Work Place Research Articles

The Primary Care and Environmental Health e-Learning Course to Integrate Environmental Health in General Practice: Before-and-After Feasibility Study.

Environmental and behavioral factors are responsible for 12.6 million deaths annually and contribute to 25% of deaths and chronic diseases worldwide. Through the One Health initiative, the World Health Organization and other international health organizations plan to improve these indicators to create healthier environments by 2030. To meet this challenge, training primary care professionals should be the priority of national policies. General practitioners (GPs) are ready to become involved but need in-depth training to gain and apply environmental health (EH) knowledge to their practice. In response, we designed the Primary Care Environment and Health (PCEH) online course in partnership with the Occitanie Regional Health Agency in France. This course was used to train GP residents from the Montpelier-Nimes Faculty of Medicine in EH knowledge. The course was organized in 2 successive parts: (1) an asynchronous e-learning modular course focusing on EH knowledge and tools and (2) 1 day of face-to-face sessions. This study assessed the impact of the e-learning component of the PCEH course on participants' satisfaction, knowledge, and behavior changes toward EH. This was a pilot before-and-after study. Four modules were available in the 6-hour e-learning course: introduction to EH, population-based approach (mapping tools and resources), clinical cases, and communication tools. From August to September 2021, we recruited first-year GP residents from the University of Montpellier (N=130). Participants' satisfaction, knowledge improvements for 19 EH risks, procedure to report EH risks to health authorities online, and behavior change (to consider the possible effects of the environment on their own and their patients' health) were assessed using self-reported questionnaires on a Likert scale (1-5). Paired Student t tests and the McNemar χ2 test were used to compare quantitative and qualitative variables, respectively, before and after the course. A total of 74 GP residents completed the e-learning and answered the pre- and posttest questionnaires. The mean satisfaction score was 4.0 (SD 0.9) out of 5. Knowledge scores of EH risks increased significantly after the e-learning course, with a mean difference of 30% (P<.001) for all items. Behavioral scores improved significantly by 18% for the participant's health and by 26% for patients' health (P<.001). These improvements did not vary significantly according to participant characteristics (eg, sex, children, place of work). The e-learning course improved knowledge and behavior related to EH. Further studies are needed to assess the impact of the PCEH course on clinical practice and potential benefits for patients. This course was designed to serve as a knowledge base that could be reused each year with a view toward sustainability. This course will integrate new modules and will be adapted to the evolution of EH status indicators and target population needs.

COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccination experiences and perceptions among health workers during the pandemic in Ebonyi state, Nigeria: An analytical cross-sectional study

Background COVID-19 continues to be a disease of global public health importance and requires long-term management and control. Health workers’ (previous) experiences and perceptions regarding the COVID-19 pandemic and COVID-19 vaccination/vaccination process will influence not only their subsequent use of control measures but also public experiences/perceptions. We explored the COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccination and the vaccination process experiences and perceptions, and their predictors, among the health workers in Ebonyi state, Nigeria. Methods We conducted an online-offline analytical cross-sectional survey between March 12 and May 9, 2022 among all categories of health workers (clinical/non-clinical, public/private) working/living in Ebonyi state who consented to participate and were selected by convenience/snowballing techniques. A structured electronic questionnaire was used to collect data: self-administered via WhatsApp and interviewer-administered via KoBoCollect for participants who did not have WhatsApp. Data was analysed using descriptive statistics and bivariate/multivariate generalized linear models. Results Of the 1276 health workers surveyed: 55.8% had strong COVID-19 experience and perception, 80.7% had good COVID-19 vaccination expectation and perception, and 87.7% had positive COVID-19 vaccination process experience and perception. The most important predictors of the extent and level of COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccination and the vaccination process experiences and perceptions were level of place of work (primary-secondary/tertiary), level of attitude towards COVID-19 (vaccination), and level of knowledge about COVID-19. Another important predictor was place of work (public/private). Conclusions The evidence indicate the factors that should guide subsequent policy actions in the strategies to enhance the COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccination and the vaccination process experiences and perceptions of health workers (and their use of control measures) in Ebonyi state, Nigeria, and other similar contexts. It also indicate factors to be considered by future policy actions regarding similar diseases.

