Sustainable Development Goal 10: Reduced Inequalities (1278)

The objective of this investigation was to describe the work engagement perceived by UK workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted. The sample included 1085 participants, aged 18 years and older, living in the UK during the COVID-19 pandemic, who were active workers. Data were collected using an online questionnaire and the UWES-9. They were analysed using descriptive statistics, a t-test for equality of means or ANOVA, and the Chi-squared Automatic Interaction Detection method. The mean value in the UWES-9 was 3.46 (SD = 1.11). Participants with lower satisfaction (21.8%) gave significantly low or very low UWES-9 scores in 58.5% of the cases. Greater work engagement was obtained with more resources and less conflict, risk, and stress. In cases where there had been contact with COVID-19, this was associated with slightly lower levels of work engagement. These results could motivate and guide companies to adopt risk prevention measures and protocols to return to normal working conditions after the initial crisis phase of the pandemic. Full article

Background: Violence against women and girls continues to be a widespread problem, and its elimination is one of the targets of the Sustainable Development Goal 5 toward achieving gender equality. One of the main causes of this violence is the structural sexism present in societies that continues to be perpetuated through pornography, especially among young people. Therefore, the main objective of this research is to analyze the consumption of pornography among young people, studying its effects and relationship with affective-sexual education. Methods: This study was carried out with a sample of 280 students in the north of Spain. The ages of the entire sample ranged from 18 to 37 years (M = 20.3, SD = 2.6). From the sample, 78.9% (n = 221) define their gender identity as women and 21.1% (n = 59) define their gender identity as men; no person within this research self-identify as non-binary. The instrument used was the Survey on Affective-sexual Education and Pornography (Ballester et al., 2019). The sample was recruited by snowball sampling. Results: The results of the present study show that the average age at which people start watching pornography is 10.4 years. The majority of young people consume it to satisfy their curiosity. In addition, with regard to gender, boys consume more pornography, especially for masturbation. Finally, 20.5% of the participants believe that the sexual education they have received has not been adequate, and most of them solve their sexual doubts by asking friends. Conclusions: The results indicate that it is necessary to improve the affective-sexual education provided in schools, since students consume pornography at a very early age, and young people have normalized its consumption to address their curiosity and satisfy their sexual needs. Finally, the impact of pornography consumption on SDG5 was reflected on. Full article

We aimed to develop a core outcome set (COS) for systems-wide public health interventions seeking to promote early life health and wellbeing. Research was embedded within the existing systems-based intervention research programme ‘ActEarly’, located in two different areas with high rates of child poverty, Bradford (West Yorkshire) and the Borough of Tower Hamlets (London). 168 potential outcomes were derived from five local government outcome frameworks, a community-led survey and an ActEarly consortium workshop. Two rounds of a Delphi study (Round 1: 37 participants; Round 2: 56 participants) reduced the number of outcomes to 64. 199 members of the community then took part in consultations across ActEarly sites, resulting in a final COS for systems-based public health interventions of 40 outcomes. These were grouped into the domains of: Development & education (N = 6); Physical health & health behaviors (N = 6); Mental health (N = 5); Social environment (N = 4); Physical environment (N = 7); and Poverty & inequality (N = 7). This process has led to a COS with outcomes prioritized from the perspectives of local communities. It provides the means to increase standardization and guide the selection of outcome measures for systems-based evaluation of public health programmes and supports evaluation of individual interventions within system change approaches. Full article

Alzheimer’s disease will affect more people with increases in the elderly population, as the elderly population of countries everywhere generally rises significantly. However, other factors such as regional climates, environmental conditions and even eating and drinking habits may trigger Alzheimer’s disease or affect the life quality of individuals already suffering from this disease. Today, the subject of biomedical engineering is being studied intensively by many researchers considering that it has the potential to produce solutions to various diseases such as Alzheimer’s caused by problems in molecule or cell communication. In this study, firstly, a molecular communication model with the potential to be used in the treatment and/or diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease was proposed, and its results were analyzed with an artificial neural network model. Secondly, the ratio of people suffering from Alzheimer’s disease to the total population, along with data of educational status, income inequality, poverty threshold, and the number of the poor in Turkey were subjected to detailed distribution analysis by using the random forest model statistically. As a result of the study, it was determined that a higher income level was causally associated with a lower risk of Alzheimer’s disease. Full article

Type 2 Diabetes (T2D) has reached epidemic levels among the pediatric population. Furthermore, disparities in T2D among youth are distributed in a manner that reflects the social inequality between population sub-groups. Here, we investigated the neighborhood determinants of T2D risk among a sample of Latino adolescents with obesity residing in Phoenix, Arizona (n = 133). In doing so we linked together four separate contextual data sources: the American Community Survey, the United States Department of Agriculture Food Access Research Atlas, the Arizona Healthy Community Map, and the National Neighborhood Data Archive to systematically analyze how and which neighborhood characteristics were associated with T2D risk factors as measured by fasting and 2-h glucose following a 75 g oral glucose tolerance test. Using linear regression models with and without individual/household covariates, we investigated how twenty-two housing and transportation sociodemographic and built and food environment characteristics were independently and jointly associated with T2D risk. The main finding from these analyses was the strong association between the density of fast food restaurants and 2-h glucose values (b = 2.42, p < 0.01). This association was independent of individual, household, and other neighborhood characteristics. Our results contribute to an increasingly robust literature demonstrating the deleterious influence of the neighborhood food environment, especially fast food, for T2D risk among Latino youth. Full article

The main drivers of gender mainstreaming in basic and clinical research appear to be funding agencies and scientific journals. Some funding agencies have already recognized the importance of their actions for the global development of ideas in science, but further targeted efforts are needed. The challenges for women scientists in fungal research appear to be similar to those in other science, technology, engineering, and mathematics disciplines, although the gender gap in mycology publishing appears to be less pronounced; however, women are underrepresented as last (corresponding) authors. Two examples of best practices to bridge the gap have been promoted in the fungal community: “power hour” and a central resource database for women researchers of fungi and oomycetes. A more balanced ratio of women researchers among (plenary) session speakers, (plenary) session chairs, and committee members at the recent fungal genetics conference is an encouraging sign that the gender gap can be closed. The editorial policy of some journals follows the guidance “Sex and Gender Equality in Research,” and other journals should follow, and indicate the gender ratio among authors and reviewers. Full article

