still lack resources to become more innovative. The objective of the article is to analyze factors affecting sustainable innovation in food processing SMEs and their impact on business sustainability. Cross-sectional quantitative research builds on a sample of 157 owners of food processing SMEs in Indonesia. The results show that organizational sustainable innovation in food processing SMEs depends on employees’ innovation potential and an organization’s innovation culture; meanwhile, both variables are influenced by leaders’ support of sustainable innovation. Promisingly, organizational sustainable innovation increases business sustainability. Thus, our research highlights the important role of leaders’ support in achieving organizational sustainable innovation and, finally, long term business success. Furthermore, this study uncovers the underlying mediatory mechanisms, which deepen our theoretical understanding and guide practitioners with a concise and comprehensive framework for sustainable innovation in SMEs.

In the rising new global economic and social period, after the COVID-19 pandemic, traceability is expected to be a critical parameter for the selection of foods by consumers worldwide. Accordingly, traditional foods (TFs) can become the foods of choice in the new era due to their originality, authenticity, unique organoleptic properties, and locality. In this paper, the consumers’ perception on traceability regarding Greek TFs and northwest Greek TFs is investigated, in order to find out the specific information they require for the purchase of these foods. Traceability was tested using variables related to package, product, quality, process, and personal information of these foods. A self-response questionnaire survey was carried out in September and October 2021 on a sample of 1707 participants through the Google platform. The results show that the participants consider traceability regarding questions on package information “quite important” and “very important” by an average of 68%, on food information by 64%, on quality information by 69%, on production process information by 78%, and on personal information by 65%. A similar pattern was recorded for the regional northwest Greek TFs for information on production process, personal, and package data, although there was a significant increase in the perception by the participants for data related to food information itself by 87% and more related to quality information by 94%.

The aim of this exploratory research is to identify how working from home and the consequent social isolation interfered in teachers’ work and students’ learning and to identify the challenges, difficulties, advantages, opportunities, demands, trends, implications, outlooks, lessons, directions, and feelings of students and teachers in the teaching processes during the COVID-19 pandemic period. To reach its aim, the authors of this paper developed searches and scientific databases and they also sent an email questionnaire to Rio de Janeiro city schools. The descriptive analyses were made by descriptive statistics (proportions, rates, minimum, maximum, mean, median, standard deviation, coefficient of variation—CV). The results show that working from home and the consequent social isolation interfered in the students’ and teachers’ feelings and sensations and highlight the words “frustration”, “hope”, and “strangeness”. From the sample, 96.4% of the teachers affirmed that working from home and the social isolation interfered in their work and 97.4% of the teachers affirmed that working from home and the consequent social isolation interfered in the students’ learning. This research is the starting point to boost discussions on the subjects of COVID-19, working from home, social isolation, and education. This paper will support researchers in the development of future studies related to the subjects.

With the deepening of the garbage classification policy strength, making urban household garbage sorting mandatory in China, it is imperative to clarify the key factors affecting the urban residents’ intention to behave in garbage classification. Though it has attracted the attention of researchers, there are still several aspects that need to be supplemented and improved. Thus, this study aims to investigate the critical factors affecting the urban residents’ intention of garbage sorting and develop an extended model of planned behavior by integrating expectancy theory (ET) and norm activation model (NAM). Given the positive externalities of urban residents’ garbage sorting behaviors, awareness of consequences and attribution of responsibility are correspondingly interpreted as environmental benefits (EB) and environmental concerns (EC). The sample data of 668 urban residents who lived in four pilot cities of garbage classification in China were collected and adopted to the structural equation modeling (SEM) with bootstrapping estimation method to assess the causal relationship between variables. The results indicated that the expectation (Exp) was a significant positive predictor of garbage sorting intention. Attitude (AT), perceived behavior control (PBC) and subjective norm (SN) positively affected urban residents’ expectation of garbage sorting, with SN having the most significant direct impact. The results also found that the EB has significant influences EC, which strongly influences urban residents’ expectation of garbage sorting. Furthermore, the total effect of EC on Exp is higher than other paths, and the mediating effect of SN on Exp by AT and PBC is greater than other indirect paths, which accounted for about 27.1% of the total effect. Finally, we discuss both theoretical and practical implications, along with recommendations for future research.

University students are expected to have the appropriate digital competence to face the demands of the changing educational model and to meet the challenges of the future work. This paper describes university students’ perceptions of digital competence and analyzes the impact of personal factors on digital competence in a sample of 5164 students from all majors in the first and fourth year of their studies at Gansu Agricultural University (China). A quantitative methodology was followed, employing a non-experimental method and the survey technique to collect data. The results obtained show that students’ perceptions of digital competencies in terms of information and data literacy, communication and collaboration, and safety were positive. Furthermore, there were significant differences in students’ self-perceptions of digital competence related to gender, grade level, area of residence, and prior relevant training in the DigComp framework-based instrument. The development of key competency areas for digital competence, such as the creation of digital content, should be promoted, along with helping students to gain knowledge when dealing with everyday technological issues. The need for training related to the use of ICT and digital competencies was also highlighted, as well as supporting the promotion of female students in selected areas of digital competence and assisting lower grade students and students from rural areas in digital competence development.

