Interindividual differences in personality traits, especially impulsivity traits, are robust risk factors for addictive disorders. However, their impact on addictive disorders during the COVID-19 lockdown remains unknown. This study assessed patients being followed for addictive disorders before the lockdown. We aimed to determine whether impulsivity traits  were associated with addictive disorders severity during the lockdowns. We also explored the patients’ subjective experiences, focusing on high versus low impulsivity. The quantitative study assessed 44 outpatients consulting for addictive disorders, for impulsivity, emotion regulation, anxiety/depression, and their addictive disorder characteristics, using self-administered questionnaires. In the qualitative study, six patients from the quantitative study were assessed using guided interviews. We observed that higher negative and positive urgencies were associated with addictive disorder severity. The subjective experiences of patients during the lockdowns differed according to their emotion-related impulsivity: high versus low. Low impulsive patients used online technologies more effectively to maintain follow-up, with more positive reappraisal. In contrast, highly impulsive patients reverted more frequently to self-medication with substances and/or behaviors, more social isolation, and found coping with negative emotions more challenging. Overall, the patient’s ability to cope with stressful events, like the COVID-19 lockdown, depended on their emotion-related impulsivity. Addictive disorders are diseases characterized by the interplay between three factors: the use of a specific substance or behavior that produces pleasure and/or reduces distress, individuals with vulnerability risk factors, and specific socioenvironmental context where the substance or the behavior is highly prevalent ,2.Since March 2020, the socio-environmental context in many countries has been brutally modified, following the decision by governments to enforce a lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This lockdown has severely constrained people’s daily lives, particularly those vulnerable to addictive disorders. These people lacked the time to adapt to these restrictions . At the At the beginning of the first lockdown, a review summarized the psychopathological consequences of the socio-environment induced by the pandemic . BoredomInterindividual differences in personality traits are robust risk factors for addictive disorders ,15. AmonWe sought to address this issue by using a mixed quantitative and qualitative methodology, focusing on a broad range of addictive disorders , and focusing on emotion-related impulsivity . For the qualitative section, we divided patients with high versus low impulsivity, based on the approach proposed by Joël Billieux , that coThe aims of this mixed quantitative and qualitative study, conducted among patients that were followed up for an addictive disorder during the COVID-19 lockdowns, were twofold: (1) to determine whether some impulsivity traits  were associated with addictive disorders severity during the lockdowns (quantitative study), and (2) to explore the subjective experience of these patients during the lockdowns, by describing the experiences of patients with high versus low impulsivity .This cross-sectional study was designed with a mixed methodology: comprised of a quantitative and a qualitative study.The quantitative study was conducted between July 2020 and December 2020 and the qualitative study between August 2021 and March 2022. Adults, living in France, with an addictive disorder that consulted in one of the following French outpatient centers were included: general practitioners , the Addiction Departments of the Georges Sand Hospital Center (Bourges) and the University Hospital of Tours, and the “Centre de Soins d’Accompagnement et de Prévention en Addictologie CICAT” . All patients had a confirmed diagnosis by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)-5 criteria and were being followed up for at least one addictive disorder.Quantitative data were collected using self-administered questionnaires. The questionnaire explored three main themes: patients’ socio-demographic characteristics, types and severity of addictive disorders, and symptoms associated with addictive disorders.Age, gender, marital status , educational level , and professional status were assessed using a self-administered questionnaire.For tobacco use disorders symptoms, we used the self-administered, validated French version of the Fagerström test for Nicotine Dependence (FTND) ,32. The For alcohol use disorder, we used the Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test (AUDIT) ,34. The For gambling disorders, we used the Canadian Problem Gambling Index (CPGI) . This seFor internet addictions, we used the French version of the Internet Addiction Test (IAT) ,37. ThisFor food addictions, we used the modified Yale Food Addiction Scale 2.0 (mYFAS 2.0) ,39. ThisThe types of addictive disorders were assessed based on the medical record of their clinical assessments, using the DSM-5 criteria. We focused on the addictive disorders most likely to become dysbalanced during a lockdown . We assessed the symptoms associated with these disorders as follows:Impulsivity, emotion dysregulation, and anxiety and depressive symptoms were assessed during the study.Impulsivity was assessed using the French UPPS Impulsive Behavior Scale, short version (UPPS-P) . The UPPEmotion dysregulation was assessed using the brief version of the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS-16) , comprisDepressive and anxiety symptoms were evaluated using the French version of the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) ,45. The For the qualitative study, patients were selected from those that completed questionnaires in the quantitative study. Purposive sampling was used to obtain patients with high and low impulsivity. Qualitative data were collected using guided interviews. The subjective experiences of patients were described according to the level of impulsivity: high versus low impulsivity. Patients with an impulsivity score higher than one standard deviation above the overall mean sub-score, for either negative urgency or positive urgency in the UPPS-P, were considered as having high impulsivity. The remaining patients were classified as having low impulsivity. Patients were recruited to maximize the variation in age, gender, and substance-related disorders versus behavioral addictions, and professional status. Participants were then divided into two groups: those with high impulsivity and those with low impulsivity. Interviews were conducted at the medical practices where patients were being followed up. The initial guided interview was developed by all the authors see . The guip-values < 0.05 were considered statistically significant. Quantitative data were described using descriptive statistics: percentages for ordinal variables and means with standard deviations for continuous variables. To determine the factors associated with either negative urgency or with positive urgency (UPPS-P subscores), we used Spearman’s correlation tests for independent continuous variables and Mann–Whitney non-parametric tests for independent ordinal variables.Quantitative analyses were conducted using SPSS version 22 . All analyses were two-tailed; ® software for verbatim coding.The qualitative analysis was performed using two approaches: a phenomenological approach for some sections, including description of life experiences, and an approach inspired by grounded theory for sections focusing on social interactions. The verbatims were analyzed with respect to various categories. Those based on the phenomenological approach explored the patient’s feelings (including categories around emotions such as sadness or fear). While those based on social interactions explored their point of view on organizational aspects during the lockdown . The scientific validity criteria for grounded theory analysis were met. Indeed, 32 of 32 items in the Consolidated criteria for reporting qualitative research (COREQ) grid were completed. Our qualitative analysis included data triangulation and inductive analysis. We used the SonalThis study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the University Hospital of Tours (IRB number: 2020 043). All procedures were performed in accordance with the ethical standards of the national and/or institutional research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. All participants took part freely and voluntarily in the study. Informed consent was obtained from all individuals prior to study participation.Overall, we received 46 self-administered questionnaires. Among these, 44 were fully completed and included in the analysis. The data are summarized in The correlations between impulsivity facets , age, addictive disorder symptoms, emotion dysregulation, and anxiety and depression symptoms are presented in p = 0.59), marital status , being employed , nor educational status .Higher negative urgency was associated with a higher score for tobacco use disorder, but not with alcohol use disorder, gambling disorder, internet addiction, and food addiction symptom scores. Negative urgency was also positively correlated with emotion dysregulation and anxiety symptoms. In contrast, negative urgency was not significantly associated with gender , marital status , being employed , nor educational status .Higher positive urgency was associated with a higher food addiction score, but not with tobacco use disorder, alcohol use disorder, gambling disorder, nor internet addiction scores. Positive urgency was also positively correlated with emotion dysregulation and anxiety symptoms. However, positive urgency was not significantly associated with gender  and Patient #5 (P5) represented those with high impulsivity. The other patients  were classified as with low impulsivity. The patient characteristics are shown in I cannot go and see my friends and family […], I cannot go and get cocaine as I want, finally I am really suffering living like this!” (Patient #5). The reminiscence of a period of incarceration and the feeling of injustice made the lockdown unbearable, “If I had not been imprisoned for 15 years, maybe I would not have felt this way, but now I find the lack of freedom even more insufferable, this really weighed me down” (Patient #5). “Even though I was not doing much, I knew that