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We study five exogenous shocks: climate, violence, price hikes, spoilage and the COVID-19 lockdown. We analyze the association between these shocks and trader characteristics, reflecting trader vulnerability.

Using primary survey data on 1,100 Nigerian maize traders for 2021 (controlling for shocks in 2017), we use probit models to estimate the probabilities of experiencing climate, violence, disease and cost shocks associated with trader characteristics (gender, size and region) and to estimate the probability of vulnerability (experiencing severe impacts).

Traders are prone to experiencing more than one shock, which increases the intensity of the shocks. Price shocks are often accompanied by violence, climate and COVID-19 shocks. The poorer northern region is disproportionately affected by shocks. Northern traders experience more price shocks while Southern traders are more affected by violence shocks given their dependence on long supply chains from the north for their maize. Female traders are more likely to experience violent events than men who tend to be more exposed to climate shocks.

The data only permit analysis of the general degree of impact of a shock rather than quantifying lost income.

This paper is the first to analyze the incidence of multiple shocks on grain traders and the unequal distribution of negative impacts. It is the first such in Africa based on a large sample of grain traders from a primary survey.

The study explores the connection between foresight and Artificial Intelligence (AI) methods in a community within an environment of social instability in Colombia. It aims to contribute to research on aligning these methods for future-shaping, with the goal of enhancing shared governance, peer learning and collective learning among traditional decision-makers and local communities in emerging countries. The study seeks to foster a community of social actors who are likely to engage constructively in strategic dialogues. To enhancing shared governance and learning a hybrid model is synthesized, combining foresight and computational intelligence.

The case study explores the integration of computational intelligence and foresight through Gaston Bachelard's (Bachelard, 1936) phenomenology concept of ante-perception. The mathematical representation of the cone of scenarios provides a structured way to explore multiple future pathways, allowing communities to visualize and compare different trajectories and make informed decisions amid uncertainty. The model facilitates critical reflections on present assumptions, deepening insights into future scenarios. Ante-perception challenges traditional approaches to foresight by encouraging a break from established experiences, allowing for novel insights into possible futures. When enriched by computational intelligence, this reflective process is further strengthened by quantitative approach scenario modeling.

This research develops and tests a proposal that includes the logic and methods for constructing a mathematical representation of the cone of scenarios. This process, which is interactive and deliberative, is driven by anticipation and combines qualitative and quantitative approaches within a context of high uncertainty. By combining the critical reflection facilitated by ante-perception with the predictive power of computational intelligence, the model allows communities to transcend established thought patterns and explore innovative future possibilities. This integrative approach helps them envision and work toward social self-transformation.

The article aims to identify the creation of scenarios in contexts of high uncertainty, to respond to the needs of communities in emerging countries to manage change.

This article explores a novel approach to using foresight for address collective intelligence by developing a shared future vision in high-uncertainty contexts within local communities in emerging countries. The application of the hybrid model demonstrates that foresight is a key innovative social tool for developing long-term strategic reflection and planning for territories.

In developing long-term reflective processes, explaining phenomena, mechanisms and correlations requires the use of value judgments. This set of value judgments requires a representation that facilitates their treatment, helps to account for their behavior during the inference process to form a shared future vision. Consequently, ensuring the recognition of the opinions of local communities through participatory discussion spaces and their subsequent refinement, from a technical perspective, aims to illustrate the development of this social construction process. While similarities exist, differences add value through a transfer process, often subconscious. This process stimulates collective learning and builds capacities as knowledge is developed through inquiry, evaluation, interpretation and generalization.

This research provides a unique hybrid model that fosters collective learning and engagement by integrating local community perspectives with advanced computational intelligence methods. By facilitating both reflective and quantitative approach future-shaping, it offers a practical framework for addressing uncertainty while empowering communities to shape their own futures. It underscores the importance of recognizing local community views through bottom-up participatory discussions, thereby widening the stakeholder community to active engagement in addressing broader societal issues. The case study focuses on community collaboration in Puerto Gaitán, a Colombian municipality.

