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Psychologically Informed Planned Environments (PIPEs) are designed to support individuals to develop positive relationships. This can be achieved through social activities and engagement with committees. Developing understanding of diversity and inclusion (D&I) continues to be an area of need in criminal justice. A custodial PIPE therefore developed a D&I committee, which included the planning and delivery of community events. This study aims to explore the effectiveness of the committee and events in increasing understanding of protected characteristics, enabling individuals to raise D&I-related issues, developing positive relationships and increasing feelings of safety.

Eight participants residing on a PIPE engaged in semi-structured interviews to explore their experience of the D&I committee and events. Thematic analysis was used to explore the responses and to identify common themes within the data.

Four themes were identified: “you’re in a safe environment here”, connectedness, opportunities to learn and grow and “it could be better”. The research indicated that the D&I committee and events support several of the enabling environments standards and provide prisoners with an opportunity to build on their strengths and capabilities, in line with the Good Lives Model (Ward, 2002; Ward and Gannon, 2006), which underpins the ethos of PIPEs (NOMS and DoH, 2012; HMPPS and NHS, 2023).

There is scope for similar committees to be implemented in other psychologically informed environments, which could potentially be extended to other therapeutic environments and “standard wings” within prisons. However, future research should consider the influence of prisoners’ individual characteristics on their experience of such committees and events.

PIPEs provide a unique environment in which various committees can be implemented. A D&I committee has provided the space and opportunity for staff and prisoners to develop their knowledge and understanding and to build positive relationships. This research has evaluated the effectiveness of this and aims to promote the use of such committees in other services.

This study investigates the motivations and challenges of Nigerian women in leadership roles in male-dominated family firms. It addresses the literature gap in gender dynamics within these businesses, particularly in Nigeria, where such enterprises are economically significant yet often display gender biases due to cultural and societal norms. Using qualitative methods and a multiple case study approach, the research analyzes the experiences of eight women leading family firms. It identifies three key motivations for these women: acquiring necessary skills and capabilities, career development, and enhancing quality of life, influenced by personal growth, job satisfaction, and balancing work and family. The study also highlights three main challenges: the glass ceiling effect, traditional gender roles, and primogeniture, leading to stereotypes, societal pressures, and often relegating women to subordinate roles or presenting significant leadership hurdles.

The connection between critical thinking and students' reliance on Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been examined in this chapter. While there are many educational advantages to AI technology, it has been demonstrated that a heavy dependence on it may impair autonomous problem-solving and critical thinking skills. The research highlights the necessity of incorporating a critical thinking approach into educational programs to assist students in scrutinizing, analyzing, and assessing AI technologies. For data analysis descriptive and correlational analysis were conducted to test the research hypothesis. Furthermore, by honing their critical thinking skills, students will be able to question data supplied by AI, recognize potential biases, assess the validity of sources, and make defensible conclusions. Additionally, the findings show a positive relationship between using AI and critical thinking toward transformation of innovative learning. This study highlights the importance of critical thinking abilities in navigating an AI-driven society by demonstrating a link between higher critical thinking capabilities and a stronger desire to employ AI technology. It is advised that lawmakers and educational institutions give the integration of critical thinking abilities in curricula top priority considering these findings. Furthermore, future studies should focus on the difficulties in integrating AI into classroom environments and the long-term impacts of a critical thinking approach on AI dependence. This chapter's main contention is that critical thinking is necessary for the ethical use of AI, autonomous reasoning, and independent decision-making.

We propose to see, regarding the Venezuelan context and at the same time in dialogue with the literature on Latin American prisons, the prison through the prison-neighborhood correspondence. This includes, for example, looking at how the prison organizes crime outside, attributes social and reputational capital, extracts and redistributes illegal profits, export/import modes and logics of action and domination. The purpose is to (a) discuss the “hydraulic” theses on prison gangs, dominant in North American literature, which explain their emergence through conditions endogenous of the prison, and instead put the emphasis on the dynamics of exclusion and the “lumpen economies” in which the poor subsist, and (b) nuance the perspectives on the relations between prison and community from the point of view of the peripheral South, marked by high rates of exclusion, informality, and an economy strongly dependent on commodities and a significant labor surplus population, in contrast to the industrial economies of the Global North.

