Search Results (548)

Environmental regulations serve as a critical determinant of industrial competitiveness in the global market. Recent policy shifts have driven a gradual convergence of rural environmental standards with urban norms, fostering a dynamic landscape of “top-down competition” between urban and rural regulatory frameworks. While the economic consequences of regional regulatory disparities are well-documented, the specific impacts of this regulatory convergence remain insufficiently explored. To address this gap, this study constructs a novel index to measure the convergence of environmental regulations between urban districts and rural counties at the prefecture level. Utilizing an unbalanced panel dataset of 5600 county-level timber processing enterprises, the Heckman two-stage model is employed for empirical analysis. The results demonstrate that the convergence of urban and rural environmental regulations significantly enhances both the export probability and export intensity of county-level firms, with these effects exhibiting persistence and cumulative growth over time. These findings remain robust across a series of validation tests, including instrumental variable estimation, double machine learning, and alternative model specifications. Mechanism analysis reveals that regulatory convergence promotes exports primarily by improving access to green credit and enhancing peer quality within the industry. Furthermore, heterogeneity tests indicate that the positive effects are most pronounced for start-ups and firms in the decline stage, as well as for enterprises located in eastern China, those outside the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and those subject to minimal government intervention. This study provides critical micro-level evidence that helps enterprises navigate the evolving policy landscape and supports the formulation of strategies to boost export trade amidst the integration of environmental regulations. Full article

Background: Frailty is a geriatric syndrome of increased physiological vulnerability, decreasing an older adult’s ability to successfully cope with health stressors. Social determinants of health (SDOH), including rural residence, can amplify healthcare disparities for older adults due to less accessibility to resources and lead to worse health outcomes. While the impact of rurality on older adult health is well-established, little is known about how the interaction of SDOH and geographical residence impact frailty status in older adults. Methods: Older adults (65+ years) in the National Health and Aging Trend Study (2011–2021) were categorized using Fried’s frailty phenotype (robust, pre-frail, frail). Rurality was defined using the 2013 Rural–Urban Continuum Codes. Generalized estimation equations with generalized logit link function determined the relationship between SDOHs (healthcare access, community support, income, education) and frailty status. Results: Of n = 6082 participants (56.4% female), the mean age was 75.12 years (SE 0.10), 1133 (18.6%) lived in rural residence, and 2652 (53.0%) had pre-frailty. Although there was no relationship between geographical residence and frailty status (p = 0.73), we did observe lower associated odds of worse frailty status for those with Medigap insurance coverage (0.81, SE 0.08; p = 0.04) and inconsistent frailty status trends for those of divorced (1.12, SE 0.05; p = 0.007) and never married (0.20, SE 0.03; p < 0.001) status in urban areas. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that geographic residence may modify the relationship between SDOH and frailty status in older adults, providing novel insight into the complexity of these interactions. This work is important for identifying modifiable areas where additional support interventions may be important for mitigating frailty development and progression for older adults with efforts at both the individual and system levels. Full article

The unique geo-ecological conditions of karst river basins (KRBs) heighten rural vulnerability to compound disturbances; therefore, enhanced rural resilience (RR) is critical for regional ecological security and sustainable development. In this study, the Wujiang River Basin was chosen as the study area. A comprehensive evaluation index system was first established to assess RR. Key driving factors were identified using the Optimal Parameters-based Geographical Detector (OPGD) mode. The Geographically and Temporally Weighted Regression (GTWR) model was then applied to analyze the spatiotemporal heterogeneity in the driving mechanisms of RR. Our results show that from 2010 to 2022: (1) RR in the study area increased significantly, and disparities among counties decreased notably, indicating a trend toward more balanced regional development. (2) RR displayed strong positive spatial autocorrelation, with spatial clusters evolving dynamically under the influence of policy interventions and environmental constraints. (3) The main drivers of spatial heterogeneity in RR included urban–rural income disparity, road network density, agricultural machinery power, etc. Their driving mechanisms exhibited significant spatiotemporal non-stationarity. The findings inform the development of targeted strategies to enhance regional resilience. Additionally, the methodology and empirical insights can serve as valuable references for RR research and practice in other similar KRBs worldwide. Full article

