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Despite the promising development and marketing potential of the metaverse, our understanding of how realistic metaverse environments impact user engagement and behaviours remains limited. This study investigates the role of perceived realism in influencing user engagement, thereby affecting external search behaviour and visit intentions.

We surveyed 270 active metaverse users to test the research model. The data were analysed using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM).

The results of our study show that three dimensions of realism – avatar involvement, perceptual pervasiveness and social realism – significantly enhance user engagement, which in turn influences external search behaviour and visit intention. In contrast, simulation realism and freedom of choice have minimal effects on absorption and dedication.

This study highlights the role of perceived realism in enhancing user engagement with the metaverse and its impact on physical world behaviours. It contributes to metaverse literature by demonstrating that engagement within the metaverse significantly influences physical world behaviours, including visit intentions and external search behaviours.

This study offers practical guidance for developers to enhance user engagement in metaverse environments. Specifically, our findings advocate for visual and audio quality enhancements, greater persuasiveness of virtual spaces, improved avatar representativeness and a closer alignment of metaverse activities with real-life events.

This study advances the theoretical understanding of perceived realism by examining how its dimensions – such as visual and audio quality, avatar representativeness and alignment with real-life events – impact user engagement in the metaverse. It also explores how this engagement influences offline behaviours, thus bridging the gap between virtual and real-world interactions.

Through the theoretical lenses of media richness, perceived realism and customer engagement, this study aims to investigate the mechanisms that promote customer engagement in metaverse-mediated environments in the meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions (MICE) context, as well as the impact of customer engagement on customers’ metaverse usage intensity and future visit intention.

A survey of customers who have experience with metaverse-mediated MICE activities was conducted. Data from 267 respondents were analysed using partial least squares-structural equation modelling and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to test our research framework.

Media richness dimensions, including multiple cues, immediate feedback and personal focus, were found to enhance perceived metaverse realism, which in turn affects the dimensions of customer engagement, leading to customers’ metaverse usage intensity and future visit intention. The fsQCA analysis identifies three configurations that lead to high event visit intention.

This research helps developers and marketers better understand how rich media contents create realistic experiences in the metaverse, aiding them to devise strategies for customer engagement and improve resource allocation.

Despite its potentially revolutionary impacts, empirical studies on the mechanisms driving customer engagement in the metaverse and its effects are scarce. This study contributes by revealing the multiple-phase mechanism of the customer engagement journey in the metaverse-mediated MICE context. By expanding the media richness theory into this area, our study provides new insights by illustrating how media richness dimensions create multisensory experiences and real-time interactions, enhancing perceived metaverse realism and customer engagement. It also addresses the debate on whether metaverse-mediated events substitute or complement real-life events.

The purpose of this article is to meet Professor Paul T.P. Wong, PhD, CPscyh, who is based at the Department of Psychology, Trent University, Peterborough, Ontario, Canada. Wong represents an interesting case of how a racial/cultural minority could achieve success in a hostile environment consisting of the systemic biases of injustice, discrimination and marginalization. His life also epitomizes how one can experience the paradoxical truth of healing and flourishing in an upside-down world through the positive suffering mindset (PSM).

This case study is presented in two sections: a positive autoethnography written by Wong, followed by his answers to ten questions. The core methodology of positive autoethnography allows people to understand how Wong’s life experience of being a war baby in China, a constant outsider and a lone voice in Western culture, has shaped a very different vision of meaning, positive mental health and global flourishing.

Wong reveals how to live a life of meaning and happiness for all the suffering people in a difficult world. He has researched the positive psychology of suffering for 60 years, from effective coping with stress and searching for meaning to successful aging and positive death. According to Wong’s suffering hypothesis and the emerging paradigm of existential positive psychology (Wong, 2021), cultivating a PSM is essential for healing and flourishing in all seasons of life.

