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Little is known about the effects of education on the practice of PR. This chapter aims at demonstrating the differences between economics-educated practitioners and communication-educated practitioners. Based on a quantitative survey among 790 practitioners working in non-profits in Austria, the research presented here sheds light on the influences of education on thinking and acting by practitioners in communication practice. Although public relations are not a protected profession, education has become an on-going topic in public relations literature and practice. Furthermore, education for public relations increasingly takes place in various environments. Courses available range from one-day seminars at community colleges to PR-specific studies. Furthermore, public relations are not only a topic in communications-related studies, but also in economics and humanities. The results highlight the differences in practice in relation to the education.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the environmental behaviors of well-educated people in Thailand. Determinants of individuals’ involvement in pro-environmental behaviors (PEBs) are evaluated.

An exploratory model was created to investigate the relationship between PEBs and potential predictors that were selected based on the purposes of environmental risk communication and environmental education improvements. Those factors included dispositional, attitudinal, motivational, environmental knowledge, and psychosocial characteristics. Questionnaire surveys with well-educated people (n=810), that is those holding an educational qualification that ranged from a senior high school degree to a doctoral degree, were conducted. Multiple regression analysis was performed to justify the proposed relationship.

The result revealed that PEBs of well-educated people could be greatly predicted by an individual’s sense of obligation, perceived probability of receiving impacts from environmental problems, outcome expectancy from environmental behaviors, and environmental knowledge related to environmental phenomena and appropriate environmental actions; whereas, an individual’s environmental worldview and life satisfaction were less significant. Moreover, most of psychosocial variables were not significant predictors.

Factors determining well-educated people’s engagement in PEBs were evaluated. The results of the investigation provided the implications for environmental risk communication and environmental education improvements.

The study focuses on employment equity among Canadian women with a nursing education, examining differences across racialized groups.

The analysis used data from the 2021 Canadian Census of Population on a large sample of women aged 25–64 years with a nursing education (n = 112,000). The analysis compared women from ten racialized population groups to those from the White population group on attainment of a nursing education, employment in the health sector, and having an occupation that matched their nursing education. These comparisons were made separately for women who were Canadian-born, Canadian-educated immigrants and foreign-educated immigrants and controlled for differences in educational and demographic characteristics.

Most racialized women were under-represented in terms of having a nursing education, which was a barrier to their inclusion in the nursing workforce. Having a Canadian nursing education eliminated most disparities between racialized and White women in terms of employment outcomes. Foreign-educated immigrant women experienced a large penalty in levels of workforce integration, and this penalty was mostly larger for those from racialized population groups than the White population group. Large proportions of foreign-educated immigrant women with a nursing education had non-health occupations or health occupations that underutilized their skills.

This study provides a granular perspective on disparities between racialized and White women in levels of employment and utilization in the nursing workforce. The analyses illustrate the need for disaggregated data to reveal where the disparities lie and the context in which these disparities emerge.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how active labour market policy (ALMP) training programmes and hiring subsidies increase or decrease differences in the unemployment risk between lesser and higher educated people during an economic downturn. A focus is put on potential job competition dynamics and cumulative (dis)advantages of the lesser and higher educated.

The paper uses multi-level data. The fifth wave (2010) of the European Social Survey was used and combined with macro-level data on labour market policies of the OECD. The sample consisted of 18,172 observations in 19 countries.

The results show that higher levels of participation and spending on training policies are related to a smaller difference in the unemployment risks of the educational groups. Higher training policy intensity is associated with a lower unemployment risk for the lesser educated and a higher unemployment risk for the higher educated. This implies that the lesser educated are better able to withstand downward pressure from the higher educated, thereby, reducing downward displacement during an economic downturn. Hiring subsidies do not seem to be associated with the impact of education on unemployment.

The paper adds to the discussion on ALMP training and hiring subsidies that are primarily rooted in the human capital theory and signalling theory. Both theories ignore the social context of labour market behaviour. The job competition theory and cumulative (dis)advantage theory add to these theories by focussing on the relative position of individuals and the characteristics that accompany the social position of the individual.

What role do people's attitudes toward social policies play for the politics of welfare state reform? This chapter contributes to a growing scholarship on policy responsiveness in welfare state research with a longitudinal comparative case study of the Bismarckian welfare states of France and Germany. Quantitative analyses of changes in mean attitudes as well as polarization and inequalities of attitudes based on the 1996, 2006, and 2016 waves of the International Social Survey Program (ISSP) Role of Government module are triangulated with a thick description of social policy changes. While recommodifying and defamilializing reforms in Germany transformed the welfare state fundamentally, there was more continuity in the French welfare state, in spite of a stronger focus on labor market activation policies. The quantitative results suggest that lower attitudinal stability toward the welfare state in Germany and lower polarization evoked a higher willingness for reform than in France, where more polarized attitudes and overall marginal changes in attitudes gave French governments less maneuverability in adopting reforms. In both countries, I find no evidence for an upper-class bias in policy responsiveness. In sum, my research supports the claim that change in public opinion toward the welfare state and diverging attitudes within societies play a role for the timing and direction of reforms.