I had freedom, and they took this away from me” (Patient #3).After the lockdown was announced, patients with high impulsivity reported that they suffered due to the extreme limitations imposed on their daily lives, “Anyway, we were in prison! Even if we have nice cages with space, and everything we wanted, we were still confined at home” (Patient #6). They also complained of a loss of freedom as if they had been condemned, “We did not have chains, we did not have handcuffs, we did not have ankle chains, it was just that we could not go outside. It’s a violation of our basic freedom, which is nothing more than to be able to circulate, and this was very, very, very hard” (Patient #6).The patients with a low impulsivity used the same terms to describe their limited, confined living space, “to be without” was especially expressed by patients with a low impulsivity, “In the beginning, I thought the dealers would be restricted, but no. Also, even the product (heroin), I thought that after a certain time, it would not circulate as much, or they  would not be able to obtain” (Patient #4).The fear “Since I was going walking with a bogus pretext, I was always afraid that I would come face to face with the police. If the cop was nice, it would be okay, the cop would say nothing, but if came face to face with a stupid cop. I was more scared of the police during the lockdown!” (Patient #5).In contrast, patients with a high impulsivity expressed fear of the authorities, “My parents were there, they watched over me because they knew that I was in a bad state” (Patient #3), “I am lucky to have a partner that I get along very well with. It thanks to him that I held on” (Patient #4). Those that were employed expressed the benefit of maintaining their work during the lockdown, “Oh yes, thank goodness that I have a job, I do not know how people manage without a job, I would have lost my head” (Patient #4). To be able to communicate with others, to ask them for help, and to support healthcare workers were mentioned in both the high and low impulsivity groups: “Talking always does me good. With a psychologist, with a doctor, with someone from the centre, even with someone lambda, it does me good to talk” (Patient #5), “For example, there are things that I would tell my therapist that I do not tell my wife and so this loss of connection during the lockdown was difficult!” (Patients #6).Several core values were common to patients with high and low impulsivity. Family support: “I thought dealers would not have the courage to go out, that I would see less of them than before the lockdown. Actually, nothing at all changed, they just met me wearing a mask” (Patient #4). The concept of autotherapeutic consumption was shared: “I think that I increased my consumption of heroin because the situation stressed me” (Patient #1), “I consumed to relax because I was very anxious and so this reduced the anxiety” (Patient #3).All the patients interviewed maintained access to their psychoactive substance, or their behavior associated with their addiction, “When this began (the lockdown), I told myself, maybe this will allow me to decrease my consumption” (Patient #4).The patients with a low impulsivity asserted the desire to control their consumption but also indicated that the lockdown was a favorable period for weaning of their addiction, “I went to see the doctor last night, because I do not have any more Subutex. I started shooting Subutex like a maniac” (Patient #5), “I was taking cortisone and I was being reckless with the benzodiazepines […] the pharmacist that served me saw that I was completely lost, and she asked me, what’s wrong? It is my mother who told me this” (Patient #3).In contrast, the patients with a high impulsivity mentioned a loss of control over their addiction: “The first month the weather was good, so this was a phase that I would consider as ‘cool’. I was with my family. I was at home, and I could eat whatever I wanted, it was the best” (Patient #6). Daily life at home was not a source of conflict. “It went well, we did not argue more than usual, and everything went well” (Patient #4) There was a calm atmosphere. “I can understand that some people lost their heads. Anyway, I was relatively calm” (Patient #2). For certain patients the lockdown was an opportunity to improve their lives: “I am not sure that I am going to continue (in the food business). There is a human, social side that I miss, I did this for more than 15 years, but (in the temporary work/factory) I have my weekends, I am paid more, I lose socially but I gain on the other side” (Patient #4).Patients with low impulsivity seemed to have had a more positive experience of the lockdown, than high impulsivity patients. They talked about the lockdown as if it were a holiday, “Sometimes I was really bored” (Patient #5). “I withdrew a little […] I listened to a lot of music; I watch lots of films. These were the main things that I did and other than that I did not do much” (Patient #3). As the lockdown continued a state of weariness arose “People always swept this under the rug, but I told them to stop, I spoke about other things, because I was tired of talking about the coronavirus” (Patient #5). “I was always concerned about the others, I was not going out, I was closed and completely paranoid” (Patient #3). The lockdown seemed to be reinforced by an inability to adapt to the new technology: “I don’t really know how to use the internet very well, I can’t seem to get into it, I am not from the internet generation, it is an unknown world for me. I regret this because I would like to be able to communicate by internet and do all this” (Patient #5).Loneliness and a profound boredom were conveyed by patients with high impulsivity: “This mixed qualitative and quantitative study found that among patients followed up for an addictive disorder during the COVID-19 lockdown, their subjective experiences differed according to their emotion-related impulsivity: high versus low. Although both groups reported the same stressful events during the lockdown , they differed in the way they coped. Low impulsive patients made better use of online technologies to maintain follow-up and with more positive reappraisal. In contrast, highly impulsive patients reverted to self-medication with substances and/or behaviors, more social isolation, and found coping with negative emotions more challenging. In the quantitative study, we observed that higher negative and positive urgencies were associated with the severity of some addictive disorders.The qualitative methodology allowed us to identify factors common among patients with high and low impulsivity, but also to distinguish the experiences, and protective and risk factors associated with high and low impulsivity. All the patients shared the sensation of a loss of freedom. Those that had been imprisoned considered the lockdown more as an injustice. The feeling of fear was also shared by the patients, but for different reasons. The less impulsive patients were more afraid that they would not have access to enough of their addictive substance. In contrast, those more impulsive, never doubted that they would have enough of their additive substance, even if they had to violate the imposed restrictions. They were more afraid of being controlled by the authorities. This was particularly true for a patient that had served 15 years in prison. A possible explanation is the social deafferentation hypothesis where complex changes in the brain can be induced by social withdrawal, prompting more impulsive behaviors . The “doFamily, employment, and therapeutic relationship were protective elements during the lockdown, expressed by all patients. The patients without a pathological impulsivity score were also those that were employed and that expressed positive experiences during the lockdown. These results are consistent with a study, based on social media posts on “Reddit” (a forum in the United States), that discussed personal experiences of people who used drugs during the COVID-19 pandemic . Though Patients with a high impulsivity reported that they lost control of their consumption and felt bored, lonely, and weary. This group of patients were more vulnerable . They haIt is important to remember that social distancing does not necessarily mean social isolation. A study has described how social isolation causes psychological harm that hinders positive behavioral development . ReducinDuring the lockdown, the patients wanted to maintain social contacts and a therapeutic relationship with their caregivers. However, patients with high impulsivity seemed to be less confident using new technology. Telehealth options, especially those that promote social connections are often presented as useful for patients with addiction ,51. But Concerning the quantitative study, the length of the questionnaire could have limited the number of complete questionnaires obtained. The lack of data meant that less prevalent addictions, such as gambling, were not well represented in the study.For the qualitative study, the use of a dual approach, comprising phenomenological and grounded theorization analysis, was justified by the search for the conceptualization of patients’ experiences . The CORThe purposive sampling of the study, although limited, provided the necessary diversity and sufficient data to illustrate patients with high and low levels of impulsivity. This qualitative research is one of the first to focus on the patients’ experiences with substance use disorders during a pandemic lockdown. In the literature, data during social isolation periods have almost exclusively focused on imprisoned patients or those living in isolation, such as during explorations or those living in submarines ,56,57,58Overall, our results support the idea that impulsivity, and especially emotion-related impulsivity, may be a key variable for studying interpersonal differences in addictive disorder vulnerability. Even though patients with high or low emotion-related impulsivity shared the same stressful life events, and other subjective experiences, during the COVID-19 lockdown, they differed in the way they coped with these events. Considering interindividual differences in impulsivity may help to improve the tailoring of treatment for patients with addictive disorders during stressful life events. Further studies will be performed to evaluate the long-term psychological effects and evolution of addictive disorders after a lockdown period.


