Search Results (980)

The transition to university is a critical period of academic, social, and emotional adjustment. Social media plays a central yet complex role, offering opportunities for connection while also posing risks to wellbeing, productivity, and social integration. This study explores how first-year undergraduates experience and interprets their social media use during this transition. Using a constructivist grounded theory approach, nine focus groups were conducted with 40 first-year students at a UK university. Analysis generated a model conceptualising social media as a ‘double-edged sword’ within the broader social transition. Five interrelated themes were identified: social transition, polarised attitudes, quality of social connection, wellbeing support, and quantity and form of use. Social media supported early connection-building, maintaining peer ties, and accessing support, yet excessive or passive use intensified social comparison, fear of missing out, and academic distraction. Students recognised problematic use themselves, often prompting peer intervention to restore balance. Form, purpose, and perceived impact shaped experiences more than time spent. Findings highlight the importance of student agency, peer networks, and institutional support, offering implications for promoting healthy social media practices, wellbeing, and smoother transitions to university life. Full article

Drawing on institutional theory and agency theory, this study examines whether venture capital (VC) and private equity (PE) ownership acts as a complement to, or substitute for, investor protection in shaping equity financing, debt financing, and leverage decisions in high-tech entrepreneurial firms. The analysis is based on a panel dataset of 403 high-tech entrepreneurial firms from 11 European countries over the period 2009–2013. To address potential endogeneity and reverse causality between external finance and VC/PE investment, the study employs two-stage least squares (2SLS) regression models using an instrumental-variable approach. The results provide tentative evidence that VC/PE ownership is associated with stronger debt-related financing outcomes, particularly leverage, in countries characterised by weaker investor protection, suggesting a possible substitutive relationship in debt-related financing outcomes. However, these findings should be interpreted cautiously given the limitations associated with the instrumental-variable strategy. The study contributes to the literature on entrepreneurial finance, corporate governance and law and finance by showing how firm-level governance mechanisms interact with national institutional settings in shaping financing decisions. Full article

Platform algorithms are widely used to personalize content and organize users’ everyday social media experiences. Yet they may also become objects of resistance when algorithmic recommendations are perceived as intrusive, repetitive, or difficult to escape. Drawing on the critical theory of technology, this study develops a parallel mediation model to explain why users resist algorithm-driven social media platforms. Focusing on algorithmic power and algorithmic technicality as two perceived characteristics of platform algorithms, the model examines whether these perceptions are associated with algorithmic resistance through fairness evaluations and negative emotions. Based on survey data from users of Chinese algorithm-driven social media platforms, the results show that both algorithmic power and algorithmic technicality are associated with stronger algorithmic resistance through lower fairness evaluations and stronger negative emotions. These findings suggest that algorithmic resistance is not merely a response to inaccurate or opaque recommendations, but also reflects users’ reactions to algorithms experienced as systems of platform control and data-driven inference. By identifying fairness evaluations and negative emotions as parallel cognitive and affective pathways, this study shifts attention from algorithmic acceptance to algorithmic resistance and provides a more critical understanding of user agency in human–algorithm relations. Full article

This theoretical article considers a case where a chief subject-area superintendent within the Ministry of Education issued a policy, and teachers implemented it more radically than intended—extending it in a way that eliminated core elements of the original mandate. Applying ecosystem theory to the case, the article advances the conceptual theorization of ecosystem theory principles—with respect to teachers’ leadership acts—by refining key components (proximity between actors and interconnectedness, roles in ecosystems, and democratization), adding nuances that the case highlights but existing theory leaves underdeveloped. It further engages with Weberian bureaucracy, street-level bureaucracy, and Weick’s loose-coupling theory as alternative frameworks, establishing ecosystem theory’s distinctive explanatory power for the leadership appropriation dynamics the case reveals. The Discussion delineates the article’s conceptual contributions and outlines research directions that further elaborate the refinements and theoretical differentiation (ecosystem theory vis-à-vis related theories) into areas beyond the scope of this article. Full article

The need for aligned policy responses to coordinate among governmental agencies is challenged by the “administrative silos” prevalent in government bureaucracy. How do collaboration risks influence the abilities of cities to effectively coordinate their efforts to address complex issues such as economic development, climate mitigation, and climate related disaster adaptation? Although coordination problems in the face of administrative silos are widely acknowledged, systematic examination of what accounts for variation in the extent to which local governments are able to successfully coordinate their functions to address complex problems are conspicuously absent from the literature. This research applies functional institutional collective action (ICA) theory to fill this lacuna. Problem uncertainty, actor’s political incentives, and institutions were hypothesized to influence successful coordination. Pooled GLM Probits were estimated with data from 1124 U.S. cities. Uncertainty inherent in specific types of problems, the characteristics of affected actors, and local and regional institutions influenced whether successful coordination among municipal departments was achieved. We conclude by identifying implications for collective action theory and for organizing and standard setting for sustainability policy. Full article

