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In May 2020, Kenya declared Gender-Based Violence (GBV) a health emergency amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Domestic and intimate partner violence typically rises during crises, regardless of economic status (Spangaro et al., 2021). Before COVID-19, around 45% of women and girls in Kenya had experienced violence (Musembi et al., 2022). Although Kenya’s constitution has addressed GBV since 2010 and gender equity initiatives have been promoted, the pandemic exacerbated GBV, particularly in rural areas, due to lockdowns and movement restrictions. This study examines the lessons learned from Kenya’s COVID-19 response and proposes policies and processes that integrate ethical leadership to effectively combat GBV and advance gender equity.

This exploratory phenomenology study involved conducting semi-structured interviews with pregnant women, mothers, policymakers and government representatives.

The qualitative narratives reveal several critical issues and areas for improvement in addressing gender-based violence (GBV) and related challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic in Kenya. Both policymakers and pregnant women highlighted a lack of effective leadership, public policy and application of gender equity principles, with deeply ingrained patriarchal norms hindering progress.

This study aims to improve responses to GBV during crises and promote gender equity through ethical leadership. By examining the impacts of COVID-19 on GBV and assessing the influence of intersectoral factors like employment, healthcare and financial aid, it seeks to provide actionable insights for effective interventions. The findings can inform strategies to prevent and address GBV in crises while ensuring inclusivity and justice. This aligns with international initiatives like the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and the “Leave No One Behind” agenda, fostering more resilient and equitable communities.

This research examined the effects of entrepreneurial networking, operationalised as network isomorphism and network social capital, on the sustainable growth of small enterprises and the role of innovation in the hypothesised relationship.

The study employed a survey design and the questionnaire method to collect data from 319 small enterprises which were selected via quota sampling from the membership lists of the Association of Ghana Industries and the Ghana Enterprises Agency. Data were analysed using the covariance-based structural equation modelling (CV SEM-Amos) technique.

The study found that most small enterprises participate in business networks, followed by social and political networks. Entrepreneurial networking has a significant positive influence on the sustainable growth of small enterprises, and the influence is strongly mediated by innovation. Compared with network isomorphism, the value derived from social networks has a higher significant effect on sustainable enterprise growth.

Small enterprises that tap into valuable network resources to drive internal innovation should experience sustainable growth, whereas those that do not leverage the power of entrepreneurial networking miss the opportunity to access critical resources for innovation and sustainable enterprise growth.

The paper extends beyond the resource-based view by integrating institutional and network-based theories to offer a unique “entrepreneurial network model.” By testing the model, the empirical findings provide unique comprehensive insights into network isomorphism and network social capital as entrepreneurial mechanisms which facilitate access to network resources for innovations and sustainable growth of small enterprises.

This paper seeks to demonstrate the pedagogical potential of incorporating virtual reality (VR) and primary sources in social studies education. It seeks to highlight how VR can enhance student engagement, foster critical thinking and provide immersive contextualization for historical events. Despite acknowledging challenges, this paper advocates for the purposeful adoption of VR technology in the classroom to enrich the teaching and learning of history.

This paper explores the integration of virtual reality and primary sources in social studies education by providing a detailed lesson plan that could be used as a model for this type of teaching, as well as other resources and opportunities to do so. It highlights the potential of VR to enhance engagement, historical thinking and historical empathy.

Integrating virtual reality and primary sources can support student engagement, critical thinking and historical empathy. There are also challenges that can be mitigated through careful planning.

This paper provides teachers with a pedagogical model and resources for integrating VR and primary sources, along with challenges and methods for mitigating those, in their secondary social studies classroom.

This paper offers a unique model for combining virtual reality and primary sources for secondary social studies educators. It provides an example lesson plan exemplifying its application and emphasizing VR’s potential to support teaching and learning.

The purpose was to examine the core curriculum of the top 50 graduate programs in occupational therapy (OT), physical therapy (PT), nursing, speech-language pathology (SLP) and audiology programs. The study aimed to answer the following questions: Do SLP and audiology program curricula include leadership in course offerings? How do their leadership offerings compare to those of other healthcare graduate programs? It was hypothesized that SLP and audiology programs included fewer leadership courses than other healthcare graduate programs.

