Environment and Social Psychology

Primary school religious education is important and understudied in modern educational practice. Classes on religious education are used to impart knowledge to pupils about the world’s main religions. Knowledge about specific religions, or how to collaborate with representatives of different religions, is mostly absent. Unfortunately, teachers of religious education often do not use their classes as a tool for their students’ moral and spiritual development. It is also one of the problems for Swedish schools and it has to be solved because Sweden is a very multicultural country with representatives of many religions; and one of the tasks of modern schools is to show how to be tolerant of others. This research aims to highlight problems and develop ways of teaching religious education in primary schools through theoretical literature analysis on the research topic. Also, we provide didactic exercises which teachers can use during religion lessons to diversify them and make it more accessible to students.

Adult learners, in particular, must possess lifelong learning (LLL) skills to prepare for their future endeavours. Knowing their strengths in LLL characteristics is crucial for them as it allows better understanding of their learning strengths. There are studies that suggest adult learners do not engage enough in LLL as their learning style. This may conflict with their characteristic of being independent learners, which involves a continual process of learning in order to be able to maintain themselves. It is therefore the purpose of this study to investigate the relationship between LLL characteristics and LLL tendency among adult learners in higher education institutions in Malaysia. It also aims to investigate any moderating effect from demographic data, gender and academic background. The data were collected through an online survey and analysed using SPSS with a 95% response rate. The statistical analysis used for the analysis includes descriptive and inferential analysis of multiple linear regression analysis and moderating analysis. The result indicates that there is a medium positive relationship between LLL characteristics and LLL tendency. In terms of the moderator, gender and academic background do not affect the relationship in any way. This study may benefit stakeholders, especially management, in ensuring that adult learners can maximize their potential to adopt continuous learning practices.

The impact of pandemic control measures on student education in rural areas of China, particularly focusing on the challenges faced by educators. With the adoption of diverse pedagogical methods like online education during the pandemic, little attention has been given to the specific struggles of teachers in rural regions. The pandemic has exacerbated existing issues, leading to an alarming increase in rural teacher attrition. High turnover rates have detrimental effects on educational excellence, school culture, and the overall cohesion of educational institutions. Furthermore, the costs incurred to recruit and train new instructors in impoverished or remote communities pose additional challenges. As China lifts COVID-19 restrictions in 2022, a pivotal moment emerges for the advancement of rural education. To address challenges and support early-career teachers’ resilience, a comprehensive understanding of the rural educational environment is crucial. By prioritizing the well-being and needs of new teachers, education leaders can provide effective support and resources in the post-pandemic era, leading to a more optimistic scholastic atmosphere and improved student achievement.

In this era of uncertainty, the adverse impact of social ill-being brings forth dissatisfaction and discontentment in our life. Social peace gives us the required nourishment to yield a quality life. In this study, we made a modest attempt to assess to what extend the individuals’ life gets affected in these hours of post COVID-19 crisis. To understand the mental frame of individuals, we have adjudged the recourse to two key factors, i.e., digital illiteracy, communication crisis and social isolation, which might lead to dissatisfaction of life. Moreover, the present research assessed the degree of impact of social ill-being on the individuals’ life dissatisfaction. It gives us the provision to explore the mediating effect of higher stress on the association between social ill-being and life dissatisfaction. This honest attempt may help citizens and policymakers to get channelized, well-digitally equipped and prepared to come up with innovative solutions that serve to manage the curse of the COVID-19.

This study was conducted to identify the influence of academic stress and self-control on the psychological well-being of university students in the Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia campus. Besides that, gender ethnicity and location (on-campus and off-campus) have been compared according to academic stress, self-control and psychological well-being. This study uses a quantitative method in which 320 university students were involved. The research questionnaire consists of the Perception of Academic Stress Scale (PAS), the Sense of Control Scale and the Psychological Wellbeing (PWB) Scale were used as instruments of this study. This study found that academic stress and self-control are direct predictors of the psychological well-being of university students during the COVID-19, with beta value, the study findings showed (Beta = –0.18, R² = 0.056, p < 0.05) and self-control (Beta = 0.17, R² = 0.052, p < 0.05). Based on this indicates, academic stress contributed (5.6%) and self-control (5.2%) to the psychological well-being of university students during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is due to the academic stress from the aspect of workload that is given during the online teaching and learning sessions. Therefore, university student needs to give importance to self-control and other recreational activity for them to be psychologically happy during the COVID-19 pandemic. With high self-control, students can manage their academic stress and increase their psychological well-being.