The study explores the relationship between internal control effectiveness, corporate social responsibility (CSR), and technological innovation. By establishing a mediating effect model, we analyzed the effect of internal control effectiveness on technological innovation. The study selected the data of Chinese A-share listed companies between 2014 and 2019 as the sample. The sources of variable indicators include China Stock Market and Accounting Research (CSMAR), DIB Internal Control database, and Hexun CSR score. The empirical study shows that internal control effectiveness is significantly and positively related to technological innovation. Enhancing internal control effectiveness has a significant positive effect on the fulfillment of corporate social responsibility. In the process of internal control effectiveness on technological innovation, corporate social responsibility functions as a mediating variable and plays a partial mediating role. The study provides empirical data to support listed companies’ emphasis on internal control and active fulfillment of social responsibility, thereby enhancing their technological innovation performance.

Electric automated vehicles are zero-emission, energy-saving, and environmentally friendly vehicles, and testing and verification is an important means to ensure their safety. Because of the scarcity of dangerous scenarios in natural driving roads, it is required to conduct accelerated tests and evaluations for electric automated vehicles. According to the scenario data of the natural road in cut-in conditions, we used the kernel density estimation method to calculate the probability distribution of the scenario parameters. Additionally, we used the Metropolis–Hastings algorithm to sample based on the probability distribution of the parameters, and the Euclidean distance was combined with the paired combination to accelerate the simulation test process. The critical scenarios were screened out by the safety indicator, and the feature distribution of the critical scenario parameters was analyzed based on the Euclidean distance clustering method, so as to design importance sampling parameters and carry out importance sampling. The study obtained the distribution characteristics of critical scenario parameters under cut-in conditions and found that the importance sampling method can accelerate the test under the condition of ensuring that the relative error is small, and the improved accelerated simulation method makes the overall calculation amount smaller.

The purpose of this study was to examine how family involvement affects the environmental innovation of firms. While prior studies have shown that family involvement can enhance environmental performance, these environmental performances have been portrayed as firm activities to prevent environmental issues, such as air pollution, CO2 emissions, etc. We maintain that environmental performance should be more proactive and enable firms to transform their activities more fundamentally towards environmental protection. In this sense, we consider environmental innovation, i.e., technological development to address environmental issues, as a proactive measure enacting firm activities to address environmental issues. Furthermore, we determine whether and how family involvement can motivate firms to develop technologies for environmental performance. To illuminate this relation, we utilized a socioemotional wealth perspective, which provides useful insights into how family-controlled firms behave differently in comparison to non-family firms. Building on this socioemotional wealth approach, we suggest that family involvement helps firms engage in environmental innovation. In this study, we also explore how the positive link between family involvement and environmental innovation is dependent on family interlocks—the circumstance wherein a firm’s family directors are affiliated with the boards of directors of other firms. Specifically, we suggest that an increase in a firm’s family interlocks would strengthen the positive relationship between family involvement and environmental innovation. To test our ideas, we used a sample of 623 US public firms ranging from 1996 to 2010, which yielded 5047 firm-year observations. We find that family involvement facilitates the environmental innovation of firms. We also find that family interlocks intensify the positive effect of family involvement on environmental innovation. Finally, we discuss the theoretical and empirical implications of our results.

Given that the university teachers with more experience in the use of virtual reality are those corresponding to the areas of Health Sciences and of Engineering and Architecture, this article analyzes the assessment these teachers make about virtual reality as a teaching resource in their respective disciplines. The study uses a questionnaire that assesses the technical aspects and future projection of virtual reality, its drawbacks and the perception of the different dimensions of the participants’ knowledge about virtual reality and its didactic employability. The questionnaire was answered by a sample of 423 university teachers of different genders, ages, academic level and teaching experience, whose teaching activity is developed in various Latin American universities in the area of Health Sciences or in the area of Engineering/Architecture. Their answers have been analyzed descriptively and Spearman’s r statistics and the Multifactor ANOVA test have been used to verify the existence of significant differences in their evaluations for the different variables considered, cross-referencing them with the field of knowledge. Within the main results, gaps by area, years of teaching experience and academic level in the participants’ evaluations have been identified and discussed.