This quantitative analysis evaluated the core coursework of the 250 healthcare graduate programs. The data sample included the top 50 OT, PT, nursing, speech-language pathology (SLP) and audiology programs. The graduate programs were examined for leadership content within the core coursework. A thematic text coding guide was developed following the “Ready, Willing, and Able” leadership model created by Keating, Rosch and Burgoon (2014). A Chi-Square was used to test for a categorical relationship between the graduate programs and leadership curricula. A percentage was calculated for each field to determine the number of schools offering a leadership component within their core curriculum.

The study revealed that SLP and audiology graduate programs are less likely to include leadership within the curriculum. Descriptive percentages revealed that 68% of nursing, 82% of OT, 42% of PT, 12% of audiology and 6% of SLP graduate programs included a leadership component within the core coursework. Based on the study findings, it is concluded that there is a missed opportunity for leadership preparation within the SLP and audiology curriculum. Leadership education is a crucial component to consider when developing competent clinical leaders. Following the findings, leadership development for SLP and audiology graduate programs is recommended.

A limitation of this study is that data collection relied on a single source, US News Educational Rating, to obtain the program rankings. However, US News Rankings is reliable and readily available. Another limitation is the overwhelming lack of literature on speech-language pathology and audiology leadership education. Finally, most programs had the curriculum and progression schedule publicly available on their website, but not all. Some programs do not make the curriculum information available to the public online. To minimize this limitation, the researcher contacted one or more programs via email to clarify their curricula.

This study serves as a starting point for further exploration into leadership education for SLP and audiology graduate programs. It suggests curriculum considerations, such as leadership development and identifies the need for future research. The literature review hints at a potential correlation between different leadership styles and profession selection, a hypothesis that could be further investigated. This underscores the urgency and potential for future research in this area, particularly for prospective students.

This study breaks new ground in the field of healthcare education. It is the first of its kind to investigate leadership education in SLP and audiology graduate programs. The researcher’s review of literature, research questions, study design, analysis and findings are all original contributions. The work has been synthesized and triangulated, adding unique insights to the field. This study’s originality is a crucial first step for SLP and audiology graduate programs, sparking a focus on leadership within the curriculum.

The adoption of e-taxing plays an important role in modernizing tax administration. Ghana, like many other developing countries, has adopted e-taxing to modernize its revenue collection processes and improve its tax-to-GDP ratio. This study aims to examine the current state of e-taxing maturity in Ghana, focusing on the advancements made and what can be done to achieve a mature e-taxing system.

Through qualitative design, interviews were conducted with Ghana Revenue Authority, National Information Technology Agency and Businesses to provide an in-depth understanding of the strengths, weaknesses and opportunities for improving e-taxing maturity.

The study reveals mixed e-taxing maturity. While the digital service aspect of e-taxing has seen progress, digital infrastructure, digital analytics, digital integration and digital culture hinder the full actualization of mature e-taxing.

The findings suggest the need for a comprehensive plan that addresses regulatory, cultural, technical and organizational aspects to drive digital transformation in e-taxing tax implementation.

The lack of resilient infrastructure, especially in rural areas, can worsen societal inequalities. Owing to the lack of telecommunication infrastructure and poor internet connectivity in rural areas, businesses in these areas may lack the needed information for business growth and expansion. This can result in unfair treatment of rural businesses widening the inequality gap between businesses in urban areas and rural areas. Therefore, the study is important from the standpoint that implementing the recommendations will help to bridge the gap between businesses in urban areas and rural areas.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this study is among the first to conduct an empirical study on e-taxing maturity in Ghana.

This study aims to examine Victorian primary school parents’ perspectives about a potential school-provided lunch program (LP).

An online cross-sectional survey was conducted in Victoria, Australia, in 2022 to explore parents’ perceptions regarding the lunch menu, funding source, amount willing to pay, frequency of meals and special dietary needs of a school-provided LP.

Over half of parents (57% out of 359) said they would allow their child to participate in a school LP, 34% were unsure and only 9% said they would not. The opportunity for hot cooked lunches at school and the perceived convenience for parents were the top two reasons for favouring such a program. Fifty-eight percent were in favour of hybrid-type funding from both the government and parents. The most preferred amount to pay per meal was AUD5-6 (43%), followed by AUD3-4 (25%). Parents expected meals to be healthy and made from whole food and cater to the special dietary and cultural needs of their children. They also expected enough time to be allocated so children could eat and enjoy the meals.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to explore Victorian parents’ perceptions regarding the above aspects of a school-provided LP. The findings suggest that parents are receptive to a school-provided LP; they, however, did have several expectations regarding the menu and time for eating. These findings provide important directions for designing future school-provided LPs at primary schools in Australia.