Rising income inequality is strongly linked to health disparities, particularly in regions where uneven distribution of wealth and income has long been a concern. Despite emerging evidence of COVID-19-related health inequalities for adults, limited evidence is available for children and their parents. This study aimed to explore subtypes of families of preschoolers living in the disadvantaged neighborhoods of Hong Kong based on patterns of family hardship and to compare their patterns of parenting behavior, lifestyle practices, and wellbeing during the COVID-19 pandemic. Data were collected from 1338 preschoolers and their parents during March to June 2020. Latent class analysis was performed based on 11 socioeconomic and disease indicators. Multivariate logistic regressions were used to examine associations between identified classes and variables of interest during the COVID-19 pandemic. Four classes of family hardship were identified. Class 1 (45.7%) had the lowest disease and financial burden. Class 2 (14.0%) had the highest financial burden. Class 3 (5.9%) had the highest disease burden. Class 4 (34.5%) had low family income but did not receive government welfare assistance. Class 1 (low hardship) had lower risks of child maltreatment and adjustment problems than Class 2 (poverty) and Class 3 (poor health). However, children in Class 1 (low hardship) had higher odds of suffering psychological aggression and poorer physical wellbeing than those in Class 4 (low income), even after adjusting for child age and gender. The findings emphasize the need to adopt flexible intervention strategies in the time of large disease outbreak to address diverse problems and concerns among socially disadvantaged families. Full article

The COVID crisis has disrupted routine patterns and practices across all spheres of everyday life, rupturing social relations and destabilising our capacity for building coherent selves and communities by recollecting the past and imagining potential futures. Education is a key domain in which these hopes for the future have been dashed for many young people and in which commitments to critical scholarship and pedagogies are being contested. In a world of stark socioeconomic inequality, racism, and other forms of dehumanising othering, the pandemic serves not to disrupt narratives of meritocracy and progress but to expose them as the myths they have always been. This paper will explore forms of political resistance and the (im)possibilities for experimental pedagogies in response to the broken promises and unrealised dreams of (higher) education in the context of the COVID crisis. Reflecting on my own everyday life as a scholar and educator in a South African university, and in dialogue with students’ narratives of experience, I will examine the ways in which the experience of the pandemic has released and mobilised new forms of resistance to historical institutional and pedagogical practices. However, these hopeful threads of alternative narratives are fragile, improvised in the weighty conditions of a status quo resistant to change, and in which the alienation and inequality of the terrain are being exacerbated and deepened through a proliferation of bureaucratic and technicist solutions. Full article

This study extends the theory of planned behavior model and examines the humane factors (altruism, environmental knowledge, personal appearance concerns, attitude, perceived behavioral control, and subjective norms) that shape attitudes and buyer behavior toward cruelty-free cosmetics and the consumer characteristics that reflect their behavior toward such products. Recent global occurrences have affected human behavioral patterns, namely, the COVID-19 pandemic, which we aim to study. Has behavior changed to become more ethical? A survey was carried out involving a sample of 425 Portuguese participants (a feminine culture), following a convenience- and snowball-sampling procedure. Significant correlations were found between environmental knowledge, subjective norms, and buyer behavior toward cruelty-free cosmetics with attitude and environmental knowledge and buyer behavior. Through structural equation modeling to evaluate the conceptual model, a good model fit was found, being that standardized values in the model are significant except for regressions from perceived behavior control and personal appearance concerns to buyer behavior toward cruelty-free cosmetics. Women present higher values than men on attitude, altruism, environmental knowledge, and buyer behavior, in line with what is expected in a traditional and conservative feminine culture such as that to be found in Portugal. Such a result points to the need to promote increased gender equality, for example, in senior leadership roles, as women are seen to have the desirable qualities required for a more sustainable, cruelty-free, and humane society. This is an alert for human-resource managers in the region. Full article

Debates in urban social research indicate that one of the most significant problems facing cities of the global south is the dilemma of crime. This study explores the research question: what is the level of influence of economic deprivation and residential mobility weights on criminal activities within vulnerable neighborhoods in urban centres? This research focuses on the urban social structural theory of social disorganization, to investigate how socioeconomic, demographic, and physical characteristics affect criminal behaviour. The study adopted a qualitative research approach that is cross-sectional. With the use of volunteer self-selection sampling techniques, in-depth interviews were conducted with heads of households via a semi-structured interview guide. The data were analyzed using thematic analysis. The study found that sociological factors such as economic deprivation and socioeconomic inequality lead to the gradual integration of delinquency in cities. The findings of this research build on the existing theory of social disorganization. To ensure safety, residents’ economic status must be standardized by supporting the provision of more regulated informal sector opportunities and activities for active engagement in supervising and controlling youth behaviour. Full article

(1) Background: Tuberculosis presents an epidemiological trend toward inequality, especially among people in social exclusion and situations of vulnerability. This study aimed to analyze territories with a concentration of people diagnosed with tuberculosis in a street situation and who partake in chronic use of alcohol, tobacco, and illicit drugs. We also analyzed trends in this health condition in southern Brazil. (2) Methods: Ecological study, developed in the 399 municipalities of Paraná, southern Brazil, with all tuberculosis cases in the homeless population registered in the Information System of Notifiable Diseases between 2014 and 2018. For data analysis, we used descriptive statistics, the Prais–Winsten autoregression method for the time series, and the Getis-Ord Gi technique* for spatial analysis. (3) Results: in total, 560 cases were reported. We found a predominance of alcohol, smoking, and illicit drug users, with an increasing trend in the state and clusters of spatial risk in the East health macro-region. (4) Conclusions: We observed territories with critical levels of highly vulnerable people who use psychoactive substances and are in a street situation. The results highlight the importance of incorporating public policies of social protection for these individuals and resolutive health services that receive these cases and assist in eradicating TB. Full article

Advances in technology and population growth are two factors responsible for increasing electricity consumption, which directly increases the production of electrical energy. Additionally, due to environmental, technical and economic constraints, it is challenging to meet demand at certain hours, such as peak hours. Therefore, it is necessary to manage network consumption to modify the peak load and tackle power system constraints. One way to achieve this goal is to use a demand response program. The home energy management system (HEMS), based on advanced internet of things (IoT) technology, has attracted the special attention of engineers in the smart grid (SG) field and has the tasks of demand-side management (DSM) and helping to control equality between demand and electricity supply. The main performance of the HEMS is based on the optimal scheduling of home appliances because it manages power consumption by automatically controlling loads and transferring them from peak hours to off-peak hours. This paper presents a multi-objective version of a newly introduced metaheuristic called the bald eagle search optimization algorithm (BESOA) to discover the optimal scheduling of home appliances. Furthermore, the HEMS architecture is programmed based on MATLAB and ThingSpeak modules. The HEMS uses the BESOA algorithm to find the optimal schedule pattern to reduce daily electricity costs, reduce the PAR, and increase user comfort. The results show the suggested system’s ability to obtain optimal home energy management, decreasing the energy cost, microgrid emission cost, and PAR (peak to average ratio). Full article