Using cross-sectional data from 165 countries, this study takes a fresh look at whether or not the sharing economy is a green solution for countries. This study relies on the Timbro sharing economy index and uses both carbon emission and environmental performance index as proxies for the greenhouse gas effect and overall environment, respectively. Due to limited sample size and non-normal distribution of the sample, this paper applies the Bayesian regression model, which is based on posterior distribution. The findings suggest the following: (1) a high sharing economy level has a negative relationship to carbon emissions but a positive relationship to overall environmental performance, (2) the joint variables show that a high sharing economy level together with high broadband access, urbanization, and high education level reduces carbon emissions, and (3) for manufacturing countries, a high sharing economy level together with high urbanization is associated with comparatively low carbon emissions and high environmental performance. In general, these findings allow us to conclude in favor of the contribution made by a high sharing economy level to sustainability.

With the burgeoning “war for talent”, attracting the right workforce has become a major key checkpoint for a firm’s sustainability. The main purpose of this study was to predict prospective employees’ organizational attraction by integrating person–organization (P–O) fit perceptions and the theory of planned behavior (TPB) into a single framework. Although many studies have reported inconsistent results for the impact of subjective norms and self-efficacy on intention in the TPB framework, adequate empirical research on applicant attraction for this theoretical phenomenon is still unavailable. This may be the first study that examined the mechanism of how and when the TPB model becomes more instrumental with subjective P–O fit perceptions. With a sample of 335 young job seekers in Bangladesh, the study examined the research hypotheses related to the TPB and P–O fit using path analysis with AMOS, a structural equation modeling (SEM) program. The results showed that P–O fit partially mediated the relationship between self-efficacy and job search intentions. Observably, P–O fit significantly moderated the relationship between subjective norms and job search intentions in such a way that the impact of subjective norms was stronger for individuals with a lower level of P–O fit but slightly weaker for those with a higher level of P–O fit. In line with the research findings, some notable theoretical contributions and practical implications for HR professionals have been discussed.

COVID-19 has brought serious challenges to education and many other sectors. Within the educational context, the main difficulties experienced have been reported as challenges related to not only mechanical impediments—such as technology or infrastructure—but also to methodological and personal features, such as lack of motivation or online learning/teaching experiences. The abrupt transition from face-to-face to online education has created the need for some specific abilities, such as digital literacy on the side of the learners at all educational levels. In this context, this mixed-method study aims to determine the digital literacy levels of learners belonging to different school levels and whether age, gender and school degree were significant variables. This study also investigates the technology-related challenges students experienced during COVID-19 pandemic. The sample consisted of 510 participants representing different school levels, age groups, and genders, in addition, a smaller representative group (n = 30) revealed their own evaluations related to their levels of digital literacy and the technology-related challenges they had about online learning. The findings suggest that there is a statistically significant relationship between students’ digital literacy and their gender and school degree, while age was not found to be a statistically significant variable. The qualitative self-reported data suggested that learners have sufficient levels of digital literacy, and that the major technology-related challenges were reported to be lack of the necessary technologies and difficulties in adapting to a new approach to learning.

With this paper, we aim to examine the relationship between cognitive, social, and demographical factors, as well as national culture and its relationship with social entrepreneurial activity in Southeast Europe (SEE). The empirical research employs a binary logistic regression model, utilizing data obtained from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor. For the purpose of the empirical research, we selected a sample of early-stage entrepreneurs who founded their businesses in Hungary, Romania, Slovenia, Croatia, or North Macedonia. The research sample in these five countries includes 10,012 examinees, of which 615 are social entrepreneurs. A statistically significant relationship was identified between observed phenomena in terms of entrepreneurial networking, risk aversion, individualism, entrepreneurial social image, media impact, gender, work status, and education. The results can be explained by the specific entrepreneurial context of the SEE region. We also point out recommendations for future research.

This study examines the effect of foreign boards on corporate social responsibility, exploring the issues of two-tier board systems (boards of directors and boards of commissioners). Using data for manufacturing firms listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange over the sample period of 2017–2019, the results suggest that a foreign board engages more in corporate social responsibility activities. Our key finding remains robust with respect to all foreign board measures (foreign ownership, foreign board members, foreign directors, foreign commissioners, foreign CEO, and foreign chairperson) and to alternative estimation methods, and pass a series of endogeneity checks. We established the causal effect from foreign boards to CSR, supporting institutional theory and contesting agency theory.

This article has aimed to better understand employee engagement in a post-COVID-19 workplace ecosystem. We identified a knowledge gap in the relationship between employee engagement and the physical workplace environment through an interdisciplinary literature review. We subsequently tested this gap by comparing employee engagement metrics proposed by leading academics in the field of organisational psychology with a sample of commonly used real estate industry approaches to monitoring workplace design/management. We focused specifically on industry-projected post-COVID-19 workplace ecosystem scenarios, and the results suggest that traditional employee engagement metrics and industry approaches to monitoring workplace design and management do not fully reflect the recent shift to hybrid work patterns. We shed light on the implications that this can have on our existing knowledge of “sustainable” property markets in a wider city context.