This book chapter briefly discusses the historical and cultural context of ethnography and evaluation as positioned in the United States and the opportunities made possible by merging techniques and methodology. By merging, methodological pluralism and increased responsiveness to cultural contexts are leveraged, and the critical relevance of engaging communities in evaluation processes is underlined. However, engaging with communities with marginalized backgrounds can present complicated power dynamics in practice that require the evaluator to rethink their role. Equity-centered research practices from the Equity-Centered Research Framework are linked to expound on the need for transforming the evaluator's role to shift and share power with communities throughout engagement. We expand on how transformative work also requires ongoing examinations of positionality in the evaluator role through the lens of relationships. Borrowing from ethnographic concepts, relational dimensions of positionality are conceptualized as alignment, temporality, and place. Each component is illustrated with details on how power dynamics may occur throughout community engagement as well as ways to manage and mitigate power differentials between the roles of the evaluator and community partners. We then offer three broad evaluator practices to support transformation: (a) identify positionality, (b) embed into everyday practice, and (c) negotiate in collaborations with communities. With these practices, we reflect on critical questions and position communities as critical learning partners to promote actions to mitigate and manage ongoing power dynamics. We close this chapter with our experiences interrogating positionality to illustrate distinct burdens and insights as evaluators of color.

The aim of this research is twofold: first, to get more insights on digital maturity to face the emerging 4.0 augmented scenario by identifying artificial intelligence (AI) competencies for becoming hybrid employees and leaders; and second, to investigate digital maturity, training and development support and HR satisfaction with the organization as valuable predictors of AI competency enhancement.

A survey was conducted on 123 participants coming from different industries and involved in functions dealing with the ramifications of Industry 4.0 technologies. The sample has included predominately small-to-medium organizations. A quantitative analysis based on both exploratory factor analysis and multiple linear regression was used to test the research hypotheses.

Three main competency clusters emerge as facilitators of AI–human interaction, i.e. leadership, technical and cognitive. The interplay among these clusters gives rise to plastic knowledge, a kind of moldable knowledge possessed by a particular human agent, here called hybrid. Moreover, organizational digital maturity, training and development support and satisfaction with the organization were significant predictors of AI competency enhancement.

The size of the sample, the convenience sampling method and the geographical context of analysis (i.e. California) required prudence in generalizing results.

Hybrids’ plastic knowledge conceptualized and operationalized in the overall quantitative analysis allows them to fill in the knowledge gaps that an AI agent-human interplay may imply, generating alternative solutions and foreseeing possible outcomes.

The aim of this empirical study is to identify the relationship between student accommodation characteristics (SACs) and academic performance (AP). SACs, considered as the single independent variable, were divided into three further constructs: perceived location advantage (PLA), perceived facilities (PFs) and perceived safety and security (PSS). This study also intends to uncover the mediating role of perceived overall satisfaction (POS) over the direct relationships.

The study used a cross-sectional quantitative survey methodology to investigate the hypothesized relationships based on 384 sample responses (n) selected using purposive sampling techniques from six Scottish universities. The study used IBM SPSS version 29 and partial least squares-structural equation modeling version 4 for descriptive statistics and for testing the hypotheses, respectively.

Based on survey responses and the application of proper statistical measures, this study found that all three independent constructs (PLA, PFs and PSS) have a significant positive association with the dependent variable, AP. The mediator (POS) was also found to be positively correlated with AP. Furthermore, this study identified that POS can partially mediate all three direct relationships.