Leaders’ views on leadership and skills development in the Fourth Industrial Revolution

Orientation: The Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) is increasingly becoming a reality in organisations worldwide.Research purpose: The aim of this article was to explore the views of international leaders on leadership and skills development in employees to equip them for the 4IR.Motivation for the study: Leaders have to adjust their perspectives and leadership while the entire workforce is required to focus on their skills development on technological, individual and interpersonal levels.Research approach/design and method: A qualitative research methodology is applied, using a phenomenological paradigm. Eight top leaders from Australia, India, Germany, South Africa, North America, the United Arab Emirates, and Singapore in various global and organisational fields were interviewed on leadership and skills development in the 4IR.Main findings: Leaders focus on understanding and applying new technological trends, adopting a 4IR mindset, and developing skills through training and integrating systems. Additionally, they believe that skills development needs to include hard and soft skills, continuous training, and anticipating future trends. Skills need to have individual, interpersonal, organisational, societal and spiritual aspects to address the 4IR complexities adequately.Practical/managerial implications: Leaders need to understand the complexes of the 4IR and need to train and support employees to develop themselves and their skills adequately.Contribution/value-add: This article adds to the research on skill development, training and understanding future work trends to prepare leaders, industry and employees for future work trends and requirements for education for future work places.

Training and Development Needs Analysis with Special Reference to Software Companies in Hyderabad

This study investigates the how to examine the importance of training and development needs analysis in enhancing the employee efficiency in the social – environment and the workplace. Training and development is the most important weapon for the workplace to know the need analysis and effectiveness. Training is focus on today’s activities of the software companies in Hyderabad, India. The 40 sample size is used. This study concludes that there is an impact of training and development need analysis on the performance of workplace. Also it recognize organization and development is focus on the future tasks and responsibilities. Training and development is one of most important tool of HRM to increase organization’s output and competencies. This research is quantitative and secondary in nature. The data was collected from the different that the ability and skills of employee is helpful for the performance of organization and this skill are come from training and development. The study results illustrate the positive correlation between variables such as Training need analysis, Training transfer and employee efficacy, Learning and Job Satisfaction of the work place of the employee. These findings are significant to design training programs as part of the continuing professional development which are essential in achieving employee efficacy and leads to the benefits to the organization.

Enhancement of work place comfort through the use of soft landscape

The work environment has been shown to have a great influence on employees’ physical and mental state, as such employers try as much as possible to provide a comfortable working environment. However, recent studies have shown that the work environment is no longer as comfortable as it used to be due to heat gain from the increasing use of hard landscape features and neglect of soft landscape features in the work environment. This has resulted in stress causing both mild and severe health conditions for employees. Thus, this study aims to analyze the use of soft landscape in enhancing users' comfort with the view of reducing stress and health-related issues in the work environment. The paper adopted a mixed method using observation checklists, structured interviews, questionnaires, and case studies. A total of eighteen office complexes were selected to describe the existing situation as related to most office complexes and to also gain insight into the subject matter as already applied to life situations. Structured interviews and questionnaires were also conducted with occupants of the buildings and professionals to hear their perceptions and expectations of their work environment. Results showed that 20 percent of the offices give proper consideration to the use of soft landscapes in the work environment, and 40 percent give inconsiderable attention to soft landscapes while making use of them in small quantities solely for improving the aesthetical value of the building. In comparison, the remaining 40 percent do not consider landscape use as a means of improving comfort in the work environment. Findings also revealed that 80 percent of office buildings give major consideration to parking space using hard landscapes without a proper blend of soft landscapes after building design which hurts occupant comfort. The research concluded that the incorporation of soft landscape elements both within the building using recesses and protrusions and on the building walls through the use of exoskeleton and climbers while incorporating trees, shrubs, flowers, hedges and water around the building can have these required effects on employee’s comfort.