Cultural perspectives are important when exploring caregivers’ experiences. However, not much research has been conducted in South Africa on the experiences of caregivers who are taking care of children living with an autism spectrum disorder. This study was aimed at reviewing literature on the experiences of caregivers living with autistic children. A narrative review was employed as the research method and information was purposively extracted from different databases such as Google Scholar, ScienceDirect and EBSCOHost to collect data. It was gathered that caregivers have insufficient knowledge and understanding regarding the child’s autism diagnosis. We also found that caregivers experience socio-economic and psychological challenges. Little social support is enjoyed by caregivers from community and family members as a coping strategy.  Thus, we conclude and recommend that caregivers need a form of intervention that will help or assist their psychosocial well-being while providing care for their children. Moreover, caregivers have limited knowledge of autism and experience psychological challenges that are associated with the autism diagnosis of their child. This affects their subsequent abilities to efficiently provide care to the children.

Introduction: The global prevalence of Smokeless Tobacco (SLT) use is estimated to be 4.72%, concentrated in South East Asia. Despite declining smoking rates, SLT usage remains high, resulting in 2.5 million DALYs and 90,791 deaths in 2017 due to cancers and heart diseases, with India contributing 70% of DALYs. This study examines risk factors for SLT use in Indian males and females aged 15–49 using 2019–2021 demographic and health survey data, also exploring gender differences. Methods: The study analyzed a substantial sample of 724,115 females and 93,267 males utilizing data from a nationally representative cross-sectional demographic and health survey conducted between 2019 and 2021. Gender-specific multivariable logistic regression analyses were performed to identify risk factors influencing SLT use. Results: The findings reveal gender-specific variations in SLT use risk factors. Among males, older age groups (35–49) were less likely to use SLT compared to those aged 30–34. In contrast, among females, SLT use increased with age, with the highest rates in the 40–44 and 45–49 age groups. Marital status played a significant role, with widowed, divorced, and separated females having higher odds of SLT use compared to currently married females. Tribe ethnicity was associated with increased odds of SLT use in females but not in males. Christian females had higher odds of SLT use than Hindu females, while Christian males had lower odds compared to Hindu males. Conclusion: These findings provide valuable insights for policymakers, healthcare professionals, and public health advocates in developing targeted interventions to combat SLT use in South-East Asia. By addressing gender-specific risk factors and tailoring strategies to different populations, progress can be made in reducing the burden of SLT use and improving public health outcomes in the region.

This paper pretends to investigate the effectiveness of distance education during the COVID-19 pandemic time. Its objective was to analyze variables that impacted the results of emergency distance education, the challenges that arise for teacher training and comprehensive and inclusive education during and after pandemic periods. It corresponds to a documentary investigation, uses qualitative content analysis, and is framed in a stage of initial results on peer-reviewed academic articles from the Web of Science and websites of institutions relevant to the topic studied. The total sample was 70 articles. The results identify variables mostly studied in the scientific literature that affected distance learning, related to socio-emotional, motivational, self-regulation and executive skills of the students, along with those coming from particular family and social contexts and the organization of schools. It is expected that the conclusions will contribute to educational policy decisions on teacher training and intersectoral actions to face future emergencies that involve school closures and constitute a set of evidence of the main barriers and facilitators of educational work in a period of health emergency available to the educational community, useful for the design of improvements in educational quality for the diversity of students in different scenarios.