Background/Objectives: Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) remain a leading cause of mortality worldwide, with a particularly high burden in Central Asian countries. Despite ongoing urbanization, rural populations constitute a significant demographic in this region, yet epidemiological data stratified by urban and rural residence are limited and fragmented. This systematic review aimed to synthesize current evidence on the incidence, prevalence, mortality, and risk factor profiles of CVDs among urban and rural populations in Central Asia, identify disparities, and inform targeted prevention and control strategies. Methods: A systematic literature search was conducted across the PubMed, Science Direct, Web of Science, and Google Scholar databases for studies published between 2015 and 2025. Included studies reported cardiovascular health indicators with urban–rural stratification in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan. Data extraction and qualitative synthesis were performed, with methodological quality assessed using the Newcastle–Ottawa Scale. Results: Eight original studies met the inclusion criteria, encompassing national and regional datasets with diverse designs, including retrospective analyses, cross-sectional surveys, and registry data. Overall, CVD incidence and prevalence showed increasing trends in both urban and rural areas, with consistently higher mortality rates in urban populations. Key modifiable risk factors—hypertension, obesity, dyslipidemia, and smoking—were prevalent, particularly in rural settings. Variability in healthcare access and preventive program implementation contributed to the observed disparities. Limited data from some countries, particularly Tajikistan and Turkmenistan, highlight gaps in epidemiological surveillance. Conclusions: The cardiovascular disease burden in Central Asia demonstrates significant urban–rural disparities, underscoring the need for tailored public health interventions and enhanced healthcare resource allocation in rural regions. Strengthening epidemiological monitoring and implementing region-specific prevention programs targeting modifiable risk factors are imperative for reducing CVD morbidity and mortality. Further high-quality research is necessary to address existing data gaps and optimize cardiovascular health strategies across the region. Full article

In the context of China’s accelerated urbanization process, the increasing number of rural-to-urban migrants has become an integral part of urban economic development. Ensuring stable housing for the floating population is essential to facilitating their integration into urban society and promoting the realization of their health rights. Drawing on data from a large-scale survey of Chinese internal migrants, this study empirically analyzes how homeownership influences health services accessibility in rural-to-urban migrants. The findings indicated that homeowners exhibited approximately 18.4% higher odds ratio of accessing public health services compared to renters. This result remained robust after addressing potential reverse causality using instrumental variable approaches and correcting for self-selection bias through propensity score weighting methods. Meanwhile, the mediating effect decomposition showed that migrants’ perception of acculturation and community participation played parallel mediating roles in the relationship between homeownership and health services accessibility. Furthermore, the heterogeneity analysis revealed that the positive impact of homeownership on health services accessibility was more pronounced among individuals with lower household income and shorter migration duration. Our research underscores the importance of securing stable housing for rural-to-urban migrants as a key determinant in advancing the equitable development of urban health systems. Full article

Background/Objectives: This study aimed to estimate the prevalence of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) among children and adolescents aged 0–18 years in the Republic of Armenia (RA), characterize geographic and sex-specific variations, and determine the mean age at diagnosis. These data are essential for informing health system planning, evaluating potential disparities in access to diagnostic services, and generating hypotheses regarding the biological and healthcare-related factors underlying geographic variation in ASD prevalence. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted using administrative records from outpatient medical facilities serving children and adolescents across all ten marzes of RA and the city of Yerevan in 2021. ASD prevalence was estimated at the national and regional levels and stratified by urban and rural residence. The male-to-female prevalence ratio and the mean age at ASD diagnosis were also calculated. Results: The overall prevalence of ASD in RA was 2.3 per 1000 children (95% CI: 2.1–2.4). The highest prevalence was observed in Yerevan (3.7 per 1000). The mean age at diagnosis was 4.5 ± 2.5 years. Males exhibited a 5.1-fold higher prevalence compared to females. ASD prevalence was significantly higher in urban areas than in rural settings. Conclusions: ASD prevalence in RA demonstrates marked geographic and sex disparities, with significantly higher rates in urban regions and among males. These findings underscore the importance of continued ASD prevalence monitoring in RA to identify trends, explore potential biological and healthcare-related contributors to geographic variation, and improve healthcare system planning and management. In turn, improved understanding of regional differences in ASD prevalence may help inform more targeted and personalized approaches to care. The results may also support national and regional policymakers in health, education, and related sectors in developing and strengthening services for children and adolescents with ASD and their families. Full article