Impact of Covid-19 on Readymade Garments Workers at Dhaka Division Of Bangladesh

In this study we are attempts to identify the real situation of COVID-19 impact on working environment of RMG workers in Bangladesh. The consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic impact on RMG workers is dire and include uncertainty about the wages during the COVID-19 pandemic and related issues such as lack of money for essentials such as food, and concerns about the re-opening of factories during COVID-19 infection peak times. The objectives of this study is to identify the COVID-19 impact on readymade garments (RGM) workers as well as shows the present conditions of readymade garments workers and work place environment of RMG sector in Bangladesh. Finally, to find out the problems and suggest some policy recommendations of RMG sectors in Bangladesh. This study attempts to know COVID-19 Impact on working environment of RMG workers in Bangladesh in Selected Factories in Dhaka division. The present study is an exploratory sample survey. Besides this, to enhance the acceptance of result and considering the circumstances few case studies are also conducted. The sampling of my study is 50 workers selected based on accidental sampling techniques and five garments selected based on sample survey and purposively out of the total population of these garments industries. The sources of data to carry out the proposed study data has been collected from two sources; Primary and Secondary sources. The data processing with various tables, pie-charts, bar-diagrams and figures have been used for analyzing the collected data. The information have been classified and tabulated under various characteristics. The results have been shown using simple statistical methods, qualitative and quantitative both kinds of analysis have been used. Some problems and limitations are therefore, inevitable in the way of conducting such a broad task. Finding of this study are most of the workers have lost their overtime work. Their income level falls that result, domestic violence has raised in most of the workers families. At last we can say that the production of clothing during the COVID-19 pandemic must not go ahead without an urgent overview of the system and the development of a plan to ensure the health and safety of workers.

The impact of nurse empowerment program on patient safety culture in general public hospital in Indonesia

Background Patient safety is crucial to health-care quality and is one of the major parameters monitored by all health-care organizations around the world. Nurses play a critical role in improving the quality of care and patient safety because of their intensity in caring patients and families. Objectives This study aimed to determine the impact of nurse empowerment program on patient safety culture in general public hospital in Indonesia. Methods This study was designed as a quasi-experimental design in Indonesia. This program was conducted for three months with a five-day workshop (4 h for each day), followed by hanging up posters and handing out informative pamphlets to the experimental group's nurses and supervisors at their place of work in three common place that visited by nurses such as changing room, nurse station and near toilet. Results In the intervention group, patient safety culture practice score was significantly increased from 3.11(standard deviation [SD] = 1.43) before intervention to 4.89 (SD = 1.33) after three-month intervention (T2), with the t was 5.78, and p = .001. While in the control group, no significant increased score of patient safety culture practice before intervention and after three months intervention (3.05 ± 1.49 vs. 3.09 ± 1.25, t = 0.76, p = .516). Conclusion The implementation of this innovative empowerment program, which included nurses and supervisors, resulted in an increase in patient safety culture scores as well as growth in domain score. Therefore, this program can be used to advance these critical facets of patient safety culture, which are currently underdeveloped.

Nordic radiographers’ and students’ perspectives on artificial intelligence – A cross-sectional online survey

IntroductionThe integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into the domain of radiography holds substantial potential in various aspects including workflow efficiency, image processing, patient positioning, and quality assurance. The successful implementation of AI within a Radiology department necessitates the participation of key stakeholders, particularly radiographers. The study aimed to provide a comprehensive investigation about Nordic radiographers' perspectives and attitudes towards AI in radiography. MethodsAn online 29-item survey was distributed via social media platforms to Nordic students and radiographers working in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Iceland, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands including items on demographics, specialization, educational background, place of work and perspectives and knowledge on AI. The items were a mix of closed-type and scaled questions, with the option for free-text responses when relevant. ResultsThe survey received responses from all Nordic countries with 586 respondents, 26.8% males, 72.1% females, and 1.1% non-binary/self-defined or preferred not to say.The mean age was 37.2 with a standard deviation (SD) of ±12.1 years, and the mean number of years since qualification was 14.2 SD ± 10.3 years. A total of 43% (n = 254) of the respondents had not received any AI training in clinical practice. Whereas 13% (n = 76) had received AI during radiography undergrad training. A total of 77.9% (n = 412) expressed interest in pursuing AI education. The majority of respondents were aware of the potential use of AI (n = 485, 82.8%) and 39.1% (n = 204) had no reservations about AI. ConclusionOverall, this study found that Nordic radiographers have a positive attitude toward AI. Very limited training or education has been provided to the radiographers. Especially since 82.8% reports on plans to implement AI in clinical practice. In general, awareness of AI applications is high, but the educational level is low for Nordic radiographers. Implication for practiceThis study emphasises the favourable view of AI held by students and Nordic radiographers. However, there is a need for continuous professional development to facilitate the implementation and effective utilization of AI tools within the field of radiography.