Concerns over the pollution caused by internal combustion vehicles have increased owing to population and industrialization increment. Addressing the confrontations, the demand for electric vehicles (EVs) as a combustion engine substitute became necessary in responding to environmental worries from internal combustion. The development of bio lubricant in lubricating the sliding parts of EVs is required to maintain the sustainability idea and to improve the system performance, which this research tends to explore.

In this research, the enhancement of base Jatropha oil was done using polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) and hexagonal boron nitrate (h-BN) as additives. Different characterization was conducted on the new formulation to ascertain its anticorrosion tendency. The wear and friction behavior of the formulations on the tribo-pairs surfaces in contact were investigated using ball on flat tribometer to determine their tribological responsiveness as mineral lubricant alternative. To explore the surface topography, surface profilometer, scanning electron microscope and energy dispersive X-ray investigations were PTFE, lubrication and EV carried out.

The test’s input parameters were EVs’ usual load and sliding speed, and the addition concentrations for PTFE were 0.3 Wt.%, 0.4 Wt.%, 0.5 Wt.% and 0.6 Wt.%, whereas h-BN were 0.4 Wt.%, 0.8 Wt.% and 1.2 Wt.%, respectively. The study on corrosion demonstrated resistance when applied PTFE and h-BN additives in Jatropha oil. The analysis revealed that 0.5 Wt.% PTFE + 0.8 Wt.% h-BN concentrations significantly improved the tribological characteristics when compared to the base Jatropha oil. The application of formulations yielded percentage reduction of 8.67%, 10.98%, 7.34% and 7.35%, respectively, for 0.5% poly + 0.5% h-BN, 0.5% poly + 0.6% h-BN, 0.5% poly + 0.7% h-BN, 0.5% poly + 0.8% h-BN against base Jatropha oil under 20 N.

The formulation of PTFE and h-BN for electric transmission with wear and friction effects was accomplished in this paper. The mechanism of particle diffusing at the sliding contact on tribological behavior could be examined based on the created model of operation.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/ILT-07-2023-0235/

What kind of robotic service do customers prefer when they dine out alone? This study aims to investigate how robotic service type affects solo diners’ attitude toward robotic service and restaurant revisit intention, through the mediation of rapport. It also examines the moderating effects of the need to belong and restaurant type.

Three experiments were conducted. Study 1 used a one-factor between-subjects design to test the effect of robotic service type on rapport and solo diners’ responses. Study 2 conducted a 2 (robotic service type: service-delivery vs entertainment) × need to belong quasi-experimental design to examine the moderation of need to belong. Study 3 used a 2 (robotic service type: service-delivery vs entertainment) × 2 (restaurant type: traditional restaurant vs solo-friendly restaurant) factorial between-subjects design to test the moderation of restaurant type. A qualitative study (Study 4) complements the experimental results based on semistructured interviews.

Entertainment (vs service-delivery) robotic service has a stronger effect on solo diners’ responses, with rapport serving as a mediator. Additionally, solo diners with a heightened need to belong demonstrate an intensified rapport effect when receiving entertainment-oriented robotic service. Furthermore, restaurant type plays a moderating role between robotic service type and consumer responses. For traditional restaurants, solo diners who receive entertainment (vs service-delivery) robotic service tend to form stronger rapport and favorable responses. The results of the qualitative study elucidate and support the hypothesized relationships of the experimental studies.

Restaurant operators could consider offering entertainment-based smart devices that allow solo diners to indulge themselves during the dining encounter. Restaurants could also design environmental cues that can signify a sense of comfort, such as redesigning tables with individual seats for solo diners to enhance their perceptions of shared characteristics among other solo diners in the same space.

This research advances the literature on solo dining and robotic service, by investigating how human–robot interaction can fulfill solo diners’ relatedness goals, as self-determination theory suggests. This inquiry also represents an early attempt in the hospitality literature to empirically examine the influence of robotic service type on consumer responses through the mediation of rapport.