Background: Due to the outbreak of COVID-19, the mental health of the people all around the world is severely disrupted. Aim: The purpose of this study is to identify whether ‘Fear of COVID-19’ impacted on future workforces’ career anxiety at the first place and whether depression from COVID-19 has any indirect effect on ‘Fear of COVID-19’ and future workforces’ career anxiety. Method: Based on three different scales related to ‘Fear of COVID-19’, depression and career anxiety, a structured questionnaire was developed and the survey data was collected for this study. Results: The empirical result of the study reveals that, due to the outbreak of COVID-19 fear, the future workforce is getting anxious about their future career. Again, depression from COVID-19, caused by ‘Fear of COVID-19’, as a mediator, has a significant indirect impact on the relationship between ‘Fear of COVID-19’ and future career anxiety, resulting in a full mediation. This means, due to the outbreak of ‘Fear of COVID-19’ people are becoming depressed and anxious about their future career which is creating a long-term negative effect on human psychology. Conclusion: These research findings will be a major tool for the policymakers, as well as the human resource planning professionals, to sketch plans after COVID-19 pandemic. This study is a novel work combining the concepts of fear and depression with career anxiety in a pandemic situation like COVID-19, and also assists future researchers in many folds.

This article aims to understand the association between service quality and customer satisfaction to use mobile banking through structural equation model, because, Bangladesh is one of the fastest increasing mobile banking service providers in the world. A structured survey questionnaire was prepared to collect data from participants in Bangladesh. A convenience sampling method was used to select potential participants in this study. Out of the distributed questionnaires, 240, completed and usable, were selected for the analysis which employed partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). The results showed that there are positive and significant effects of all constructs of service quality, namely, tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy on customer satisfaction for using mobile banking. Particularly, the responsiveness has a strong impact ( β = 0.3165) on customer satisfaction. Furthermore, the tangibility has identified as less significant factor ( β = 0.0770) on customer satisfaction. Findings also indicate that mobile banking service providers should concentrate on all dimensions of service quality, with special focus on responsiveness and reliability for improving their customer satisfaction. This study has several implications for researchers, banking authority, policymakers and financial agencies when rendering services to end users and customers of mobile banking. Furthermore, this implication also helps banks to understand and develop strategies as well as policies to improve the services of mobile banking of Bangladesh.

Purpose Poor quality of services in the health-care sector of the developing countries like Bangladesh forces affluent patients to seek advanced medical treatment from abroad. The purpose of this study is to explore the outbound medical tourists’ satisfaction and loyalty on the basis of the quality of the health-care service provided by foreign medical institutions. Design/methodology/approach The medical tourists from Bangladesh who have got medical services from Indian medical institutions were taken as a sample by applying a purposive sampling technique. For the measurement of outbound medical tourists’ satisfaction, the dimensions of the HEALTHQUAL model were adopted. A self-administrated questionnaire was the major tool for collecting data from the respondents. Using partial least square-structural equation model multivariate statistical technique and with the aid of SmartPLS software, primary data collected from 218 final respondents were analyzed. Findings The findings of this study reveal that four dimensions of the HEALTHQUAL model, namely, empathy, tangibility, efficiency, and safety have a significant positive impact on building medical tourists’ overall satisfaction, and then the overall satisfaction also has a positive level of significance on building loyalty towards foreign medical service providers. Practical implications The findings of this study can be a helpful instrument for the developing countries to rethink and reshuffle their own existing health-care system for providing quality medical services and at the same time, the medical tourists importing countries to sharpen their existing service quality as well as to attract more medical tourists in the future. Originality/value A handful of research has been carried out, especially focused on health-care service quality measurement and the relationship of health-care service quality with satisfaction and loyalty from the perspective of developing countries outbound medical tourists. Thus, this research work will give a flavor to think of health-care service quality in a different dimension.

Due to the outbreak of COVID-19 different forms of anxiety disorder have been seen in the mindset of people all around the world. This study aims to examine a structural relationship between ‘COVID-19 phobia’ and career anxiety among the workforce from the perspective of a developing country. This study collected survey data using a structured questionnaire by applying the scales of ‘COVID-19 Phobia’ and career anxiety. Study results reveal that the factors of the ‘COVID-19 phobia’ have a substantial influence on generating career-related anxiety among the workforce. Study results can play a vital role for the policymakers to formulate long-term policies to retrieve the world's economy. This study combined the concept of specific phobia and general anxiety disorder (GAD) to figure out how the global pandemic impacted peoples' mindsets and create career anxiety. The study results have theoretical and practical implications in many folds.

