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This research aims to identify the factors that influence the investment intention of retail investors in Indian REITs. The study incorporates the theory of planned behavior and innovation diffusion theory as the research framework, with perceived risk and mass media influence as additional constructs.

Primary data were collected using self-administered questionnaires from 534 potential investors in India. The data were analyzed using partial least square structural equation modeling.

The study showed that factors such as relative advantage, compatibility, attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control and mass media significantly and positively influence investment intention in Indian REITs. However, perceived risk was found to have a negative and significant influence, while complexity did not affect investment intention.

This is the first quantitative investigation into determining the factors influencing the investment intention of Indian retail investors on Indian REITs.

Although a fashion subscription offers significant environmental benefits by transforming physical products into shared services, most customers are reluctant to adopt it. This hesitation, exacerbated by poor communication from brands that primarily emphasize its personal benefits, hinders its sustainable growth. This study aims to examine specifically which concerns increase hesitation, and the role of explicitly informing consumers about the service’s environmental benefits in mitigating the impact of consumer concerns on their hesitation.

Data were collected through an online experiment with more than a thousand U.S. adults nationwide and analyzed using a two-step analysis. First, theory-based causal modeling was conducted to examine the effects of consumer concerns on hesitation, accounting for ambivalence as a mediator and informed environmental benefits as a moderator. Second, machine learning was used to cross-validate the findings.

Results show that certain types of consumer concerns increase hesitation, significantly mediated by ambivalence, and confirm that informed environmental benefits mitigate the effects of some concerns on hesitation.

This study contributes to building on the hierarchy of effects theory by exploring negatively nuanced constructs – concerns, ambivalence and hesitation – beyond the traditional constructs representing the cognitive, affective and conative stages of consumer decision-making. Findings provide strategic guidance to brands on how to communicate the new service to consumers. Leveraging theory-based causal modeling with machine learning-based predictive modeling provides a novel methodological approach to explaining and predicting consumer hesitation toward new services.

This study aims to examine success factors for food truck businesses in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), focusing on customer convenience, government support, cultural infrastructure and location decisions. Given the unique cultural and economic context of the UAE, this research aims to fill a notable gap in the existing literature.

Using SmartPLS and partial least squares structural equation modeling, data from 250 food truck owners are analyzed to identify significant relationships between success factors and business performance.

The findings reveal significant relationships (p < 0.05) between success factors and the performance of food truck businesses. Customer convenience indirectly affects success through location suitability. Additionally, cultural infrastructure, government support and strategic location decisions have a direct impact on business performance. However, some indirect effects, such as customer convenience through location selection, were found to be statistically insignificant (p = 0.061).

The study offers practical guidance for policymakers and entrepreneurs, highlighting the importance of strategic location selection, cultural infrastructure and customer convenience for business success. Establishing designated food truck zones based on suitability will ensure optimal operational environments, particularly in high-traffic tourist areas.

This study contributes new insights into the food truck industry in the UAE, using advanced statistical techniques to identify specific success factors relevant to the region’s unique dynamics.

This paper aims to propose a plan-do-check-act-oriented framework for implementing the “Sustainability circles” (SCs) approach to achieve sustainability excellence within higher education institutions (HEIs).

The SCs approach, derived from the quality circles concept, involves groups of individuals working together to promote sustainability within HEIs. This paper demonstrates the application of this approach through a case study of the University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates, establishing clear links between sustainable development goals (SDGs), the Universitas Indonesia (UI) GreenMetric Ranking System and SCs.

The case study revealed that SCs significantly impacted the achievement of SDGs and improved the university’s rankings in the UI GreenMetric within a short period. The SC approach effectively engaged a wide range of stakeholders, including students, academic and administrative staff.

By involving students, faculty and administrative staff in SCs, HEIs can embed sustainability into their institutional culture, developing new ideas and innovative solutions. The SCs approach effectively increases the number of points gained from respective sustainability ranking systems and their evaluation categories, showcasing its strength and novelty in driving engagement and sustainability excellence.

