The study aims to ascertain how different levels of society have been influenced by the impact of pandemics over the last many years. The study also determines the societal implications of the COVID-19 pandemic. The integrative literature survey method is adopted to extract the secondary data pertinent to the socio-economic effect of pandemics and COVID-19 on society. Primary data is collected to diagnose the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown on employees (N = 210) working in the Indian organized (...) sector. Findings of the study suggest that pandemics have been a cause of economic slowdown measured with a fall in gross domestic product (GDP) at the macro level. The reduced level of economic activity is found to be negatively related to an individual socio-economic status building their psychological distress. The descriptive analysis of the data reveals that although employees have managed their jobs and finances during COVID-19, they have experienced stress in their lives due to the pandemic. The study assimilates the pandemic effect using inductive reasoning to develop a COVID quadrilateral conceptual framework. (shrink)

Over the past 6 months, coronavirus-induced disease has spread across 212 countries, affecting millions of people. As it has no known cure, social distancing is highly recommended for prevention of spread of the disease. Here, we have described the impact of the social distancing measures implemented by the Government of India on various sections of the society, especially the vulnerable sections. Furthermore, we have presented an analysis of these measures, according to the World Health Organization´s Guidance for Managing Ethical Issues (...) in Infectious Disease Outbreaks ; we have also applied principles, as applicable, from the Indian Council of Medical Research’s National Ethical Guidelines for Biomedical and Health Research Involving Human Participants. Finally, we have presented several measures that should have been adopted before and in addition to implementing the lockdown to improve its effectiveness. (shrink)

Do immigrant faculty trained in American higher education institutions adopt the outlook and practices of native US scientists and engineers, or do they diverge from such practices? The modern science paradigm holds that location will not matter significantly and that immigrants in either place will converge to a common standard of scientific practice. Drawing upon 134 in-depth interviews, this paper compares the scientific practices of two groups of Indian immigrant faculty in science and engineering: those who studied and worked in (...) the United States and then returned to India and those who continued to work in the United States. This paper shows that the two groups differed in important ways: ease of securing grants, management of grants, research environment, professional autonomy, and research type. (shrink)

Studies on skilled return migration from developed to developing countries have focused on the industrial sector. This article focuses on why academic engineers and scientists from developing countries leave developed countries to return to their countries of birth. Data for this study comes from a National Science Foundation funded study with 83 engineers and scientists who returned to India after study and work in U.S. universities. Better career prospects in India namely ample funding available for research, less competition for grants, (...) ability to work on theoretical topics, and freedom in research objectives emerged as the key factors that prompted return. These findings, therefore, differ with return migration of industrial engineers and scientists who moved back primarily to start companies in India and immigration challenges in the United States. With very little scholarly work on return migration of academic engineers and scientists, this study expands the understanding of high skilled migration in a globalized world. (shrink)

In their article “Implementing Expanded Prenatal Genetic Testing: Should Parents Have Access to Any and All Fetal Genetic Information?” Bayefsky and Berkman briefly mention that: “[s]ome are...