The objective of the article is to analyze, based on social exchange theory, the different risk and safety perceptions of employees and customers in the hospitality industry regarding the protections against the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic in an emerging market, namely in Romania. To this end, a questionnaire was administered simultaneously to both categories in Romanian hospitality units obtaining a sample of 561 employees and customers in the sector. While the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 virus has generated a lot of diverse research, studies focused on this particular topic, also regarding both customers and employees, were much less exploited. Therefore, eleven working hypotheses were formulated. It was highlighted that there is a positive perception of safety at work for employees, and jobs are protected from disappearance due to the pandemic through active measures taken by the organization. Employees do not show a significant desire to change jobs due to the new working conditions. The magnitude of safety measures taken had a positive impact on the customers, and customers do not pose a significant threat in hospitality industry units regarding the possibility of infection with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The paper enlarges the understanding of behavioral effects of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, while from a managerial perspective the results are particularly useful for hospitality industry owners in order to attract and retain employees and to communicate and develop better relations with customers.

Favorable policy implementation results are due not only to policy makers’ abilities but also to the behavior of those responding to the policies. For example, a CEO’s understanding of a government policy’s content and his or her willingness to respond to it, based on the expectation of profits, plays a vital role. To understand the relationship between how policies are perceived and how enterprises behave in response to innovation policies in the era of the 4th Industrial Revolution (Industry 4.0), in this study, we use structural equation modeling to investigate the roles of various factors and examine the response mechanisms in enterprises through which entrepreneurs react to Industry 4.0 innovation policies. The hypothesized model is validated empirically using a sample collected from 337 domestic Chinese high-tech firms. The modeling results indicate that positive perceptions of policies have a positive effect on entrepreneurs’ preferences which, in turn, motivate positive behavior toward innovation. Moreover, testing the model showed partial and complete mediation effects, indicating that the perceived practicability of a policy is a factor with a strong impact on response behavior that sometimes exerts its influence by altering the mediator of entrepreneurs’ responsive preferences. The empirical results and management implications of this study can serve as a reference for the effective implementation of and response to government development plans.

Many studies demonstrate the importance of communication in project performance. However, little is known about how project communication exerts its effects on the outcomes of capital projects that have a large impact on environmental and economic sustainability. Using a longitudinal survey and bootstrap-based structural-equation modeling, this study uncovers how project competencies and team innovative behavior affect the relationship between project communication and capital project performance. This study collects repeated measures from project managers at two time points: immediately after the initiation and planning stages end and immediately after project completion. Excluding responses with missing data, this study’s sample includes 108 capital projects. This study finds that project technical and managerial competencies completely mediate the relationship between project communication and project performance. This study also finds that team innovative behavior affects project performance through the mediating effect of project technical competence. Team innovative behavior also moderates the relationship between project technical competence and project performance. Project communication has the largest effect on project performance despite having the smallest direct effect, project managerial competence possesses the next-largest effect on project performance despite having the largest direct effect. This study discusses the managerial and research implications.

The purpose of this study is to provide preliminary exploration of how corporate social responsibility issues are currently reported and communicated by US major casino companies. Empirical evidence is drawn from standalone CSR reports and websites of the 30 largest casino companies in the US, which is explored through content analysis methodology. This paper finds that there are substantial variations in the reporting and communication of CSR issues by casino companies. While casino companies mainly rely on websites to communicate CSR issues, 23% of the sample companies use standalone CSR reports. Whereas websites tend to provide relatively limited information about CSR activities, standalone CSR reports have a tendency to cover comprehensive CSR themes in a detailed manner. In addition, the content analysis based on website reveals that while most casino companies tend to be passive about responsible gaming, some are trying to behave more actively and responsibly about this issue.

The community learning center provides a means of completing compulsory education and increasing the level of educational participation in Indonesia. Through this program, regardless of age, people can continue their education to a level equivalent to junior or senior high school. However, factors that contribute to the success of the program are still in question. This study aimed to determine the contribution of individual characteristics, including work experience, work perception, work motivation, and work discipline, to the success of the equivalency education program at the community learning center. This research was conducted in East Java using a quantitative approach and an explanatory research design. The research sample was taken from 101 program managers through random sampling techniques and the Slovin formula. The data were collected using a questionnaire and then analyzed using multiple regression techniques. The results showed that the education program had high success, with the participants achieving examination pass rates of 96.4% in package B, which is equivalent to junior high school, and 98.2% in package C, which is equivalent to senior high school. The average involvement of community members in the program implementation was 68.6%, and the financial support reached 75.5%. The work experience, work perception, work motivation, and work discipline of the program managers had a significant effect, both simultaneously and partially, on the success of the equivalency education program. In addition, the four independent variables also had a significant predictive effect on the dependent variable, with a simultaneous contribution of 53.8%. Based on these findings, it was recommended that these factors be considered to improve the success, sustainability, and development of education programs at the community learning center.