An expanding literature has been developed to illustrate why the missing link in well-being research is how to transcend and transform suffering into triumph. Wong reveals how this emerging area of research is still not fully embraced by mainstream psychology dominated by the individualistic Euro-American culture, and thus why, in an adversarial milieu, existential positive psychology is limited by its inability to attract more researchers to test out Wong’s suffering hypothesis.

The wisdom and helpful tools presented here may enable people to achieve mature happiness and existential well-being even when they have a very painful past, a very difficult present and a bleak future.

This autoethnographic case study offers new grounds for hope for all those who are injured by life, marginalized by systemic biases or tormented by chronic illnesses and disorders. It also provides a road map for a better world with more decent human beings who dare to stand up for justice, integrity and compassion.

Meaning as reflected in suffering is according to Wong the most powerful force to bring out either the worst or the best in people. The new science of suffering shows us how the authors can achieve positive transformation through cultivating a PSM, no matter how harsh one’s fate may be.

This study aims to explore various conceptions of global citizenship education (GCE) and pedagogies among frontline Chinese Hong Kong secondary school teachers under the onset of a new political climate of conservative nationalism.

It utilised interview findings with a purposive sample of about 22 experienced secondary school teachers in 2019, which was shortly before the city was caught in huge waves of protests. Interviewees come from different demographics, such as subsidy types of schools and school sponsoring bodies and admit students of different socio-economic status and academic capabilities.

The findings reveal both liberal and nationalistic orientations on knowledge and values of GCE, including sustainability, in recent school education, and the use of discussion and experiential learning for teaching GCE.

A conceptual framework is developed for further research on teaching GCE in different cultural contexts. Developing pedagogies to instil in learners the values, attitudes and behaviours that support responsible global citizenship should become an international research agenda.

The analysis offers insightful views on what, why and how these teachers teach GCE. The authors also construct a framework of teachers' values and teaching beliefs that cultivate global citizens based on the research findings. This framework can inform school leaders, curriculum planners and teacher trainers in developing a more substantial pedagogical framework for GCE.

Construction workers’ safety compliance is attracting considerable critical attention as it plays a decisive role in improving safety on construction sites. This study applied the concept of differentiating safety compliance into deep compliance (DC) and surface compliance (SC) and relied on trait activation theory to investigate the effects of situational awareness (SA) and emotional intelligence (EI) on safety compliance.

Cross-sectional survey data were collected from 239 construction workers in Australia, and these responses were statistically analyzed using the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to validate the proposed model.

Results revealed that both EI and SA positively impacted DC and negatively impacted SC. Moreover, SA partially mediated the link between EI and two types of safety compliance (DC and SC). The outcomes showed that construction workers’ ability in regulating their emotions could influence their perception of environmental cues and the effectiveness of safety compliance behavior.

This study sheds light on investigating the antecedents of DC and SC from the perspective of trait activation theory. The findings also have practical implications, stating that construction site managers or safety professionals should consider providing training on construction workers’ EI and SA to enhance their willingness to expend conscious efforts in complying with safety rules and procedures, which can lead to improved safety outcomes.

Online food delivery has been prevalent in recent years worldwide, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, and people's consumption behaviors have changed significantly. This study aims to investigate the consumption behavior of young adults using online food delivery platforms during the COVID-19 pandemic and focuses on the dominant factors influencing their decision to use online food delivery platforms.

Semi-structured interviews including 14 young adults aged 18–25 living in Hong Kong were conducted to collect data about their perspectives on online food delivery platforms in five areas. This research adopted the stimulus-organism-response model (S-O-R model) to analyze how the factors influence young adult users' loyalty and satisfaction with online food delivery platforms.

Thematic analyses revealed that young adults were attracted to online food delivery platforms for their numerous benefits. They had a high frequency of usage and significant spending. Usability, usefulness, satisfaction and loyalty influenced young adults' behaviors on online food delivery platforms. Participants were overall satisfied with their experiences, but platforms still had room for improvement.