Omushkego Cree of subarctic Ontario, Canada. Disruptions stemming from colonization and climate change have led to a decrease in harvesting, resulting in higher rates of food insecurity. The aim of the Niska program was to reconnect Elders and youth to revitalize goose harvesting activities and associated Indigenous knowledge within the community. The program and evaluation were built using a two-eyed seeing (Etuaptmumk) and community-based participatory research approach. Salivary cortisol, a biomedical measure of stress, was collected before (n = 13) and after (n = 13) participation in the spring harvest. Likewise, cortisol samples were collected before (n = 12) and after (n = 12) the summer harvest. Photovoice and semi-directed interviews were employed after the spring (n = 13) and summer (n = 12) harvests to identify key elements of well-being from an Indigenous perspective. The changes observed in cortisol levels for the spring (p = 0.782) and summer (p = 0.395) harvests were not statistically significant. However, there was a noteworthy increase in the subjective well-being observed through the qualitative measures (semi-directed interviews and photovoice), highlighting the importance of using multiple perspectives when assessing well-being, especially in Indigenous peoples. Future programs should incorporate multiple perspectives when addressing complex environmental and health issues, such as food security and environmental conservation, especially in Indigenous homelands worldwide.Historically, goose harvesting provided a source of culturally significant, safe, and nutritious food for the  The increasing threat of climate change has had many detrimental impacts on public health globally . One exaOmushkego Cree community which is only accessible year-round by plane, by boat during ice-free seasons, and by ice roads after a freeze-up. Its location makes the transport of goods including food very expensive, as the nearest entry point for food distribution is in Timmins, Ontario, which is 769 km south of Fort Albany FN  and you’re not recognizing your medicines” .“When we stopped my dad told me to tell him to put that thing away… his phone… He told me to tell him look around” .“It was evident that goose harvesting was important for the cultural continuity along with well-being, as it increased the social cohesion and allowed for more opportunities for the transfer of Cree knowledge.Participants frequently spoke of different types of healing  which took place while participating in goose harvesting activities. The social aspects of the activity, along with the increased knowledge and experience, gave individuals a great avenue to improve their well-being. Participants spoke about their emotional and mental health when on the land:I’m brand new again, I’m revived… it clears your mind” .“It’s just so calm out there it’s just like an invisible medicine… It’s very healthy for the mind” .“I feel free when I’m out there, but here I kinda feel trapped” .“As goose harvesting was also a very physically demanding activity , many paHe’s sitting here the whole time, he’ll get sick… He’d go in the bush and in two days he’d get better… To be healthy, it’s just to go out there” .“Healthwise, to stay active… walking and working, keeping your mind busy” .“Although the land is seen as an opportunity for healing and improving well-being, there were many challenges and barriers which were identified, some of which stemmed from colonization,What happened in the past it’s still going on today. What happened in residential schools… I don’t know what they were thinking. Trying to get the Indian out of us… We should have more events, more of this kind of thing [the program]” .“Another challenge within the community was substance abuse, with many speaking of its impacts at an individual and community level:They’re (Elders) slowly passing away and not everybody knows the land and the rivers… For the young people you can’t really teach them anymore because of the drugs and alcohol… It clouds their mind” .“Drugs and alcohol when they came, they started messing up our traditional ways” .“We can’t really go out together anymore because of… break and enters… too many drugs and alcohol in the community and one has to look after the fort” .“Although these issues were prevalent; many stated that participating in the harvest and other traditional activities were a means of beginning their healing journey:I don’t plan on going back there to my old life because I struggled a lot with drugs… doing speed made me feel depressed… I actually had three overdoses… Right now I’m on my healing journey… I haven’t done any drugs for over two months now… I didn’t even smoke cigarettes too, so I’ve been cold turkey for two and a half months” “Overall, participating in harvesting was seen as a means of improving their well-being in all areas of health such as mental, physical, spiritual, and emotional. It was seen as a means of overcoming barriers and challenges which have negatively impacted them and the community. The social aspects of harvesting, along with the individual development of skills to sustain themselves, were all factors which contributed to the health and well-being of participants.The land was a continual theme present in all the discussions, which highlighted the strong connection each individual had with the land. When asked what was important to their well-being, many frequently referenced the land or nature:I like it out there, there’s peace and quiet. You’re out there with nature. It’s great being out there… I prefer the land but everything’s kind of here you know” .“That would be one of the best opportunities you could get. Getting wild meat or fish… I went on the boat on the weekend, I came home, and I slept all night… There’s a lot of fresh air out there, and there’s less stress… Your mind is clear… There’s a calmness there… I notice my blood pressure, is kinda high when I’m around here“ .“We can get out of society for a bit and feel better… if you go out for a night or so, you already feel better… I enjoyed it cause I love hunting geese” .“Omushkego Cree culture.The positive phrases and emotions used reiterate the importance of going on the land as an integral part of the A subtheme that was evident when discussing the land was the accessibility of food and other resources. Goose harvesting was a practice which provided a source of traditional food, which was seen as healthier and more accessible:Just look at my stomach man, that’s how I look at it… eating properly, not having an empty stomach… It’s kind of important in my culture. I gotta look at my family… make sure they don’t starve and keep doing that for the whole year” .“It’s good to eat wild meat… Not like from the store, lots of chemicals in there. They can hurt you… Give you diabetes… In the bush it’s free, good water, fresh air” .“You can tell by… the way people want food, and a lot of people at times here are mostly hungry… I can see people getting hungry all before the end of the month maybe before welfare comes. So, to have this kind of thing happening there (the program)… not just geese but caribou hunting, it would be good, fishing and moose hunting” .“There’s a lot of lack of outdoors… like parents taking their kids out camping… to learn their culture, or just to go experience… our traditional ways of life… People are relying on the stores… Nowadays the young generations are more reliant on buying stuff… I want them to know their culture” .“You’re going to harvest animals for your health… If you assist somebody, or if you harvest food and share it with other people  … you’re” .““You suffer… the cost of everything, cause there’s no road” . The cost of living, including the cost of food and other resources, was one of the many barriers discussed by participants to their well-being:It was apparent that the access to traditional food was a key component of their health and well-being. As Fort Albany FN is a remote community, food must be flown into the community, therefore making it more expensive. As discussed by one on-the-land expert, There’s always gonna be barriers… because of the way things are up here… There’s a lot of people who can’t get canoes… Cause there’s a lot of people that don’t work… not much work up here… Most of the people here are on social assistance” .“They don’t really have boats… or people to take them out there” .“They don’t have what they need… a lot of them they wanna go, but then they don’t have anything to use to go. It would be good if it was, the way we were… if they did that with the younger ones, and set them up” .““Way back… my grandfather travelled up the whole James Bay by foot… When he was a young man and back then there were no skidoos. They used to run to Moosonee, they use to work on the ships out in the bay… that was like way back about 1940” .Reducing the barriers for participation was one of the goals of the program. Therefore, it was essential that participants were provided with the resources that they needed. For many, going back to traditional ways of harvesting was a potential solution to address these barriers, One on-the-land expert discussed an initiative that he and other community members wanted to take to supply more resources to the youth:I was wishing, to make a camp… up the river along the traplines there, or up the trail… We know them by heart… I almost thought of having a bingo one time just to buy skidoos… and toboggans for the kids. I was gonna do that to have fundraising… I’m starting a little bit now with (name omitted). He’s looking after taking the kids out” .