This article aims to evaluate the level of compliance with the accessibility requirements of the most popular native Android mobile applications, for which a sample of 50 Google Play Store applications available in Ecuador was taken. A five-phase method using the Accessibility Scanner tool was used to evaluate the apps. The results revealed that 47.5% are related to problems with tactile orientation, followed by the labeling of elements with 28.2%, and text contrast with 9.2%. The highest number of barriers found in the evaluation of mobile applications corresponds to the principle of operability with 53.9%. This study reveals that, although social networks are widely used, they have 28.7% of accessibility problems. Basing accessibility analysis exclusively on an automatic tool is very limited since it neither detects all errors nor are the errors they detect accurate. However, we suggest complementing the automatic review evaluations with a manual method based on heuristics to ensure an adequate level of accessibility in mobile apps. In addition, we recommend using this study as a starting point to create a software tool using WCAG 2.1 based on artificial intelligence algorithms to help developers evaluate accessibility in mobile apps. This research was funded by Universidad de Las Américas-Ecuador, an internal research project INI.PAV.20.01.

The diversity of the board of directors continues to be a matter of concern for investors, regulators, and the general public. In this sense, the purpose of the research presented was to identify whether there is a positive and significant impact between the diverse variables of the board of directors and the financial performance of the firms. In this context, the study’s objective was to determine if the diversity in the composition of the boards of directors has a positive and significant impact on the financial performance of the companies listed in the Chilean stock market. The study considered a sample of 1106 reports on social responsibility and sustainable development between the 2015–2020 period and their respective returns. The research was descriptive-correlational, which determined the incidence of gender, nationality, and age diversity in the financial performance of the firms. The results show, in general, a low degree of gender and nationality diversity in Chilean boards. However, a positive and significant impact is observed in the commercial sector, nationality diversity, and the construction and gender diversity axis. In this regard, the study allows confirming the heterogeneity of results by linking the variables of diversity and financial performance and the importance of conducting sufficiently disaggregated studies to understand the relationship between both types of variables. Finally, this study updates the diversity levels of the board of directors for the Chilean stock market and establishes challenges for the regulator in terms of gender quotas and good corporate governance practices.

This study investigates how wireless sensor network (WSN) applications in agriculture are discussed in the current academic literature. On the basis of bibliometric techniques, 2444 publications were extracted from the Scopus database and analyzed to identify the temporal distribution of WSN research, the most productive journals, the most cited authors, the most influential studies, and the most relevant keywords. The computer program VOSviewer was used to generate the keyword co-occurrence network and partition the pertinent literature. Findings show the remarkable growth of WSN research in recent years. The most relevant journals, cited countries, and influential studies were also identified. The main results from the keyword co-occurrence clustering and the detailed analysis illustrate that WSN is a key enabler for precision agriculture. WSN research also focuses on the role of other technologies such as the Internet of Things, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and unmanned aerial vehicles in supporting several agriculture activities, including smart irrigation and soil management. This study illuminates researchers’ and practitioners’ views of what has been researched and identifies possible opportunities for future studies. To the authors’ best knowledge, this bibliometric study represents the first attempt to map global WSN research using a comprehensive sample of documents published over nearly three decades.

This study uses 31 provinces and municipalities from China’s textile industry as a research sample and divides the region into four geographical areas: eastern, central, western, and northeastern. It quantified smart servitization in the textile industry using input–output data and applied the fuzzy set qualitative comparison analysis to identify potential pathways for promoting smart servitization in the textile industry. The study’s findings indicate that there are significant geographical differences in the level of smart servitization in the textile industry across China. Moreover, the transformation and development of the textile industry require the co-operation of numerous factors, and the Chinese textile industry’s transformation paths can be summarized as “high-input” path, “technology—aggregation” path, “open” path, and “economic-agglomeration” path.

The increasing number of economic shocks and disruptions and their highly heterogeneous territorial impacts reopened the debate on the ability of regions to withstand and recover from exogenous shocks. This paper focuses on the recessionary impact of the 2008 global financial economic crisis. It empirically explores the relationship between pre-crisis spatial connectivity and economic resilience across European Union (EU) regions over the 2008–2015 period. The empirical analysis is performed on a sample of 1312 NUTS-3 regions in 25 countries. Standard, spatial and multilevel hierarchical regression models are applied to investigate the effect of spatial connectivity and other pre-crisis determinants on regional economic resilience across three geographical scales: national, NUTS-2 regional and NUTS-3 regional. The results show that accessibility is an important factor for EU NUTS-3 regions to build resilience capabilities to exogenous shocks. Our findings demonstrate that higher accessibility is associated with greater regional economic resilience. The model results indicate a positive effect of migration and a negative effect of the ageing population on regional reaction to the crisis. Our analysis highlights the importance of country effects and spatial spillover effects on the ability of regions to shape resilience capabilities.

