Search Results (14)

Background/Objectives: The COVID-19 pandemic intensified stress among students, though its impact on burnout symptoms remains mixed. Previous research emphasized examining both study-related behavior such as academic engagement and burnout for a fuller understanding of students’ well-being in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: In this cross-sectional study we examined stress, burnout, study-related behavior, and typical coping patterns among three cohorts of university students before (2016), at the start of (2020), and after (2024) the pandemic, with 1016 students participating. Results: Perceived stress was significantly higher during the pandemic but returned to pre-COVID-19 levels afterward. Depression scores remained stable across cohorts. Burnout symptoms, particularly cynicism and academic efficacy, were significantly lower in the COVID-19 cohort. Study commitment, including subjective importance of studying, academic goals/ambition, willingness to exert oneself, and striving for perfection were lower during and after the pandemic than before. Emotional distancing peaked in 2020, suggesting disengagement as a coping strategy. Pre-COVID-19 students exhibited higher active coping scores than the COVID-19 and post-COVID-19 cohorts, while satisfaction with studies was highest post-pandemic, likely due to the return of in-person academic and social experiences. Conclusions: These findings reveal fluctuations in students’ stress, burnout, and study-related behavior over time. While stress-levels have normalized, study commitment and typical coping patterns such as active coping remain altered, indicating the pandemic’s lasting impact on students’ academic behavior and mental health. Full article

As smart voice assistants (SVAs) become increasingly integrated into digital commerce, understanding the psychological factors driving their adoption or resistance is essential. While prior research has addressed the impact of privacy concerns, few studies have explored the competing forces that shape user decisions. This study investigates the dual role of privacy cynicism as a context-specific belief influencing both trust (reason-for) and perceived creepiness (reason-against)—which in turn affect attitudes, behavioral intentions, and resistance toward SVA usage, based on the Behavioral Reasoning Theory (BRT). The study used a convenience sampling method, gathering data from 250 Turkish consumers aged 18–35 through an online survey technique. The research model was analyzed using PLS-SEM. The findings revealed that perceived creepiness increases resistance intention but does not significantly affect attitudes toward using SVAs. Perceived cynicism was found to positively influence perceived trust, and perceived trust, in turn, increased both behavioral intentions and attitudes toward using SVAs. Furthermore, attitudes toward SVA usage decreased resistance intention but increased behavioral intention. The results emphasize consumer trust and skepticism in AI-driven marketing. The study offers both theoretical contributions by extending BRT with a novel dual-path conceptualization of privacy cynicism, and practical implications for developers aiming to boost SVA adoption through trust-building and privacy assurance strategies. Full article

Globally increasing educational pressures and associated decreases in well-being among adolescents and young adults make educational burnout a major challenge in sustainable education, which is becoming more systematically investigated. This paper overviews previous studies on the structure of educational burnout. It provides new data on the validity of the School Burnout Inventory (SBI) among 650 Polish university students, including associations between educational burnout and problematic study-related attitudes and behaviors, stress, and anxiety. The original three-factor structure of the SBI was revised to a two-factor model due to the collinearity between cynicism and a sense of inadequacy. The adjusted model demonstrated a good fit and was cross-validated in an independent subsample. The SBI showed good reliability. Exhaustion was strongly and positively correlated with study overload. It showed a more consistent pattern of correlations with problematic study-related attitudes and behaviors than the cynicism/inadequacy component, which showed distinctive associations with learning competencies (learning self-efficacy and study enjoyment). Both components showed relatively strong positive correlations with stress and anxiety. The findings suggest that educational burnout is significantly associated with problematic overstudying and well-being, with exhaustion playing a central role in this construct. This research contributes to understanding educational burnout and its components in a Polish academic context, highlighting the importance of preventing its development to enhance student well-being and educational outcomes. Full article