“Omushkego Cree ways, would address the present-day issues of food insecurity, and would provide a setting for the transfer of intergenerational knowledge, healing, and a way to reconnect with their culture and protect future generations.Overall, the benefits of participating in the goose harvesting outweighed the challenges and barriers, which when addressed, increased participation from the youth. Community members showed a willingness to help address these barriers by working together, especially with others who may not have had the same opportunities. They acknowledged that these opportunities would allow some to return to the traditional Niska (goose) program aimed to revitalize the community harvesting activities to reconnect youth with Elders and experts, the land, and cultural traditions, while also addressing food security and ecosystem conservation. Utilizing complementary constructs, such as CBPR and the two-eyed seeing approach, allowed us to further our understanding of health and well-being from a biomedical and First Nations’ perspective.The One of the aims of this program was to examine the impacts of goose harvesting activities on the well-being of participants from a remote subarctic FN community. Even though our intervention showed positive effects with respect to the subjective well-being of participants, no statistically significant differences were observed in short-term salivary cortisol concentrations  after taking part in the goose harvesting activities. Participants described the importance of traditional activities to the community and how harvesting activities and their overall well-being has been impacted because of colonization and the residential school system. In the literature, the forced assimilation to a different  culture, known as acculturation, has impacted Indigenous communities over the past century . These aSeveral studies have noted that Indigenous populations have, and currently experience, more stressful life events compared to non-Indigenous populations ,64,65,66Many of the health inequities associated with Indigenous peoples have been as a result of complex social and environmental factors which converge on chronic psychosocial stress . There hMany participants described that their health and/or wellness dramatically improved when they were on the land; participants also reported experiencing more positive emotions  while on the land compared to being in the community. An important stressor which was discussed was trauma, specifically intergenerational trauma because of the residential school experiences. The effects of residential schools, such as the decline in participation in traditional activities, were still being observed in the community. Through discussions, we were able to identify some of the impacts of intergenerational trauma, especially with the youth, when discussing issues of substance abuse and a lack of familial structure contributing to the decreased participation in traditional activities. For this reason, studies with Indigenous and other marginalized communities must consider the accumulation of stress across generations due to deeply rooted historic trauma stemming from colonization, which have led to present-day stressors  .Etuaptmumk) [The findings from our study and others  highlighaptmumk)  and is baptmumk) ,77,78,79aptmumk) ,58,79. I, et al. [When discussing well-being, participants shared that taking part in the goose harvesting allowed them to revitalize cultural practices, promote healing, increase their time on the land, and have more opportunities for knowledge dissemination. Other studies involving Indigenous populations in Australia ,81,82,83, et al.  found th, et al. [Participants also spoke of the negative health outcomes they have experienced as a result of a decline in the harvesting activities. The reduced transmission of knowledge in the subarctic James Bay region is well documented as a concern of Elders and on-the-land experts ,41,44,90, et al.  investig, et al. , the uniAmisk (beaver) harvesting program. The Amisk program aimed to address community concerns of local flooding by connecting the Elders with youth to revitalize traditional beaver harvesting and introduce other activities, such as the removal of the beaver dams [Amisk program identified many positive outcomes, for instance, the sharing of knowledge, and the reconnecting of youth with their identity and the land [Niska (goose) program, as no statistically significant changes were observed in the salivary cortisol levels pre- and post-activities; however, a statistically significant increase in cortisol levels was observed when breaking the beaver dams. The potential reasons for this increase were the increased physical activity [The results of the present study were comparable to the predecessor of this program, the ver dams . Particithe land . The coractivity  and an iactivity . Overallactivity .Omushkego Cree culture in the James Bay region. Participants described the importance of goose harvesting as it provides a source of nutritious food and allows for knowledge transfer in the community. This knowledge was important as it allowed them to preserve teachings which were passed on from previous generations. One of the teachings discussed was the importance of sustainable harvesting to ensure that the waste from the animal harvesting was minimal. Within the community, another program utilized goose innards and bones, along with organic waste within the community, in a composter which aimed to minimize the dependency on imported fertilizers for crop production [Goose harvesting has been a very important aspect of the oduction . Althougoduction ,10,13,92The present program also addressed issues of conservation. The importance of harvesting the overabundant goose species  for the conservation of ecosystems has been identified in many studies ,30,96,97Another important issue which we aimed to address through this study was food security. This was particularly important as Fort Albany FN has a very high prevalence of food insecurity . Many paParticipants in our study stressed the importance of revitalizing and maintaining traditional food practices for economic, cultural, and health reasons. Opportunities to maintain these practices were through the dissemination of Indigenous knowledge in the community, especially amongst youth. This knowledge was identified as being crucial for current and future generations, as it would provide them with the skills to obtain nutritious food from the land such as wild meats, berries, and other plants for medicine. Participants frequently discussed technology as impacting youth engagement, stating that they would prefer to be at home, as the community does not have cell service. Although technology was seen as a challenge, other participants described advances in technology making goose harvesting easier than in the past. One of these is the increasing use of freezers; many participants reported that this modernization allowed for the year-round access to traditional food, as goose and other meats could be stored and shared at a later date.The sharing of traditional foods was mentioned by participants as an important way to combat food insecurity. In one study by Tsuji, Tsuji, Zuk, Davey and Liberda , the fooMyocastor coypus) in Louisiana, USA [Pterois volitans) [It has been suggested that the use of Indigenous harvesting programs in other parts of the world may be used to address overabundant and invasive species, and address food security ,13. Incoana, USA  and lionolitans) ,114 haveolitans) ,114,115.olitans) . In summAmisk (beaver) harvesting program [The limitations for this study included the limited sample sizes of the two programs; thus, the cortisol findings should be interpreted with caution. One reason for the limited sample size was that the pool of Elders and experienced people with the requisite knowledge was limited. As discussed previously, the pyramidal population structure of Fort Albany FN  in effec program , the hun program .Another limitation of this study which was also identified by participants was that some only spoke “high” Cree. We attempted to overcome this barrier by inviting participants to bring a translator of their choice who spoke “high” Cree and English. However, some of the words and concepts were not directly translatable to the English language or the more commonly spoken conversational Cree. Any quotes which were translated were labeled “English Translation from Cree”. Lastly, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, several face-to-face meetings had to be canceled, with remote communication being used as the alternative.Niska (goose) harvesting program provided an opportunity for the Cree in Fort Albany FN to connect (or reconnect) with important aspects of their identity and increase social cohesion and well-being within the community. By harvesting overabundant geese, which are detrimental to the environment, not only was the issue of food security addressed, but it also contributed to the efforts to protect and provide time for the recovery of impacted ecosystems. Beyond these benefits, the harvesting program also addressed barriers which allowed for: the transfer of Indigenous knowledge; increased opportunities for healing; the strengthening of social networks ; and other benefits associated with being on-the-land . Utilizing a local approach for on-the-land programs, especially in a remote community, allowed for the identification and adaptation to challenges using Indigenous knowledge.The Our findings highlight the need for the expansion of culturally relevant programs and policies for Indigenous peoples. Using approaches such as two-eyed seeing and CBPR allowed for more impactful and meaningful engagements with community members, which could be extended to other Indigenous and marginalized populations. Using a biomedical evaluation of cortisol has been successful in many non-Indigenous ,117,118


And, while the phrase ‘5-a-day’ for the consumption of fruit and veg is well known, there’s no equivalent for physical activity. Perhaps that’s why only between 8% and 18% of people in the UK were able to recall that the Chief Medical Officers’ guidance is at least 150 minutes of moderate exercise per week.2–4 GPs faired marginally better: just 20% could recall the guidance.5Environments in the UK have been designed to make our lives physically easier: cars, trains, lifts, washing machines — even the humble remote control. It’s no surprise then that around 4 out of 10 of us are inactive.r = 0.67 (moderately strong).6 If inactivity increases in a town, so do preventable deaths. Given all the other determinants of health — alcohol, diet, drugs, access to health care, education, employment, environment, and poverty (and so on) — this is quite remarkable.The consequences of inactivity in our population are well known: high levels of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, and poor mental health. These are self-evident from Fingertips, the public health statistics gateway for general practices in England. Consider, for instance, the under 75 mortality rate from preventable cardiovascular diseases. According to Fingertips, if we look at towns across the country, the mortality rate correlates linearly with inactivity with a correlation coefficient of 7 — less time than the Queen has been on the throne. Shockingly, only four towns have a HLE at birth for males of ≥70 years: Richmond upon Thames, Rutland, Wokingham, and, of course, Windsor. Notably, they all have activity levels of at least 68% and inactivity levels <21%.6As you might expect from this, healthy life expectancy (HLE) also correlates with levels of inactivity. Figures from the Office for National Statistics show that HLE for males in the UK is just 62.8 years8 And yet, in one study of patients who were overweight and obese accessing primary care, 70–80% of professionals didn’t speak to them about physical activity.9 Understanding and appreciating the drivers and barriers to becoming more active would help considerably.Despite