This paper pretends to investigate the effectiveness of distance education during the COVID-19 pandemic time. Its objective was to analyze variables that impacted the results of emergency distance education, the challenges that arise for teacher training and comprehensive and inclusive education during and after pandemic periods. It corresponds to a documentary investigation, uses qualitative content analysis, and is framed in a stage of initial results on peer-reviewed academic articles from the Web of Science and websites of institutions relevant to the topic studied. The total sample was 70 articles. The results identify variables mostly studied in the scientific literature that affected distance learning, related to socio-emotional, motivational, self-regulation and executive skills of the students, along with those coming from particular family and social contexts and the organization of schools. It is expected that the conclusions will contribute to educational policy decisions on teacher training and intersectoral actions to face future emergencies that involve school closures and constitute a set of evidence of the main barriers and facilitators of educational work in a period of health emergency available to the educational community, useful for the design of improvements in educational quality for the diversity of students in different scenarios.

Although emotional management and executive functioning have been widely associated with effective decision making, not much attention has been paid to their role in vocational decision making. This study analyzed the relationship between insecurity in career choice, executive functioning, and emotion regulation in university students. Results show how executive dysfunction significantly predicted insecurity in vocational choice. Its mediating role between emotional management and the academic-vocational decision-making process was also confirmed. Our findings contribute to the understanding of vocational choice in youth and suggest the need to consider both variables in guidance programs, to prevent subsequent dissatisfaction with the vocational decision.

This paper pretends to investigate the effectiveness of distance education during the COVID-19 pandemic time. Its objective was to analyze variables that impacted the results of emergency distance education, the challenges that arise for teacher training and comprehensive and inclusive education during and after pandemic periods. It corresponds to a documentary investigation, uses qualitative content analysis, and is framed in a stage of initial results on peer-reviewed academic articles from the Web of Science and websites of institutions relevant to the topic studied. The total sample was 70 articles. The results identify variables mostly studied in the scientific literature that affected distance learning, related to socio-emotional, motivational, self-regulation and executive skills of the students, along with those coming from particular family and social contexts and the organization of schools. It is expected that the conclusions will contribute to educational policy decisions on teacher training and intersectoral actions to face future emergencies that involve school closures and constitute a set of evidence of the main barriers and facilitators of educational work in a period of health emergency available to the educational community, useful for the design of improvements in educational quality for the diversity of students in different scenarios.

This research analyses the impact of a teaching intervention aimed at the development of historical awareness skills in future secondary school social science teachers (n = 19), and its relationship with the curricular inclusion of controversial issues, gender and its diversity in history education. From a quasi-experimental design, the Epistemology, Methodology and Gender in taught history (EMG) scale was adapted as a data collection instrument. The main results obtained report a statistically significant impact of the intervention on the curricular need for didactic treatment of social problems and controversial issues, and for addressing education for participatory democracy in the social science curriculum; making visible individuals, social groups/collectives and plural identities (including gender); recognizing the relative nature of social-historical knowledge; and redirecting historical knowledge towards purposes oriented towards social transformation and education for the future. Likewise, after the programme, the representations of future teachers tend to weaken the perception of historical knowledge as an interpretative reconstruction of the past, its limited impact on the historicity of the present and its absence in the configuration of desirable futures, and to strengthen the need to understand the historical method in the teaching of social sciences.

This paper investigates the dimensions of emotive language used by women to situate their stances on cheating husbands in Calabar, Southern Nigeria. The data for the study were generated by means of non-participant observation and semi-structured interviews, aided by audiotape recording and field notes. One hundred married women constitute the representative sample from whom the data were elicited. Findings show that the participants used emotional language to establish different stances in discourses on adulterous acts of their husbands. The participants’ stances are construed to be nuanced in religious, punitive, revengeful, sociobiological, reconciliatory and legal considerations. Participants’ choices were influenced by the women’s religious, gendered and sociocultural orientations, educational background and level of exposure, family and social pressure, personal safety and psychological state. These differentials connect the appraisal patterns with the consequences of each stance which should also serves as expository guide on the rational for such decisions by women on cheating spouses. The emotive outbursts by the participants stress the need for men to be faithful to their wives to sustain mutual happiness and peaceful marriages.

