Risk assessment of exposure to the Middle Eastern dust storms in Iran

The aims of this study were to i) assess the relationship between COVID-19 cases with PM10 concentration and ii) investigation premature deaths due to cardiovascular (M-CVD) and respiratory (M-RD) diseases in three classification levels (PM10<50 mu g m(-3) in normal days, 50-200 mu g m(-3) in dusty days, and >200 mu g m(-3) in MED storm), by using daily averages of PM10 concentrations. The number of M-CVD and M-RD were estimated by concentration-response model, per 10(5) people during 2017 to 2021. The results showed that 187, 183, 163, 215, and 206 days were observed with the PM10 concentrations lower than 50 mu g m(-3) during 2017 to 2021, and 178, 180, 200, 150, and 149 days were subtotal with exceeding PM10 from the WHO guideline (50 mu g m(-3)), respectively. A positive correlation (r(2)=0.33, p < 0.05) was found to be between the number of COVID-19 cases and PM10 mean concentrations (r = 0.589, p = 0.046). Our findings showed that the highest M-CVD and M-RD were among exposed people at dusty days (50 < PM10 <= 200 mu g m(-3)) in 2019. The total M-CVD and M-RD from 2017 to 2021 were 11.78 and 12.2, 18.25 and 17.4, 22.29 and 23.78, 10.33 and 7.6, 10.37 and 9.95 per 10(5) people, respectively which 31.48% of health effects were related to PM10 concentrations more than 200 mu g m(-3).

Predicting Antecedents of Employee Smart Work Adoption Using SEM-Multilayer Perceptron Approach

The COVID-19 pandemic forced many organizations to move to telework and smart work (SW), and this practice is expected to continue even later in the postpandemic period. Hence, it is very important for managers and organizations to identify the motivating and deterrent factors in adopting smart work and plan to manage them. Therefore, the present study using an innovative methodology tried to identify and prioritize the factors influencing employee SW adoption. In the first stage, the conceptual model of the research was designed, inspired by the literature. In the next step, using structural equation modeling (SEM), antecedents whose effects on employee SW adoption were confirmed were identified. Finally, the output of the SEM model was considered as the input of the multilayer perceptron (MLP) model, which is an artificial neural network model, to determine the importance of each antecedent in the prediction of employee behavior. The present study provides quantitative empirical evidence that perceived value, institutional and technological support, perceived limited communication, and perceived cost are antecedents of employee SW adoption that are, respectively, important in predicting the behavioral intentions of employees in acceptance of SW. The findings of this study contribute to both the SW and the behavioral intention theory literature. © 2023 Wen-Bao Wang et al.

How Do Human Capital Empowerments Constitute the Organizational Performance?

Much research has proven the effect of human capital on the organizational performance;the present study demonstrates how this causal relationship take place in the reality. In other words, in this research, first, organizational factors that cause human capital to flourish and be empowered are identified, and then their effects on the factors that shape the performance of an organization are identified. Hence, the main objective of this study was to examine the impact of the organizational factors empowering human capital on the organizational performance enablers. To do so, a questionnaire is administrated and Linear regression analysis using SPSS 22.0 applied for data analysis. According to the results, human capital empowerment factors have a statistically significant impact on the performance enablers. Finding disclosed that an effective performance evaluation system and effective leadership, which empower human capital in the organization, have a positive significant effect on the organizational performance. The findings indicate that organizations with an effective performance appraisal system and effective leadership not only provide a platform in which human capital is identified and grown, but also improve the factors that shape the performance of an organization. This research contributes to the literature on human resources, human capital, organizational management, and ultimately organizational performance.