The SC approach provides HEIs with a structured method to overcome sustainability challenges by fostering collaboration, innovation and stakeholder engagement. This framework can accelerate the achievement of SDGs and enhance sustainability practices within HEIs.

The SCs approach impacts the society by equipping students with sustainability awareness and critical problem-solving skills to address real-world sustainability challenges. Consequently, these students take an active part in developing a more aware, engaged and proactive society.

This paper introduces an innovative application of the quality circles concept to sustainability within HEIs, addressing the significant challenge of integrating and involving both top-level leadership and bottom-level stakeholders. The proposed SC approach effectively bridges this gap by combining top-down and bottom-up strategies, fostering collaboration and engagement across all levels. This novel framework demonstrates how HEIs can overcome barriers to sustainability implementation, ensuring comprehensive participation and accelerating the achievement of SDGs.

This paper aims to provide a full introduction, new classification, comparison and investigation of the challenges as well as applications of layerless 3D printing, which is one of the industry 4.0 pioneers.

Given the significance and novelty of uniform 3D printing, more than 250 publications were collected and reviewed in an unbiased and clear manner.

As a result, the majority of uniform parts printed in polymer form are known up to this point. In a novel division for better researchers’ comprehension, uniform printing systems were classified into three categories: oxygen inhibition (OI), liquid lubrication (LL) and photon penetration (PP), and each was thoroughly investigated. Furthermore, these three approaches were evaluated in terms of printing speed, precision and accuracy, manufacturing scale and cost.

The parameters of each approach were compared independently, and then a practical comparison was conducted among these three approaches. Finally, a variety of technologies, opportunities, challenges and advantages of each significant method, as well as a future outlook for layerless rapid prototyping, are presented.

This study presents a systematic literature review (SLR) of the interdisciplinary literature on drones in last-mile delivery (LMD) to extrapolate pertinent insights from and into the logistics management field.

Rooting their analytical categories in the LMD literature, the authors performed a deductive, theory refinement SLR on 307 interdisciplinary journal articles published during 2015–2022 to integrate this emergent phenomenon into the field.

The authors derived the potentials, challenges and solutions of drone deliveries in relation to 12 LMD criteria dispersed across four stakeholder groups: senders, receivers, regulators and societies. Relationships between these criteria were also identified.

This review contributes to logistics management by offering a current, nuanced and multifaceted discussion of drones' potential to improve the LMD process together with the challenges and solutions involved.

The authors provide logistics managers with a holistic roadmap to help them make informed decisions about adopting drones in their delivery systems. Regulators and society members also gain insights into the prospects, requirements and repercussions of drone deliveries.

This is one of the first SLRs on drone applications in LMD from a logistics management perspective.

While the tourism–growth nexus is one of the better researched themes in both tourism and economics literature, there is limited evidence on how institutional quality affects this link, especially in the context of the developing world. To address this gap, this study aims to investigate the tourism-led growth hypothesis (TLGH) through the lens of institutional quality, drawing on evidence from African economies.

This study adopts a longitudinal design, involving panel data on 43 countries over an 18-year period, and the data were analyzed using the difference generalized method of moments model.

Results indicated that international tourism earnings contributed to economic growth in the selected economies. However, institutional quality negatively moderated the tourism–growth relationship on the continent, particularly in low-income economies, while reinforcing this link in middle-income countries.

This study provides new insights into how the TLGH varies across different levels of institutional quality and development.