Consumers encounter significant psychological and social barriers that hinder their participation in ecological transitions. Green influencers (or Greenfluencers), through their communication style and perceived credibility, have the potential to increase consumer awareness and engagement with circular practices. Previous research has focused on green influencers’ role in eco-friendly purchases, but their impact on promoting circular economy behaviors is less studied. To address this gap, the present explorative study investigates how green influencers’ communication can shape consumers’ perceptions of the barriers to adopting circular economies. Using a single case study of the Italian Greenfluencer “@Eco.narratrice” (Elisa Nicoli), this paper examines how green content creators’ communication can address psychological and social obstacles that prevent consumers from embracing circular models in the Italian context. Our findings reveal a different impact of Greenfluencer communication effectiveness on consumer perceptions of circular economy adoption barriers. While Greenfluencer communication helps reduce barriers like knowledge gaps and psychological essentialism, it may also heighten concerns about switching costs, inertia, and cynicism. The findings contribute to the growing literature on green influencers, offering new insights into the broader effects of their communication on consumer engagement with circular economies. This research provides insights for marketing managers on leveraging Greenfluencers to promote circular business models. It also provides feedback for Greenfluencers to refine their communication strategies, helping them better address consumer perceptions of CE barriers, particularly in areas where their efforts may fail to achieve the desired impact. Full article

This article aims to investigate the impact of toxic leadership (TL) on counterproductive work behavior (CWB) with the mediating roles of organizational cynicism (OC) and organizational injustice (OIJ), using 392 questionnaires collected from employees working in the Egyptian higher education sector. The data are examined using AMOS 25 for structural equation model (SEM) analysis. The results show that toxic leadership positively affects CWBs, organizational cynicism, and organizational injustice. Furthermore, organizational cynicism positively affects CWBs, and organizational injustice significantly affects CWBs. Finally, organizational cynicism and injustice partially mediate the relationship between toxic leadership and CWBs. This study adds novelty to the literature by exploring the influence of toxic leadership on CWBs, OC, and OIJ in Egypt’s higher education sector. As a result, addressing the prevalence of toxic leadership and its ripple effects is essential for fostering sustainable organizational cultures. Sustainable work environments prioritize fairness, employee well-being, and positive leadership practices, reducing counterproductive behaviors. Finally, this article reviews the limitations but also assesses the substantial contributions to theory and practice made by the paper. Full article

This study aims to explore how work disengagement (WD) is affected by employees’ perceptions of distributive injustice (DI). It also investigates the mediating roles of workplace negative gossip (WNG) and organizational cynicism (OC). Responses were received from the full-time employees of category (A) travel agencies and five-star hotels operating in Egypt. WarpPLS 7.0 was used to run a PLS-SEM analysis on the 656 valid responses. The results revealed that there is a positive relationship between employees’ perception of distributive injustice and work disengagement level; in addition, there is a positive relationship between perception of distributive injustice and workplace negative gossip and organizational cynicism. Results also reported positive relationships between workplace negative gossip, organizational cynicism, and work disengagement. Furthermore, findings showed that workplace negative gossip and organizational cynicism mediate the relationship between distributive injustice and work disengagement. Some groundbreaking investigations were conducted as part of the research. Research on how DI affects WNG, OC, and WD is still lacking. In terms of contextual significance, an empirical investigation of the relationship between these factors in hotels and travel companies is unavailable. By empirically examining these connections in the context of Egyptian hotels and travel agencies, the current study has filled a gap in the literature on tourism and hospitality, human resources management, and organizational behavior. Full article

Machiavellianism refers to the propensity of taking advantage of people within a society. Machiavellians have reputations for being cunning and competitive. They are also skilled long-term strategists and planners. Other than their “victories,” there are no other successful conclusions for them. The belief component of Machiavellianism includes cynical views of human nature (e.g., manipulated and manipulating individuals), interpersonal exploitation as a technique (e.g., strategic thinking), and a lack of traditional morality that would forbid their behaviors (e.g., immoral behaviors). This paper focuses on a game that involves manipulation. The game was conceptualized using the best and worst Nash equilibrium points as part of our contribution. We constrained the problem to homogeneous, finite, ergodic, and controllable Bayesian–Markov games. Machiavellian players pretended to be in one state when they were actually in another. Moreover, they pretended to perform one action while actually playing another. All Machiavellian individuals engaged in some form of interpersonal manipulation. Manipulating players exhibited a higher preference compared to manipulated participants. The Pareto frontier is defined as the line where manipulating players play the best Nash equilibrium and manipulated players play the worst Nash equilibrium. It is also considered a sequential Bayesian–Markov manipulation game involving multiple manipulating players and manipulated players. Finally, a tractable characterization of the manipulation equilibrium results is provided. To guarantee that the game’s solution converged into a singular solution, we used Tikhonov’s penalty regularization method. A numerical example describes the results of our model. Full article