Among the many studies about risk perception, only a few deal with Bangladesh. Paul and Bhuiyan’s (2010) study has shown the earthquake-preparedness level of residents of Dhaka, but there are some biases in the data collection. This paper aims to examine the seismic-risk perception and the level of knowledge on earthquake and preparedness among the residents of Dhaka.

A questionnaire was developed, and data collection was undertaken through home and sidewalk surveys. This paper investigates how attitude, perception and behavior differ depending on gender, age, education and casualty awareness. This research tries to examine and make a comparison of the risk perception and preparedness level between different groups of gender, age and level of education.

This research shows that female respondents have a much better risk perception of and are better prepared for earthquakes than male respondents; younger people have a higher knowledge about earthquake preparedness than older people and less-educated people are at a higher risk of unpreparedness than more-educated people.

This research is only limited to the Dhaka Division.

This paper concludes by noting that public awareness on seismic-risk perception and mitigation is poor, and their knowledge on basic theory and emergency response must be improved.

This study aims to analyze the financial inclusion of individuals living in the Middle East, North African, Afghanistan and Pakistan (MENAP). It intends to show the influence of these individuals’ characteristics on financial inclusion, using the World Bank Global Findex Database 2014 for 16 countries in the region.

A probit model is used to examine the marginal effect of financial inclusion of the characteristics of individuals living in the MENAP region. These characteristics include gender, age, income and education. Individual characteristics that are linked to the main financial-inclusion indicators include having a formal account and formal saving and borrowing. The barriers to having a formal account, alternative borrowing sources and motivations for borrowing are also linked to the respondents’ characteristics.

The results indicate that females and the poor are less likely to be included in financial systems, while education level enhances financial inclusion. As disadvantaged people consider access to credit is important to improving their lives, the study finds that the poor are more likely to borrow for medical issues than for other needs. While Islam is the majority religion in the MENAP region, it is not considered a barrier to having a formal bank account. Furthermore, people in different income quintiles are more likely to use informal financial sources, while the educated are more likely to use formal ones.

The results show that policymakers in MENAP should make more of an effort to enhance financial inclusion as a way to enhance economic development in the region. Also, governments institutions, such as central banks, financial ministries and other institutions, could build on these results to enhance financial inclusion as a way toward development in the MENAP region.

To the author’s best knowledge, this is the first study to examine the influence of individuals’ characteristics on financial inclusion in the MENAP region.

This study examines mosquito-borne diseases and health hazard of using mosquito repellents in Bangladesh. This study also targets to explore the use of different mosquito repellents and associated health hazard between slum and residential people.

This study has applied a stratified systematic sampling technique taking 120 adult individuals from residential and slum areas covering users and non-users of mosquito repellents of Khulna city, Bangladesh. A structured questionnaire has been used to collect data from respondents.

Econometric techniques are exercised to examine the occurrence, severity and duration of different respiratory diseases. Results exhibit that poor and less-educated slum people are more prone to face respiratory diseases compared to residential people. The health cost of slum and residential people is estimated US$ 134 and US$ 9, respectively.

Relevant stakeholders under public health programs should spread awareness among people regarding the negative health effect of using mosquito repellent, encourage them to limit the use of harmful repellent and instead use herbal product (neem coil), avoid using repellent in living room rather use outside of room and close window and use proper bed net at night.

This study underpins arranging public health programs and taking averting actions as an impetus to raise consciousness toward the negative health effect of using mosquito repellents.

The purpose of this paper is to show how young educated adults in the state of precarity perceive the lack of stability in their employment, life and prospects, and what influences their decision making with respect to their career.

Qualitative research on evidence from ten semi-structured in-depth interviews. The method of analysis is consensual qualitative research.

Young Russian adults in the state of precarity have little interest in stable employment, believing it imposes inadequately tight constraints in terms of work organisation, as compared to the potentially modest returns in terms of career development and professional self-actualisation. The respondents tend to choose work which corresponds to the rhythm of their lives and preferences. They are willing to sacrifice stability and higher income in the hope of achieving career success and financial prosperity in the future. They do not hope for or expect assistance from the state but feel fully responsible for their own lives. The downside of this optimism is the lack of long-term plans and, hence, the uncertainty of the future.

The authors not only consider the state of precarity as an effect of structural factors such as the state of the labour market, but also aim to show the role of the worker’s agency in creating such a situation. Instead of the conventional view of precarious individuals solely as victims of circumstances, this study suggests to regard them as actors whose experience, goals and aspirations determine career and life choices.