To raise awareness about health inequalities, a well-functioning health inequality monitoring system (HIMS) is crucial. Drawing on work conducted under the Joint Action Health Equity Europe, the aim of this paper is to illustrate the strengths and weaknesses in current health inequality monitoring based on lessons learned from 12 European countries and to discuss what can be done to strengthen their capacities. Fifty-five statements were used to collect information about the status of the capacities at different steps of the monitoring process. The results indicate that the preconditions for monitoring vary greatly between countries. The availability and quality of data are generally regarded as strong, as is the ability to disaggregate data by age and gender. Regarded as poorer is the ability to disaggregate data by socioeconomic factors, such as education and income, or by other measures of social position, such as ethnicity. Few countries have a proper health inequality monitoring strategy in place and, where in place, it is often regarded as poorly up to date with policymakers’ needs. These findings suggest that non-data-related issues might be overlooked aspects of health inequality monitoring. Structures for stakeholder involvement and communication that attracts attention from policymakers are examples of aspects that deserve more effort. Full article

Gender-related barriers to immunization are key targets to improve immunization coverage and equity. We used individual-level demographic and health survey data from 52 low- and middle-income countries to examine the relationship between women’s social independence (measured by the Survey-based Women’s emPowERment (SWPER) Global Index) and childhood immunization. The primary outcome was receipt of three doses of the diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis vaccine (DTP3) among children aged 12–35 months; we secondarily examined failure to receive any doses of DTP-containing vaccines. We summarized immunization coverage indicators by social independence tertile and estimated crude and adjusted summary measures of absolute and relative inequality. We conducted all analyses at the country level using individual data; median results across the 52 examined countries are also presented. In crude comparisons, median DTP3 coverage was 12.3 (95% CI 7.9; 16.3) percentage points higher among children of women with the highest social independence compared with children of women with the lowest. Thirty countries (58%) had a difference in coverage between those with the highest and lowest social independence of at least 10 percentage points. In adjusted models, the median coverage was 7.4 (95% CI 5.0; 9.1) percentage points higher among children of women with the highest social independence. Most countries (41, 79%) had statistically significant relative inequality in DTP3 coverage by social independence. The findings suggest that greater social independence for women was associated with better childhood immunization outcomes, adding evidence in support of gender-transformative strategies to reduce childhood immunization inequities. Full article

Several factors affect the relationship between a diabetic patient and a healthcare worker. Among these, there is the well-being of healthcare workers and how they perceive their work environment, especially in the context of the presence or absence of gender inequality. To show the importance of these aspects, a selected sample of healthcare workers who were exposed daily to people (mainly diabetic patients) within the working environment were interviewed. The different opinions of the interviewees show that in an environment where factors that negatively affected their work and personal well-being were minimized, healthcare workers were able to fully express their potential. They expressed great satisfaction with their work involving daily contact with patients, while achieving the type of patient–healthcare worker relationship model desired for a better management of diabetic patients’ care. Full article

Background: Patients with hypertension are sensitive to multimorbidities (i.e., the existence of ≥2 chronic diseases), and the related treatment can create enormous economic burdens. We sought to examine the distribution of multimorbidities, the prevalence and factors of catastrophic health expenditure (CHE), the impact of multimorbidities on CHE, and the variation in this relationship across age groups, work status, and combinations of socioeconomic status and health insurance types. Methods: Socioeconomic-related inequality associated with CHE was estimated by concentration curve and concentration index. We examined the determinants of CHE and the impact of age groups, work status, and combinations of socioeconomic groups and health insurance schemes against the relationship with multimorbidities and CHE using logistic regression. Results: 5693 (83.3%) participants had multimorbidities. In total, 49.8% of families had experienced CHE, and the concentration index was −0.026 (95% confidence interval [CI], −0.032 to −0.020). Multimorbidities were related to the increased odds of CHE (odds ratio [OR], 1.21; 95% CI, 1.18–1.25). The relationship between multimorbidities and CHE persisted across age groups, work status, and combinations of socioeconomic status and health insurance schemes. Conclusions: More than 80% of patients with hypertension had multimorbidities. The protection of health insurance schemes against financial risks is very limited. Full article

Research on environmental pollution and public health has aroused increasing concern from international scholars; particularly, environmental hazards are among the important issues in China, focusing public attention on significant health risks. However, there are few studies concentrated on how perceived environmental hazards are characterized by spatial variation and on the impact of these risks on residents’ health. Based on a large-scale survey of Zhengzhou City in 2020, we investigated how the self-rated health of residents and the environmental hazards perceived by them were spatially inequal at a fine (subdistrict) scale in Zhengzhou City, China, and examined the relationship among self-rated health, environmental hazards, and geographical context. The Getis–Ord Gi* method was applied to explore the spatially dependent contextual (neighborhood) effect on environmental health inequality, and the ordered multivariate logistic regression method was used to examine the correlative factors with environmental hazards, geographical context, and health inequality. The results reveal that self-rated health and environmental hazards were disproportionately distributed across the whole city and that these distributions showed certain spatial cluster characteristics. The hot spot clusters of self-rated health had favorable environmental quality where the hot spot clusters of environmental hazards were located and vice versa. In addition, health inequality was evident and was related to gender, income level, educational attainment, and housing area of residents, and the inequalities of environmental hazards existed with respect to income and housing area. Meanwhile, environmental risk inequalities associated with the social vulnerability of residents (the poor and those with low educational attainment) were obvious, with those residents experiencing a disproportionately high exposure to environmental hazards and reporting bad health conditions. The role of the geographical context (subdistrict location feature) also helps to explain the spatial distribution of health and environmental inequalities. Residents with better exposure to green coverage generally reported higher levels of self-rated health condition. In addition, the geographical location of the subdistrict also had a significant impact on the difference in residents’ self-rated health status. The purpose of this study is to provide reference for policy makers to optimize the spatial pattern of urban public services and improve public health and environmental quality at a fine scale. Full article

