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The present study identifies socioeconomic, political, and institutional factors that shape extensive budget unbalances in four European Mediterranean countries (Portugal, Italy, Greece, and Spain), causing significant deficits and a public debt equal to (or above) 120% of their respective Gross Domestic Product at the end of 2020. The regression analysis, run on official statistics, demonstrates that the dynamics of fiscal deficits in these countries are largely heterogeneous. This outcome suggests that the various factors and contexts considered here exert different effects in each country. Political factors played an important role in Greece, being less important in Spain, and having a negligible role in both Italy and Portugal. On the contrary, institutional factors were recognized as particularly important in Greece, Italy, and Portugal. Although important almost everywhere, the magnitude of the impact of economic factors also differed across the four countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a comparison between Italy, Spain, Greece, and Portugal to test the cross‐cultural validity of the Differentiation of Self Inventory Revised (DSI‐R) Scales of emotional cut‐off (EC) and emotional reactivity (ER). Our study focuses on the importance of in‐depth analyses of the differentiation of self‐constructs from a cross‐cultural perspective and reflects on the possibility of conceptualising the universality of Bowen theory in southern European countries. The study involved 1,807 healthy individuals. All participants completed the DSI‐R (Skowron & Schmitt, 2003). It was found that the measurement models had a suitable fit for each country group. Nevertheless, in our study, the two DSI‐R subscales, ER and EC, highlighted a weak invariance, specifically demonstrating only the invariance of the pattern factor loadings and the magnitude of factor loadings in the four samples. The empirical and clinical implications of these data are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Implementation of the EPBD in Southern European countries is analysed. • Italy widely leads the way in scientific production in the field. • Optional application of the standard impedes homogeneous progress. • France leads the transposition of European Directives into its national regulation. • A greater number of common objectives with mandatory compliance should be implemented. The Energy Performance of Buildings Directive covers a broad range of policies and supportive measures designed to help European Union national governments boost energy performance of buildings and improve existing building stock. This review is a comparative study of Southern European countries with respect to their transposition of successive European Directives developed by each Member State through their own regulations and implementations of specific energy performance requirements. The article presents, on the one hand, a complete study of the literature, showing that Italy, Spain and Portugal are the countries that have developed a greater number of articles with content strongly focused on the scope of this work, with Energy and Buildings by far being the reference journal on this topic. On the other hand, conclusions about the applications carried out by each Member State are shown, such as the Directives that were implemented in a reasonable time, although not all countries have done so at the same pace or with the same degree of development. Many of the Southern European countries are not adequately prepared for the correct and effective implementation of nearly zero-energy buildings, and there are still many improvements that should be addressed in the coming years. For these reasons and to increase the effectiveness of the framework Directive, a greater number of common objectives subject to mandatory compliance should be considered. Establishing basic formulas and methodologies while ensuring flexibility for Member States to account for their own unique characteristics is necessary to achieve these common objectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]