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This paper aims to design, develop and validate an instrument to measure employer branding by considering existing employee perceptions.

In this systematic research, the predominant factors of employer branding are identified through Pareto analysis; using structured questionnaire information and data collected from 423 employees. The number of items and dimensions was reduced by conducting exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and validated extracted dimensions using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) using statistical software (SPSS-21). The designed scale was verified by applying relevant statistical techniques, including a multicollinearity test, construct validity, content validity, divergent validity, convergent validity and reliability test. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was performed using AMOS, to explore the interrelationship between the dimensions of the scale.

Considering the perception of existing employees, seven factors along with 24 items scale were designed and developed to measure the employer branding. The identified seven factors are; career development opportunities; compensation and benefits; corporate social responsibility; training and development; work environment; organizational culture; and work-life balance. The proposed model explains a total variance of 70.35% and the model fit indices are within the acceptable range, validity and statistical reliability are established for seven dimensions of employer branding.

Employer branding is studied from existing employee perspective by collecting responses from the employees of the IT sector only.

This validated scale is valuable for practitioners and academicians. The proposed dimensions in the scale may help practitioners explore the impact on the outcomes of organizations such as employee commitment, employee retention, employee satisfaction and total productivity. This novel instrument helps to measure employees' perception of their employers. Further, the authors identify the gaps and accordingly plan strategies to attract and retain the talented workforce.

The authors believe that this novel measuring instrument is comprehensive and the first of its kind. Employer branding has been modeled using SEM analysis by considering the perceptions of the present employees.

Purpose: This paper investigates how Europe’s fast fashion industry’s sustainability efforts correlate with socio-economic well-being, focusing on the Human Development Index (HDI), Sustainable Development Goals, and textile waste.

Design/Methodology/Approach: Applying Principal Component, Regression, and Spatial Analysis, the study examines cross-European data to identify relationships between development indices and textile waste.

Findings: There is a strong link between adherence to Sustainable Development Goals and higher living standards, but the impact of textile waste on well-being is minimal.

Research Limitations/Implications: Limitations refer to excluding other socio-economic factors and a narrow metric focus, which may obscure the broader effects of textile waste.

Practical Implications: Results advocate for sustainable waste management policies, which were crucial during the European energy crisis, to foster eco-friendly practices in the fashion industry.

Social Implications: The study emphasises the need for a circular economy shift in fast fashion, which is vital for environmental sustainability and societal health.

Originality/Value: This research enriches the sustainability narrative by correlating it with socio-economic health in European contexts, providing a unique industry perspective.

Plain Language Summary: Exploring the connection between sustainability in Europe’s fashion industry and quality of life, our study finds that eco-friendly policies match higher living standards. However, fashion waste’s direct effect could be much better. Amidst an energy crisis (Kent, 2022), our insights press for greener practices in fashion, underscoring the necessity for a circular economy to support environmental and social well-being.

The European Marriage Pattern (EMP) was characteristic of preindustrial northwestern Europe and, in recent years, has been proposed as an important factor in the rise of the West. Yet, the origins and ultimate causes of the EMP remain obscure. We examine a novel hypothesis that the EMP can emerge in geographic environments with a lighter infectious disease burden. We overcome significant challenges facing empirical analysis of premodern societies. Using a large, individual-level database of marriages from the county of Kent, England, as well as a spatial regression discontinuity approach, we demonstrate a robust association between physical ecology and female age at first marriage (FAFM). We also find that the two potential channels proposed in the literature play starkly different roles in explaining our finding. Specifically, we fail to find that pastoralism plays any significant role in explaining the EMP, while the mortality rate channel accounts for a significant portion of the observed relationship between the disease environment and FAFM.

Perhaps the most important question universities need to ask themselves is how they can increase their efforts to meaningfully contribute to resolving the major societal issues of today. Universities are probably the only institutions that, when working together, can truly have a large and sustained influence on the global challenges we face. With that in mind, the fundamental question for universities that we try to answer in this chapter is: How can we ensure and increase our relevance in a way that is ethically and socially responsible? Our metaphor for working through this question is to argue that a university must ‘think differently’. We argue in favour of what we consider a pragmatic approach to engagement. To illustrate this approach, the University of Leeds’ approach to broaden its engagement and social responsibility both regionally and globally is used as an example. Ultimately, universities that are engaged and socially responsive must strategically redefine excellence towards more generosity and collaboration. Excellence is impossible without social impact and the deep collaborations necessary to deliver it.

This study explores the coping strategies employed by people of color in response to racial discrimination and examines how cultural norms inform these strategies.

In-depth qualitative interviews were conducted with 34 Black and Asian Americans about their experiences with racial discrimination.

Findings reveal that participants cope through humor, seeking social support on social media, from family and friends, and through avoidant coping strategies. Seeking social support from empathetic others, especially when they shared the same racial background as participants, contributes to feelings of comfort, sanity, and a sense of community. Group differences emerge in seeking family support with Black Americans more likely to seek parental support, likely because of racial socialization practices by their parents that prepared them for experiencing bias. Asian Americans preferred talking to siblings or cousins, citing a cultural gap between them and their parents.

The study underscores the importance of considering the quality of social support, not just its use, as a buffer against harms related to discrimination.

Racial discrimination is a routine experience for many people of color. This study demonstrates how the type of coping strategy matters for coping with the distress that often accompanies these experiences.

In contrast to monoracial-focused studies, this research demonstrates the convergence and divergence of coping strategies among different racial groups.

We review the major developments that have occurred in identity theory since 2014, when we last reviewed the theory in Advances in Group Processes.

Our focus is on changes and developments in the theory itself rather than a review of the substantive findings of research using the theory.

During the past decade, there have been important conceptualizations to the identity process to help refine it, which we discuss. We also include a more precise way of measuring the cognitive, behavioral, and emotional responses to identity nonverification, which earlier were expressed in verbal terms rather than mathematical terms. We discuss advances in conceptualizing identity characteristics, such as identity prominence and salience, and we add identity dispersion to these conceptualizations. Over the past decade, there has been more integration of the perceptual and structural foci in identity theory, showing the unity of one theory. We can see this in how the identity–society relationship has been explicated in more detail, which we highlight. Identity theory continues to integrate with other theories, and we discuss how this integration has occurred most closely with exchange theory during the past decade. Finally, advances in substantive areas have been made such as new research on racial/ethnic identities and counter-normative and stigmatized identities, and we briefly review this work.

We show the many ways identity theory has advanced in the past 10 years. We anticipate that developments in the next 10 years will be just as exciting.