This study aims to investigate the relationship between front-line employees’ (FLEs) extra-role behavior (ERB) and its influence on student satisfaction (SS), student loyalty (SL), and university image (UI), while also examining the moderating effect of student cynicism (SC). Drawing on the service profit chain model, this research proposes a positive relationship between ERB and SS, SL, and UI, with SC acting as a moderator for the relationship between ERB and SS. Using a survey research design, the study was conducted at a semi-government university in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) during a service encounter between FLEs and students, involving 251 students as respondents. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was used to analyze the data collected. The findings demonstrated a significant positive relationship between FLE ERB and SS, SL, and UI. Additionally, the study revealed that SC moderates the relationship between FLE ERB and SS, suggesting that highly cynical students are less responsive to employee extra-role behavior. These findings have significant implications for university management and policymakers. By understanding the impact of FLE ERB on student outcomes and the moderating effect of SC, universities can develop and strengthen targeted strategies to enhance SS, SL, and UI. Full article

Powerful rising trends of mobile media platforms have also resulted in the escalation of users’ privacy concerns. However, there is a paradox between users’ attitudes towards privacy and their actual privacy disclosure behaviors. This study attempts to explain the phenomenon of privacy paradox in the mobile social media context from the privacy fatigue perspective. Based on the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) and employing the method of Propensity Score Matching (PSM), this paper confirmed that privacy fatigue could directly explain the privacy paradox. Among the findings, cynicism turned the relationship between privacy concern and privacy protection behaviors from positive influence to negative influence, while emotional exhaustion would weaken the positive influence relationship between privacy concern and the intention to undertake privacy protection behaviors. In addition, the study also revealed the heterogeneous effects of individual characteristics and usage characteristics variables on how the privacy fatigue influences privacy paradox. Full article

Background: The health behaviors smoking, risky alcohol consumption, insufficient physical activity, and poor diet constitute the main contributors to non-communicable diseases. Clustering of risk behaviors is common and increases the risk of these diseases. Despite health benefits, it is difficult to change health behaviors. Psychosocial factors could play a role in health behavior change, with research showing relationships between unfavorable psychosocial factors and health risk behaviors. However, many studies only investigated one or two health behaviors at a time. The present study, therefore, aimed to investigate associations between a broad range of psychosocial factors and multiple health risk behaviors in a general middle-aged population in Sweden. Methods: A cross-sectional design was used to investigate a random sample from the general population in Sweden (n = 1007, 45–69 years, 50% women). Questionnaire data on health behaviors (smoking, alcohol consumption, physical activity, and fruit/vegetable intake) and psychosocial factors, with both psychological and social resources (social integration, emotional support, perceived control, self-esteem, sense of coherence and trust) and psychological risk factors (cynicism, vital exhaustion, hopelessness and depressiveness), were analyzed. Logistic and ordinal logistic regression were used to analyze associations between psychosocial factors and multiple (0–1, 2 or 3–4) health risk behaviors. Results: A total of 50% of the sample had two health risk behaviors and 18% had three health risk behaviors. After adjusting for age, sex, education, employment status, and immigrant status, eight out of 10 psychosocial factors (exceptions: social integration and self-esteem) showed significant odds ratios (ORs) in the expected directions; low levels of psychosocial resources and high levels of psychosocial risk factors were associated with multiple risk behaviors. The strongest associations with multiple risk behaviors were seen for vital exhaustion (adjusted (adj.) OR 1.28; confidence interval (CI) 1.11–1.46), depressiveness (adj. OR 1.32, CI 1.14–1.52), and trust (adj. OR 0.80, CI 0.70–0.91). When controlling for all psychosocial factors in the same model, only the association with trust remained statistically significant (adj. OR 0.89, CI 0.73–1.00, p = 0.050). Associations with individual health behaviors were fewer and scattered, with no psychosocial factor being related to all four behaviors. Conclusions: Examining associations between a broad range of psychosocial factors and multiple health risk behaviors revealed consistent and significant associations for almost all psychosocial factors. These associations were stronger compared to associations to single health risk behaviors. Our findings support the relevance of considering psychosocial aspects in interventions aimed at health behavior change, especially for people with multiple health risk behaviors. Full article

