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Alcohol and tobacco consumption are significant public health concerns and considered some of the riskiest behaviors among students. Despite strong indications of heavy consumption of these substances, certain sections of the student population remain unexplored regarding their consumption patterns and associated factors, including research scholars pursuing Doctor of Philosophy degrees. This study aims to explore the patterns and correlations of consumption of alcohol and tobacco among doctoral students in three Indian universities.

A cross-sectional study was conducted on a total of 530 scholars from three central universities, Aligarh Muslim University, Banaras Hindu University and Jawahar Lal Nehru University, and focused on two substances (alcohol and tobacco) frequently used by students in India. Bi-variate analysis and penalized logistic regressions were applied to analyse the prevalence and associated factors of alcohol, smoking and smokeless tobacco among doctoral students.

Tobacco consumption was observed to be the dominant form of substance use among doctoral students. Findings revealed that 34% of scholars smoked and 25% consumed smokeless tobacco daily and around 14% consumed alcohol at least once a week. Major significant correlates of substance consumption among scholars were found to be gender, religion, parental mortality, dissatisfaction with academic performance and stress about future career/employment. Significant variation in substance use patterns was observed among universities.

This study provides first-hand evidence on substance use patterns and the correlates among doctoral students in three Indian universities. Findings indicate the implementation of specific intervention programs for mental health and counselling for this section of students to prevent substance use addiction would be beneficial.

This paper aims to evaluate the bane of home ownership in Nigeria through mortgage financing by examining the determinants of intention of using mortgage in financing home ownership.

The paper adopted a survey quantitative research design. A total of 235 valid questionnaires randomly distributed were retrieved from 300 potential homeowners who were the sample of the research. Partial least squares-structural equation modeling was used for data analysis and hypotheses testing.

The findings revealed that religious perception on mortgage was the most significant determinant of intention of using mortgage in financing home-ownership. Subjective norms and perceived behavioral control also have significant effect on intention of using mortgage financing. However, attitude and familiarity/knowledge of mortgage were found not to have a significant effect on intention of using mortgage financing. The determinants cumulatively determined 77.6 per cent (R2 = 0.776) of the variance in intention of using mortgage in financing home ownership.

The research contributed to knowledge and has practical implications to policy makers, mortgage institutions, investors and the society.

The paper uniquely explores the bane of home-ownership through mortgage financing by examining potential home-owners’ intention of using mortgage financing. To authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper to evaluate intention of using mortgage financing, at least in Nigeria.

The aim of this study is to study the relationship between halal certification and small and medium entreprise (SME) performance in a turbulent environment such as the Palestinian environment.

In this study quantitative cross-sectional research design using questionnaires distributed over 51 certified SME’s used, and analysis was performed using partial least squares-structural equational modeling.

The current study revealed that there is a positive relationship between certification and business performance of SME’s in terms of financial and operational performance, and operational performance can mediate the effect between certification and financial performance. It is recommended to conduct further research with larger sample sizes and conduct research using different research designs, such as the longitudinal research design.

Certification of Halal also has a positive relationship with performance, even in a turbulent environment like Palestine. Accordingly, Palestinian food manufacturing firms are called to implement food safety standards like the Halal certificate to gain beside the good gained image the good financial performance.

This study was conducted in one of the most turbulent environments, as well as in developing countries, enriching the literature with results from emerging/turbulence and developing countries.

The purpose of this study is to know the influence of palm oil fuel ash and metakaolin on the strength of concrete and crack resistance of reinforced concrete beam. An ordinary portland cement has been used in the concretes production where it is an important material to be considered due to its nature that reacts with every substance present. During the cement production, a significant amount of carbon dioxide is emitted from the clinker in rotary kiln and lot of energy is required in the production processes. Such an event can be prevented by replacing the part of cement with metakaolin (MK) and palm oil fuel ash (POFA). Aside from being a cementitious alternative, the materials can also contribute to a greener environment and more sustainable building, as POFA is available in Malaysia and may be used to substitute cement and minimize pollution.

This study assesses the effect of MK and POFA on the concrete in terms of compressive strength and cracks pattern of the reinforced concrete beam based on the relevant previous studies.

From this study, the compressive strength of concrete containing MK and POFA was higher than the control mix with the percentage of improvement in the range of 0.8%–78.2% for MK and 0.5%–14%, respectively. The optimum content of MK and POFA is between the range of 10% and 15% and 10% and 20%, respectively, to achieve high strength of concrete. Other than that, the inclusion of MK to the concrete mix improves the strength of reinforced concrete beams and reduces cracks on the surface of reinforced concrete beams, whereas the inclusion of POFA to the concrete mix increases the cracks on reinforced concrete beams. The cracks appeared within the flexure zone of every beam containing the MK and POFA.