Absorptive capability is the capability of actors to acquire, assimilate and exploit external knowledge. In this paper, we consider absorptive capability to be multi-dimensional and to have three dimensions. Although a sufficient amount of work in the literature discusses dynamic absorptive capability, empirical studies are relatively rare. At the urban or regional levels, related empirical studies are even fewer. In this paper, we build a framework of the dynamic absorptive capability at the urban level by using 339 Chinese cities at the prefecture level and above as our sample. In order to take the geographical distance into consideration, we use a Spatial Durbin Model to measure the effects of the acquirement, assimilation, and exploitation of absorptive capability. The results show that all of the core variables (acquirement, assimilation, and exploitation) have significant positive impacts on innovation performance. Additionally, the two control variables (R&amp, D personnel and R&amp, D investment) have significant positive impacts on innovation performance. In this way, the role performed by multidimensional absorptive capability in fostering innovation performance is highlighted, and some policy recommendations are provided.

The transition from conventional vehicles (CVs) to electric vehicles (EVs) could be promising in tackling environmental challenges in China. Using a sample of 1216 respondents in Beijing, China, our study intends to understand the underlying factors that drive the decision to purchase an EV among potential Chinese vehicle purchasers. We built two choice models to estimate vehicle purchase behavior and fuel choice. We found that males and having higher household income are associated with greater intention to purchase EVs (both plug-in and battery electric vehicles). However, a previous inclination to choose CV negatively impacted willingness to buy EVs. Between specific EV types, we found that Plug-in Hybrid EV (PHEV) purchase was negatively associated with plans to obtain a driver’s license within three years and longer durations of having owned a motorized vehicle first. Yet, the number of electric bicycles in the household was positively associated with PHEV-purchase likelihood. For Battery EVs (BEV), we found that respondents who had previous experience with an EV (either as a driver or passenger) were more likely to purchase a BEV while existing ownership of a driver’s license and a higher purchase budget reduced such possibility. Based on our findings, we recommend authorities continue to, or increasingly, provide direct monetary incentives to purchase EVs, and to provide EV driving and riding experience to customers, especially who are in the middle- and low-income vehicle purchasing groups, to improve the Chinese EV market relative to CVs.

The purpose of the study is to investigate the employees’ attitudes to CSR practices and reveal the differences in staff perceptions within different groups of responadents. The tasks to be accomplished are: (1) to investigate the differences of CSR perception between males and females, (2) to investigate the differences of CSR perception among representatives of different generations, (3) to investigate the differences of CSR perception among representatives of different sectors of the economy. The online survey was conducted using the authors’ developed research instrument (questionnaire). In total, 129 respondents—employed Latvian citizens—participated in the survey. To assess the influence of age, gender, and other control characteristics in the sample, the authors implemented regression-based moderation analysis in the SPSS environment. The analysis indicated the moderating role of gender in the perception of corporate social responsibility, which appeared to be strong, especially in terms of leveraging business honesty, as a predictor. The sector, too, appeared to be a moderator, though it was much less statistically significant than gender. On the other hand, generation appeared to be an independent and significant predictor of corporate social responsibility perception itself, while its moderating effect was insignificant. The findings in the paper support existing literature in terms of moderating the role of gender, as outlined previously, yet, this research estimated that males value corporate social responsibility higher than females, while our results estimate the opposite. Our research revealed that age (generation) is a significant factor, which defines a personal attitude towards corporate social responsibility, i.e., the older generation values CSR higher than the youngsters. We have not found any correlation between the economic sector and corporate social responsibility perception.

Non-green labor patterns have a negative impact on health and organizational sustainable development. This research proposes a green labor style that takes the sustainable development of employees themselves as the premise, with the protection of their physical and mental health as a long-term goal, that is not only concerned with how to build a reasonable mechanism to guarantee the physical and mental health of employees, but also with the labor protection mechanism of the whole process, from production to output. On the basis of social cognitive theory and the job demands-resources (JD-R) model, this study recruited a sample of 884 Chinese employees to explore the mechanism of their willingness to conduct green labor, including factors such as institutional constraints, boundary management, and organization-based self-esteem (OBSE). The results show that high levels of institutional constraints curbed employee demand for green labor and, in employees, good boundary-management skills acted as a mechanism of resistance against negative constraints. Furthermore, individual OBSE, as a positive psychological resource, could buffer the negative impacts of the organizational scenarios on outcomes.