This study explored the intricate nuances of the tensions and dualities that underlie the stress experienced by survivors of a downsizing process, encompassing the embodied dimensions of these tensions. Data was analyzed from a large public organization located in Canada, providing empirical evidence of the various tensions experienced by individuals while responding to the changes brought about by downsizing. It was suggested that these tensions could be understood as discursive strategies employed by members to navigate the stress and uncertainty of the process. To examine these accounts more closely, communication ventriloquial approach was utilized, offering a robust framework and analytical method that proved instrumental in dissecting the responses of organizational members as they confronted the multifaceted challenges stemming from the downsizing process. This research presented a tension-centered perspective of change, challenging traditional approaches to change. This approach enabled a deeper understanding of individuals’ communicative strategies and discourses during this period. By tracking figures, and tensions, the analysis shed light on preoccupations constituting the downsizing process. The analysis revealed three main tensions during the change process: supportiveness vs. equity, effectiveness vs. authority, and accountability vs. collegiality. It has been proposed that recognizing the communicative construction of these tensions is pivotal in effectively addressing issues of change and employees’ concerns throughout this process. The current literature did not explain how employees voiced their concerns or how these preoccupations interacted with one another to create multiple tensions. The findings suggested that employees’ preoccupations and concerns provided a deeper and more global picture of their experiences during the organizational change process, offering a better understanding of the tensions that were also part of the change process.

The provision of essential services to residents heavily relies on the infrastructure and functioning of urban local government institutions. The satisfaction citizens have with these institutions is an important indicator of the effectiveness of governance mechanisms. This study aims to assess the degree of citizen satisfaction with urban local government services and infrastructure, specifically in the context of Pabna municipality in Bangladesh. A qualitative and quantitative research approach was employed, utilizing survey data from 120 structured questionnaires and 20 interviews. The study results show that a significant proportion of municipality residents (56%) express deep dissatisfaction with basic services and infrastructure performance. The municipality has failed to effectively deliver sanitation, disaster management, waste management, roads and bridges, traffic infrastructure, and public utilities services as required. The study also identified key challenges in delivering basic services, including poor infrastructure, a lack of initiatives, adequate resources, a large workforce, and sufficient equipment. The findings suggest that the municipality should prioritize sustainable city planning through democratic participation and consideration of residents’ perceived experiences to deliver a high degree of citizen satisfaction.

The present study aims to evaluate the relationship between leadership and innovation in online education, focusing on the Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences of the Universidad Técnica de Manabí (FSBSUTM) during the first semester of 2023. The university is located in the Republic of Ecuador. The research was developed under a quantitative approach, using a Likert-type questionnaire. The population of interest was made up of teachers from the Faculty of Humanistic and Social Sciences of the Technical University of Manabí, with a total of 70 members. To select the sample, non-probabilistic participatory sampling was used. The statistical analysis focused on the study of correlations between variables, using Spearman’s correlation coefficient. The results obtained indicate that stronger training and experience in educational innovation are positively related to the ability to overcome difficulties and promote the effective implementation of strategies in virtual education. It is concluded that university leaders face challenges in implementing online educational innovation. However, the importance of implementing effective leadership strategies and fostering a pro-innovation digital culture as a means of overcoming such difficulties is highlighted. These findings have significant implications for university leadership training and development, as well as for the promotion of educational innovation in virtual environments.