PurposeThe objective of the study is to measure outbound medical tourists' satisfaction and loyalty based on medical tourists' experience from a developing country's perspective.Design/methodology/approachThe medical tourists taken medical services from India constituted the population of this study. By applying a purposive and snowball sampling techniques, samples were selected. Based on the expectation confirmation theory (ECT) and a modified medical tourism experience model, this study empirically analyzed the research hypotheses by applying the partial least square–structural equation modeling (PLS–SEM) technique.FindingsThe empirical result revealed that the experience of service quality, medical tourism infrastructure and experience of medical tourism expenses has a direct impact on medical tourists' satisfaction. Furthermore, destination appeal and culture has a significant moderating effect on the relationship between medical tourists' satisfaction and destination loyalty. Multigroup analysis (MGA) was performed to examine group differences of the model. The MGA results revealed that, based on age, the research model remains undifferentiated between groups. In contrast, based on income, the only relationship, medical tourism infrastructure and medical tourists' satisfaction significantly differ between groups, while others remain identical from each other.Practical implicationsThe study results will contribute both theoretically and practically. Theoretically, the study will be a helpful instrument to figure out medical tourists' behavior through the lens of ECT in a developing country’s perspective. Furthermore, practically this study results will assist policymakers and practitioners of medical tourism in formulating strategies and making future decisions effectively.Originality/valueThe study has uniqueness in two aspects. First, the study empirically revealed Bangladeshi medical tourists' experience and behavioral intention to Indian medical tourism destinations. Second, the study’s findings exposed quantifiable insights into the Bangladesh–India medical tourism phenomenon.

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For customers’ purchasing decisions, word of mouth (WOM) has been considered as one of the major influential factors. With the rise of Internet-based technology and usage of online-based devices, customers are now considering online reviews and other users’ e-opinions as one of the significant sources of information gathering for taking final purchasing decisions. Organizations also emphasize electronic word of mouth (eWOM) as a major promotional tool for their business. This study aims to examine the impact of eWOM on customers’ buying intention and tries to determine the mediating relationship of trust between eWOM and customers’ buying intention. For this, an exploratory study has been designed using the purposive and convenience sampling technique. With the assistance of a self-administrated structured questionnaire, a total of 218 respondents’ data were finally selected for the structural equation model (SEM) analysis. The result of the study reveals that eWOM has a direct influence on customers’ intention to buy without the presence of the mediator trust. Nevertheless, with the presence of trust as a mediator, the direct relationship gets weakened, resulting in full mediation. The study results can contribute both theoretically and practically in many ways.

Due to the share market crash in 2010-2011, the investors have lost confidence regarding the share market till now. Therefore, this study is an endeavor to giveaway to rethink about the share market of Bangladesh and to increase the confidence of the investors. For that, Tobin's Q ratio used to analyze the share market in this study. Tobin's Q represents the ratio of the market value of a firm's share capital to the replacement cost of the firm's share capital. Tobin's Q is greater than one means stock is overvalued. Tobin's Q is less than one means stock is undervalued. Again, Tobin's Q is equal to one means stock is fairly valued. The study found that, the value of Tobin's Q of the all sampling banks is gradually decreasing means moving the value of the stock from overvalued to undervalue. The value of Tobin's Q of the all sampling banks is less than one in the year 2014 except Dutch Bangla Bank Limited (DBBL). The average value of Tobin's Q of the banking industry is also decreasing and the average value of Tobin's Q of the banking industry is less than one in the year 2014. Thus, the average stock value of the banking industry is moving from overvalued to undervalue gradually. Again, the value of Tobin's Q of all sampling banks fell down drastically from the year 2010 to the year 2011 as share market has been crashed in those years. As a result, the average value of Tobin's Q of banking industry also fell down drastically from the year 2010 to the year 2011. Therefore, the value of the share slopes down drastically from the year 2010 to the year 2011.