The transformation trend towards digital technology to achieve sustainability targets and meet legal regulations has been visible in many industries. The printing sector has already been increasingly boosting sustainability performance through digitalization to automate workflows of processes. The goal of this paper is to initially diagnose a sustainable performance of Printing 4.0 (Industry 4.0 in the printing sector). To achieve this goal, qualitative interviews were carried out with representatives of 11 printing companies. Results of the diagnostic study showed that advanced technologies have had a positive impact on sustainability in the analyzed printing companies due to a higher awareness of sustainability. It was observed in the surveyed sample that interviewees confirmed such an assumption. These companies that tailor their operational activities toward digitalization have more quickly noticed a positive effect on their sustainable businesses. This survey has served as a basis for more extensive research.

This study investigates the challenges to Nigeria’s renewable energy growth, specifically, it analyzes the factors that influence the intention to use renewable energy in Nigeria. This paper was based on the theory of planned behavior, the technology acceptance model, the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology, the diffusion of innovation theory, and previous studies on acceptance. The proposed hypotheses have been tested using structured questionnaires based on a sample of 500 Nigerian family heads. A structural equation modeling technique was used to analyze the relationships of the studied variables—relative advantage, ease of use, perceived behavioral control, subjective norm, awareness, cost, attitude, income, gender, age, and education—with purchase intention. The study findings show that attitude has a significant mediating effect on the relationship between intention to use and determinants (relative advantage, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control, ease of use, cost and awareness) and no significant impact on the purchase intention of the control variables (income, education, age, and gender) in the structural model. The study’s results support business decisions in the renewable energy sub-sector in Nigeria and other developing nations. Furthermore, the results of this study could serve as a reference for the government to make decisions concerning the implementation of renewable energy.

This study empirically investigates the role of employees’ perceptions of CSR in improving their green behavior in the hospitality industry. In addition, this study investigates the mediating role of employee well-being and the moderating role of hotels’ environmental strategy in this relationship. Empirical analysis is performed in a cross-country setting using evidence from Pakistan and Italy. The study model is tested through PLS-SEM using survey data of 485 hotel employees. Findings from the overall sample and country-specific samples reveal that CSR is positively and significantly related to employee green behavior. Moreover, employee well-being serves as a significant mediator in the relationship between corporate social responsibility and employee green behavior, while hotels’ environmental strategy significantly moderates this relationship in the overall and country-specific samples. These results suggest that paradoxically, though the selected countries have different tourism implementation levels, economic development, and cultures, the employees’ perceptions of CSR and its effect on their green behavior do not vary significantly across both countries.

Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has emerged as a global pandemic since late 2019 and has affected all forms of human life and economic developments. Various techniques are used to collect the infected patients’ sample, which carries risks of transferring the infection to others. The current study proposes an AI-powered UAV-based sample collection procedure through self-collection kits delivery to the potential patients and bringing the samples back for testing. Using a hypothetical case study of Islamabad, Pakistan, various test cases are run where the UAVs paths are optimized using four key algorithms, greedy, intra-route, inter-route, and tabu, to save time and reduce carbon emissions associated with alternate transportation methods. Four cases with 30, 50, 100, and 500 patients are investigated for delivering the self-testing kits to the patients. The results show that the Tabu algorithm provides the best-optimized paths covering 31.85, 51.35, 85, and 349.15 km distance for different numbers of patients. In addition, the algorithms optimize the number of UAVs to be used in each case and address the studied cases patients with 5, 8, 14, and 71 UAVs, respectively. The current study provides the first step towards the practical handling of COVID-19 and other pandemics in developing countries, where the risks of spreading the infections can be minimized by reducing person-to-person contact. Furthermore, the reduced carbon footprints of these UAVs are an added advantage for developing countries that struggle to control such emissions. The proposed system is equally applicable to both developed and developing countries and can help reduce the spread of COVID-19 through minimizing the person-to-person contact, thus helping the transformation of healthcare to smart healthcare.

The efficient development of Economic and Technological Development Zones (ETDZs) across China has been key to the country’s economic transformation. Despite this, few studies have addressed the dynamic characteristics of the efficiency of ETDZs. Taking China’s 115 national ETDZs established before 2010 as the research sample, this study measures the comprehensive operating efficiency of ETDZs and identifies dynamic characteristics of that efficiency throughout the period 2011–2017, using a three-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA) model and the Markov method. This research also explores the relationship between the operation efficiency of ETDZs and urban economic development. The results indicate that the operating efficiency of national ETDZs was generally low, and subject to a downward trend over the study period, the efficiency of ETDZs in the western region was found to be higher than that in the central and eastern areas. It was found that operating efficiency was stable in terms of the types of transfer witnessed, and the results emphasize the difficulty of achieving leapfrog development in a relatively short time. In addition, medium-high coupling coordination was detected in the relationship between urban social and economic development and the operating efficiency of ETDZs. When the operating efficiency of the ETDZ was high, this coupling coordination improved significantly. Finally, most of China’s ETDZs remain in a factor-driven stage in their development, with their expansion occurring at the expense of efficiency. Based on these results, this paper suggests that the government should pay greater attention to the overall efficiency and growth quality in the sustainable development of the country’s ETDZs.

