Knowledge acquisition and precautionary behaviors for individual resilience to the COVID-19 pandemic: A study of rural Latin America.

The concept of resilience gains prominence as human society faces more frequent and impactful shocks and disturbances. This study seeks to investigate how rural populations build resilience amid the COVID-19 pandemic. A simple theoretical model is presented to illustrate the determinants of knowledge acquisition and precautionary behaviors among rural residents. Based on a High Frequency Phone Survey of 10,583 Latin American adults, this study found that rural residents were less capable of using informal channels (e.g., the internet) to collect COVID-19 information. Younger generations were generally less likely to adopt precautionary behaviors than the elderly. The age disparity, however, was relatively minor for rural populations. Costly preventive measures such as staying at home are less affordable for rural residents. Meanwhile, confidence in government ensures better compliance to ensure public health guidelines. We argue that internet skills, prosociality, and political confidence are necessary to build rural residents' resilience during the pandemic.

The impact of digital finance on household participation in risky financial markets: Evidence-based study from China.

Chinese households have overinvested in risk-free financial assets, resulting in a single structure of financial assets. However, this proportion declined as digital finance developed. By combing the data from the China Household Finance Survey Data and the Peking University Digital Financial Inclusion Index of China, we find that digital finance significantly promotes household participation in risky financial markets. Further mechanistic analysis unveils that digital finance mainly affects households' participation in risky financial markets by reducing the lack of investment channels, promoting households' access to financial information and increasing the possibility of household risk appetite. In addition, the heterogeneity analysis suggests that digital finance effectively reduces the deterrent effect of wealth and cognitive thresholds on all households, reflecting the inclusive nature of financial development. Our findings provide an empirical basis for the mainstream positioning of digital finance in the development of inclusive finance, and display its positive impact on social welfare.

Queen Bees: How Is Female Managers' Happiness Determined?

This paper aims to study the determinants of subjective happiness among working females with a focus on female managers. Drawn on a large social survey data set (N = 10470) in China, this paper constructs gender development index at sub-national levels to study how institutional settings are related to female managers' happiness. We find that female managers report higher levels of happiness than non-managerial employees. However, the promoting effect is contingent on individual characteristics and social-economic settings. The full sample regression suggests that female managers behaving in a masculine way generally report a high level of happiness. Meanwhile, female managers who refuse to support gender equality report low happiness levels. Sub-sample analysis reveals that these causalities are conditioned on regional culture. Masculine behavior and gender role orientation significantly predict subjective happiness only in gender-egalitarian regions. This study is one of the first to consider both internal (individual traits) and external (social-economic environment) factors when investigating how female managers' happiness is impacted. Also, this study challenges the traditional wisdom on the relationship between female managers' job satisfaction and work-home conflict. This study extends the literature by investigating the impacts of female managers' masculine behavior on their happiness. This study is useful for promoting female managers' leadership effectiveness and happiness.