This study utilizes bibliometric knowledge mapping to guide the development of consumer behavior within a theoretical framework in live E-commerce environments. This analysis is based on data collected by existing customers on platforms such as Taobao, JD.com, Mogujie, Xiaohongshu, and Jumei Youpin. The literature survey chart is based on 2000 articles. The resulting theoretical concept shares the same structure as the stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) model of consumer behaviors. The stimulus has social, technical, stream and viewer factors. The social stimulus includes social influence, and interaction among the live anchor and the consumers. The stream factor is represented by vicarious learning. The technical stimulus consists of performance and effort expectancies, the synchronicity of live session and system, and system and service quality. The viewer stimulus consists of impulsive buying tendency and innovativeness of consumers. Multilayer perceptron neural network (MLP-NN), which integrates many variables in bibliometrics, has become an effective means to guide Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) analysis and configuration, thus generating a knowledge base. The study offers many practical and theoretical implications, for instance, numerous theories are found fit to explain the roles of social stimuli such as cognitive development theory. Trust and enjoyment are found to significantly influence consumers’ flow state, which implies the working of cognitive appraisal theory, as an expanded insight into the flow theory of consumer behaviors. In addition, addiction to live is another factor that is significantly critical to influencing the impulsive buying of consumers.

Movie is an important cultural form, carrying multiple levels and meanings such as art, entertainment and social value. Movie review and rating data sets are huge, and deep learning and natural language processing methods are widely used today. Advances in big data and deep learning offer unprecedented opportunities to understand moviegoer behavior and preferences while providing a cost-effective way to gain insights relevant to the entertainment industry. This project conducts sentiment analysis, topic modeling, and visual statistical analysis based on the IMDb movie data set to identify key factors and deeper insights that influence successful decision-making in film production. This project first uses the word embedding method to vectorize the movie review text, and then uses Bidirectional Long Short-Term Memory (Bi-LSTM) to perform sentiment classification. In addition, statistical methods such as visualization were used to discover conclusions such as the highest average number of movies released in November, and identify trends, patterns and relationships between the variables of IMDb movies. Finally, the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) topic modeling model was constructed to find out that the important topic with increased demand is light entertainment movies, highlighting the commercial feasibility of comedy movies as a profitable business model. In summary, this project uses an emotion-topic fusion analysis method based on the Bi-LSTM emotion classification method and the LDA topic modeling method. The results show that the Bi-LSTM model can better identify positive and negative emotions in movie reviews, and the LDA topic model performs well in mining popular topics.

The outbreak of COVID-19 affected the lives of all sections of society and caused serious implications for mental health. The aimed study was to investigate and analyzed the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic on the life of students. This cross-sectional survey was conducted from October - December 2020 on 472 students. We prepared the questionnaire addressing some factors such as demographic, education, social life, and mental health. The p < 0.05 was considered significant. The average age was 20.45, and 70% of participants were females. Approximately 23% of students referred to present problems with depression, fear, and anxiety during COVID-19. The mean value of PHQ9 resulted in the moderate range while the mean GAD7 score was in the mild range. In females, 61% are more likely to be affected by mental health during this worldwide pandemic compared to males 39%. The findings of this study identify mild levels of anxiety and depression in students. These mental health levels were related to a combination of pandemic-related stresses and limitations caused by the lockdown, negative impact on social life, poor social communication, and disturbed sleep habits. However, we strongly recommend providing students support by academics and stakeholders to reduce the likelihood of longer-term problems.

This paper pretends to investigate the effectiveness of distance education during the COVID-19 pandemic time. Its objective was to analyze variables that impacted the results of emergency distance education, the challenges that arise for teacher training and comprehensive and inclusive education during and after pandemic periods. It corresponds to a documentary investigation, uses qualitative content analysis, and is framed in a stage of initial results on peer-reviewed academic articles from the Web of Science and websites of institutions relevant to the topic studied. The total sample was 70 articles. The results identify variables mostly studied in the scientific literature that affected distance learning, related to socio-emotional, motivational, self-regulation and executive skills of the students, along with those coming from particular family and social contexts and the organization of schools. It is expected that the conclusions will contribute to educational policy decisions on teacher training and intersectoral actions to face future emergencies that involve school closures and constitute a set of evidence of the main barriers and facilitators of educational work in a period of health emergency available to the educational community, useful for the design of improvements in educational quality for the diversity of students in different scenarios.

