SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
This study examined the affordances of an online learning platform used in a Chinese university for online teaching and learning during the pandemic period. A usefulness theoretical perspective was adopted to examine three types of affordances of the platform, namely, educational affordances, social affordances, and technological affordances. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected and analyzed, including survey questionnaires, observation, and semi-structured interviews. A range of educational affordances emerged from the results, including Representation, Resource sharing, Community-building, Promoting interaction, and Administration. However, despite the respondents’ perceived ease of use of the platform, results indicate that the platform played a limited role in increasing learners’ social presence. A framework for examining usefulness has been developed based on the results. Pedagogical implications are proposed and suggestions for future research are provided.

SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
Although the debate over the into-A and into-B interpreting has never stopped, the focal point was mostly set on simultaneous interpreting and sign language interpreting. Directionality in consecutive interpreting (CI) has not been studied fully so far. The present systematic literature review was designed to examine the relationship between directionality and performance in CI across a wide range of settings and empirical methods based on PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) and search for articles in English in Scopus and Web of Science. Three problems were investigated in the current research: (i) How does directionality impact performance among professional and student interpreters in CI? (ii) What factors contribute to the effect of directionality on performance? (iii) Does directionality preference impact the interpreter’s performance? The findings include: (i) directionality proves to influence the performance of interpreters whose A- and B-languages are not equally proficient, whereas balanced bilinguals are not affected by directionality; (ii) both internal and external factors contribute to the interpreters’ performance; (iii) only descriptive studies about interpreters’ directionality preference were identified in the prior literature, and a further study with more focus on the interactive power of directionality preference on interpreters’ performance is required.

SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
This review aims to obtain the relationships between characteristics of the facilities and the quality of life of older adult residents, and to obtain the direction in which new studies should be addressed as well as their application to healthcare policies. A systematic review was conducted following PRISMA guidelines. Multiple databases have been used: Scopus, Web of Science, Wiley online library, PubMed, ProQuest, EBSCOhost, and Emerald, from January 1, 2011 to July 1, 2023. Ten studies from 1,037 articles were included. Evidence exists on the positive relationships between quality of life and hours of management, care, activities, and qualified staff, and in general, the characteristics included in the categories of space management, supporting facilities and building services. In contrast charitable and for-profit facilities, Medicaid status, resident acuity, deficiencies, chain affiliation, size, hours of practical nurses, turnover, and financial resources (except occupancy rate) have a negative impact on quality of life or their dimensions.

SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
Despite several attempts made to analyze students’ socialization into academic discourse in relevant reviews, we still lack a topical study providing an overview of how students are apprenticed into academic communities through oral activities at post-secondary institutions. This study aims at contributing to a comprehensive overview of both theoretical and empirical studies in the field of academic discourse socialization (ADS). A systematic review approach was adopted due to the qualitative and quantitative research design and connections between theory and evidence. The material search of ADS literature published between 2000 and 2022 resulted in 72 studies in total. While the synthesis of theoretical studies reveal the extant definitions, categorization of characteristics and theoretical orientations, the empirical study findings compare differences in participants and contexts, research approaches, communication events, and academic outcomes. This review also discusses major areas of research concerning ADS, mainly types of socialization agents, students’ feedback, learners’ identity construction, and assessment of consequences of ADS. With limitations concluded, the review encourages further focused investigation into micro-macro connections, application of digital technologies, a wider range of participants, disciplines and contexts, multiple types of oral activities and perspectives, learners’ linguistic production as well as correlation of oral and written texts, and joint efforts from multiple sides.

SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
Following the need for more recent rigorous empirical evidence on the role of institutions at sectoral level as well as the conflicting empirical evidences on the institutions-growth relationship in Africa, this study investigated the sectoral impacts of institutional quality in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The study also revisited the role of institutions in the aggregate economy. The system GMM estimation procedure and a panel of 42 SSA countries were used over the period 2010 to 2018. The results indicate that contrary to the widely held view that institutions foster growth and development, the role of institutional quality in sectoral and aggregate economic performance in SSA generally remained muted. However, the results indicate that initial level of real GDP and labor are robust drivers of growth, particularly in the aggregate economy. The study therefore concludes that the sub-region requires institutional reform, enhanced human capital development and capital accumulation to drive sectoral and aggregate economic performance in SSA.JEL Classification: N20; F43; C23; N17

SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
The term “childless” is highly problematic. Attempts to split it into “voluntary” and “involuntary” may appear to give more detail on context, but the differentiation can be misleading. The condition of “-less” has negative connotations and implies “missing” something; possibly something which is “natural.” The term “childfree” has been employed as an alternative expression which denotes active choice, freedom, and emancipation. Few studies, however, have explored how individuals refer to themselves, or how they interpret—or even care—about these distinctions. Such existing studies only explore the use of these English expressions among speakers of English as their primary language. This exploratory qualitative study explores how women without children define themselves in their native language in an Asian setting—Cantonese in Hong Kong. It also explores how such women interpret the various terms developed in English to describe their circumstances. Respondents refer to themselves in neutral, factual terms—literally “without children.” Others make an explicit link between being unmarried and childless status. While respondents find the English expression of “childfree” positive, they do not express a strong need to either deploy it in English, nor “develop” a Cantonese equivalent. The study provides further evidence that “labels” generated and applied by academics in one context and in one language may not be universally applicable.

SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
Coupling tourism development (TD), scientific and technological innovation (ST), and ecological environment (EE) is crucial to regional sustainable development, and it is necessary to explore the spatial and temporal characteristics. The study constructs a coordinated development evaluation index system for the three subsystems. And the spatiotemporal characteristics of the coupling coordination between TD, ST, and EE were revealed by applying the entropy method, coupling coordination model and based on the panel data of 30 regions in China from 2005 to 2020. The results show that: (1) the comprehensive development index and coupling coordination degree show an increasing trend, focusing on the stages of endangered and mild imbalance recession;(2) Most regions are in a state of high coupling and low coordination, mainly concentrated in tourism lagging or science and technology lagging; (3) the coupling coordination shows a spatial pattern as the moderate imbalance in the northwest and the relative balance in the southeast, with a vast regional disparities and clustering characteristics; and (4) the gray prediction model shows that the coupling coordination degree will continue the upward trend in the future. In a nutshell, this research presents a novel framework and results that can be used as an evaluation index and policy insights for coupling TD, ST, and EE.

SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
The proliferation of unsafe behavior in underground-construction sites has been widespread, which leads to accidents in underground construction from time to time. Accidents are not only a threat to the personal safety of construction workers but also cause property losses. Intervention on how to prevent the propagation of unsafe behavior among underground-construction workers in a timely manner, further improvement in the safety-management level of construction enterprises, and ensuring smooth implementation of projects are urgent measures to solve this problem. In this study, an SCIMR (Susceptible-Contacted-Infective-Removed) model was developed to study the spread of unsafe behavior among underground-construction workers. Increase in the improvement, control, and awareness rates could provide a preventive effect on the spread of unsafe behavior among underground-construction workers, whereas increase in the adoption and forgetfulness rates could facilitate increase in unsafe behavior. This work combined the SIR (Susceptible-Infective-Removed) theory with the underground-construction context to enrich the theory of underground-construction safety personnel management, which provides a reference solution and suggestions for construction companies to intervene and predict the proliferation of unsafe behavior and a novel method of planning and direction for safety management.

SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
COVID-19 and the actions to curtail its spread have elevated the value of mental health as well as public health crises and pandemics. This calls for increased research in this area and the use of consistent and valid instruments to measure diverse aspects of mental health in different populations. This study presents preliminary psychometric properties (i.e., factor structure, internal consistency, convergent and discriminant validity) of the WHO-5 index as compared to other mental health instruments used in three countries (Botswana, Zimbabwe, and Malaysia). Data was collected from three countries during the first 5 months after the onset of COVID-19 in the Southern African and Southeast Asia regions: Botswana (N = 422; Mean Wellbeing = 9.8; SD = 5.4), Zimbabwe (N = 325; Mean = 9.4; SD = 5.3), and Malaysia (N = 425; Mean = 13; SD = 5.3). After data quality and scaling properties were evaluated, factor structures were assessed using principal component analysis and internal consistency of the extracted components were examined using Cronbach’s alpha (α). Construct validity was examined using Pearson’s correlations to establish both convergent validity and discriminant validity among the three mental health constructs (i.e., well-being, generalized anxiety, and loneliness). With Cronbach’s alpha of the total WHO-5 Wellbeing index of .86 (Botswana sample), α = .85 (Zimbabwean data) and α = .88 (Malaysian data), as well as (α > .7) for the selected demographic subgroups, the findings broadly suggest that WHO-5 is a unique, reliable, and valid instrument for measuring subjective well-being, and by extension mental health among diverse subgroups—in Botswana, Zimbabwe, Malaysia, and possibly, other similar settings.

SAGE Open, Volume 13, Issue 4, October-December 2023.
Most theoretical and empirical studies of discourse marker multifunctionality do not approach it using a formal, systematic annotation model. Drawing on a domain-function taxonomy, this study examines 270 tokens of the discourse marker ni zhidao in Chinese media interviews. All values of the two-dimensional model designed for the whole category of discourse markers apply to ni zhidao, demonstrating its equally potent affordance on a particular discourse marker case cross-linguistically. By putting this model to the test, we found that “emphasis” needs to be added to the original 15 functions in the model, and that domains and functions need to be treated as dependent layers of pragmatic meaning. Functions determine domains, and domains need to be regarded as macro-functions to which specific functions are attributed. As such, we tentatively put forth an updated version that provides finer granularity and greater affordance, shedding new light on the pragmatic meaning of ni zhidao and the speaker’s underlying communicative intent. We propose that the sample be divided into uni-functional and multi-functional categories before being analyzed within the updated model to capture the multifunctional discourse markers in the same context-specific utterances. This study has implications for the need of more exhaustive, speech-friendly annotation models of DM multifunctionality and the cross-linguistic adaptation or refinement of established DM annotation models to cater to the unique traits of spoken DMs in different languages.