Background and purpose: This paper relates challenges faced by older adult employees during the COVID-19 crisis in order to describe strategies to reduce the digital divide and technostress, thereby supporting inclusion and retention in the marketplace. Older adults are particularly at risk of Internet-related social exclusion, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. The main research question of the current scoping review were: What kind of strategies can reduce the digital divide and technostress of older adult employees and contribute to their inclusion and retention in the working market during the COVID-19 pandemic? Methodology: This review is based on the Arksey and O’Malley framework for scoping reviews. The six-stage framework includes: identifying research questions, identifying relevant studies, study selection, charting the data, summarizing and reporting the results, and a consultation exercise. A scoping review was conducted using five humanistic and social electronic databases - CINAHL with full text, EBSCO, Medline, SocIndex, Web of Science - and additionally hand-searches performed on Google Scholar. The search was limited to studies published from January 2020 to March 2021. After applying inclusion and exclusion criteria, 10 articles were included. Results: This review shows that the most important strategies are: 1) ICT educational training courses; 2) social dialog; 3) building inclusive workplaces; 4) implementation of successful ‘aging in public’ policies. Our results are beneficial for individuals, organizations, industries and different societies by showing how concrete strategies can be implemented at multiple levels. Conclusion: The study has found that one of the most effective strategies to reduce the digital divide faced by older adult employees during the COVID-19 crisis and technostress is social dialog between employers and employees, which can be a source of innovative and creative solutions (e.g. partnership programs or tailored support). Social dialog should include active cooperation with older adult workers - asking what they need and want - to enable skills development through training.

The role and responsibilities of next-of-kin carers are significant, filling several years of their lives and causing them to experience a burden of care. This study was conducted to investigate the burden of next-of-kin carers for dementia sufferers in Slovakia. Data were compiled via the Relatives’ Stress Scale (RSS) screening instrument through a survey of 112 primary next-of-kin carers and analysed using the statistical tests of descriptive statistics, means, scores and significance differences (Wilcoxon test). This is one of the few scales which provides: (a) specific measures of caregiver stress, and (b) is standardised for a population of informal carers in the home environment. The profiles of Slovak next-of-kin carers were identified with statistically significant characteristics (gender, age of carers). The study identified a high level of caregiving stress (82.15%), and selected factors were found to be significant in all burden dimensions: emotional stress (p = 0.001), social stress (p = 0.003), and negative feelings (p = 0.002). The results emphasise the need for coordination of healthcare and social services, possibly by expanding the network of social support groups, operating a counselling hotline/chat, and introducing national educational programmes for the next-of-kin carers of dementia sufferers. The results are also a source of reference for the umbrella organisation ‘the Slovak Alzheimer’s Society’ to access when implementing changes at a national level.

Various countries in Europe have different strategies for promoting care solutions for dementia challenges. The different approaches of Austria, Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Gibraltar, Ireland, Israel, Malta, Nederland, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom (Scotland and Wales) were investigated. Dementia has a significant social, psychological and economic impact on the individual, family and society.  As the disease progresses dementia sufferers become increasingly dependent. As many dementia sufferers are at home during the initial stages, the physical, emotional, and social demands of the dementia sufferers are often covered by informal caregivers. This study, therefore, aims to investigate the integration of psychosocial interventions for comprehensive care pertaining to informal caregivers of people with dementia in Europe. Furthermore, the study will highlight how implementation of technologies might enable psychosocial support of informal caregivers. The data is based on 15 national dementia strategies from various European countries. Data was based on preexisting coding systems with the predefined keywords and analyzed by qualitative content analysis by four of the authors. Our results show that psychosocial support is provided in various modalities and that informal caregivers need to be supported by a psychosocial approach. Due to this need the national dementia strategies should include measures to reduce the emotional burden of informal caregivers. Psychosocial support provided to informal caregivers in a comprehensive and systematic way is likely to enable informal caregivers to handle the emotional, cognitive, and behavioral consequences of the disease and its treatment, while helping to maintain their work-life balance.

Social media and advertising offers opportunities for receiving pre- and post-purchase information. Advertising plays a significant role in business marketing, as every company wants its product to be successful, and familiar to its target audience, and thus, it is essential to promote it. Promotion plays an important role within the marketing mix, as its aim is to draw the attention of potential buyers. The main purpose of this study is to find out how social media, especially advertising, changed its content during the COVID-19 pandemic. A questionnaire was distributed among respondents by means of social media. This way we included representatives of each age category trying to resemble, as closely as possible, the Slovak market. From among the randomly selected participants (social media users), 135 respondents completed the questionnaire. As for the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, in terms of advertising, we found out that there had been a certain change. According to the answers of our respondents, the changes related to the content of advertisements, the motives used, their narratives, offered products or services, or the combination of all the above. Consumers noticed an increased amount of COVID-19 related products such as face masks, disinfectants, etc.

Social media platforms rely on algorithms to filter and select content, thereby personalizing every individual's social media experience. Many use social media without awareness of this personalization and its impact, pointing to a need to both understand and improve literacy among active social media users. This qualitative study addresses adolescents' social media literacy through an investigation of their experiences with personalization on social media, aiming for a nuanced perspective of their outcomes. A thematic analysis of eight focus group interviews with 47 students aged 15–19 years uncovered two main themes: (1) diverse levels of adolescents' awareness and familiarity with personalization and (2) positive, negative, and mixed emotions toward personalization. Theme one uncovered that although the adolescents were largely unfamiliar with the terminology, when prompted, most of them could provide examples of personalization, whereas theme two revealed that adolescents appreciated relevant content and yet were uneasy about certain features.