This paper aims to investigate the determinants of performance for insurance companies in Tunisia from 2004 to 2017. Namely, we consider three dimensions of determinants; those related to firms’ microenvironment, macroenvironment and meso or industry environment. The performance of insurance companies is measured using three criteria: Return On Assets (ROA), Return On Equity (ROE), and Combined Ratio. The independent variables are categorized into three groups: microeconomic variables (Firm Size, Financial leverage, Capital management risk, Volume of capital, and Age of the firm), meso-economic variables (Concentration ratio and Insurance Sector Size), and macroeconomic variables (Inflation, Unemployment, and Population Growth). The General Least Squares (GLS) regression technique is employed for the analysis. The study reveals that the financial performance of Tunisian insurance companies is positively influenced by firm size, capital amount, and risk capital management. On the other hand, it is negatively influenced by leverage level, industry size, concentration index, inflation, and unemployment. In terms of technical performance, the capital amount of the firm, industry size, age of the firm, and population growth have a positive impact. However, firm size, leverage, concentration index, and risk capital management negatively affect technical performance. This paper contributes to the existing literature by examining the determinants of performance specifically for insurance companies in Tunisia. Besides the classical proxies of performance, this paper has the originality of using the technical performance which is the most suitable for the case of Insurance companies.

This study aims to explore the factors influencing people’s intention to use home fitness mobile apps in the post-pandemic era. By incorporating the perspective of playfulness into the decomposed theory of planned behavior, it seeks to construct a behavioral model for the public's use of AR sports games for home exercise. The research focuses on Active Arcade users residing in Taiwan, employing the snowball sampling method to conduct an online questionnaire survey. A total of 340 valid questionnaires were collected and analyzed using linear structural equations. The study reveals three main findings: first, the behavioral model for Active Arcade users constructed based on the decomposed theory of planned behavior demonstrates a good fit; second, users’ attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control have a positive and significant impact on behavioral intention; third, perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and perceived playfulness all positively and significantly influence attitudes, with perceived playfulness having the highest impact coefficient; fourth, perceived benefits of exercise are the most crucial factor affecting subjective norms; and fifth, convenience technologies are the key factor influencing perceived behavioral control. This study provides valuable insights for theory and management practice, offering guidance on the use of home fitness apps in the post-pandemic era while addressing research limitations and suggesting future directions.

The allocation of funds in the local budget is a matter of concern for the governments and economic scholars. The study examines the influence of local budget expenditures on the GRDP per capita of 63 provinces and municipalities in Vietnam from 2018 to 2022. Regression analysis of panel data reveals that capital expenditure has a positive correlation with local GRDP per capita, whereas current expenditure has a negative correlation with GRDP per capita. Furthermore, the analysis indicates that the percentage of individuals aged 15 and above who are employed and the percentage of urban citizens have an equivalent influence as the GRDP per capita. Conversely, the average age and local Gini coefficient have contrasting effects on GRDP per capita. The author suggests several policy alternatives to assist localities in boosting their GRDP per capita based on the findings of the study model.

Understanding the factors that influence early science achievement is crucial for developing effective educational policies and ensuring equity within the education system. Despite its importance, research on the patterns of young children achieving science learning milestones and the factors that can reduce disparities between students with and without disabilities remains limited. This study analyzes data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study of Kindergarten Cohort 2011 (ECLS-K: 2011), which includes 18,174 children from 1328 schools across the United States, selected through a complex sampling process and spanning kindergarten to 5th grade. Utilizing survival analysis, the study finds that children with disabilities achieve science milestones later than their peers without disabilities, with these disparities persisting from early grades. The research highlights the effectiveness of center-based programs in enhancing science learning, particularly in narrowing the achievement gap between children with and without disabilities. These findings contribute to the broader discourse on equity in the education system and policy by introducing novel methodologies for assessing the frequency and duration of science learning milestones, and by providing insights into effective strategies that support equitable science education.

Fire accidents are one of the serious security threats facing the metro, and the accurate determination of the index system and weights for fire assessment in underground stations is the key to conducting fire hazard assessment. Among them, the type and quantity of baggage, which varies with the number of passengers, is an important factor affecting the fire hazard assessment. This study is based on the combination of subjective and objective AHP (Analytic Hierarchy Process) with the available Particle Swarm Optimisation algorithm PSO (Particle Swarm Optimization) and the perfect CRITIC (Criteria Importance Through Intercriteria Correlation) empowered fuzzy evaluation method on the metro station fire hazard toughness indicator system and its weights were determined, and a fuzzy comprehensive evaluation model of metro station safety toughness under the influence of baggage was constructed. The practical application proves that the method provides a new perspective for the fire risk assessment of underground stations, and also provides a theoretical basis for the prevention and control of mobile fire load hazards in underground stations.

Fiscal spending for road construction to link Kalabakan, Sabah, Malaysia with North Kalimantan, Indonesia is an idea that have been proposed for over 20 years. The announcement for the relocation of Indonesia’s capital city from Jakarta to East Kalimantan give a strong justification for the construction of the Serudong-Simanggaris road. The fact that population size is big in Kalimantan and strong purchasing power is estimated in North and East Kaliamantan provide a strong argument for the need to have a road link. Having said that, the effect of road construction on output growth is not clear. The purpose of this study is to estimate the impact of road construction and the business activities across two sectors being assumed on output Sabah’s output growth. Based on the input-output analysis conducted using the output multiplier, the one-off road construction would lead to 1.8% growth in Sabah’s overall output.