Understanding how green spaces foster sense of place is critical for sustainable urban planning and human well-being, yet no comprehensive synthesis has integrated findings across the fragmented literature spanning multiple disciplines. This systematic review analyzed 497 empirical studies examining green space-place attachment relationships, following PRISMA guidelines across three major databases through June 2025. Beyond documenting the field’s rapid growth—from 10 annual publications pre-2010 to over 50 by 2021—this review reveals critical patterns and gaps with implications for theory and practice. While the term ‘place attachment’ was most frequently used (45% of studies), the field employs diverse terminology often without clear definitional boundaries. Only 18% comprehensively addressed the Person-Process-Place tripartite model, with process dimensions particularly neglected. This theoretical incompleteness limits the understanding of how attachments form and evolve. Geographic analysis exposed severe disparities: 78% of studies originated from high-income countries, with Africa (2.4%) and South America (3.6%) critically underrepresented, raising questions about the applicability of current theories beyond Western contexts. Urban settings dominated (49.5%), potentially overlooking rural and indigenous perspectives essential for comprehensive understanding. Methodologically, studies demonstrated sophistication through strategic deployment of quantitative (60%), qualitative (15%), and mixed methods (25%). Key thematic areas, residence duration, restorative benefits, and pro-environmental behaviors, showed promise, yet environmental justice remained underexplored despite its critical importance. This synthesis advances the field by identifying specific pathways for progress: expanding geographic representation to develop culturally inclusive theories, employing longitudinal designs to capture attachment formation processes, developing validated cross-cultural measures, and centering environmental justice in green space planning. These findings provide essential guidance for creating equitable green spaces that foster meaningful human-nature connections across diverse global contexts. Full article

Rapid urbanization has intensified resource and population agglomeration while exacerbating urban-rural disparities. To address the long-standing dual structure, China advocates urban-rural integrated development (URID) to achieve common prosperity. However, the long-term evolutionary patterns and explanatory mechanisms of URID remain insufficiently explored, particularly at the county (district)-level in western China. This study constructed an entropy-weighted TOPSIS evaluation system combined with kernel density estimation and an optimal parameters-based geographical detector (OPGD) model to analyze the spatiotemporal evolution and explanatory mechanisms of URID in 26 counties (districts) of the Xi’an metropolitan area from 2010 to 2022. The results showed that: (1) URID levels increased steadily over the study period, forming a pronounced core-periphery gradient with faster improvement in national URID pilot counties. (2) Factor associations evolved from being dominated by a few dimensions to multidimensional coupling. Socioeconomic and geographical factors remained dominant and relatively stable, demographic influences were clearly stage specific, and the interaction between forest coverage and economic variables weakened over time. (3) Enhancing regional transport accessibility, optimizing land use efficiency, and fostering positive population-industry interaction are key pathways for promoting URID in the study area. Methodologically, this study introduces a “significance testing followed by threshold verification” logic into the OPGD model, refining the parameter-setting process and improving the robustness and q-value of factor detection. The findings enrich URID theory, provide county (district)-scale evidence for western China, and offer policy implications for optimizing factor allocation and promoting coordinated regional development. Full article