Far from being merely repetitive, the painted decoration in Theban tombs of the New Kingdom reveals a rich variety of individual artistic choices, and therefore offers a privileged point of view for the study of agency in ancient Egypt. By examining selected pictorial units from a number of tombs, personally investigated by the author, this paper will explore the painters’ approaches to tomb decoration through the lens of the agency theory developed by Alfred Gell. Personal intervention can be recognised in many little details which ensure that no two Theban chapels are identical, even where the same scenes are represented. These variations undoubtedly sprang from the individual choices of the artists. Preparatory ostraca show the basic layout of text and scenes, with the division into registers and columns, but these remain only preparatory sketches. All the final details in the lines, colours, and components that make up a figure or a sign offer room for modifications. By analysing how artists interacted with the single pictorial units they were tasked with painting, their patterns of action and horizons of freedom become clearer, offering us a deeper insight into the role of Theban painters in the history of the site. Full article

Spatial studies play a significant role in navigating the actions, experiences, and interactions happening in a specific place and context. The intersection of spatiality and theology will expand the scope of relating the biblical elements to contemporary relevant issues. Genesis 6–9, often termed the flood narrative, is considered a major biblical evidence in terms of environmental vulnerability and divine faith. By incorporating geocriticism alongside the other spatial theories of Tuan, Bachelard, and Tally, this study offers a critical, exegetical textual analysis of Genesis 6–9 to understand the dynamics of mobility, spatial agency, and re-habitation as shown in the narrative. The paper’s primary argument is that the ark functions as an affective space and an architectural structure of protection, belonging, and preservation during and after the flood. Secondly, it focuses on how the flood narrative negotiates between the real, imagined and textual spaces of spatial re-creation and how it resonates with contemporary environmental concerns by interpreting it as an instance of environmentally induced displacement while retaining its theological significance. Full article

Contemporary societies are characterized by increasing role multiplicity and accelerated social change, intensifying identity-related strain and inter-role conflict. Although role theory, narrative identity research, and psychological flexibility frameworks have independently advanced the understanding of psychological adaptation, an integrative structural model explaining how life domains are hierarchically organized and reorganized over time remains underdeveloped. This manuscript introduces Casa Vital (Vital House), a dynamic structural model that conceptualizes identity as a hierarchical architecture of interdependent life domains organized around a central integrative function. The model proposes three core constructs: structural coherence, structural modes (rigidity/flexibility) and self-directed agency, and argues that psychological adaptation depends not only on emotional regulation or narrative coherence but also on the capacity to reorganize domain hierarchies in alignment with personal values and contextual demands. By positioning identity at a meso-structural level of analysis, the framework integrates sociological, narrative, and contextual behavioral traditions while offering testable hypotheses and a falsifiable research agenda. Casa Vital expands the current models of adaptation by introducing hierarchical structural reorganization as a central component of identity functioning in complex contemporary contexts. Full article

This article examines how Chinese scholars and institutions selected Western musicological works for translation into Chinese and how these choices shaped the formation of musicology as a modern discipline in mainland China from 1900 to 2025. Drawing on disciplinary translation history, it asks which musicological works were translated, who selected and translated them, under what historical and institutional conditions they circulated, and how they contributed to the intellectual development of Chinese musicology. On the basis of translated works, publication records, archival materials, and the secondary literature, the article identifies four historical stages: technical transplantation (1900–1949), planned transplantation (1949–1978), critical transformation (1978–2010), and two-way dialogue (2010–2025). Each stage was shaped by a different configuration of ideology, academic demand, market forces, and translator agency. The article argues that the Chinese translation of Western musicological scholarship was never a passive import of foreign theories. Rather, it was a historically situated process in which Chinese scholars, translators, publishers, and institutions identified, adapted, and reorganized foreign musicological knowledge in response to local academic needs. The findings contribute to knowledge translation studies by offering a diachronic, multi-agent account of translation selection and by explaining how these choices helped shape modern Chinese musicology as a discipline. Full article