This paper pretends to investigate the effectiveness of distance education during the COVID-19 pandemic time. Its objective was to analyze variables that impacted the results of emergency distance education, the challenges that arise for teacher training and comprehensive and inclusive education during and after pandemic periods. It corresponds to a documentary investigation, uses qualitative content analysis, and is framed in a stage of initial results on peer-reviewed academic articles from the Web of Science and websites of institutions relevant to the topic studied. The total sample was 70 articles. The results identify variables mostly studied in the scientific literature that affected distance learning, related to socio-emotional, motivational, self-regulation and executive skills of the students, along with those coming from particular family and social contexts and the organization of schools. It is expected that the conclusions will contribute to educational policy decisions on teacher training and intersectoral actions to face future emergencies that involve school closures and constitute a set of evidence of the main barriers and facilitators of educational work in a period of health emergency available to the educational community, useful for the design of improvements in educational quality for the diversity of students in different scenarios.

Introduction: Empathy, or being empathetic, is the meaning of the inner framework of others with the precision and the emotional component and understanding the other was a person, but never lost; as a state. Being empathic, also known as comprehending another’ inner workings precisely and emotionally, and realizing that the other person was once a person but is now a state. Social intelligence is the ability to understand and manage people. The purpose of this research was to evaluate the knowledge that nursing students and students carry about empathic skills and social intelligence. Methods: This research is descriptive and quantitative. It is cross-sectional research. The Empathy quotient (EQ) questionnaire is used to measure empirical skills. The questionnaire Messi Methodology was used to measure social intelligence. The study involved a participant pool of 150 individuals. Results and discussion: From the findings through the correlation analysis, there has been a positive correlation between empathic skills and social intelligence with r = 0.301 and p = 0.010 *. The model explains 12% of variance and is significant with p = 0.028, where from the three explanatory factors only social intelligence with p = is significant 0.007 **, while gender and age do not appear to be significant explanations for empathic skills. Research findings show that there is a link between empathic skills and social intelligence where our first hypothesis is confirmed. Conclusion: In conclusion, this study highlights the necessity to differentiate between different types of empathy while confirming the robust correlation between social intelligence and empathy. It refutes the notion that empathy varies with age by showing constant values throughout the age spectrum. Despite the fact that gender was not a significant effect, this highlights the significance of recognizing gender differences in empathic abilities.

This paper pretends to investigate the effectiveness of distance education during the COVID-19 pandemic time. Its objective was to analyze variables that impacted the results of emergency distance education, the challenges that arise for teacher training and comprehensive and inclusive education during and after pandemic periods. It corresponds to a documentary investigation, uses qualitative content analysis, and is framed in a stage of initial results on peer-reviewed academic articles from the Web of Science and websites of institutions relevant to the topic studied. The total sample was 70 articles. The results identify variables mostly studied in the scientific literature that affected distance learning, related to socio-emotional, motivational, self-regulation and executive skills of the students, along with those coming from particular family and social contexts and the organization of schools. It is expected that the conclusions will contribute to educational policy decisions on teacher training and intersectoral actions to face future emergencies that involve school closures and constitute a set of evidence of the main barriers and facilitators of educational work in a period of health emergency available to the educational community, useful for the design of improvements in educational quality for the diversity of students in different scenarios.

Drawing on research-based discourse, this article provides an updated overview of what silence means in social psychology. Such meanings can be viewed from an interpersonal dimension and an intrapersonal dimension. That is, silence can be externally or internally generated. The external process sees silence as a response to the social environment, while the internal process views silence as an individual choice. The article argues that silence has a sociological nature. When a silent person sends out a silent message to the public (such as showing resistance or alienation), this person not only expresses their personal view but also acts on behalf of others. The article rests on the ideal of sociological imagination to argue that an individual’s issue of concern or trouble, seemingly a limited social experience, may not be a single case but can represent the concern of a group or a society. This means that the lives of individuals can signify the status and reaction of their community. By presenting silence from various individual perspectives, the article showcases the richness of what silence means and what it does in social contexts.