The contemporary approach to assessing the housing conditions of households requires taking into account not only the physical characteristics of dwellings but also the quality of their surroundings. From a sustainability perspective, the quality of the external residential environment constitutes a key dimension of sustainable living conditions, closely linked to environmental well-being, spatial equity, and the objectives of sustainable urban and territorial development in the European Union (EU). Despite the growing awareness of the importance of the living environment for residents’ well-being, this issue remains insufficiently represented in analyses addressing the territorial variations in household housing conditions in the EU countries. The scientific literature reveals a lack of comprehensive comparative studies that would link subjective assessments of external residential environmental quality with the level of urbanisation, enabling a more complete evaluation of the living environment and its spatial variability. The aim of the study was therefore to assess the perceived external residential environmental quality of households in EU countries, taking into account the level of urbanisation—differences between urban, town, and rural areas. The study aimed to test the hypothesis that “The external residential environmental quality in EU countries significantly varies depending on the level of urbanisation and regional affiliation, with the highest quality observed in rural areas, particularly in Western European countries.” The study was conducted based on data from the Eurostat database, which were processed using descriptive statistics, inferential statistics, and taxonomic methods. The results of the study confirmed that the external residential environmental quality of households in EU countries significantly differs depending on the level of urbanisation and regional affiliation. The highest level of residential environment quality for households is observed in rural areas of Northern and Eastern European countries. The greatest challenges occur in large cities, particularly in Western Europe, indicating the need to intensify efforts to improve the quality of the living environment in these areas. Full article

Sociodemographic and socioeconomic factors are key digital divide determinants. This study used a three-level framework to analyze differences in digital access, capability, and outcomes between male and female, urban and rural, and high-family-SES and low-family-SES university students. Interviews further explored student perspectives on these disparities. The study found significant digital divides among these groups. Male students were more proactive with computers and had better computer skills and learning abilities than female students. Urban students had superior digital infrastructure, resources, skills, and competitiveness compared to their rural peers. High-SES students enjoyed greater digital access, family support, skills, and learning outcomes than their low-SES counterparts. This research contributes an updated digital divide framework and proposes practical suggestions to minimize digital inequality in higher education. Full article

This study investigates how housing prices influence urban–rural income inequality (URG) in mainland China by explicitly incorporating spatial interdependence and nonlinear adjustment mechanisms, features often neglected in previous research. Using a balanced panel of 31 provinces from 2005 to 2023, we develop a dynamic spatial panel threshold model that jointly accounts for temporal persistence, spatial spillovers, and regime-dependent estimation. This framework enables a full decomposition of housing price effects into direct, indirect (spillover), and total impacts across distinct market regimes. The results reveal three major insights. First, URG in mainland China displays strong temporal persistence, suggesting that income disparities evolve gradually over time. Second, rising housing prices significantly widen the urban–rural income gap, both within provinces and through interprovincial transmission, underscoring the amplifying role of spatial spillovers. Third, threshold estimation identifies a critical housing price level of ln(HP) = 8.4843 (approximately 4838.21 RMB/m²), revealing that the inequality-enhancing effect of housing prices is stronger in low-price regions but diminishes as markets mature and affordability constraints intensify. These findings provide new empirical evidence that the housing market functions as a nonlinear and asymmetric driver of regional inequality in mainland China, with implications for housing policy and inclusive growth. Full article

Access to Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) is a critical component for social inclusion and population development. This study aimed to analyze ICT access in Argentine households, considering its distribution according to deprivation conditions and area of residence (urban–rural) at the regional level, and incorporating a spatial association perspective at the departmental level. The percentage of households with Internet access, computers (or tablets), and cell phones with connectivity was examined at the regional level, according to household deprivation type and area of residence. At the departmental level, the analysis was conducted through thematic maps and the estimation of spatial autocorrelation patterns (global and local Moran’s Index). Indicators were constructed using data from the 2022 Population, Household, and Housing Census. Results revealed significant disparities in ICT access, attributable to deprivation conditions and the geographic distribution of households. Spatial autocorrelation patterns with low ICT access were mainly identified in the Northwest (NOA) and Northeast (NEA) regions, while the highest coverage levels were concentrated in the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area (AMBA), the Pampeana, and Patagonia regions. The evidence highlights the need to design public policies aimed at reducing digital divides. Full article