This paper aims to investigate the formation of an inter-organizational collaboration network that made it possible to repair 2,516 mechanical respirators that were inoperative in Brazil during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

A qualitative approach was used in a single case study with semi-structured interviews. The interviewee selection process was non-probabilistic through snowball sampling.

The results suggest that society, through different social groups with their different roles, can organize itself quickly through the formation of collaborative networks, and this organizational configuration can be an alternative for facing crises where actions isolated would be insufficient or slow to urgently address complex situations.

This paper aims to (1) demonstrate that society, through different social groups with their different roles, can organize itself quickly through the formation of collaborative networks; (2) favor the understanding and dynamics of the formation of a network; and (3) contribute to a possible replication of this initiative in future contexts.

The case portrays an unprecedented formation of a collaboration network involving more than 144 organizations that mobilized quickly in a complex context of a pandemic and that generated remarkable results through the reintroduction of equipment that were responsible for the preservation of thousands of lives during the year from 2020.

The purpose of this study is to identify challenges and derive options for stakeholder engagement of project partnerships for sustainable innovations in higher education institutions (HEIs).

Guided by Donabedian’s structure-process-outcome (SPO) model, our conceptual exploration focuses on understanding stakeholder experience and identifying stakeholder engagement options in different project phases. This research includes empirical data on sustainability expectations towards HEIs collected from 239 business students from the USA and Germany. The Kano method and factor analysis were used for data analysis.

This research suggests that balancing differences in stakeholder types and priorities, identifying and fulfilling key stakeholder expectations and addressing their resource limitations play a crucial role in the partnership’s structure stage. Adjustments for timing and forms of engagement, based on the stakeholder types and their expectations, are necessary during the process stage. Attaining stakeholder consensus on goal achievement and fostering trust and long-term commitment for sustainability are vital tasks in the outcome stage.

HEIs are advised to identify and assess stakeholders according to their anticipated inputs and contributions to the expected project outputs. They should consider adopting minimal thresholds of involvement and actively engaging key stakeholders, students, by demonstrating direct sustainability impacts.

This conceptual study adds value by enhancing the understanding of sustainable project partnerships in HEIs through the adoption of concepts from open innovation, service management and relationship management research. It illuminates the significance of stakeholder engagement and experience, including the management of expectations, thereby supporting HEIs in effectively implementing sustainability initiatives.

The study aims to explore factors that influence students’ academic performance in the context of physical ergonomics and assess the mediating effect of motivation between lighting, noise, temperature, chair design and students’ performance from the student’s perspective.

The research was categorised as a correlational study and employed non-contrived and cross-sectional methods to achieve its objectives. The target population was university students aged 18 years old and above enrolled in Malaysia’s higher education institutions. Due to the inaccessibility of the sample frame, convenience sampling, a type of non-probability sampling, was utilised. Data collection was conducted through an online survey primarily distributed among student groups.

The study’s findings reveal that only two exogenous variables, lighting and noise, directly influence students' performance. Additionally, motivation is a potent and significant factor in shaping students' performance. Motivation is also identified as a mediator in the complex relationship between lighting, noise, temperature and student performance. Surprisingly, although temperature does not directly influence student performance, it indirectly influences performance through motivation.

This study is an original exploration into the intricate factors shaping students' academic performance within the domain of physical ergonomics from a student perspective. The research uniquely investigates the mediating impact of motivation on the relationships between lighting, noise, temperature, seating arrangements and academic outcomes. The findings will contribute novel insights to the existing body of knowledge, offering a distinct perspective on the complex dynamics that influence student learning experiences and performance in educational settings.

Racial wealth inequality is a significant and growing issue in the USA. Improving the lagging rate of black new venture creation and successful entrepreneurship could help close the gap. The purpose of this paper is to focus needed attention on the financial challenges resulting from institutional and systemic discrimination that black entrepreneurs must deal with. Following this literature review, the paper makes recommendations and broad public policy suggestions.