Hope during Crises: A Thematic Analysis of a Podcast on Hope in Amsterdam during the COVID-19 Pandemic

While crises, like pandemics, have a negative impact on mental health, hope may affect it positively. However, hope during COVID-19 has hardly been explored. In this study, we explored the hope of interviewees in a podcast on hope in Amsterdam during the COVID-19 pandemic, which sought variations in the gender, spiritual backgrounds, and places of work of the interviewees. Underpinned by hermeneutic phenomenology, we thematically analyzed the six transcribed episodes. We found that the present was sketched as closed down, while hope related to (the potential of) spaces and the future opening up. Sources of hope were the vaccine, good weather, faith and trust, and the history of Amsterdam, which was characterized by resilience. Several participants appreciated their everyday life in a new way: COVID-19 made them slow down and aware of what really mattered, which was a source of hope. Frequently mentioned sources of hope were connections with others, and especially solidarity. Also, showing solidarity was identified as a way of offering hope to others. We conclude that both in our study and in several religions, the link between hope and solidarity is common, and that hope is a spiritual topic that is worth addressing in mental health care.

Measuring Chinese mobility behaviour during COVID-19 using geotagged social media data

COVID-19 caused widespread disruption to normal lives and human activities. In China, the mobility behaviour response to the COVID-19 pandemic at the intra-city and population group levels is largely unknown, mainly due to a lack of individual-level publicly available mobility data. Using 210 million geotagged posts from 10 million social media users, the study quantified the changes in stay-at-home and outings across amenities and groups in China during the pandemic. The users were compared to national census data to examine their representativeness. To validate the results externally, the geotagged data was performed post-stratified correction and further comparison with commonly used data sources. The findings reveal that (i) there was between 16.8% and 57.7% decrease in visits to places of work, retail and recreation sites, parks, transit stations, grocery stores, and pharmacies within one month of the outbreak; (ii) those who are young, have a bachelor’s degree or higher, and are unmarried experienced a greater decline in outings; (iii) people preferred to visit nearby locations, resulting in a 4.3% increase in visits to retail and recreational sites within a 3-kilometer radius of their homes. The data and findings could gain insight into the asymmetric impact of the pandemic on public infrastructure use and socio-demographic groups, helping design targeted policies to promote outdoor activities, stimulate economic recovery, and alleviate social inequality in vulnerable groups.

The body as territory: a movement perspective

ABSTRACT Drawing on my background as a Mexican dancer and researcher, I analyse my practice-research on the body as territory, referencing the Latin American feminist concept of Cuerpo-Territorio (Body-Territory), which is rooted in the claim that ‘there is no ontological difference between territory and the body. Hence, what is done to the body is done to the territory and vice versa’ (Zaragocin and Caretta 2020: 1508). Within this methodology, the body-map serves as a ‘fixed locus’ where significant places such as the home, family, work place, or natural entities are located, allowing for a cartography of personal and collective connections to territory. I propose that the body, the space it occupies, and the place it inhabits are profoundly interconnected. I argue for the necessity of exploring Cuerpo-Territorio from a movement-based perspective in order to shift the notion of the body as fixed locus to a body in movement. I analyse two components of my approach: the body as territory as concept and metaphor that shifts from the static to the dynamic body; and workshops as spaces for collective embodied reflection. Each encompasses new ways of perceiving and moving from the body as a territory and, significantly, expands the Cuerpo-Territorio methodology.

