Employer-Sponsored Sports Programs Amid COVID-19: The Approach of Social Capital.

OBJECTIVE: To examine the effect of bridging social capital through sports programs on the job insecurity-well-being relationship. METHODS: A total of 473 Korean employees participated in a cross-sectional survey in May 2020. Using structural equation modeling, we tested the following hypotheses: (a) job insecurity will partially mediate the relationship between perceived threat and well-being and (b) social capital through sports programs will moderate the relationship between job insecurity and well-being. Socioeconomic status was used as a control variable for well-being. RESULTS: The hypothesized relationships in the structural model were all significant (P < .001). Bridging social capital through sports programs had a significant moderating effect on the proposed relationship. CONCLUSIONS: Strong bridging social capital through employer-sponsored sports programs is likely to buffer the detrimental effect of job insecurity on employee well-being.

Ecological risk assessment for perfluorooctanoic acid in soil using a species sensitivity approach.

Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) is one of the persistent organic pollutants that has been listed in Annex A of the Stockholm Convention and has attracted attention owing to its endocrine-disrupting properties. However, there is currently little information available regarding the soil ecotoxicity of PFOA and the associated ecological risks. Accordingly, in this study, we sought to assess the soil ecological risk of PFOA based on a probabilistic approach using data obtained from multispecies bioassays and soil toxicity assessments, from which we generated soil species sensitivity distributions and estimated soil protective concentrations for PFOA. Using the latter distributions, we also undertook a probabilistic ecological risk assessment. On the basis of acute and chronic toxicity estimates obtained from bioassays involving eight soil-associated organisms from six diverse taxonomic groups, we could deduce that PFOA poses a negligible risk to soil ecosystems. However, we also found that this chemical may be more toxic than some of the established endocrine-disrupting chemicals such as bisphenol A, nonylphenol, and methylparaben, thereby indicating that further in-depth studies would be necessary to obtain a better understanding of the toxic potential of this chemical in the soil environment.