The lower digitization among seniors must be understood in the context of the coming together of multiple digital divides. In addition to the obvious generation divide (age is one of the factors most determining digital uses), others also have an influence, such as a lower education or income level, which is characteristic of this group and also strongly correlated with lower use of new technologies. We also find gender differences in the digital uses of seniors (more pronounced than in the population as a whole) and a significant geospatial inequality in several variables. The latter is important due to both the rapid aging of the rural population, greater than that seen in the urban population, and the fact that the geographical areas with a lower income level, where the aging population tends to be concentrated to a greater extent, are also the areas where digitization reaches the least, in terms of both infrastructures and uses. This article addresses the multiconfluence of the aforementioned “digital divides in older people” (or “seniors”), trying to determine the effects and degree of importance of each, identify the main groups at risk of digital exclusion, and to characterize the technological uses of seniors and their main segments. To do this, we have used the microdata from the “Survey on Equipment and Use of Information and Communication Technologies in homes”, produced by the Spanish Statistical Office (INE) for the year 2020. Full article

The present article analyzes the connection between, on the one hand, gender equality and, on the other hand, loneliness and social isolation. It hypothesizes that modern relational institutions that support gender equality, such as no-fault divorce laws, reduce loneliness in close relationships. This hypothesis is put to the test through a multilevel analysis of the International Social Survey Program (ISSP) 2017. The analysis reveals that the data agree, to a large extent, with the theoretical arguments. The prevalence of loneliness is higher in countries with higher levels of gender inequality (as measured by the Gender Inequality Index (GII)). This can be attributed to a moderation effect; at lower levels of gender inequality, partnerships provide better protection from loneliness. These results are robust to controls for demographic composition, level of health, educational attainment, income poverty, and interview mode. Last, the analyses show that the threat of emotional isolation is more widespread in countries with low gender inequality. These findings, however, are only significant before controlling for demographic composition, level of health, educational attainment, income poverty, and interview mode, and they require further analysis. The concluding section relates these findings to the popular tendency to argue that modern society has created a “loneliness epidemic” and discusses policy implications. Full article

It is evident that relations between political conditions and community development have become sophisticated in recent years. More people now live in urbanized areas, and this ongoing urbanization has various ramifications. Many countries are facing swift urban transformation which alters their regional development patterns. Urban sprawl, migration and rural depopulation, regional inequalities, increasing urban poverty, and social injustice are some of these emerging problems. Assessing regional development for identifying the aforementioned predicaments is really imperative and related to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 11. However, there are limited studies that focus on the assessment of regional sustainable development at both national and regional scales, simultaneously. Thus, this study aims to fill the gap by developing a robust method that can assess and compare the level of sustainability in various regions and at varying scales. This helps to identify areas where urgent prevention or mitigation strategies and action plans are required. In this study, we strived to evaluate Iran’s regions and Tehran’s provinces based on sustainability indicators. To end this, the authors use factor analysis and F’ANP model in both assessments. The results of the study show that Tehran Province was the most developed province, and its F’ANP result was 2.006. Tehran is 10% more sustainable than the third region in the country which is Khorasan Razavi. Isfahan and Khorasan Razavi provinces were in the next in rank with scores of 1.984 and 1.8, respectively. At the bottom of the list, the northern Khorasan, Ilam, and Kohkiloye-Boyerahmad provinces were in the lowest ranked in terms of access to sustainability indices. It is patently obvious that Iran suffers from uneven development, and the majority of border provinces have moderate or bad situations. This uneven development also intensifies migration to Tehran, which already has one-sixth of Iran’s population which has led todeteriorating social inequity and environmental injustice, nationally. The results of the regional assessment of Tehran also show that there is uneven development in Tehran Province. Tehran County is twice as good and sustainable as 68 percent of the counties in this region. The F’ANP result for Tehran County was 0.580, and it has been ranked first over a period due to the exceptional number of facilities in this region. Tehran County became 20% more sustainable during this decade. After Tehran, Firoozkoh and Damavand counties were in the next ranks with scores of 0.389 and 0.343, respectively. Qarchak, Ghods, and Baharestan counties were the weakest based on the sustainability indices, and their F’ANP results were below 0.2. Full article

Cities continuously evolve and dynamically organize themselves in unbalanced ways and by means of complex processes. Efforts to minimize or solve the problems resulting from spatial inequalities tend to fail when relying on traditional public policies. This work is committed to analyzing the context for implementing public policies and their impacts on the periphery of São Paulo, Brazil. São Paulo is a city characterized by territorial and social heterogeneity and inequality. The materialization of these public policies involves the construction of unified educational centers in peripheral neighborhoods that, in addition to education, offer sports, leisure, and entertainment activities not only to enrolled students but to the wider residents’ community. The adopted methodology was based on cellular automata models driven by remotely sensed images designed to investigate land use and land cover patterns in the surroundings of these educational centers before and after their construction. The achieved results demonstrate that the initial land use and land cover configurations have a great influence on the land use and land cover spatial arrangements after the construction of the educational centers. However, in all the test sites of this research, it was observed that these social infrastructure facilities favored the reproduction of real estate market logic, marked by socially exclusive differentiation and an uneven appreciation of the urban environment. Full article

Engineering is traditionally considered a male domain with lower female participation despite various affirmative actions taken in recent decades. There is evidence of greater gender equality as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and precautionary lockdown measures. With this in mind, this paper investigates whether women engineers in India were more adversely affected than their male counterparts by the COVID-19 pandemic. Such an impact may be explained by ‘intersectional stigma’, expanded upon in the literature on discrimination. The impact of such stigma varies in different countries based on socio-cultural factors. Through the use of ethnographic and statistical research methods on secondary and primary data from a sample of 384 engineers, this paper shows that the impact of COVID-19 is not significantly different between genders in engineering education and employment. This may be due to the high demand for digital engineering skills, and strong family support in Indian society. Engineering branch may play a relatively more important role than gender in terms of impact. This finding has repercussions for continuing engineering education (CEE) programs and regulatory bodies in India in terms of enhancing course content and the results may be used in developing affirmative programs in other regions. Full article