Interactive effects of organizational commitment and incentives on firm resilience during a global crisis

The COVID-19 pandemic was a global crisis that impacted supply chains and disrupted manufacturing and services systems across the globe. The exodus of workers from their place of work to their respective native places was a phenomenon that resulted in 600 million workers migratingin India. The pharma industry, among others, struggled to keep its supply chains operational. Our article explores the mediating role of organizational commitment (OC) and the moderating role of incentives on the impact of organizational citizenship behaviour (OCB) on firm resilience (FR) during the COVID-19 pandemic and researched the pharma industry bearing the highest risk. Data from contractual workers in two large Indian companies indicates that OCB positively influences OC, while both impact FR. Moreover, OC partially mediates, while incentives significantly and positively moderate OC on FR, especially for non-loyalists. These findings establish that organizations need to monitor the impact of both OC and OCB on FR and thereby use appropriate incentives to improve the ‘loyalty’ of contract employees, specifically during major crises like the ongoing pandemic.

Evaluation of Yazd General Dentists’ Knowledge about Vital Pulp Therapy in Immature Permanent Teeth in 2022

Introduction: Vital pulp therapy includes is differnt methods that are used to preserve pulp vitality and root development in immature permanent teeth with thin dentin wall and open apical foramen which have been damaged or inflamed due to dental caries, trauma, or during the restoration. This study was conducted to assess the knowledge of Yazd general dentists toward Vital pulp therapy in immature permanent teeth in 2022. Methods: In this descriptive-cross-sectional study, a valid and reliable questionnaire, including demographic information and 15 questions related to the knowledge of vital pulp therapy was distributed among 150 general dentists in Yazd City, Iran. Data were analyzed using SPSS-22 software, T-test and ANOVA. Results: The participants in this study, included 55.3% men and 44.7% women with an average age of 34.25 (±7.32) years old and an average years of job experience of 8.32 (±7.04). Among them, 35.3% had participated in dentistry retraining courses. The average knowledge score of the participants in this study was 9.2 out of 15. The average score in different groups did not show any significant difference in terms of age, sex, job experience, work place and participation in retraining courses. (P-value &gt;0.05) Conclusion: Yazd general dentists had intermediate level of knowledge about the vital pulp therapy of immature permanent teeth. It seems that the need for retraining courses to improve the level of knowledge about vital pulp therapy to help choosing the best treatment plan for young permanent teeth is evident.  

Turning Policy into Delivery: A Case Study Approach

The purpose of this article is to encourage institutions, especially secondary schools, to move towards greater improvement through turning policy into delivery. It is imperative that each institution or organization has appropriate policies in place. Certain institutions and organizations are good at policy design but less so in policy implementation. Policy itself is not enough to turn an institution or organization around hence policy design should not be equivalent to a silo. To turn an institution or organization around is directly proportional to turning policy into delivery. The policy should promote a culture of development and enculturation of those who happen to join the institution. In addition, self-regulation strategies are crucial when attempting to turn policy into delivery. Clearly, delivery chain should allow for policy to be deliverable. Although there is a vast amount of literature about policy implementation, the researchers wanted to encourage principals of secondary schools to move from partial effectiveness to improvement through intensifying turning of policies into a delivery strategy. The researchers adopted a case study approach and selected five principals of schools randomly. The respondents were interviewed at their respective places of work when convenient. The purpose of interviews of the participants was to ascertain their experiences in turning policy into delivery in their working environments. Their responses were analysed using data matrix. Their responses were recorded and presented as a case study approach. The findings of both the respondents and the literature review confirm that all stakeholders are ultimately responsible for turning policy into delivery.