This study explores the relationship between educational practices perceived by high school students and their level of burnout, as defined by emotional exhaustion, cynicism and inadequacy. A total of 287 adolescents (146 girls) aged between 14 and 19 years old (M = 16.08, SD = 1.01) and recruited from a public high school in French-speaking Switzerland completed a questionnaire regarding perceived educational practices and school burnout. Results from path analysis showed that the three dimensions of burnout were negatively associated with certain teacher- and school-related educational practices. More precisely, support for struggling students (ß = −0.24, p < 0.001) as well as teaching time (ß = −0.16, p < 0.05) were predictors of exhaustion (R² = 0.27). Teachers’ instructional behavior (ß = −0.22, p < 0.01) and teacher motivation (ß = −0.31, p < 0.001) were predictors of cynicism (R² = 0.20) and application of rules (ß = −0.21, p < 0.01) predicted inadequacy (R² = 0.09). These educational practices should be of particular interest when it comes to strengthening the protective role of schools and teachers against school burnout in adolescents. Full article

Although it is believed that physical activity, sedentary, and dietary behavior (i.e., energy balance-related behavior) may decrease the risk of burn-out, the association between both is currently not well understood. Therefore, the aim of this systematic review was to synthesize studies investigating the relationship between energy balance-related behavior and burn-out risk. A systematic literature search was conducted in four databases, resulting in 25 included studies (ten experimental and 15 observational studies). Nine out of ten experimental studies showed that exercise programs were effective in reducing burn-out risk. Fourteen out of fifteen observational studies found a negative association between physical activity and burn-out risk, whereas one study did not find a relation. Two of the 15 observational studies also showed that being more sedentary was associated with a higher burn-out risk, and two other studies found that a healthier diet was related to a lower burn-out risk. No experimental studies were found for the latter two behaviors. It can be concluded that physical activity may be effective in reducing burn-out risk. The few observational studies linking sedentary and dietary behavior with burn-out risk suggest that being more sedentary and eating less healthy are each associated with higher burn-out risk. More high-quality research is needed to unravel the causal relationship between these two behaviors and burn-out risk. Full article

Organizational cynicism has been a topic of discussion and debate among employees and top management. The purpose of this study is to find out the relationship between organizational cynicism and organizational pride. Precisely, the objectives are to identify and measure organizational cynicism among employees in industrial organizations; to determine and measure the degree of organizational pride among employees in industrial organizations and to study the effect of organizational cynicism on the organizational pride of employees in industrial organizations. In this empirical research, the study population was employees of industrial organizations of Oman. Using a purposive sampling technique, nine industrial organizations from Oman were picked. With the help of structured questionnaire, data from 350 respondents was obtained. Structural equation modeling was used through Amos version 25.0 for data analysis. The results reveal that the two dimensions of organizational cynicism (affective cynicism and behavioral cynicism) have a significant and negative impact on emotional pride, while cognitive cynicism does not significantly effect emotional pride. The study results indicate that the one dimension of organizational cynicism (affective cynicism) has a significant impact on attitudinal pride, while the rest of the other dimensions (cognitive cynicism, behavioral cynicism) do not have a significant effect on attitudinal pride. The limitations and implications of the research are also discussed. Full article

This study investigated information systems security (ISS) as one of the important issues of e-government for sustainable development. ISS is becoming increasingly important in the discourse on information technology-related organizational transformation, and governments need to undergo organizational transformation to establish an effective ISS system for advancing e-government capacity which plays a vital role in achieving sustainability. Furthermore, ISS breaches are becoming the norm rather than the exception, but ISS can only be achieved when employees fully and firmly embrace the concept by changing their behavior to comply with advanced ISS technologies. A research model is theoretically developed in this context based on institution theory, which proposes a dual path model consisting of legitimacy-leading organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) and organizational cynicism-causing counterproductive work behaviors (CWB) in the process of innovating ISS for e-government. This dual-path model is empirically tested against 388 data collected from information security managers in 30 departments and councils within Korea’s central government. A structural model evaluation of the collected data principally validates the research model. The results indicate that the path through legitimacy, influenced by normative and coercive isomorphism, is stronger than that through organizational cynicism. The data largely supports the proposed research model, confirming the applicability of institutional theory in explaining the institutionalization processes in effective ISS compliance at the organizational and individual levels. The implications of these findings are then discussed in detail. Full article