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Although corporate social responsibility–corporate financial performance (CSR-CFP) research topics have been widely investigated, previous research has yet to examine the relationship between the specific dimension of CSR and CFP among Malaysian public-listed companies. Through literature review, it has been found that the CSR-CFP studies conducted in Malaysia have omitted the role of workplace diversity dimension in contribution to CFP. Failure to consider this variable may risk misrepresenting the relationship between CSR and CFP, thereby preclude consensus on the direction of the relationship between the variables. The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between individual CSR dimensions and CFP.

By using the CSR dimension disclosure-scoring method and cross-sectional data analysis, this research has conducted a content analysis on annual reports of the sample companies to evaluate the influence of CSR practices on companies’ profitability during 2015.

The results show that companies displaying CSR behavior are associated with higher CFP. That is to say, there is a positive relationship between CSR and CFP. However, the result has further revealed that the five CSR dimensions in isolation would differently associate with the two proxies of CFP.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study in Malaysia that considers workplace diversity issues as one of the dimensions of CSR. The findings will thus bring new insights into CSR application in Malaysia and its association with the CFP.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the effectiveness of a career management program embedded within a business module, with a specific focus on enhancing the employability of students.

The study involved five one-hour workshops based on the DOTS model, covering aspects like resume writing and professional communication. Surveys, using a structured questionnaire and a Likert scale, measured participants' perceived employability. The pre-survey included demographic details, while the post-survey evaluated the effectiveness of the Career development learning workshop. Incentives and QR codes were employed to boost participation, and data were collected at the semester's start and end, with responses linked through students' phone numbers.

The results confirmed a positive connection between the perceived effectiveness of skill programs and students' employability. Integration of career management into the curriculum cultivates a heightened professional mindset and boosts employability. Validation through a paired-samples t-test demonstrates a substantial increase in perceived employability after program participation, affirming the program's role in fostering psychosocial empowerment and elevating students' confidence in job seeking.

This pioneering research integrates a career management program into a business module, addressing employability challenges in Industry 4.0. It provides empirical evidence of the program's positive impact on students' perceived employability.

The drone food delivery service (DFDS) is a revolutionary technology owing to its ability to reduce delivery costs, alleviate traffic congestion, and offer a more environmentally friendly alternative compared to traditional delivery methods. While studies have been conducted to understand consumers’ intentions towards DFDS, very few of them considered internal factors such as personality traits. Considering the aforementioned factors, this research employs the belief-desire-intention (BDI) model and the big five personalities (BFP) traits to explore how personality traits (neuroticism, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness) moderate the associations between the desire for DFDS and consumers’ intention to use DFDS (ITU).

Survey questionnaires were distributed online via Facebook and WhatsApp. A total of 359 responses were considered valid, and the study employed the partial least squares structural equation modelling approach to test the hypotheses.

The study revealed a positive impact of the desire for DFDS on ITU. Additionally, extraversion and agreeableness were found to moderate the effect of the desire for DFDS on ITU.

This study is the first in DFDS literature to employ the BDI model, showcasing its effective application in understanding the desire-to-intention relationship. Also, this is the first study that explores the moderating role of the BFP traits in the context of DFDS usage intention. The results provide insights for developing marketing strategies to encourage DFDS usage intention based on consumers' personality traits.

This study aims to determine how different event quality dimensions (i.e. information availability, program content, food, staff service, merchandises, ticketing, facility and convenience) individually affect the satisfaction of millennial festival participants, and how their satisfaction subsequently influence their behavioral intention.

The research hypotheses were tested with a sample of 272 millennial participants attending the Borneo Jazz Festival held in Miri, Sarawak.

The results indicated that program content and facility are crucial predictors of millennial participants' level of satisfaction with the event. Furthermore, the level of satisfaction would, in turn, affect their intention to revisit the event and spread positive word-of-mouth.

The results are expected to assist festival planners in managing and designing festivals that can appeal to millennials who make up a significant percentage of tourism market.

The study adds to the knowledge of how music festival environment can yield loyalty amongst millennial festival participants in Sarawak, an Eastern state of Malaysia on the island of Borneo.

This study investigates the factors influencing the saving behaviour of Chinese Generation Z (Gen Z) through Internet wealth management (IWM) services. It adopts the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) as the theoretical framework, focusing on key determinants such as performance expectancy (PE), effort expectancy (EE), social influence (SI) and facilitating conditions (FC). The research also explores the mediating role of the intention to save via IWM and its subsequent influence on actual saving behaviour.

The hypotheses were assessed using data collected from 274 Gen Z users in China. The data were analysed using the partial least squares structural equation modelling.

The results suggest that the formation of intention among Gen Z to save through IWM services is directly affected by factors such as PE, EE, SI and FC. Intention to save via IWM positively influences actual saving behaviour. Mediation analysis further confirms the mediating role of intention to save via IWM in these relationships.

The findings have direct implications for financial institutions and policymakers engaged in promoting the practice of saving via IWM services among Gen Z, thereby fostering a culture of proactive financial management and encouraging saving behaviour.

The study contributes to the existing literature by being among the first to examine Gen Z’s IWM adoption as a personal saving tool through the theoretical lens of the UTAUT.

The Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has increased the use of food delivery containers in the food and beverage industry. Based on the theory of planned behavior (TPB), the aim of this paper is twofold: Firstly, it examines the influence of three elements of TPB (attitude, perceived behavioral control and subjective norm) and time pressure on the intention to reuse reusable food delivery containers (ITR). Secondly, it examines ITR as an antecedent to the willingness to pay more for reusable food delivery containers (WTPM).

Data were collected from 401 higher education institution (HEI) students and analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM).