We explore the role that a country’s economic and political uncertainty plays in shaping its environmental performance. We put emphasis on the role played by gender diversity in the board of firms, and we address two limitations characterizing the literature on the topic: (i) the use of static modelling that prevents identifying static and dynamic endogeneity and (ii) the assumption that the relationship is linear, which prevents accounting for the factors that affect the magnitude and the shape of this nexus. Using a System-GMM approach, we find evidence that gender diversity is associated positively with firms’ environmental results. Furthermore, the intensity of this relationship is increasing in gender diversity, and more importantly, the effect tends to be greater in less uncertain countries. These findings are of first importance in terms of the policy. Improving environmental quality can be achieved cost-effectively through the promotion of gender diversity, along with building/strengthening institutions to mitigate the effects of economic and political uncertainty. The benefits of these actions can support an effective implementation of the UN SDGs related to gender equality (Goal 5) and several environment-related SDGs (Goal 13 and Goal 15). Full article

Being unemployed has been linked to various health burdens. In particular, there appears to be an association between unemployment and alcohol-attributable deaths. However, risk estimates presented in a previous review were based on only two studies. Thus, we estimated updated sex-stratified alcohol-attributable mortality risks for unemployed compared with employed individuals. A systematic literature search was conducted in August 2020 using the following databases: Embase, MEDLINE, PsycINFO, and Web of Science. The relative risk (RR) of dying from an alcohol-attributable cause of death for unemployed compared with employed individuals was summarized using sex-stratified random-effects DerSimonian-Laird meta-analyses. A total of 10 studies were identified, comprising about 14.4 million women and 19.0 million men, among whom there were about 3147 and 17,815 alcohol-attributable deaths, respectively. The pooled RRs were 3.64 (95% confidence interval (CI): 2.04–6.66) and 4.93 (95% CI 3.45–7.05) for women and men, respectively. The findings of our quantitative synthesis provide evidence that being unemployed is associated with an over three-fold higher risk of alcohol-attributable mortality compared with being employed. Consequently, a global public health strategy connecting brief interventions and specialized care with social services assisting those currently unemployed is needed. Full article

(1) Background: This study introduces a novel computational approach to examine government capabilities in information intervention for risk management, influential agents in a global information network, and the socioeconomic factors of information-sharing behaviors of the public across regions during the COVID-19 pandemic. (2) Methods: Citation network analysis was employed to gauge the online visibility of governmental health institutions across regions. A bipartite exponential random graph modeling (ERGM) procedure was conducted to measure network dynamics. (3) Results: COVID-19 response agencies in Europe had the highest web impact, whereas health agencies in North America had the lowest. Various stakeholders, such as businesses, non-profit organizations, governments, and educational institutions played a key role in sharing the COVID-19 response by agencies’ information given on their websites. Income inequality and GDP per capita were associated with the high online visibility of governmental health agencies. Other factors, such as population size, an aging population, death rate, and case percentage, did not contribute to the agencies’ online visibility, suggesting that demographic characteristics and health status are not predictors of sharing government resources. (4) Conclusions: A combination of citation network analysis and ERGM helps reveal information flow dynamics and understand the socioeconomic consequences of sharing the government’s COVID-19 information during the pandemic. Full article

Using the same data set, a researcher can obtain very different reduced form estimates just by assuming different macroeconomic models. Reiterative Truncated Projected Least Squares (RTPLS) or Variable Slope Generalized Least Squares (VSGLS) can be used to estimate total derivatives that are not model dependent. These estimates can be used to pick between competing macro models, improve current models, or create new models. A selected survey of RTPLS estimates in the literature reveals several common patterns: (1) as income inequality has surged around the world, the effect of changes in government spending (G), exports (X), and money supply (M-1) on Gross Domestic Product (GDP) have plummeted, (2) decreases in G, X, and M-1 cause GDP to fall more than equal increases in G, X, and M-1 cause GDP to rise, and (3) unusually large increases in G and M-1 cause their effect on GDP to plummet. These common patterns fit with a global glut of savings hypothesis, which predicts that an increase in savings will not cause an increase in production expanding investment. An appropriate model could be built around the idea that investors have a choice between investing to increase production or investing to earn rent or interest. Full article

With the vast number of comments posted daily on social media and other platforms, manually monitoring internet activity for possible national security risks or cyberbullying is an impossible task. However, with recent advances in machine learning (ML), the automatic monitoring of such posts for possible national security risks and cyberbullying becomes feasible. There is still the issue of privacy on the internet; however, in this study, only the technical aspects of designing an automated system that could monitor and detect hate speech in the Arabic language were targeted, which many companies, such as Facebook, Twitter, and others, could use to prevent hate speech and cyberbullying. For this task, a unique dataset consisting of 4203 comments classified into seven categories, including content against religion, racist content, content against gender equality, violent content, offensive content, insulting/bullying content, normal positive comments, and normal negative comments, was designed. The dataset was extensively preprocessed and labeled, and its features were extracted. In addition, the use of deep recurrent neural networks (RNNs) was proposed for the classification and detection of hate speech. The proposed RNN architecture, called DRNN-2, consisted of 10 layers with 32 batch sizes and 50 iterations for the classification task. Another model consisting of five hidden layers, called DRNN-1, was used only for binary classification. Using the proposed models, a recognition rate of 99.73% was achieved for binary classification, 95.38% for the three classes of Arabic comments, and 84.14% for the seven classes of Arabic comments. This accuracy was high for the classification of a complex language, such as Arabic, into seven different classes. The achieved accuracy was higher than that of similar methods reported in the recent literature, whether for binary classification, three-class classification, or seven-class classification, as discussed in the literature review section. Full article

Building upon prior research on intergenerational income mobility, we assess class effects versus racial effects on the probability of becoming a poor adult, broken down by gender. We define the class effect (for each race-and-gender group) as the difference between the probability that a person who was born into the lowest income quintile becomes poor and the probability that a person who was born into the highest income quintile becomes poor. For each minority-by-gender group, using Whites as the baseline, the racial effect is defined as the average racial differential in the probability of becoming a poor adult, irrespective of class origins. The results indicate that, for all minority-by-gender groups, the class effect is larger than the racial effect. Our findings underscore the continuing significance of the comparatively large effects of class origins, which have not been adequately acknowledged in recent research. Full article