This article explores the structural paradox of the byeong-gut (Korean shamanic healing ritual): why it adheres to the rigid and canonical format of the jaesu-gut (shamanic blessing ritual) instead of adopting a specialized clinical procedure. Critiquing the instrumental trap of previous scholarship that reduces shamanic healing to psychological comfort or social liberation, this study proposes a relational displacement model by integrating Roy Rappaport’s theory of ritual invariance with the relational ontologies of Bruno Latour and Tim Ingold. The article demonstrates that shamanic healing operates through a dual mechanism. First, at the non-discursive (material) level, the ritual functions as an ontological technology that objectifies and displaces individual suffering onto external surrogates. Second, at the discursive (linguistic) level, a meticulous analysis of the manse-baji (invocation chant) illustrates how the patient’s fragmented life is re-assembled into a meshwork of human and non-human agencies. Ultimately, this article argues that the byeong-gut transcends mere functional curing; it serves as a sophisticated knowledge system that re-maps the isolated ego onto a relational cosmology, transforming the Geertzian bafflement of suffering into an intelligible event within a shared and sacred cosmic order. Full article

Saudi Arabia’s audit market faces three governance challenges that existing frameworks may not fully address. These challenges concern a potential regulatory gap around autonomous AI accountability, a trust dimension that standard technology-adoption models may not fully capture, and limited mechanisms for independently verified ESG assurance under Vision 2030. This study adopts a conceptual design approach within the design science research tradition and proposes the CMA Agentic AI Platform as a practical response to these challenges. The platform comprises two segments. Segment 1 deploys autonomous drone swarms to verify corporate assets across four audit tasks—asset valuation, ESG compliance, anomaly detection and construction progress—using deep learning, thermal imaging and social-media cross-referencing. Segment 2 continuously monitors discretionary accruals and uses objective earnings-management data to inform auditor assignment and rotation decisions. This approach replaces subjective reputational assessments with transparent, quantifiable governance criteria. The platform is governed through the Triadic Agentic Framework, which extends classical agency theory by distributing authority across the Principal, the Human Agent and the AI Agent. The framework also operationalises Trust Expectancy as the primary adoption condition. The evidence base draws on two complementary streams: a PRISMA-guided systematic review and bibliometric analysis of thirty-nine peer-reviewed studies, and a documentary analysis of four national agentic-AI regulatory frameworks (SDAIA, MDDI/IMDA, NIST and ICO). The study contributes the concept of Algorithmic Accountability as a distinct governance domain, the Triadic Agentic Framework as an operational architecture for autonomous regulatory monitoring, and a reframing of the UTAUT trust construct for agentic-AI adoption in mature professional contexts. The platform converts theoretical governance into a regulatory architecture with direct implications for concentrated capital market regulators. Full article

Racial diversity is normatively desirable in public organizations, but the social and psychological processes it activates may lead to employees’ negative work attitudes. Combining social categorization theory, perceived organizational support theory, and psychological contract theory, this study investigates whether racial diversity is negatively related to employee work engagement in U.S. federal agencies and whether the perceived effectiveness of agency ethics programs moderates this relationship. Using multilevel mixed-effects regression analyses with data from 10,088 employees nested within 24 federal agencies drawn from the 2016 Merit Principles Survey, we find that racial diversity was negatively associated with work engagement. However, this negative relationship was reduced when employees perceived their agency’s ethics program as more effective. At high levels of perceived effectiveness, the negative association was no longer statistically significant. These findings suggest that the perceived effectiveness of ethics programs is a meaningful organizational condition under which the negative association between racial diversity and work engagement may be attenuated. This pattern has implications for diversity management and human resource practice in ethical, high-performing, and sustainable public organizations. Full article

The intensification of the global ecosocial crisis has exposed the structural incompatibility between continuous economic growth and the biophysical limits of the planet, prompting increasing interest in degrowth as a framework for ecological sustainability and social justice. Despite the growing development of degrowth theory within ecological economics and political ecology, its educational implications remain underexplored. This article examines the role of education in the transition toward post-growth societies through a critical review of the literature and a conceptual analysis informed by critical pedagogy, ecofeminism, environmental education, and degrowth scholarship. The study identifies how contemporary educational systems reproduce growth-oriented subjectivities through human capital theory, neoliberal governance, competitiveness, and productivist curricular frameworks. The analysis demonstrates that dominant models of sustainability education frequently remain embedded within the assumptions of green growth and fail to address the structural drivers of ecological degradation and social inequality. As a result, the article develops an integrated framework for a pedagogy of degrowth structured around ecosocial literacy, democratic participation, care ethics, cooperation, critical civic engagement, curriculum transformation, technological sovereignty, and commitment to the commons. The main contribution of the study lies in articulating a comprehensive educational model that connects pedagogical transformation with broader processes of post-growth social change, positioning education not merely as a tool for environmental awareness but as a strategic arena for cultivating the values, capacities, and collective agency required for ecosocial justice. The findings suggest that a transition toward sustainable and equitable societies requires a profound reorientation of educational aims, contents, institutions, and practices beyond the paradigm of economic growth. Full article