This study conducts a literature review and discusses the myriad of reasons black entrepreneurs struggle with inadequate access to capital, with special emphasis on weaker entrepreneurial ecosystems that have resulted from systemic racism.

The paper sheds light on several factors which continue to directly impede successful black entrepreneurship including discrimination in lending, distrust in institutions, over-reliance on (inadequate) personal capital and declining black-owned banking and financial institutions, as well as community banking options in black communities.

The paper is conceptual and relies on prior literature. The proposed solutions are just a starting point and are certainly not meant to be all-inclusive or comprehensive. Much future research, particularly longitudinal research, is needed to further develop theory and specific public policies which can close the disparities this study has discussed. This study outlines several key areas in need of further quantitative and qualitative studies to better understand black entrepreneurship.

The US economy will increasingly suffer if the nearly 15% of population (and growing) made up of black communities continues to struggle. The broad-based policy solutions proposed in this paper would allow for increased access to capital that would address the long-term deficiencies and help to close the racial wealth gap.

Through this study’s broad-based potential solutions, entrepreneurial ecosystems can be strengthened to build the environment for successful new venture creation in black communities. The longer-term benefit would be increased tax revenues, improved communities with fewer individuals needing support through government assistance and greater social stability as economic gaps between various racial groups are closed.

Using a broader entrepreneurial ecosystem framework and a systemic racism theory lens, this study discusses the limited capital black entrepreneurs have access to. Following this literature review, this study offers broad-based policy solutions that can strengthen ecosystems and directly address the issues raised in the paper.

This study holistically and systematically consolidates the available research on digital reading to reveal the research trends of the past 20 years. Moreover, it explores the thematic evolution, hotspots and developmental characteristics of digital reading. This study, therefore, has the potential to serve as a research guide to researchers and educators in relevant fields.

The authors applied a bibliometric approach using Derwent Data Analyzer and VOSviewer to retrieve 2,456 publications for 2003–2022 from the Web of Science (WoS) database.

The results revealed that most studies' participants were university students and the experimental methods and questionnaires were preferred in digital reading researches. Among the influential countries or regions, institutions, journals and authors, the United States of America, University of London, Electronic Library and Chen, respectively, accounted for the greatest number of publications. Moreover, the authors identified the developmental characteristics and research trends in the field of digital reading by analyzing the evolution of keywords from 2003–2017 to 2018–2022 and the most frequently cited papers by year. “E-books,” “reading comprehension” and “literacy” were the primary research topics. In addition, “attention,” “motivation,” “cognitive load,” “dyslexia,” “engagement,” “eye-tracking,” “eye movement,” “systematic analysis,” “meta-analysis,” “smartphone” and “mobile reading/learning” were potential new research hotspots.

This study provides valuable insights into the current status, research direction, thematic evolution and developmental characteristics in the field of digital reading. Therefore, it has implications for publishers, researchers, librarians, educators and teachers in the digital reading field.

This study assesses the impact of online grocery shopping and food delivery services on food insecurity before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This study uses an online survey of 1,532 respondents. Respondents’ sociodemographics, food consumption, purchasing behavior, food security status, food insecurity coping mechanisms and concerns associated with food safety were asked before and during COVID-19.

Online grocery shopping and food delivery services increase food insecurity. Moreover, households with female primary shoppers were less likely to be food insecure than households with male primary shoppers. Furthermore, households with children were more likely to be food insecure. Minority households, such as Black, Hispanic, Native American and younger households, were more likely to be food insecure.

Panel data with the same households surveyed before and after COVID-19 would be a better approach. Similarly, the impact of online shopping on food insecurity needs further research, as many factors could be associated with online shopping that impact food insecurity, especially during a crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, a study of the long-term impact of online shopping on food insecurity would be interesting and could present broader and more generalizable results.

The impact of online shopping on food insecurity before and during COVID-19 has yet to be studied sufficiently. Given the increase in popularity of online grocery shopping, its impact on food insecurity still needs to be discovered. Besides online grocery shopping, we also study online food delivery services whose demand has gained momentum over the past few years, including during the pandemic.