Enhancing water use efficiency (WUE) is essential for the sustainable and green development of water utilization. The conventional Super Slack-Based Measure (CSSBM) model is commonly employed to measure WUE, however, it is prone to underestimating WUE due its exaggeration of the slack variable. Recognizing the need to deal with problems involving the slack variable without limitation, we propose an improved Super-SBM (ISSBM) model that assigns an upper bound to the slack variables. In addition, the general deprivation index (GDI) of water resource exploitation is then introduced as the output indicator representing the social equality, resulting in a comprehensive set of output indicators related to the economy, society, and ecological environment. The ISSBM and CSSBM models were applied to determine the WUE in Guangdong province, China from 2009 to 2018, and the results indicate that the WUE calculated via CSSBM exhibited relatively extreme performance (i.e., the high and low values were greater than 2 and less than 0.1, respectively), while the ISSBM-estimated WUE showed relatively stable performance (i.e., the majority of the city’s WUE was located in the range between 0.5 and 1). The WUE determined from the output indicators involving GDI thus demonstrated stronger discriminating power compared to that without GDI. Furthermore, the spatial pattern of WUE in Guangdong province presents an essentially radial distribution, with high WUE located in Pearl River Delta and low WUE located North, East, and West of Guangdong. These results verify that the proposed ISSBM model can obtain a relatively appropriate WUE and could potentially be applied to other regions. Full article

This study explores the social gradient of psychiatric morbidity. The Hong Kong Mental Morbidity Survey (HKMMS), consisting of 5719 Chinese adults aged 16 to 75 years, was used. The Chinese version of the Revised Clinical Interview Schedule (CIS-R) was employed for psychiatric assessment of common mental disorders (CMD). People with a less advantaged socioeconomic position (lower education, lower household income, unemployment, small living area and public rental housing) had a higher prevalence of depression and anxiety disorder. People with lower incomes had worse physical health (OR 2.01, 95% CI 1.05–3.82) and greater odds of having CMD in the presence of a family history of psychiatric illnesses (OR 1.67, 95% CI 1.18–2.36). Unemployment also had a greater impact for those in lower-income groups (OR 2.67; 95% CI 1.85–3.85), whereas no significant association was observed in high-income groups (OR 0.56; 95% CI 0.14–2.17). Mitigating strategies in terms of services and social support should target socially disadvantaged groups with a high risk of psychiatric morbidity. Such strategies include collaboration among government, civil society and business sectors in harnessing community resources. Full article

Globally, urbanisation has been the most significant factor causing land use and land cover changes due to accelerated population growth and limited governmental regulation. Urban communities worldwide, particularly in Iraq, are on the frontline for dealing with threats associated with environmental degradation, climate change and social inequality. However, with respect to the effects of urbanization, most previous studies have overlooked ecological problems, and have disregarded strategic environmental assessment, which is an effective tool for ensuring sustainable development. This study aims to provide a comprehensive vulnerability assessment model for urban areas experiencing environmental degradation, rapid urbanisation and high population growth, to help formulate policies for urban communities and to support sustainable livelihoods in Iraq and other developing countries. The proposed model was developed by integrating three functions of fuzzy logic: the fuzzy analytic hierarchy process, fuzzy linear membership and fuzzy overlay gamma. Application of the model showed that 11 neighbourhoods in the study area, and more than 175,000 individuals, or 25% of the total population, were located in very high vulnerability regions. The proposed model offers a decision support system for allocating required financial resources and efficiently implementing mitigation processes for the most vulnerable urban areas. Full article

Studies have reported that there is a gender disparity wherein women do not study equally to men in bachelor’s degrees in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) areas, although they lead the race of having a better terminal efficiency rate in higher education. This research explores engineering students’ math anxiety and math self-efficacy levels, aiming to determine if there is a gender gap for this specific population. Data were collected from 498 students using adapted items from existing surveys. These items were translated to Spanish, and validity tests were used to establish content validity and reliability. A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used to determine possible differences between male and female math anxiety and math self-efficacy levels. Male engineering students reported higher self-efficacy and lower math anxiety levels, and this difference was shown to be significant according to the MANOVA results. Findings of this research could help engineering educators to better understand how their students feel when they are practicing and performing math-related activities and what type of strategies could be designed when aiming to ameliorate female students’ math anxiety feelings. Full article

Groundwater irrigation has a critical role in the sustainability of arable farming in many developing countries including Pakistan. Groundwater irrigation is generally practiced to supplement surface water supplies in Pakistan. Nevertheless, uninterrupted and extensive use of groundwater irrigation has raised several concerns about its sustainability and resultant environmental implications. Due to the scarcity of groundwater and heterogeneity in farmers’ resources, informal groundwater markets have emerged in Pakistan, where farmers trade water using a contractual system. Yet, the effects of these markets on agricultural productivity and equity remain largely unknown. This paper aims to analyze the impact of participation in the groundwater market on farmland utilization, cropping patterns, water access, and income. We analyze these impacts using primary data collected from 360 farmers in three different zones of the country’s largest province. The farmers were categorized as buyers, sellers, and self-users of water. Results indicate that participation in water markets increased agricultural land utilization, evinced by a higher cropping intensity among participants. A horizontal and vertical equity analysis of water markets shows that although large farmers have better access to groundwater irrigation, water market participation improves equity to water access. Based on income inequality measures such as the Gini coefficient and the Lorenz curve, water market participation also improves farmer incomes regardless of farm size. Propensity score matching revealed that wheat yield and income among water-market participants went up by approximately 150 kg and PKR 4503 per acre compared with non-participants. Groundwater market participants’ higher crop productivity and income level suggest that water markets need a thorough revisit in terms of policy focus and institutional support to ensure sustainable rural development. Full article

South Africa has long grappled with one of the highest HIV and tuberculosis (TB) burdens in the world. The COVID-19 pandemic poses challenges to the country’s already strained health system. Measures to contain COVID-19 virus may have further hampered the containment of HIV and TB in the country and further widened the socioeconomic gap. South Africa’s handling of the pandemic has led to disruptions to HIV/TB testing and treatment. It has, furthermore, influenced social risk factors associated with increased transmission of these diseases. Individuals living with HIV and/or TB also face higher risk of developing severe COVID-19 disease. In this case study, we contextualize the HIV/TB landscape in South Africa and analyze the direct and indirect impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the country’s efforts to combat these ongoing epidemics. Full article