Small work pleasures and two types of well‐being

AbstractDoes wage labor contribute to well‐being beyond providing an income? Well‐being can be understood in eudaimonic terms as the happiness derived from a socially valued life or in hedonic terms as the experience of pleasure. The eudaimonic–hedonic divide is replicated in competing progressive visions of the place of work in a good life. Laborist theories stress the centrality of paid work for a meaningful life. By contrast, for post‐work theories, pleasure is important for well‐being, and work is generally not expected to be pleasurable. Surprisingly, many of the participants in my study of diverse US job seekers described one or more of the jobs they had held as “fun.” Fun connotes enjoyment without deeper meaning, a hedonic rather than eudaimonic account of nonfinancial work rewards. What made a job fun were small work pleasures: enjoyment of the tasks and feeling competent at them, enjoyment of the physical work environment, or enjoyment of social relations on the job. These small pleasures could be found in both standard and nonstandard, precarious jobs. This study indicates the need for a labor politics that improves hedonic well‐being on the job. It also expands an “anthropology of the good” to include ordinary enjoyment.

Effects of mobility on dialect change: Introducing the linguistic mobility index.

Increased geographical mobility prompts dialectologists to factor in survey participants' exposure to linguistic variation in their research. Changing mobility patterns (e.g. longer-distance commuting; easier relocation to distant places for work, study or marriage) have caused linguistic connections to become much more diverse, potentially contributing to the acceleration of dialect change. In this methodological work we propose the Linguistic Mobility Index (LMI) to estimate long-term exposure to dialectal variation and thereby to provide a reference of "localness" about survey participants. Based on data about a survey participant's linguistic biography, an LMI may comprise combinations of influential agents and environments, such as the dialects of parents and long-term partners, the places where participants have lived and worked, and the participants' level of education. We encapsulate the linguistic effects of these agents based on linguistic differences, the intensity and importance of the relationship. We quantify the linguistic effects in three steps. 1) The linguistic effect of an agent is represented by a linguistic distance, 2) This linguistic distance is weighted based on the intensity of the participant's exposure to the agent, and 3) Further weighted according to the relationship embodied by the agent. LMI is conceptualised and evaluated based on 500 speakers from 125 localities in the Swiss German Dialects Across Time and Space (SDATS) corpus, and guidance is provided for establishing LMI in other linguistic studies. For the assessment of LMI's applicability to other studies, four LMI prototypes are constructed based on the SDATS corpus, employing different theoretical considerations and combinations of influential agents and environments to simulate the availability of biographical data in other studies. Using mixed-effects modelling, we evaluate the utility of the LMI prototypes as predictors of dialect change between historic and contemporary linguistic data of Swiss German. The LMI prototypes successfully show that higher exposure to dialectal variation contributes to more dialect change and that its effect is stronger than some sociodemographic variables that are often tested for affecting dialect change (e.g. sex and educational background).

[Erratum in "Point-of-Care Blood Glucose Testing: Post-Market Performance Assessment of the Accu-Chek Inform II Hospital-Use Glucose Meter" (DOI: 10.26442/00403660.2023.12.202522)].

In the article "Point-of-care blood glucose testing: post-market performance assessment of the Accu-Chek Inform II hospital-use glucose meter," published in the Terapevticheskii Arkhiv journal, Vol. 95, No.12, 2023 (DOI: 10.26442/00403660.2023.12.202522), errors were made: the term "measurements at the place of treatment" was changed, as well as the section "Conflict of interest." At the request of the authors' team, errors in the conflict of interest and the wording of the term have been corrected, and the section "Information about the authors" has been updated. The publisher replaced the original version of the published article with the corrected one; the information on the website was also corrected. Correct text of the section "Conflict of interest": Conflict of interest. All authors are not employees or consultants of Roche Diagnostics and have not received any compensation from Roche Diagnostics. Correct wording of the term in Russian: "измерения по месту лечения". Changes were made to the title of the article in Russian: "Измерения глюкозы по месту лечения: пострегистрационное испытание госпитального глюкометра Акку-Чек Информ II", the text of the abstract, keywords, citation, in the text of the article, and abbreviations. Information of the place of work has been updated: Center for Laboratory Diagnostics of the Russian Children Clinical Hospital, a Branch of the Pirogov Russian National Research Medical University. The publisher apologizes to readers and authors for the errors and is confident that the correction of errors will ensure the correct perception and interpretation of the results of the study described in the text.