This study investigates the application of a smart manufacturing execution system (SMES) based on the current controlling structure in a medium-sized company in the Czech Republic. Based on existing approaches on the architecture of SMESs, this paper develops a sample architecture grounded in the current controlling structure of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). While only a few papers on approaches to the given topic exist, this approach makes use of operative production controlling data and uses a standardisation module to provide standardised data. The sample architecture was validated with a case study on a Czech SME. This case study was conducted on two different entities of one production company suggesting differences in the entities due to the nature of production. The research showed that simple tasks with intelligent welding equipment allow for a working SMES architecture, while complex assembly works with a high extent of human labour, and a high number of components still remain an obstacle. This research contributes to gathering more understanding of SMES architectures in SMEs by making use of a standardisation module.

Due to differences in runners’ profiles, which can be related to sociodemographic characteristics, motivations for running can vary. This study aimed to identify Brazilian runners’ motivations for their practice, and the factors associated among runners who point to look for performance improvement as their main motivation. The sample comprised 1097 non-professional road runners. The questionnaire “Profile characterization and associated factors for runner’s performance” was used. The results showed that the oldest athletes and those with the highest income levels presented lower likelihood of reporting performance improvement as their main motivation for taking part in running. In terms of income level, results showed that as this increased, there was a lower chance of getting involved in practice with a focus on incremental improvements in performance. Differences between sexes were also observed, with men more likely to indicate performance improvement as their motivation for running. In Brazil, most runners reported “health” as their main motivation for running. Women, older runners, and those with higher income levels were less likely to point to performance improvements as their main motivation for taking up running.

The main objective of the study was to evaluate the interactions between students and schoolteachers during recess before and after the COVID-19 pandemic in primary schools in Catalonia (Spain). In a first phase, using an observational methodology, the behaviors of adults and students were diagnosed according to the type of school. The sample consisted of 23 schools, with 69 observations at different times of the school day. The COVID-19 outbreak made it necessary to extend the present study to identify changes in school recess forced by the pandemic. In this second phase, 34 school schoolteachers were interviewed. The results show little or no adult involvement during recess, beyond mere supervision, and the need for training to improve school recess management. Regarding the changes made during the pandemic, it is concluded that there was a good implementation of protocols, an increase in organization and a reduction in conflicts. The design of school recesses with the participation of schoolteachers and students is important, although during the pandemic, this idea has taken a back seat, with schoolteachers assuming the role of dividing groups and spaces, and supervising transitions. We emphasize the importance of training students to be more proactive in conflict resolution, to ensure self-care and individual and collective responsibility. This study has been co-financed under the RETSASO EFA 341/19 Project with FEDER funds. It has also been subsidized by the DOTS University Chair (Chair for the Development of Healthy and Sustainable Organizations and Territories), approved by agreement no. 193/2017 of the Governing Council of the University of Lleida on 19 July 2017.

Despite the substantial attention paid to green growth in recent years, how to achieve green growth is still underexamined because it is usually advocated as a political motto or development scheme at the macro level. This study aims to scrutinize the meanings of green growth, growth statuses, and growth paths at the corporate level. Meanwhile, eco-process, eco-product, and eco-system innovations were reviewed, and an adoption strategy that involves the concept of life cycle was put forward to support the choice of suitable eco-innovations and to realize micro-level green growth. Finally, 54 enterprises out of the top 500 enterprises in China were used for a multi-case study. The results demonstrate that the improvements in energy consumption were better than those of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the sample enterprises. However, only five firms achieved continuous green growth. For the majority of the enterprises, their significant economic growth was not certainly related to evident drops in unit energy consumption and GHG emissions. In addition, four firms obtained continuous grey growth, and the enterprises in manufacturing sectors exhibited inferior eco-efficiency. Corporate growth statuses and paths should not only be determined by considering a single environmental or economic measure. Enterprises in manufacturing sectors must develop specific eco-innovations that can greatly enhance their environmental performance. This study adds to the literature by expounding micro-level green growth as well as its relation to eco-innovations. This study also offers a quantitative and integrated view to advance corporate eco-innovations and green development.

This study explores the extent to which employee turnover, a proxy variable to employee loyalty, helps mediate the relationship between Taiwanese firms’ corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance and financial outcome. The results show that a firm’s CSR performance is negatively correlated with employee turnover and turnover variability, and moreover, employee turnover is negatively correlated with a firm’s financial performance. The result is especially noteworthy for studies regarding Taiwanese companies since quite a few of them are original equipment manufacturers (hereafter also referred to as OEMs), of intermediate goods. For the sample firms, although the contribution of social responsibility appears to have insignificantly direct benefit on financial performance, we document that the extent to which CSR conducts influence on long-term financial outcomes may be moderated and mediated by employee enthusiasm.