being unable to quote the precise physical activity guidance, a quarter of patients say they would be active if advised to do so by a doctor or nurse.One way of learning more is to look at parkrun, on which there is now a plethora of research. Usually written with a small ‘p’, it is a charity that puts on weekly, timed 5 km and junior 2 km events where participants can run, walk, or volunteer (volunteering is considered participation by parkrun). Importantly, parkrun is free.10 4 years later, 1600 have joined .11,12 In presentations of our parkrun research to GPs, link workers, and health practitioners, it’s surprising how many perceive parkrun as a lycra-clad race only for the usual sporty types. They don’t see parkrun as appropriate for themselves, never mind their patients.To promote the health and wellbeing of primary care workers and patients, the Royal College of General Practitioners set up the parkrun practice initiative to link surgeries with their local parkrun:13 Those at the front were very different to those at the middle or the back. The front was dominated by skinny young males, keen to win and focused on competition; very few had health conditions. The middle was composed almost equally of men and women, with 8% having long-term health conditions. The back was starkly different to those ahead. Some were doing 5 km for the first time since they’d left school, some were doing couch-to-5k, some were combining running with walking, and some were walking the whole thing and wondering if they could finish. Those at the back were more likely to be women, older, retired, and have health issues. Overall, 45% of walkers had long-term health conditions such as arthritis, depression, anxiety, asthma, and hypertension — precisely the conditions for which GPs say they would recommend physical activity.This led to research in which we stratified a survey of 59 999 adult parkrunners from fastest to slowest to answer the seemingly simple question, ‘what is a parkrunner?’ The quick answer is — it depends where you look.We asked parkrunners what motivated them to turn up to their first parkrun and what they perceived as the benefits. The former drives behaviour change while the latter sustains it. As expected, fitness was important as a motive, but slower runners and walkers were more interested in their health, being outdoors, and being active in a safe environment. While few chose improving mental health, happiness, or feeling part of a community as a motive, around 70–80% reported improvements, regardless of finishing time.We need to focus efforts on motivating those at highest risk of disease — those who are inactive or have low levels of activity. These groups want to increase their activity but would like it to be free, community-based, inclusive, safe, and in green spaces. The perception of competitive athletes in shorts and vests can be a major barrier for many.The parkrun model illustrates a way to motivate people to do activity and participation is increasing, not just in the UK, but in 23 countries across the world. parkrun does better than many interventions when it comes to uptake in groups less likely to be physically active — women, those with health conditions, and those in areas of deprivation.14 Social prescribing link workers have a key role in signposting to local physical activity groups.The community aspect of physical activity really matters to slower runners and walkers, who value the social connections they make. Events like parkrun can bring neighbourhoods together and act to create and then strengthen bonds between people; they are like community adhesive. Physical activity events can also impact directly at a practice level, increasing the resilience of GPs and their teams. Many parkrun practices have organised takeover days that create a social buzz and highlight the value they place on physical activity. Primary care teams can literally talk the talk and walk the walk. Volunteering at events can transform lives and has been shown to add a level of happiness and satisfaction even greater than participating in the physical activity itself.‘moderate physical activity for 30 minutes, 5 times a week’ just won’t do. Maybe instead we should simply ask people to ‘move more, more often’.The general public and healthcare professionals clearly understand the message about physical activity, even if they can’t remember the targets. Perhaps it would help to have a catchy slogan, but


Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) is an indicator that measures a company’s non-financial performance. Many firms have recently emphasized the importance of ESG. Ascertaining what topics are being discussed around ESG and how they change over time will contribute significantly to gaining insight into ESG. Using 73,397,870 text data scraped and refined from publicly available Twitter data, this study applied Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) and the dynamic topic model (DTM) to ascertain the hidden structure of the ESG-related document collection and the topics being discussed. The study further conducts a sentiment analysis to examine the sentiment of the general public regarding ESG. Topic modeling shows that various topics regarding ESG are being discussed and evolve over time. Sentiment analysis shows that many people have neutral or positive sentiments toward ESG-related issues. This study contributes to exploring insights into ESG among the public and understanding public reactions toward ESG. We further conclude the study with a discussion of managerial implications and potential future research. There is no management concept that has been receiving as much attention as environmental, social, and governance (ESG) recently. To be ESG-compliant  used to merely mean being a “good company.” Recently, however, ESG has come to mean a “company strong in crisis.” In other words, how well a company can respond to and continuously manage risks, such as “environmental, social, and governance” risks, is becoming crucial in the face of increasing uncertainty in the corporate environment . ParticuAlong with financial performance, the ESG index has become a significant indicating factor of a company’s non-financial performance. Moreover, investments based on it have recently become the “new normal.” According to Our study focuses on the ESG theme and the changes in its trends. We derive the most discussed topics about ESG and explore how society interprets and accepts ESG, and how society’s understanding and interest in ESG change over time. We achieve this by scraping vast amounts of text data from Twitter using keywords, ESG, and #ESG, and analyzing the unstructured text content using machine learning techniques (ML). Twitter was used as a data source because it allows us to obtain a large amount of textual data of public opinion on ESG in real time . AlthougThis study analyzes ESG-related big data in Twitter texts and classifies ESG-related Twitter conversations into several topics. Additionally, we examine the changes and trends in these topics over time. We further conduct sentiment analysis to examine society’s overall sentiments toward ESG.This study differs from most existing studies that consider ESG a performance or evaluation target. We focus more on the concept of ESG. We further examine what the general public is saying and communicating about ESG, its sentiment toward ESG, and how these conversations and emotions change over time.This study can be replicated by scraping and analyzing tweet data in real-time. This can help managers understand public sentiment, gain insights into ESG, and establish management strategies. Analyzing the discussion of ESG in tweets worldwide also provides a global perspective.Our research questions are(1)What is the latent topic structure of ESG?(2)How have the structures of ESG-related topics changed over time?(3)What are the sentiments of ESG-related discussions?This paper proceeds as follows. See section “Literature Review” briefly reviews related research. See section “Data and Methodology” presents the data and the model. See section “Empirical Results” discusses the findings and implications. See section “Discussion” further presents the conclusions and future research directions.The ESG concept refers to environmental, social, and governance structures, which are non-financial factors of a company, and is among the main indicators for evaluating a company’s value. The UN emphasizes that a systematic response to ESG is essential for companies to achieve sustainable growth in future and, accordingly, devised the ESG concept in the To understand ESG better, there is a need to understand the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR), which is the precursor to ESG. Since The ESG concept has been widely used as an alternative to CSR in the media, and in many studies; ESG and CSR are often defined as the same concept. However, ESG is more detailed than CSR in terms of definition and evaluation. While CSR aims to hold companies accountable, ESG defines the social role of companies in three domains: environmental, social, and governance . MoreoveThe idea of ESG began with investors’ concerns and dissatisfaction with traditional CSR. Although companies’ CSR activities may have helped enhance corporate image and reputation, investors were skeptical about whether they were effective and strategic in enhancing long-term corporate value. There were also complaints about companies’ disclosure of CSR information. Corporate CSR reports had promotions and boasted about CSR activities but had little connection with corporate performance. Moreover, traditional financial statements could not report ESG performance adequately. Factors such as corporate carbon emissions, corporate governance, and stakeholder management were not disclosed in financial statements .Various disclosure standards and frameworks of ESG information, including the Sustainability Accounting Standard Board (SASB) and Taskforce on Climate Related Financial Disclosure (TCFD), have been suggested. The SASB was established to connect investors and companies in terms of ESG performance. The board divided companies into 77 sectors and selected factors that have high investor interest and financial relevance among the ESG factors that affect the company’s financial performance, production, and operating activities in each sector . The TCFThe corporate standards of institutions such as “MSCI” and “Sustainalytics,” which existed before ESG, were developed in line with the new ESG concept . MoreoveBased on this ESG concept, ESG evaluation indexes of various ESG evaluation agencies such as “MSCI” and “Sustainalytics” were created and developed . AdditioAdditionally, concerns about the effects of environmental and climate change have raised the public demand for