It was found that the fineness of MK and POFA has a significant influence on the mechanical properties of concrete.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the perceptions and experiences of building practitioners in the adoption of renewable energy (RE) in commercial buildings in Nigeria.

A qualitative methodology was used guided by the principles of the Grounded Theory Method (GTM). Data were collected using in-depth semi-structured interviews with a purposive sample of five industry practitioners.

Five distinct factors emerged, namely, being compliant, change in mindset, normalising, being autonomous and identity. The research revealed the significance of contextual (cultural) peculiarities and the role identity plays in informing RE adoption. The findings substantiate the significance of RE adoption in the future practice of building practitioners and in ensuring environmental stability within the Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) context.

The study focuses on commercial office buildings and attempts to provide contextual grounding to inform theory generation as part of a wider study.

This research contributes methodologically and empirically by providing grounded insight into the adoption of RE in commercial buildings. Thereby, enabling a much greater understanding of the issues associated with enhanced promotion and adoption by professionals and stakeholders, which can inform policy interventions. Furthermore, it will benefit further research within the SSA context and provide valuable lessons associated with adopting GTM in construction research.

This study aims to identify evolution and advancement in the field of business-to-business (B2B) loyalty knowledge area by analyzing its intellectual structure.

The authors use bibliometric analysis for quantitative evaluation of scholarly studies published on B2B loyalty area over a period of 27 years (1993–2020). The authors analyze intellectual knowledge base of B2B loyalty area by looking into 263 studies with 14,028 references authored by 693 researchers.

The results provide a comprehensive review of B2B loyalty area by identifying its foundations, influential works and intellectual communication linkage between these works. Notably, the analysis reveals most cited studies, key authors, important keywords, intellectual turning points and emerging trends of research in the discipline.

This study creates a baseline for presenting precise and comprehensive insights into research themes in B2B loyalty area, and identifies progressive trends over a period. This study is also helpful for researchers in identifying future directions of research in the discipline.

This study reveals the intellectual structure of B2B loyalty area.

The term competitive has always been used as a comparison to provide a distinction between two or more things. Southeast Asia handles billions of tonnes of global seaborne trade annually. Thus, there is a necessity to look in detail at the performance indicators of port competitiveness on the basis of port performance.

This study has categorized 18 Malaysian bulk terminals into two different classes based on various performance indicators. The distinctions used a hierarchical cluster analysis by arranging the performance indicators. The technique is among the most popular techniques used to form homogeneous groups of entities or objects.

In this study, it was found that two classes were classified as being competitive from the homogeneous groups created. Based on the performance metrics chosen, Group 1 had the lowest score and Group 2 had the highest score. It was found that the Westport and Northport of Klang Port had the best performance of all.

A major challenge for the study is the lack of variables relevant to other port competitiveness requirements, and a detailed research study is needed to gather information on the satisfaction of terminal customers, the paperwork involved, the accuracy and consistency of tariffs paid, the level of safety at sea and on land and environmental protection around the facility site.

The study on ports has been given less attention among researchers in this particular area. Therefore, this paper focuses on the port terminals in Malaysia and compares port performance metrics between ports to determine their competitiveness.

This study aims to utilize Relational Job Design (RJD) theory and Conservation of Resources (COR) theory to explore the impact of RJD, particularly its key components – job impact (JI) and job contact (JC) – on employees’ quiet quitting (QQ) behavior. It also investigates the role of work alienation (WA) as a mediator and examines whether inclusive leadership (IL) has a moderating effect on these proposed relationships.

This paper used paired dyadic surveys to gather data from 166 full-time employees and their immediate supervisors used in service organisations across the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The study’s moderated mediation model was tested using hierarchical regression and the PROCESS Macro in statistical package for the social sciences (SPSS) v.26.

The results empirically support our hypotheses: RJD (JI and JC) significantly reduces employees’ feelings of WA, thereby decreasing the likelihood of engaging in QQ behaviours. As expected, the study also revealed that IL acts as a moderator by amplifying the detrimental effects of RJD (JI and JC) on feelings of alienation from one’s work, which in turn decreases the likelihood of engaging in QQ behaviour.

