Sexual assault (SA) crimes are horrific crimes against humanity. It is critical for our society to find ways to reduce and ultimately eradicate this issue. How-ever, it is not yet clear which of the possible factors impact the occurrence of SA crimes more than others. There is also a lack of quantitative studies on SA crime rates. This leads to less focused and targeted efforts when trying to reduce the occurrence of SA. This paper fills these gaps by leveraging machine learning techniques. The work explores the impact of various legal, societal, economic, and demographic factors across all 50 US states on SA crime. A Random For-est regression model is used to determine the relative influence of each factor on SA crime rates. SHAP values are used to identify the features that correlate the most and least with SA crime rates. The work suggests that factors such as drug usage and rural population density are more strongly correlated with SA crime rates than legal factors such as the strictness of statute penalties. The find-ings indicate that rather than focusing solely on increasing statutory strictness, directing efforts to other solutions, such as educational programs and community initiatives, will be more impactful. The study also contradicts conclusions from previous studies by finding that states with more registered sex offenders have lower SA crime rates.
This study examines the intersectional relationship between vocational training, youth aspirations, and social mobility across selected rural sub-regions of Northern and Central India. Utilizing a sequential explanatory mixed-methods research design, primary data are collected from a sample of 450 respondents aged 18–30 years across Varanasi, Patna, and Nagpur, calibrated using post-stratification weights. Quantitative measurements introduce the exploratory Aspiration-Mobility Gap Index (AMGI), utilizing Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to quantify structural inequality. Multivariate logistic regression analysis reveals that while Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY) participation is positively associated with regular employment odds (OR = 2.14, p < 0.001), nested intersectional models reveal severe treatment heterogeneity. The employment-generating capacity of skilling is significantly compressed for female graduates (OR_Interaction = 0.62, p = 0.012) and Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe (SC/ST) youth (OR_Interaction = 0.51, p < 0.001). Lived experiences from 48 semi-structured interviews and 6 focus groups reveal that caste stigma, network deficits, and patriarchal restrictions function as restrictive structural conversion blocks. These social blocks trap marginalized youth, producing elevated AMGI deviations despite training completion. Sociological discussion frames these outcomes through Bourdieu’s capital theory and Sen’s capability approach, contextualizing returns within modern technology-driven macroeconomic transitions. Policy recommendations advocate for structurally informed employment ecosystems including digitized placement networks and CSR-funded hostels to foster equitable upward social mobility. Not applicable.
The development of digital technology has drastically transformed the communication landscape, particularly with the emergence of social media as a primary tool for modern interaction. Besides functioning as a platform for personal communication, social media now plays a significant role in various sectors, including education, business, and public services. This study aims to map the trends and dynamics of social media communication based on 1,976 documents obtained from the Scopus database. The findings indicate that research trends have experienced significant growth, particularly in 2020 and 2024, driven by the COVID-19 pandemic and the rapid development of digital technology. The United States, China, and Spain were the leading contributors in terms of publication output, while the United Kingdom also demonstrated a substantial citation impact. The strategic diagram shows that themes such as health communication, digital marketing, and user engagement are currently the main research focus, whereas CSR and populism have begun to decline in academic relevance. Future research can focus on developing artificial intelligence-based communication strategies, misinformation mitigation, and the use of big data in analyzing user behavior on social media platforms. This study provides strategic insights for academics and practitioners to optimize the use of social media in various communication contexts, including business, politics, and health.
Teacher-student interaction and technology integration are important features of contemporary higher education. However, their relationships with students’ self-perceived academic success may differ when examined together. The role of student engagement in these relationships also remains unclear. This study examined the associations among teacher-student interaction, technology integration, student engagement, and university students’ self-perceived academic success in Pakistan. It also tested whether student engagement was associated with the indirect pathways between the two predictors and academic success. A cross-sectional survey was conducted with 668 university students from ten universities in Lahore, Pakistan. Data were collected using a self-developed questionnaire. The data were analyzed using Jamovi. An integrated mediation model was tested with teacher-student interaction and technology integration entered simultaneously. Direct, total, and indirect effects were estimated using 5,000 bootstrap samples. Teacher-student interaction was positively associated with student engagement, and technology integration was also positively associated with student engagement. However, teacher-student interaction was not significantly associated with self-perceived academic success. Technology integration showed a significant positive association with self-perceived academic success in the primary model, but this association became small and non-significant after overlapping items were removed in a sensitivity analysis. Student engagement was not significantly associated with academic success. Neither the indirect association between teacher-student interaction and academic success through student engagement nor the indirect association between technology integration and academic success through student engagement was significant. The findings provide limited support for the proposed model. Technology integration was positively associated with self-perceived academic success, but teacher-student interaction was not. Student engagement did not explain either relationship. The findings suggest that social interaction and technology may relate to students’ learning experiences through different pathways. Universities should not assume that increasing teacher-student interaction or technology use will automatically improve students’ perceived academic success. Technology should be integrated with clear learning purposes, while teacher-student interaction should be examined together with other academic and contextual factors.
Dignity at work depends on conditions that are distributed across structure, relationships, and institutional practice, yet existing theories each illuminate only part of this picture. This paper advances the Organizational Dignity Architecture (ODA), a conceptual framework that explains dignity as emerging from three interdependent dimensions: capability access, relational standing, and structural latitude. Building on, but distinct from, recognition theory, the capability approach, research on organizational design and institutional pressure, and open-systems theory, ODA specifies why these dimensions must be treated as one interdependent system rather than four separate literatures: each existing account explains part of the picture in isolation, but none specifies the systemic conditions — Systemic Dignity Conditions (SDC) — through which capability access, relational standing, and structural latitude stabilize or fail together in practice. The paper identifies four SDC and the threshold at which each fails, explains how erosion in one dimension propagates to the others, derives five testable theoretical propositions from this structure, and shows the framework’s boundary conditions through illustrative applications. By clarifying precisely where established theories stop and why dignity must be analyzed as a systemic property of organizations rather than an individual or interpersonal state, ODA offers a parsimonious, falsifiable foundation for future analytic, normative, and empirical work on dignity in organizational life.