corporate accountability and transparency. Increasing public engagement, especially following the spread of social media, increases public pressure. Moreover, companies make ESG a top corporate agenda.From this perspective, it is meaningful to examine the concept of ESG and examine the flow of change and the general public’s sentiment toward ESG.Environmental, social, and governance-related research in the business area mainly focuses on evaluating ESG and analyzing the relationship between ESG and corporate performance. ESG assessment can be considered a continuum as it is a prerequisite for corporate performance analysis.Research on the relationship between ESG and corporate financial performance has been ongoing for more than 40 years. Whether a company with high ESG can generate good financial performance has been a topic of interest for many scholars. There are several explanations for the positive relationship between ESG and CFP. Because the concept of ESG is subjective and changes slightly over time, research on how to evaluate it has attracted attention. However, owing to the diversity of stakeholders, various methods for measuring corporate ESG performance have been proposed. Moreover, ESG is primarily concerned with managing the relationship between a company and its stakeholders such as consumers and communities. Therefore, according to Further, the diversity of stakeholders’ interest in ESG has created various institutions and measurement methods that evaluate ESG. Therefore, comparing and tracking changes in the evaluation of ESG has become an academic topic. For example, Most ESG business studies focus on uncovering the relationship between ESG (CSR) and a company’s financial performance. This is possible because many standards and evaluations generated by ESG rating agencies and the financial reports of numerous listed companies are readily available to researchers.However, research on the ESG concept is relatively scant. The ESG concept is clearly explained using three keywords: environment, society, and governance. However, it is important to note that ESG is also a socially constructed concept, and the composition of that concept may vary with the influence of time and environmental changes.Since their inception by Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) has been applied in various fields. Some business studies use an extended LDA model or develop a model based on LDA, including correlated topic modeling (CTM), to identify correlations between topics , structuRecent studies have attempted to measure human sentiments and predict future emotions through textual data analysis. Although it is difficult to accurately measure an individual’s sentiment, the sentiment accumulated through verbal expressions can be measured if certain criteria are given. Simply put, it is a method of arranging various words corresponding to sentiments and measuring the degree of sentiment through factors such as detection frequency . SentimeBusiness research using sentiment analysis is largely divided into two types, according to the research subject. The first research stream investigates and forecasts stock market movements using sentiment analysis of online news or social media related to the stock market. The second research stream involves the analysis of product or service reviews using sentiment analysis. These studies on customer reviews initially focused on numerical analysis, such as rating rankings and the number of reviews . For exaFew studies have used text analysis as a methodology in ESG. This is because the research subject was limited to the data disclosed by the company. Early studies were aimed at deriving ESG-related words and examining trends. However, it was difficult to analyze a large amount of information owing to the limitations of early text analysis technology. Environmental, social, and governance-related text analysis has expanded its research topics from traditional initial public offering (IPO) studies to larger and broader areas, such as Twitter and Internet news. The subject of the study has been expanded from corporate disclosure data to Twitter and news, which means that ESG research, which has been narrowly studied from a corporate perspective, has been expanded to include a wider range of ideas and opinions from society. Given ESG is not only a topic of interest to companies, but an area of interest to various stakeholders such as the government, investors, and consumers, it is an appropriate change to expand ESG research to various social media platforms.Most sentiment analysis research in the business domain focuses on stock market forecasts and the customer reviews of products or services. ESG-related sentiment analysis using corporate disclosure data has many difficulties in deriving managerial implications through sentiment analysis owing to the lack of positive disclosure data. Recently, studies have been conducted using social media data to overcome the shortcomings of corporate disclosure data with too many positive messages. As shown in We chose Twitter as a data source because not only is it one of the most popular social media platforms, but is also a microblogging platform which provides data on real-time communication and information sharing in text form. Using #ESG and keyword ESG, we collected tweet data through Academic Research Track, a Twitter API that offers an unlimited time service for ten million tokens per month. The use of the term ESG began to increase rapidly after the Paris Climate Agreement in December 2015. We further set the data collection period from January 1, 2016, to December 31, 2020. We discarded retweets during this period using the Twitter API filter. The number of original tweets collected using the Twitter API with #ESG and ESG keywords totaled 1,787,230.The collected text data were then normalized, a process of transforming language that humans can understand into a standard form that can be understood by computers or machines. This normalization follows the procedures of tokenization, stop word removal, and morphological normalization. The diagram in First, tokenization was performed to break down each sentence and word into understandable minimum units. To smooth or remove noise in our textual data, we cleaned our data by converting all characters to lowercase, trimming non-English tweets, and eliminating stop words that are frequently used in the text but have no significant contribution to the meaning of the text, special characters, words less than four in length, unicode characters that are unreadable in an ASCII format, mentions, URLs, hashtags, and unnecessary white spaces. To remove stop words, we used the list of stop words provided by NLTK in Python. Third, stemming and lemmatization were performed for morphological normalization. Porter’s algorithm from the NLTK library was used to extract the stems of words. Using lemmatization, the inflectional endings of words are removed, and the root forms of words are obtained. Our preprocessing using Python resulted in 73,397,870 words.For further empirical analysis, we converted our text data into a format that could be used as an input for the topic model. Each sentence in our dataset was sentenced into a list of words, after eliminating unnecessary characters such as emoticons and punctuation. The two main inputs to the topic model, corpus and dictionary, were further created.The sentiment score for each tweet was measured using the Valence Aware Dictionary for Sentiment Reasoning (VADER), which is a lexicon and rule-based sentiment analysis available in Python. See section “Sentiment Analysis” provides more details on this measure.In summary, the topic model is an unsupervised machine learning model used to ascertain the latent thematic structure in a collection of documents with hierarchical probabilistic models. Among several algorithms such as latent semantic analysis (LSA), LDA has been one of the most widely used methods in topic modeling since its inception by The generative probabilistic process of document collection shown in 1.k = 1, …, K,For each topic k ∼ Dir (⋅| φ)generate β2.d = 1, …, N,For each document m ∼ Dir (⋅| α)generate θFor each word w in document m,m,n ∼ Mult (⋅| θd)generate zm,n ∼ Mult (⋅| βz)generate wwhere Dir denotes a Dirichlet distribution and Mult denotes a multinomial distribution.Using this hierarchical generative process of LDA, the joint distribution of the observed and hidden variables in Eq. 1 is obtained by:The hidden structure of the observed and hidden variables was inferred by posterior inference using the Gibbs sampling MCMC algorithm.Latent Dirichlet Allocation is very useful for performing the dimensionality reduction and qualitative summary of topics of large corpora; however, it does not consider the temporal order of when the tweets are written. We extended LDA into a dynamic topic model (DTM) by considering a topic as a sequence of distributions over fixed time intervals, such as years and months. Therefore, DTM allows us to discover the richer posterior structure of topics and explore the evolution of ESG-related topics over time and how the probability of top words within a topic changes over time. Considering the temporal aspect of documents is important because, for example, the term “ESG” did not even exist 15 years ago and has only been actively used recently.t denotes the time slice, which is the year, and the other notations are the same as the LDA in t evolves from a corresponding topic at time t-1.Dynamic topic model assumes that each document is arranged in a preset time span, each with its own topics. Each topic in each time span was randomly selected from the same topic in the previous time span. The probabilistic generative process of a document in a specific time span follows the same process as that of LDA. While topic modeling is an analysis of what topics are being discussed and how those topics evolve over time, sentiment analysis is a method used to understand the general public’s sentiments or opinions about a particular topic.There are two major approaches to sentiment analysis: supervised machine learning, and unsupervised lexicon- and rule-based learning. This study was conducted using Python NLTK VADER  for the lexicon- and rule-based unsupervised learning methods). VADER is well suited for our study, as it is designed for sentiment analysis expressed on social media .Valence Aware Dictionary for Sentiment Reasoning provides a quantified sentiment output of compound scores for each sentence based on the polarity (positive or negative) and the intensity of the sentiment of each word. VADER uses a dictionary to map the lexical features of each word to its polarity and intensity, which are used to assess the sentiment of each word. By identifying the sentiment score of each word in a