Income inequality in China has become increasingly serious since the beginning of the economic reform period in the 1970s, with urban–rural income inequality playing a large role. Urbanization policy and monetary policy are currently important economic policy tools for the Chinese government. In order to investigate the influence of inequality on the economy and to provide recommendations for ensuring the sustainability of growth, we study the effect of urban–rural income inequality on economic growth in the context of urbanization and monetary policy in China between 2002 and 2021. Using a flexible time-varying parametric structural vector auto-regression (TVP-VAR) model and a robust Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithm, our empirical results show that the effect is time-varying, with inequality promoting growth in the early years but affecting it adversely at later stages. Currently, urbanization mitigates inequality and promotes growth simultaneously, while easy monetary policy worsens inequality and affects growth adversely in the long term. We suggest that the authorities need to consider the implementation of policy rebalancing to ensure that the sustainability of economic development is not jeopardized because of worsening income disparity. Proactive urbanization policy and prudent monetary policy are viable rebalancing options. Full article

In Sport for Development (SFD), sport is used as a cost-effective tool to facilitate the objectives of various organizations, not limited to increasing access to education, youth development, social cohesion, and gender equality. This review aims to systematically analyze SFD programs that contribute to gender equality and women empowerment under Sustainable Development Goal 5 (SDG 5). The PRISMA methodology was used to guide the screening and selection process. Fifteen studies were identified from the Web of Science, Scopus, and SPORTDiscus databases, the Journal of Sport for Development, forward–backward reference searches, and manual searches on four prominent sport, gender, and development researchers. The findings indicated that there was evidence of micro-level outcomes in every study and three achieved meso-level impact; however, none of these studies’ suggested changes have reached the macro-level of impact when the outcomes were reported in these articles. There was a lack of intervention studies that investigated the mechanisms and reported outcomes through a validated monitoring and evaluation process. This review provides significant insights into: (a) identifying future SFD research areas, (b) refining SFD program evaluations, (c) developing indicators of outcomes for sport programs contributing to SDG 5, and (d) reproducing sustainable development outcomes under SDG 5. Full article

The mental health (MH) of especially children and adolescents with low socioeconomic status (SES) benefits from access to greenspaces. This study aimed at investigating social inequalities in the association between several types of social infrastructure (SI) and MH in children and adolescents. The sample comprised 12,624 children and adolescents of the KiGGS Wave 2 study (2014–2017). KiGGS provided information on SI (access to playgrounds, sports fields, swimming pools, parks) for all children and the environmental module (GerES V) within KiGGS on the walking time to SI for a subsample. Social inequality was measured by parental SES and the German Index of Socioeconomic deprivation and MH by the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. Ordinal logistic regression analyses showed that access to fewer SI places was associated with higher odds of MH problems. Children and adolescents experiencing high (but not medium or low) socioeconomic deprivation at the municipal level were more likely to have MH problems when having less access to SI places. At the individual level, MH problems in high- and low-SES, but not medium-SES children and adolescents were associated with no access to SI places. Children and adolescents from high socioeconomically deprived areas and with low and high SES might benefit from high-availability SI. Full article

Measures of inequality can be used to illustrate inequality between and within groups, but the choice of the appropriate measure can have different implications. This study focused on the Mean Logarithmic Deviation, the measure proposed by Theil and based on the techniques of statistical information theory. The MLD was selected because of its attractive properties: fulfillment of the principle of monotonicity and the possibility of additive decomposition. The following study objectives were formulated: (1) to assess the degree of inequality in the population and in the distinguished subgroups, (2) to determine the extent to which education and age influence the level of inequality, and (3) to ascertain what factors contribute to changes in the level of inequality in Poland. The study confirmed an association between the level of education and the average income of the groups distinguished on this basis. The education level of the household head remains an important determinant of household income inequality in Poland, despite the decline in the “educational bonus”. The study also found that differences in the age of the household head had a smaller effect on income inequality than the level of education. However, it can be concluded that the higher share of older people may contribute to an increase in income inequality between groups, as the income from pension in Poland is more homogeneous than the income from work in younger groups. Moreover, the current paper seeks to situate Theil’s approach in the context of scholarly writings since 1967. Full article

Although economic and environmental paradigms of sustainability in organizations are highly researched, more work is needed to understand the mechanisms concerning the impact of social factors. Given the importance of social sustainability in current organizational contexts, we explore how gender dimensions (diversity, equality) and social capital dimensions (embeddedness, cohesion) can lead to the betterment of socially driven, sustainable outcomes. Our conceptual framework and propositions are centered on how negotiation—particularly in its integrative form—is likely to promote social sustainability. Our study contributes to the ongoing research on the latest socially driven trends of sustainability in organizations. Full article

In South Africa, high levels of wealth inequality have persisted since 1994, to the extent that 1% of the population owns 50% of the wealth. This study examines how macroeconomic policies influenced wealth inequality in South Africa over the period 2010 to 2019 using a behavioural life-cycle model. Despite a decrease in wealth inequality over this period, the extent of this decrease is almost negligible. Results show government’s current policy model to redirect wealth from a very small tax base that is under increasing financial strain is unable to meet wealth redistributive targets. The South African government should change the wealth redistribution policy from redistribution through predominantly lump sums to creating an environment in which private enterprises are able to absorb the labour capital that South Africa possesses. An open labour market would support private and foreign direct investment into the economy, thereby strengthening economic growth and upliftment through increased income and the consequent ability to accumulate wealth. Full article

This study explores the impact of gendered citizenship on the well-being of cross-national families following the political blockade imposed on Qatar in 2017. More specifically, it examines how these families, women, and children face challenges related to their lives, well-being, and rights. Twenty-three face-to-face interviews were conducted with Qatari and non-Qatari women and men married to non-Qatari spouses residing in Qatar. The study’s findings revealed that Qatari women with non-Qatari husbands did not enjoy the benefits of full citizenship, further undermining their psychological well-being and their socioeconomic and legal rights. Additionally, children born before or during the blockade have become stateless and undocumented, which jeopardizes their mental and physical well-being and the prospects of their parents’ economic advancement. This study contributes to the conceptualization of and debate on gender citizenship rules and policies, which can exclude these women and children and deny them the recognition and rights they deserve. Since ensuring full citizenship rights is crucial for people’s well-being, increasing gender equality and reforming Qatar’s existing citizenship policies would benefit both groups and provide social justice for all. Full article