The year 2024 has been recorded as the warmest year on record, with global temperatures temporarily exceeding the 1.5 °C threshold owing to rising anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. This has intensified global attention on heatwaves, which are a major public health threat linked to increased morbidity and mortality rates. This study conducted a bibliometric analysis of 901 Web of Science-indexed journal articles (2004–2024) using the term “heat wave health.” The findings revealed a significant increase in global temperatures, with an increasing frequency, intensity, and duration of extreme heat events. Heatwaves have been linked to higher rates of injuries, mental health disorders, and mortality, particularly in urban areas, due to ozone pollution, atmospheric contaminants, and the urban heat island effect, leading to increased emergency hospitalisation. Rural populations, especially outdoor labourers, face occupational heat stress and a higher risk of fatality. Adaptation measures, including early warning systems, heat indices, air conditioning, white and green roofs, and urban cooling strategies, offer some mitigation but are inadequate in the long term. Significant knowledge gaps persist regarding regional vulnerabilities, adaptation effectiveness, and socio-economic disparities, underscoring the urgent need for interdisciplinary research to inform heat-resilient public health policies and climate adaptation strategies. This study highlights the urgent need for further interdisciplinary research and targeted policy interventions to enhance heatwave resilience, particularly in under-researched and highly vulnerable regions of the world. Full article

Digitalization has reshaped economic systems worldwide, yet its distributional consequences remain uneven and raise new challenges for sustainable development. China, where digital infrastructure has expanded rapidly, provides a critical setting to examine these effects and their implications for sustainable and inclusive growth. Using a balanced panel of 285 prefecture-level cities from 2007 to 2023, this study constructs a text-based index of digital infrastructure from government work reports and applies two-way fixed effects, instrumental variables, nonlinear models, placebo tests, heterogeneity analysis, and spatial Durbin models. The results show that digital infrastructure significantly widens the urban–rural income gap, with the effect becoming increasingly convex as digital development deepens. Two mechanisms drive this pattern: the concentration of innovation resources in urban areas, which crowds out rural R&D, and a modest degree of wage-structure polarization. Spatial spillovers also matter; digital development in neighboring cities partially offsets local inequality by enhancing interregional connectivity and knowledge diffusion. These findings provide city-level causal evidence on the unequal distributional impacts of digitalization in large emerging economies and highlight the need for sustainability-oriented digital governance, inclusive innovation systems, and regionally coordinated strategies to prevent digital infrastructure from reinforcing structural disparities. Strengthening these policies is essential for achieving more sustainable urban–rural integration in the digital era. Full article

Rapid urbanization and widening urban–rural disparities have contributed to decreasing youth engagement with rural development in China. As traditional outreach initiatives struggle to attract young people’s attention, immersive digital technologies have emerged as promising tools for strengthening connections to rural environments. This study explores how immersive virtual reality (VR) experiences shape university students’ behavioral intentions toward rural engagement. Using a cognitive–affective–behavioral (CAB) framework, an immersive VR experiment was conducted with 209 Chinese undergraduates using a panoramic rural video. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) validated a serial mediation model linking perceived sensory dimensions, restorative experiences (RE), and place identity (PI) to rural visit intention (RVI) and environmentally responsible behavioral intention (ERBI). The results show that VR significantly enhances RE and PI, with PI serving as the stronger mediator, particularly for students with limited rural exposure. Multigroup analysis further revealed demographic heterogeneity: women demonstrated stronger RE–PI pathways, while urban and short-term rural residents showed greater sensitivity to VR-induced presence. Overall, the findings indicate that immersive VR can reduce urban–rural psychological distance and strengthen youth engagement. The study demonstrates how digital immersive tools may support targeted education and policy interventions aimed at promoting sustainable rural development. Full article