Purpose: This study investigates the multi-dimensional nature of corporate risk-taking by examining how governance mechanisms exert differing pressures on accounting-based stability versus market-perceived volatility in the Saudi context, as the biggest emerging market in the Middle East. Moreover, the research uses accounting conservatism as a critical moderating variable and the sample is partitioned into high-conservative and low-conservative groups. Design/methodology/approach: The research analyzed data from 69 non-financial listed firms from 2017 to 2024 using four statistical models. Corporate risk-taking values have been captured from both accounting-based and market-based perspectives. Moreover, managerial, institutional, and concentration ownership have been used to capture ownership structure. However, board size, independence, and CEO power have been used to capture board structure. Findings: The research findings reported three main results: (1) Ownership structures have an asymmetric impact on accounting-based corporate risk-taking, as managerial and institutional ownership take a U-shaped curve, but ownership concentration has a positive impact. Moreover, from market-based corporate risk-taking, managerial and institutional ownership have a negative impact, but ownership concentration has a positive impact. (2) Board structures have an asymmetric impact on accounting-based corporate risk-taking, as managerial and institutional ownership have a negative impact, but ownership concentration has an inverted U-shaped impact. Moreover, from market-based corporate risk-taking, managerial and institutional ownership have no significant impact, but ownership concentration has a negative impact. (3) Accounting conservatism can change the nexus between ownership structure, board structure, and corporate risk behavior. Research limitations/implications: The research has many implications. For policymakers, the results discovered the role of ownership and board structures in shaping corporate risk-taking behavior in the Saudi context. Moreover, we have provided evidence-based guidance for governance reforms and firm-level decision-making. Moreover, the results can be incorporated by investors and creditors into their risk assessment frameworks, improving portfolio allocation and credit evaluation. Originality/value: The research captured corporate risk-taking behavior in the Saudi context from two perspectives at the same time. Likewise, it provides new empirical evidence that accounting conservatism can have a role in risky behavior. Full article

The shift to circular agrosystems necessitates using new ideas like sustainable biochar, which provides many eco-beneficial attributes like enhancing soil fertility, storing atmospheric carbon dioxide, and retaining soil moisture. However, there is still a small number of farmers worldwide (particularly those located in low-income countries) adopting biochar. Accordingly, this research is focused primarily on determining how factors affecting behavior will influence the decision of wheat producers in Marvdasht County, in Iran’s Fars Province, to use biochar as a circular technology for farming. The study will focus on addressing issues related to environmental challenges (e.g., degradation of soil and drought) through the implementation of resource-efficient, sustainable agricultural technologies. The intent of this paper was to research the behavioral characteristics associated with wheat farmers who choose to use biochar in the city of Marvdasht, Fars Region, Iran, using a new Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB). The model is theoretically enriched through the inclusion of personal norms and connectedness to the land, allowing for a more comprehensive understanding of pro-environmental decision-making. Data was collected from a total of 386 wheat farmers through the use of a structured survey. The data was analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) with the software Smart-PLS 3.0. The results reveal that attitude (β = 0.342, p < 0.001) and personal norms (β = 0.278, p < 0.001) are the strongest predictors of behavioral intention, while perceived behavioral control showed a weaker but significant effect (β = 0.178, p = 0.049). Subjective norms do not have a significant direct effect (β = 0.115, p = 0.199) but significantly influence intention indirectly through personal norms (β = 0.100, p < 0.001). Furthermore, connectedness to the land strongly affects personal norms (β = 0.420, p < 0.001) and exerts a significant indirect effect on intention (β = 0.117, p < 0.001), highlighting the importance of emotional attachment to land. The findings are significant because they demonstrated that farmers’ biochar adoption decisions are shaped not only by rational evaluations but also by moral obligations and emotional relationships with land. This study makes significant theoretical contributions by extending TPB with moral and relational constructs and empirically demonstrating their mediating roles in agricultural innovation adoption. The novelty of this study lies in integrating personal norms and connectedness to the land into the TPB framework to explain biochar adoption behavior within the context of circular agriculture in a developing country. Practically, the findings provide evidence-based insights for designing policies that integrate cognitive, ethical, and emotional drivers to promote biochar adoption and advance circular agriculture. Specifically, policymakers and extension agencies should prioritize behavioral-level strategies such as awareness campaigns, farmer training programs, and community-based initiatives that strengthen positive attitudes, environmental responsibility, and farmers’ emotional connection to land in order to enhance biochar adoption. Full article