Few prior studies investigated the factors affecting the consumer experience and behavioral intention of online food delivery for young adults in Asia. This study contributes to understanding young adults' experiences and problems with online food delivery platforms. It provides practical insights for system engineers and designers to improve the current services and for the governments to enhance the existing regulatory loopholes.

Social media celebrities are getting popular in promotions, and more people have experienced social media to receive information on diet and health tips. This research presents a study showing how social media can influence young people's diet behavior through collaboration with social media celebrities.

Through recruiting on various social media and online education forums, this research recruited 196 young Hongkongers to participate in an online survey developed based on the AIDA (Action, Interest, Desire, Attention) marketing communication model on how youths access diet information from social media celebrities in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong youths consume diet information from social media celebrities through instant messaging systems, social networking sites and online videos, and, in particular, information on food calories and nutrition. However, sponsorship from vendors would decrease their desire to agree with the messages from social media celebrities. After receiving this information, some participants would follow tips and guides from social media celebrities. However, they seldom share such information. Interestingly, males are more willing to follow these tips and guides.

First, this study fills the gap of prior research, which did not study much on how social media celebrities contribute to diet promotion to youths in Asia. Second, through the AIDA Model, this study shows how social media can affect the awareness and accessibility of diet information by young Hongkongers, followed by initiating their interest in this topic and retrieving more relevant information. Furthermore, the authors further understand their desire to follow and improve their behavior as promoted by social media influencers and how they practice such behavior. Based on these findings, health-related brands could consider using social media influencers helping to promote their products and services, and these brands could further use social media to secure customer engagement.

Given a baffling contradiction that the availability of safety knowledge may not necessarily lead to workers' safety behavior, this study aims to develop an exploratory two-step working model of safety knowledge in translating safety climate into safety behavior. In particular, this study highlights the importance of articulating tacit safety knowledge and improving workers' systematic problem solving (SPS) capacity in a favorable safety climate.

This study uses 110 valid responses from Pakistan-based construction workers to test five hypotheses which embody the exploratory two-step working model of safety knowledge. The partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) is used to analyze the data.

The results of this study support the two-step working mechanism of safety knowledge in translating safety climate into safety behavior. Furthermore, results suggest that safety climate as a job resource facilitates converting construction workers' tacit safety knowledge into explicit safety knowledge (i.e. safety knowledge articulation) and then enabling them to spot non-conformities in safety management practices (i.e. SPS) and consequently to work safely (i.e. safety behavior).

The study has both theoretical and practical significance. In theory, it extends organizational learning theory and job demands-resources (JD-R) theory in the construction safety research domain and elaborates on the mediating role of safety knowledge articulation and SPS for the relationship between safety climate and safety behavior. In practice, it highlights the importance of continuous articulation of tacit safety knowledge and accumulation and use of explicit safety knowledge in construction safety management practices.

Posting and sharing about food on social media has surged in popularity amongst younger generations such as Millennials and Generation Z. This study aims to analyse and compare food-tourism sharing behaviour on social media across generations. First, this study specifically investigates the factors influencing the intention to share food experiences on social media; second, it examines the impact of sharing intention on actual behaviour and loyalty; and third, it determines whether Millennials and Generation Z differ in these relationships.

A survey was carried out of Millennial and Generation Z travellers who shared food experiences on social media. Structural equation modelling (SEM) and multi-group analysis were performed to examine the cause-and-effect relationship in both generations.

The findings reveal differences in motivation, satisfaction, sharing intention, sharing behaviour and loyalty between generations (Millennials and Generation Z).

This study contributes to the literature on the antecedents of food-sharing behaviour in online communities by indicating factors that influence the sharing of culinary experiences and brand or destination loyalty across generations. Suggestions for future research include exploring online food-sharing behaviour through cross-cultural comparisons in various regions.

As Millennials and Generation Z will expand their market share in the coming years, the findings of this study can help improve marketing strategies for culinary tourism and generate more intense food experiences for both generations.

The outcome of the research provides new insights to develop a conceptual model of food-sharing behaviour and tourism on social media by drawing comparisons across generations.