虽然旅游业与经济增长之间的关系研究是旅游和经济领域中较为深入的主题之一, 但目前关于制度质量如何影响这种关系的研究仍然较少, 而以发展中国家作为研究对象的研究更为有限. 为了填补这一研究空白, 本研究从制度质量的角度出发, 以非洲国家为例, 深入探讨旅游业主导增长假说。

本研究采用纵向设计, 采集18年期间43个国家的面板数据, 并使用差异广义矩法 模型对数据进行分析。

研究结果表明, 国际旅游收入促进了所选经济体的经济增长. 然而, 非洲大陆的旅游业与增长关系受到制度质量的负向调节作用; 这种负面调节在低收入国家中更为明显, 但在中等收入国家制度质量却对旅游业与增长的关系起到了正向调节作用。

本研究创新性地研究了旅游主导增长假说 (TLGH) 在不同制度质量和发展水平下的不同表现。

Aunque el nexo entre turismo y crecimiento es uno de los temas mejor investigados tanto en la literatura turística como en la económica, existen pocas pruebas sobre cómo afecta la calidad institucional a este vínculo, especialmente en el contexto del mundo en desarrollo. Para abordar esta laguna, el presente estudio investiga la hipótesis del crecimiento impulsado por el turismo a través de la perspectiva de la calidad institucional, basándose en evidencias de las economías Africanas.

El estudio adopta un diseño longitudinal, con datos de panel sobre 43 países a lo largo de un periodo de 18 años, y los datos se analizaron utilizando el modelo de diferencias del Método generalizado de momentos.

Los resultados indicaron que los ingresos del turismo internacional contribuyeron al crecimiento económico de las economías seleccionadas. Sin embargo, la calidad institucional moderó negativamente la relación turismo-crecimiento en el continente, particularmente en las economías de renta baja, mientras que reforzó este vínculo en los países de renta media.

El estudio brinda nuevos conocimientos sobre cómo la hipótesis de crecimiento impulsado por el turismo (TLGH) varía en diferentes niveles de calidad institucional y desarrollo.

Three-dimensional bioprinting (3D bioprinting) is used for repairing and regenerating living tissues due to its ease of use, cost-effectiveness and high precision in fabricating. Owing to their high biocompatibility, natural hydrogels are widely used as scaffold materials in bioprinting. However, the mechanical properties and low printability of hydrogels present a challenge. This study aims to introduce a composite hydrogel that exhibits excellent mechanical, biological and printability properties simultaneously.

Alginate (Alg), carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) and nanohydroxyapatite (nHA) as suitable materials for 3D printing were used. Effect of material content and pre-crosslinking on various properties of these materials were investigated. Both quantitative and qualitative experiments were conducted to validate the biomaterial ink’s printability, its rheological characteristics, as well as its biological and mechanical properties.

Based on the analysis of the obtained experimental results from all mentioned tests, a hydrogel with a composition of 4% Alg, 2% CMC and 2% nHA with the pre-crosslinking process was selected as the preferred option. The results demonstrated that the selected material has good cell adhesion, wettability, degradation rate and 93% cell viability. Furthermore, compared to the composition of 4% Alg–2% CMC, the chosen material exhibited a 52% improvement in printability and a 55% improvement in compressive modulus.

A significant challenge in the field of 3D bioprinting is the development of scaffolds that possesses optimal mechanical, biological and printability characteristics simultaneously, essential for attaining tissue-like properties. Hence, this paper explores a novel nanocomposite hydrogel that demonstrates promising outcomes across all these aspects simultaneously.

From poor healthcare infrastructure to vaccine donors, India has traveled a long way. In this study, the author tried to find the investment certainty and persistence of volatility in the Indian healthcare system due to COVID-19.

Using the Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity (GARCH 1,1) model, this study quantifies the change in the conditional variance after the first case report of COVID-19. The author has used the S&P BSE HEALTHCARE index time series to analyze India’s healthcare infrastructure and practices.

The author found evidence of a decrease in investment certainty in investments related to India’s healthcare infrastructure and practices after the first case report of COVID-19. Furthermore, the estimation of the econometric model suggests the presence of a large degree of volatility persistence in the S&P BSE HEALTHCARE index.

This research would be the first of its kind where the return volatility of the Indian healthcare sector has been discussed. Also, this research quantifies the return volatility of the healthcare sector during the pre- and post-COVID-19 period.