The effect of workplace mobility on air pollution exposure inequality—a case study in the Central Belt of Scotland

A large number of epidemiological studies have identified air pollution as a major risk to human health. Exposures to the pollutants PM2.5, NO2 and O3 cause cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, cancer and premature mortality. Whilst previous studies have reported demographic inequalities in exposure, with the most deprived and susceptible often being disproportionately exposed to the highest pollutant concentrations, the vast majority of these studies have quantified exposure based only on individuals’ place of residence. Here we use anonymised personal data from UK Census 2011, and hourly modelled air pollution concentrations at 0.8 km × 1.4 km spatial resolution in the Central Belt of Scotland, to investigate how inclusion of time spent at place of work or study affects demographic inequalities in exposure. We split the population by sex, ethnic group, age and socio-economic status. Exposure gradients are observed across all demographic characteristics. Air pollution exposures of males are more affected by workplace exposures than females. The White ethnic group has the lowest exposures to NO2 and PM2.5, and highest to O3. Exposures to NO2 and PM2.5 tend to peak between the ages of 21 and 30, but those aged 31–50 tend to be most impacted by the inclusion of time spent at workplace in the exposure assessment. People in the two least deprived deciles consistently have the lowest residential-only and combined residential-workplace exposure to NO2 and PM2.5, but experience the highest increase in exposure when including workplace. Overall, including workplace exposure results in relatively small change in median exposure but attenuates some of the exposure inequalities associated with ethnicity and socioeconomic status observed in exposure assessments based only on place of residence.

Subjective Well-Being, Willingness to Accept COVID Policies, and Vulnerability: Evidence from China

China has experienced dramatic economic growth and poverty reduction over the last two decades, leading the country to declare victory in eradicating extreme poverty in 2021. While the country’s track record in poverty reduction is certainly respectable, income poverty is only one dimension of broader wellbeing. Increasingly, the notions of vulnerability and subjective well-being (SWB) have been noted by researchers and practitioners worldwide. However, the widespread outbreak of COVID-19 pressed hard on people’s livelihoods, potentially impacting SWB or tipping vulnerable households into a state of poverty. These states may impact households’ support for China’s strict measures to control the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19. To date, however, few studies have rigorously assessed household welfare and its relationship with SWB and subjective acceptance of aggressive COVID-related policies during the pandemic. Our results suggest that vulnerable households, on average, were less happy, experienced depression more frequently, and were subject to negative emotions impeding their ability to complete their work during the early period of the pandemic. Analysis also suggests that the vulnerable are less willing to accept the closure of work places, and became less confident in the government and the health system. The relationships between vulnerability, SWB, and acceptance of COVID-related policies are heterogenous and are conditional on the source of vulnerability. To enhance pre-pandemic progress in poverty elimination in China, the findings of this study suggest that interventions that can stabilize income variability also needs to be prioritized alongside raising income levels in the policy agenda.

Has Japan’s work style reform had the intended effect?

ABSTRACT Since 2016, the Japanese government has promoted the reform of work styles to reduce working hours, facilitate flexible working arrangements, and ensure the fair treatment of nonregular workers while improving productivity. Policies such as flexible work styles that leave the time and place of work to the worker’s autonomy and efforts to enhance work efficiency through the use of IT have rapidly penetrated both large companies and medium-sized companies since 2016. We use an original retrospective survey of 847 Japanese firms combined with financial data from 2009 to 2019 to examine how Japan’s work style reforms have affected overtime hours, turnover rates, sales per person, and corporate profits. By estimating fixed effect models, we find that (1) the policies for business prioritization to improve efficiency by outsourcing noncore businesses and taking on more selective orders have had positive effects on sales per employee and profits, (2) flexible work styles have reduced overtime and raised profits, and (3) the effects are heterogeneous: flexible work styles have reduced overtime hours, increased ROA and sales per employee in the service sector, and had significantly negative effects on sales per capita in the nonservice sector. Potential estimation biases are also examined in additional analyses.