Africa has been a hotspot for the development of food and bioenergy crop cultivation since the 2000s, leading to systematic challenges towards its ability to become a bioeconomy. To reduce land-use conflicts with food crop cultivation, marginal African drylands (MADs) are proposed for sustainable bioenergy cropping systems (BCSs). This study reviews the foremost socio-economic and environmental challenges for BCSs on MADs, and the development of key principles for minimizing adverse outcomes towards a sustainable bioeconomy. Socio-economic prosperity in Africa depends on several systematic solutions, and BCSs that are based on perennial bioenergy crops are promising strategies as they provide a renewable and sustainable energy source for rural areas. However, critical multidimensional challenges such as poverty, food security, gender equality, access to energy, and environmental impact must also be considered to ensure long-term sustainability. This review argues for more transparent land sales/usage (considering the agricultural work of women) and more perennial bioenergy crops. In this context, key principles were derived for a people-centered bottom-up approach that is considered fundamental to ensure the sustainable development of BCSs on MADs in the future. Full article

What is proposed is the construction of a gender agenda in the implementation of climate adaptation projects for Latin America, whose fundamental characteristic is the consideration of a double transversalization between gender equality and adaptation to climate change. To this end, a case analysis is used for the main climate adaptation initiatives in the region, with the objective of constructing our proposal from that implied by public policies and, above all, the socio-cultural norms and exclusions existing in the region. Full article

Math has a strong gender-related image, even among teachers. As teachers hold beliefs about their work, their role, their subject, and their students, they shape girls’ and boys’ mathematical beliefs and attitudes. Research during the past 20 years has shown that teachers’ gender beliefs about mathematics significantly favor boys, thereby reinforcing girls’ low math ability self-concept. Still, there is a lack of studies that examine teachers’ gender-related beliefs based on their underlying assumptions. Our study provides the first empirical evidence of the relationship between general gender stereotypes and math stereotypes. To this end, we used partial correlation and MANCOVA to analyze data from an online survey in 2019/2020 conducted in Switzerland (195 women, 80 men) as part of a cross-cultural comparison study. We therefore created a differentiated profile of prospective teachers by examining their beliefs about their self-image, their image of men and women in society, their essentialist and gender role ideology beliefs, and their math stereotypes. Then, we linked prospective teachers’ beliefs about gender (based on 48 characteristics) to their beliefs about mathematics and about girls’ and boys’ competencies in math. The extensive analysis provides knowledge about prospective teachers and is particularly important for teacher education. Full article

This study aimed to describe the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the social situation, self-perceived health status, and mental well-being of adolescents in Catalonia during home confinement, and to evaluate factors that are associated with poor overall mental well-being. An online cross-sectional study among a cohort of students (14–18 years old) of central Catalonia (DESKcohort) was performed during June–July 2020. Poisson regression models with robust variance were used to identify variables associated with “poor overall well-being,” measured by the short version of the Warwick–Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale. Out of 303 participants, 42.1% reported a decrease in family income, and 32.8% a loss of parental employment due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and these percentages were higher among people living in low socioeconomic neighborhoods (53.3% and 43.2%, respectively). Overall, 56.8% presented a poor overall well-being. Participants reporting a decrease in their family’s income (aPR = 1.33) and those knowing a close person or family who died of COVID-19 (aPR = 1.42) were more likely to report a poor overall well-being. This study highlights the patterns of inequality and social vulnerability for COVID-19 pandemic outcomes. Considering social inequalities, interventions are needed to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the physical and the psychological wellbeing of children and their families. Full article

The COVID-19 outbreak has raised challenges for people with health problems. Obesity is a global issue related to COVID-19. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) finds that obesity worsens COVID-19 outcomes. As body mass index increases, the COVID-19 death risk increases. Additionally, due to different restriction policies, the pandemic has transformed our food environment. Thus, it is important to develop an antivirus-enabled paradigm to decrease the COVID-19 spreading rate in neighborhoods with obesity concerns and design a sustainable and healthy food environment. It is found that both COVID-19 and obesity inequalities are associated with food environment inequalities, but few studies have examined the moderating effects of obesity and food environment on COVID-19. According to the Chicago Department of Public Health, more than 30% of the Chicago adult population is obese. Additionally, Chicago has 340,676 COVID-19 cases during the period between 1 March 2020 and 26 November 2021. This study uses regression models to examine the moderating effects of obesity and food environment on COVID-19 in Chicago. Besides food environment factors, green spaces and transportation access are considered. The results show COVID-19 is concentrated in areas with a high obesity rate and low food access. A 1 percent increase in obesity rate is associated with a 2.83 percent increase in COVID-19 death rate in a community. Additionally, the moderating effects of obesity on the association between food environment and COVID-19 are shown in the results. Full article

Despite the fact that there are several researchers reporting the risks of doctoral students in terms of mental health, there is still a lack of studies exploring their well-being at an organizational level, looking at the difference between male and female PhD students. This work aims at describing gender differences in the organizational well-being of doctoral students in an Italian context. A sample of 121 Italian PhD students filled an adaption of the ANAC questionnaire (National Authority for Anti-Corruption) for an organizational well-being assessment between June and July 2021. The results show that there are a number of well-being indicators for which female PhD students have statistically lower scores than men regarding: (1) the perception of health and safety at work; (2) career development; and (3) job autonomy. Practical suggestions to improve the academic system in terms of sustainability for preventing PhD students’ organizational malaise with a particular focus on gender equality are provided. Full article

This paper evaluates the recent trends in international migration and different viewpoints (arguments and counterarguments) on global population movement and examines the impacts of the social, economic, ecological, and political determinants of regional and international migration. The paper aims to analyse and compare the causal relationships between international migration, on the one hand, and economic, ecological, and socio-politic dimensions of EU countries’ development, on the other. The authors consider the impact power of the above-mentioned dimensions on the long-term net migration for the potential candidates to access the EU. First, it identifies and justifies the object of research as the EU countries and the potential EU candidates. Second, the article provides a short literature review as the authors highlight that the EU countries had the highest share of all world migrants, according to the report of the U.N. Population Division. Third, it provides the background of materials collection and methods of the study of the analyses of the panel data for 2000–2018 using the FMOLS and DOLS. Fourth, it presents the results of the study having analysed the different concepts and theories, the authors single out the core economic, ecological, and socio-politic determinants of international migration: wages, unemployment rate, income inequality (measured by the Gini coefficient), corruption, and political stability (measured by World Government Indicators), CO₂ emissions and material footprint per capita (measured by Sustainable Development Index). The discussion and conclusion section summarizes the findings of the research and evaluates the structural similarities and differences among the EU countries and potential candidates and if these similarities (or differences) cause them to respond similarly to the economic conditions and changes. Full article