sentence, the compound score of sentiment in each sentence is calculated by summing the sentiment scores of each word in a sentence and then normalizing it to a number in the range of −1 to 1. A compound score greater than 0.5, less than −0.5 and between −0.5 and 0.5 is classified as positive, negative, and neutral, respectively. The number of tweets varies by date; for example, on October 29, 2020, there were 6,399 tweets, whereas on January 1, 2017, there were 159 tweets. We computed the mean compound scores for each date to determine the change in sentiment over time.We generated the word clouds to visualize the important words based on their frequency, as shown in To conduct LDA topic modeling, we used the Gensim-LDA library in Python. To derive meaningful results from topic modeling, it is important to determine the number of topics. This is because if the number of topics increases, various ESG-related trends can be extracted, but similar topics can occur, which can distort the evolution of each topic. In this study, 20 topics were chosen to produce the most interpretable and manageable number of topics, considering the tradeoff between semantic coherence in Of the 20 topics found through topic modeling, we eliminated two topic clusters (topics 9 and 20) that were difficult or irrelevant to the label. The labels were chosen through discussion and consensus among the authors by reviewing the most likely tweets per topic and considering the top 30 most frequent words by topic and their probabilities. The 18 labeled topics and words that appeared the most in each topic are summarized in The 18 topics discovered and labeled in this study are climate change, investment, training, funds, investors, stocks, disclosure, data, carbon, conferences, business, market growth, green, ESG, rating, asset value, transparency, and consulting. Based on the intertopic distance map in Dynamic topic model results for topics of “climate change,” “green,” “rating,” “data,” “ESG,” and “investment” are shown in the following (A) “Climate Change” shows the annual trends for the probability of frequently occurring words – financial, trillion, billion, digital, and risk – within “Climate change” topic. The increasing use of the term “risk” in climate change topics seems to reflect growing awareness and interest in the risks associated with climate change. A decrease in the term “billion” and an increase in the term “trillion” among the unit words indirectly suggests that the risk of climate change is significantly increasing . The dec(B) The term “green” shows that technology, plan, fund, and green are increasingly used within the “Green” topic. Given that this is a “green” topic to an environmental crisis, the growing use of these words translates into an effort to find alternatives in terms of the environment, one of ESG.(C) The term “rating” shows that the use of the words shareholder, standard and institutional is a growing trend within the topic “Rating.” These trends reflect the growing importance of ESG evaluation standards and institutions performing evaluations in addition to shareholders’ interest in ESG.(D) The term “data” shows that the demand for data analysis and reporting is increasing owing to the increase in ESG-related data.(E) The abbreviation “ESG” shows that with respect to the ESG topic, the use of the words responsibility and transition is increasing and the use of the word good is decreasing. These trends indicate that the meaning of ESG is shifting from simply being a good company to one that is socially responsible.(F) The term “investment” shows that the use of the words increasingly, industry, fund is increasing and the use of the word affect does not show a growing trend but it is consistently used. These trends indicate that interest in investing in ESG funds continues to grow, and the recent trend in which ESG funds are invested in by the industry sector is also recognized.The number of tweets varies by date; for example, on October 29, 2020, there were 6,399 tweets, whereas on January 1, 2017, there were 159 tweets. The number of Twitter posts per day in As shown in April 22, 2018, was also one of the days when positive sentiment surged. A closer look at the tweets indicates that it was designated as Earth Day to show support for environmental protection. Earth Hour, which advocates switching off lights at 8:30 pm in more than 193 countries, is a very popular Earth Day event. Moreover, the success of these light-out events has been instrumental in the surge in positive ESG tweets.The significant increase in negative sentiment tweets on October 24, 2018 (score −0.216) and October 29, 2018 (score −0.180) appears to be related to President Trump’s conservative stance on environmental policy. During the United States presidential debate between Trump and Biden on the 23rd, Trump made headlines online when he made anti-environmental remarks, “wind energy is very expensive. kills all the birds.” On the 29th, an article was published stating that a bill to ban retirement pensions from investing in ESG funds was being pursued quickly, which drew criticism from many ESG investors.Financial Times, “The fallacy of ESG investing: Win-win arguments promoting both bigger profits and better social returns are illogical” seemed to trigger many negative tweets.Regarding the surge in negative sentiment on October 24, 2018, negative newspaper article feedback appeared to have an impact on ESG. A rare negative comment on ESG in the The reason for the high negative sentiment score on June 9, 2018, is interesting. This is because of the surge in negative sentiments caused by tweets about the losses incurred by an online gaming team that uses the abbreviation ESG. For further research, tweets about the game team ESG should be eliminated as noise. See r = 0.110) indicates that conversation volume is not significantly related to the sentiment score.Although we presumed and investigated that there could be a correlation between the number of tweets and sentiment score in ESG, an insignificant Pearson correlation between tweet volume and sentiment score  as a result of the 3-day GCAS activity.In this study, we applied LDA, DTM, and sentiment analysis to derive potential topics related to ESG and ascertain how the ESG theme is structured and changes over time and how the public’s emotions are related to this change. Whereas existing text analysis studies on ESG mainly apply simple text analysis methods or topic modeling methods, our study is meaningful in that we take an integrated approach to ESG themes by adding time-series analysis (DTM) and sentiment analysis.The results of this study are managerially and practically relevant. The results of our research can serve as a guideline for companies or organizations with a poor understanding of ESG, to easily prepare for ESG management. For example, ESG is a relatively recent concept that has received a lot of attention since the Paris Climate Agreement. For companies that understand ESG as an extension of CSR unrelated to investment or simply as being a good company, our research helps clarify that ESG is a new concept linked to investment. The sentiment analysis of ESG fluctuates and has no specific pattern. It can be used as an appropriate media response tool by analyzing ESG in real time for a specific company or organization.This study has some limitations. LDA and DTM are general topic models. However, they are based on simplified assumptions. First, models are required for the number of topics to be predetermined and fixed in advance, which is subjective and may not reflect the true distribution of topics. Second, the models are based on the bag-of-words assumption that the order of words in a document and that of documents can be ignored. Future research should consider using extended topic models that consider word dependency and are more flexible in their basic assumptions, such as the extended global topic random field .In most previous research on topic modeling, the topics in each cluster were manually named, and in this study, the topics were manually named according to previous studies. However, this method may result in judgment bias that is influenced by the subjectivity of the researcher. Therefore, in future studies should strive to minimize judgment bias through the automatic naming of word clusters without human intervention, as in Twitter is the most popular social media platform for academic research because it makes it easy to obtain data through an application programming interface (API). However, tweet data contain many expressions that differ from everyday life, such as slang, emoticons, hashtags, and ironic sentences, which makes it difficult to find the exact meaning using text-mining techniques. These difficulties pose problems for many natural language processing methods such as sentiment analysis. Because results can vary significantly by using different types of stemmers or lemmatizes and extraction of data, it is important to try various and tuned methods using a wider range of social media text data.A major challenge in using social media data to identify real-world trends is the bias caused by the self-reporting nature of social media. As discussed in organizational behavior research  a commonTo deepen our understanding of the dynamics of topics and sentiments about ESG, future research could conduct analyses that consider the dynamics and evolution of topics and sentiments together. In this study, topic modeling and sentiment analysis were conducted separately. Because we can conduct sentiment analysis using the probability of words that are frequently used in each topic, it is important to understand the complex dynamics if we understand how evolution over time of topics is related to the sentiment score and how it is affected by sentiments. Second, many ESG-related studies suggest a positive effect of ESG activities, including financial performance, on companies. Collecting ESG-related tweets about individual companies and analyzing relationships between sentiments and financial performance, such as stock price, are expected to contribute to existing research. Third, many studies have found that companies with high ESG are strong against risk. Computing the ESG scores of individual companies using tweet data and examining the role ESG plays in the crisis triggered by COVID-19 would be interesting. An event study could be used to observe stock price changes before and after the outbreak of COVID-19.The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.S-UJ: study conception and design. WC: data collection. S-UJ and JP: analysis and interpretation of results and draft manuscript preparation. All authors reviewed the results and approved the final version of the manuscript.The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.