The study found that the three elements of TPB influenced ITR. Furthermore, the results revealed that ITR directly influenced WTPM. Surprisingly, time pressure did not influence ITR.

The research is one of the earliest studies to investigate HEI students' intention to reuse food delivery containers during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study contributes to TPB by presenting a novel, integrated model to explain the independent roles of time pressure and ITR on ITR and WTPM, respectively. Finally, it contributes to the existing body of knowledge on pro-environmental behavior among HEI students and advances methodologically by establishing the PLS-SEM approach.

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has increased food delivery service demand, which generates massive amounts of solid waste, specifically plastic material. Therefore, this study aims to examine the determinants of consumers' intention to reuse food delivery containers (ITR) using the extended theory of planned behavior (TPB). Moral obligation was included as an antecedent, while behavioral expectation (BE) ahead of behavioral intention was an immediate predictor of consumers' pro-environmental behaviors.

The hypotheses were tested on 348 food delivery service users in Malaysia and analyzed using the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).

The findings indicated that consumers' ITR is directly influenced by perceived behavioral control and attitude. Perceived behavioral control and attitude had a positive partial indirect effect on ITR through BE. Meanwhile, subjective norms and moral obligation had a positive full indirect effect on ITR through BE.

The findings can be directly applied to practical situations of food delivery companies and environmental protection organizations managing solid waste among food delivery services.

Understanding consumers' ITR could promote practical environmental sustainability. Practically, the study provides insights to the food delivery service industry, policymakers and relevant stakeholders to encourage consumer behavior change by reusing food delivery containers in line with Sustainable Development Goal 12.

The study enhances the existing literature by extending TPB with two psychological variables: moral obligation (independent variable) and BE (mediating variable). To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first attempt to empirically investigate BE in consumers' pro-environmental behavioral intention in a high-context culture and developing economy. This study could benefit food and beverage merchants, food delivery companies, governments, non-governmental organizations and pro-environmental behavior researchers in this industry.

This study aims to investigate the hydraulic behaviour of a pilot-scale, two-staged, vertical flow constructed wetland (VFCW) for septage treatment, in terms of factors such as hydraulic retention time and hydraulic loading rate and its influence on the treatment dynamics. Because of intermittent feeding mode of VFCW systems and variation in its loading, its hydraulic behaviour is highly variable and need to be understood to optimize its treatment performance.

Tracer test were carried out using bromide ion with varying hydraulic loading rates (HLR) of 6.82 cm/d, 9.09 cm/d and 11.40 cm/d (i.e. equivalent to 75 L/d, 100L/d and 125 L/d). Tracer data is then analysed using the Residence Time Distribution (RTD) method.

RTD analysis showed that the increase in HLR increases the average hydraulic retention time (HRT). Subsequently, the increase in HLR results in a lower recovery of effluent, resulting in poor productivity in treatment. The study also showed that the removal of nitrogen and organic matter improved with increasing HRT. However, observations show no correlation between HRT and total solids removal.

A performance evaluation method (by tracer) is proposed to understand the hydraulics of flow in constructed wetlands, which has not been widely studied. Additionally, the dynamics of treatment in VFCWs treating septage may also be revealed by the tracer method. The study can be applied to any constructed wetlands designed for treatment of wastewater, septage or sludge.

This paper aims to study the agent learning from expert demonstration data while incorporating reinforcement learning (RL), which enables the agent to break through the limitations of expert demonstration data and reduces the dimensionality of the agent’s exploration space to speed up the training convergence rate.

Firstly, the decay weight function is set in the objective function of the agent’s training to combine both types of methods, and both RL and imitation learning (IL) are considered to guide the agent's behavior when updating the policy. Second, this study designs a coupling utilization method between the demonstration trajectory and the training experience, so that samples from both aspects can be combined during the agent’s learning process, and the utilization rate of the data and the agent’s learning speed can be improved.

The method is superior to other algorithms in terms of convergence speed and decision stability, avoiding training from scratch for reward values, and breaking through the restrictions brought by demonstration data.

The agent can adapt to dynamic scenes through exploration and trial-and-error mechanisms based on the experience of demonstrating trajectories. The demonstration data set used in IL and the experience samples obtained in the process of RL are coupled and used to improve the data utilization efficiency and the generalization ability of the agent.

Semi-crystalline polymers such as polyamide-12 can be used for selective laser sintering (SLS) to make near-fully dense plastic parts. At present, however, the types of semi-crystalline polymers suitable for SLS are critically limited. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the processibility of a new kind of semi-crystalline polypropylene (PP) with low isotacticity for SLS process.

The SLS processibility of the PP powder, including particle size and shape, sintering window, degree of crystallinity and degradation temperature, was evaluated. Effects of the applied laser energy density on the surface micromorphology, density, tensile strength and thermal properties of SLS-built PP specimens were studied.

The results show that the PP powder has a nearly spherical shape, smooth surfaces, an appropriate average particle size of 63.6 μm, a broad sintering window of 21 oC and low crystalline degree of 30.4 per cent comparable to that of polyamide-12, a high degradation temperature of 381.8°C and low part bed temperature of 105°C, indicating a very good SLS processibility. The density and the tensile strength first increase with increasing laser energy density until they reach the maximum values of 0.831 g/cm3 and 19.9 MPa, respectively, at the laser energy density of 0.0458 J/mm², and then decrease when the applied laser energy density continue to increase owing to the degradation of PP powders. The complex PP components have been manufactured by SLS using the optimum parameters, which are strong enough to be directly used as functional parts.

This paper provides a new knowledge for this field that low-isotacticity PPs exhibit good SLS processibility, therefore increasing material types and broadening the application of SLS technology.