By extending and validating current theories such as satisfaction frameworks, student engagement models and servicescape psychology, this study can significantly advance the current state of the literature. It highlights how crucial holistic satisfaction can mediate the association between academic achievement and the features of student housing. The results provide theoretical justification for incorporating accommodations into planning and policy for education. Additionally, by emphasizing on the crucial elements that enhance students’ well-being and academic achievement, such as location, safety, aesthetics and extensive support services, the study offers significant management insights.

This paper aims to explore how experienced nurses relate to hazing and uncover the underlying limits of tolerance for newcomers.

Data were collected through eight qualitative focus group interviews (n = 35) and analysed using reflexive thematic coding.

The analysis revealed three themes in the limits of experienced nurses’ tolerance of newcomers: “Don’t be sensitive”, “Prove your respectability” and “Accept your inequality of rights”.

The paper challenges existing perspectives on hazing motivation since tolerating newcomers is motivated by defending the status quo against threatening and challenging newcomers.

The prolonged drought in Chile’s Coquimbo region has created a permanent state of emergency, forcing the state to spend millions each year distributing drinking water to rural communities. The purpose of this article is to detail a study focused on optimizing the supply of drinking water through trucks in the 15 communes of the region and how the problem was faced in a context of a slowonset disaster.

A geo-referenced census and optimization analysis of the 5.541 households that receive drinking water was conducted to determine the feasibility of removing trucks from the system. To generate a greater reduction in distribution costs, it was suggested to incorporate water distribution infrastructure projects, changing the concept of ‘expenses’ to ‘investment’.

The study was born out of the concern for the increased demand for drinking water from rural areas. The proposed and implemented framework allowed an additional 20% reduction in the initial transportation costs; this confirmed the assumption that the proposed optimization model alone would not offer a robust solution and was complemented and integrated with this type of alternative, forming an “integrated model”.

The paper has implications for the resilience of territories affected by climate change.

The methodology can be replicated in other areas where similar interactions occur.

Families impacted by drought can improve their quality of life and reduce distress in the face of the constant emergency.

This research aims to contribute knowledge from the perspective of a slow-onset disaster where water resources are scarce. It presents a framework where two disciplines converge, resulting in an “integrated model” that, through its implementation, reduces the costs of resource delivery while simultaneously improving the sanitary conditions of the beneficiary families.

The study estimates the willingness to pay for organic oranges and identifies its influencing factors among consumers in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam.

The study used survey data from 413 households in the Mekong Delta from March 2022 to July 2022. The choice experiment (CE) and contingent valuation method (CVM) were employed to analyze consumers’ willingness to pay (WTP). STATA 17 software was used to analyze research data in the logit model and mixed logit model.

The research results from the CVM approach show that a number of demographic characteristics have a direct impact on WTP, such as education, educational attainment, family size, the presence of children and the elderly in the household, food safety and environmental awareness. The CE model shows product attributes that influence consumers’ WTP, such as country of origin, traceability, quality grade, organic certification, ecolabel and organic content. Both approaches show that price is the main barrier to organic orange consumption.

The study surveyed four large cities in four provinces representing the Mekong Delta region.

Our study helps administrators have a deeper insight into consumer preferences and behavior, specifically the factors that affect consumers' WTP, an important indicator of demand for the success of manufacturers and marketers in developing as well as improving marketing strategies. Knowledge of a product’s WTP on behalf of (potential) customers plays an important role in many areas of marketing management, such as pricing decisions or new product development.

Furthermore, this understanding will inform policymakers about the future of agricultural markets in Vietnam and help them better prepare for the making of sustainable agricultural policies. Develop organic agriculture to both protect human health, protect the living environment and protect the soil from degradation, ensuring sustainable agricultural production. This is also one of the measures to help people stay away from diseases to limit the social burden.

The study confirms that both CVM and CE models can be used to estimate WTP. However, CVM fits the overall WTP estimate, while CE is more appropriate when estimating WTP for individual scenarios through combining attributes with different levels.