This presentation examines the history of duckweeds in Chinese, Christian, Greek, Hebrew, Hindu, Japanese, Maya, Muslim, and Roman cultures and details the usage of these diminutive freshwater plants from ancient times through the Middle Ages. We find that duckweeds were widely distributed geographically already in antiquity and were integrated in classical cultures in the Americas, Europe, the Near East, and the Far East 2000 years ago. In ancient medicinal sources, duckweeds are encountered in procedures, concoctions, and incantations involving the reduction of high fever. In this regard, we discuss a potential case of ethnobotanical convergence between the Chinese Han and Classical Maya cultures. Duckweeds played a part in several ancient rituals. In one, the unsuitability of its roots to serve as a wick for Sabbath oil lamps. In another reference to its early use as human food during penitence. In a third, a prominent ingredient in a medicinal incantation, and in a fourth, as a crucial element in ritual body purifications. Unexpectedly, it emerged that in several ancient cultures, the floating duckweed plant featured prominently in the vernacular and religious poetry of the day. Duckweeds (Lemnaceae Martinov) are a globally spread family of higher plants with greatly reduced anatomies that float in slow-moving waters, such as found at river or lake edges or in still ponds and pools. Although these small plants are full-fledged monocot angiosperms, they reproduce mainly by vegetative budding at rapid rates, forming floating mats of verdant green in their natural habitat  Figure .Spirodela Schleid., Lemna L., Landoltia Les and Crawford, Wolffia Horkel ex Schleid. and Wolffiella Hegelm.) and has 36 species  galingale phleos bulrush; and also ‘moon-flower’ duckweed and marestail probably grow also elsewhere, but are called by different names. Of these we must speak. The goat-willow is of shrubby habit and like the chaste-tree: its leaf resembles that leaf in shape, but it is soft like that of the apple, and downy. The bloom is like that of the abele, but smaller, and it bears no fruit. It grows chiefly on the floating islands; ...”“[10.3] Now of these most are familiar: the goat-willow water-lily ‘moon-flower’ Duckweed ‘moon-flower’ and marestail require further investigation.”“[10.5] Of the plants of the lake they say that water-lily sedge and phleos bear fruit, and that of the sedge is black, and in size like that of the water-lily. The fruit of phleos is what is called the ‘plume,’ and it is used as a soap-powder... L. minor , erisypelas [bacterial inflammation of the skin] and podagral [foot gout] it helps when it is applied alone or together with barley. It also seals hernias in children.Spirodela polyrhiza (L.) Schleid. and/or L. minor  get over wine, promotes the growth of the beard and [head] hair, and quenches wasting thirst. Protracted taking may make the body light. Its other name is Shui Hua [water flower]. It grows in pools and swamps.”“, a medieval compilation of knowledge about plants, including the medicinal use of duckweeds. Hildegard was a nun and later an abbess . It may not be lighted with pitch (zefet), liquid wax (shaava), castor oil (shemen kik), nor with oil that must be burned and destroyed (shemen s’raifa), or with tail fat , nor with tallow (chailev). Nahum of Media says: We may use melted tallow . The sages, however, say: It is immaterial whether or not it is melted, it must not be used for the Sabbath lamp.”“With what may we light [the Sabbath lamp], and with what may we not light it? We may not light it with a wick made of cedar-bast .yaroka on the face of the water”. Yaroka is translated in one as “duckweed” , it crumbles [and a wick cannot be made from it]. However, Rav Pappa said that it is referring to the yaroka that accumulates on a ship [as greenery (at the water line) when a ship is stationary].” , a leading interpreter of the Gemara).“This yaroka based on location: one in seawater on the sides of ships and the other floating on the water in narrow channels. Rav Pappa in the Gemara favors seaweeds growing on the sides of stationary ships. If so, from where does the prayer-book designation of yaroka as “duckweed” arise? The answer is in the setting of the “narrow channels”, which is interpreted by other commentators as land-based, containing freshwater algae or plants  of David.Save me O God,for the waters have reached my neck.I have sunk, yawvein there is no foothold.in the depths of I have entered deep waters,the current is sweeping me…yawvein to refer to sticky mud, a mire, or a swamp. However, the important sage, Saadia Gaon , who wrote in Judaeo-Arabic and pioneered a form of rational biblical criticism based on deep knowledge of the language of the text, translated it in Hebrew as tachlav [tachlav refers to duckweed . In theof grass  and one The ancient local names for duckweed in the various cultures studied are listed in In naming duckweeds, Theophrastus concentrated on the plant’s aquatic habitat , DioscorIt is of interest to note that two ancient cultures, the later Han dynasty (c. 200 CE) in eastern China and the Maya of the Classical Period (250–900 CE) in Mesoamerica, each unaware of the other, used duckweeds as a major component in their concoctions for relieving a high fever ,24,34,35Lemna or Spirodela) as a medicinal for cooling “fulmanent heat” (eruptive fever) and “precipitating” (initiating) “water qi” (cooling strength of water) [L. minor or W. brasiliensis) for “cooling a high fever” that “descends” (cools down) as “I seized the kinam” [Lemna. These points are shown in bold in The Divine Farmer of the Chinese Han Dynasty, with its strong Daoistic influence, promoted duckweeds (presented as f water) . The Bice kinam”   rather than produce toxins as protectants. Yet, duckweeds appear to be of identifiable medicinal value. We described the Classic Maya and Chinese Han cultures, separated geographically and one unaware of the other, each promoting duckweed as a significant component in alleviating a high fever; possibly a novel instance of ethnobotanical convergence which needs further study. Unexpectedly, we also found that duckweeds played a role in ancient secular and religious poetry. While plant inflorescence is clearly poetically evocative, that is not the situation here. The peculiarities of tiny, floating duckweeds apparently evoked a poetic intimacy of the classical cultures with the plant itself.