This study fills a gap in understanding how relational work design and IL jointly influence unfavourable workplace attitudes and behaviours. It offers a foundation for future studies on QQ in diverse cultural and organisational contexts.

This study provides practical insights for organisations aiming to tackle employee quitting behaviours. Human resource (HR) professionals and leaders should focus on enhancing both JC and JI, while actively fostering IL. These actions are critical for significantly boosting employee engagement, fostering a more motivated and connected workforce and reduce QQ behaviours in the workplace.

Although the data in this study were collected from an organisation with multiple branches across the country, the findings may still have limited generalisability to other organisations or industries. While this paper acknowledges this as a limitation, it also presents an opportunity for future research to explore QQ across diverse cultural and organisational contexts. Larger and more varied samples in future studies could provide deeper insights into the prevalence and drivers of QQ in different workplace environments.

This study explores the under-researched phenomenon of QQ, revealing how RJD can mitigate these behaviours. It uncovers new psychological mechanisms, offering actionable insights for management strategies to enhance employee commitment and reduce negative behaviours.

In order to fully understand the properties of porous asphalt, investigation should be conducted from different point of views. This is from the fact that porous asphalt mixture designed with the same aggregate gradation and air void content can give different infiltration rate due to the different formation of the internal structure. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the micro-structural properties and functional performance of porous asphalt simultaneously.

The aim is to develop imaging techniques to process and analyze the internal structure of porous asphalt mixture. A few parameters were established to analyze the air void properties and aggregate interlock within the gyratory compacted samples captured using a non-destructive scanning technique of X-ray computed tomography (CT) throughout the samples. The results were then compared with the functional performance in terms of permeability. Four aggregate gradations used in different countries, i.e. Malaysia, Australia, the USA and Singapore. The samples were tested for resilient modulus and permeability. Quantitative analysis of the microstructure was used to establish the relationships between the air void properties and aggregate interlock and the resilient modulus and permeability.

Based on the results, it was found that the micro-structural properties investigated have successfully described the internal structure formation and they reflect the results of resilient modulus and permeability. In addition, the imaging technique which includes the image processing and image analysis for internal structure quantification seems to be very useful and perform well with the X-ray CT images based on the reliable results obtained from the analysis.

In this study, attention was limited to the study of internal structure of porous asphalt samples prepared in the laboratory using X-ray CT but can also be used to assess the quality of finished asphalt pavements by taking core samples for quantitative and qualitative analysis. The use of CT for material characterization presents a lot of possibilities in the future of asphalt concrete mix design.

Based on the validation process which includes comparisons between the values obtained from the image analysis and those from the performance test and it was found that the developed procedure satisfactorily assesses the air voids distribution and the aggregate interlock for this reason, it can be used.

There is a continuous drive in automotive sector to shift from conventional lubricants to environmental friendly ones without adversely affecting critical tribological performance parameters. Because of their favorable tribological properties, chemically modified vegetable oils such as palm trimethylolpropane ester (TMP) are one of the potential candidates for the said role. To prove the suitability of TMP for applications involving boundary-lubrication regime such as cam/tappet interface of direct acting valve train system, a logical step forward is to investigate their compatibility with conventional lubricant additives.

In this study, extreme pressure and tribological characteristics of TMP, formulated with glycerol mono-oleate (GMO), molybdenum dithiocarbamate (MoDTC) and zinc dialkyldithiophosphate (ZDDP), has been investigated using four-ball wear tester and valve train test rig. For comparison, additive-free and formulated versions of polyalphaolefin (PAO) were used as reference. Moreover, various surface characterization techniques were deployed to investigate mechanisms responsible for a particular tribological behavior.

In additive-free form, TMP demonstrated better extreme pressure characteristics compared to PAO and lubricant additives which are actually optimized for conventional base-oils such as PAO, are also proved to be compatible with TMP to some extent, especially ZDDP. During cylinder head tests, additive-free TMP proved to be more effective compared to PAO in reducing friction of cam/tappet interface, but opposite behavior was seen when formulated lubricants were used. Therefore, there is a need to synthesize specialized friction modifiers, anti-wear and extreme pressure additives for TMP before using it as engine lubricant base-oil.

In this study, additive-free and formulated versions of bio-lubricant are tested for cam/tappet interface of direct acting valve train system of commercial passenger car diesel engine for the very test time. Another important aspect of this research was comparison of important tribological performance parameters (friction torque, wear, rotational speed of tappet) of TMP-based lubricants with conventional lubricant base oil, that is, PAO and its formulated version.