When leaders fail: the pathology of “conscience dust” and the architecture of integrity in public administration

The practice of ethical leadership within the public sector constitutes a profound and enduring challenge. Public leaders are called to navigate an exceptionally complex field where administrative duties and political pressures intersect, creating a dynamic aptly described as “a dance with wolves” (Lasthuizen et al., 2019). While academic research on ethical leadership has seen significant growth, the particular complexities it presents in the public and political context remain largely underexplored (Lasthuizen et al., 2019). The international literature has dedicated considerable effort to studying pathologies such as corruption and inefficiency (Plant, 2018; De Souza et al., 2025; Gregory and Zirker, 2022), yet this approach often focuses on isolated individual failures or discrete administrative mechanisms. What remains less understood is the way in which the absence or failure of effective ethical leadership creates the very ecosystem within which a gradual, systemic and almost imperceptible ethical erosion can flourish (Larsen and Allen, 2023). Understanding this phenomenon requires an approach that is sensitive to context, as ethical leadership is not a universally uniform model, but a socially constructed process that is shaped and contested historically, culturally, and politically (Lasthuizen et al., 2025).

To address this significant research gap, this article argues that systemic ethical decay is a direct consequence of specific leadership inadequacies. To capture this phenomenon, we introduce the metaphor of “conscience dust”: it is not a singular pathology or a sudden ethical collapse, but rather the slow, almost imperceptible accumulation of minor compromises, ethical concessions, and silent irregularities that, over time, cloud judgment and erode the ethical reflexes of an organization (Romanelli, 2023). Our central thesis is that “conscience dust” is the tangible result of a leader’s failure to fulfill their dual role, as defined in the literature: to be simultaneously a “Moral Person,” demonstrating traits such as integrity and honesty, and a “Moral Manager,” actively shaping an ethical environment through communication, reinforcements and role modeling (Lasthuizen, 2008; Webb, 2016; Treviño et al., 2000). The systemic erosion we describe stems not so much from the absence of the “Moral Person” but from the critical failure of the leader to act as an active “Moral Manager.”

This article pursues a twofold purpose, centered on leadership: first, to diagnose the problem by analyzing the mechanisms that constitute “conscience dust” as direct consequences of leadership failures, and second, to build a framework for leadership-guided interventions to address it. The research is structured around two central research questions:

The contribution of this study is threefold and lies primarily in the innovative conceptual synthesis of four distinct theoretical streams into a coherent, leadership-centric model. The study reframes systemic ethical erosion not as a collection of administrative pathologies but as a direct result of leadership failure. Second, the study moves from diagnosis to therapy, proposing the “Architecture of Integrity” as a targeted, multi-level leadership strategy that draws on established models of leadership in the public sector (Van Eeden Jones and Lasthuizen, 2018). Finally, it uses the Hellenic Public Administration as an exemplary field of application, offering a comprehensive diagnostic tool for identifying leadership risks and a practical roadmap for leadership-guided interventions.

This section dissects the pathology of “conscience dust” by analyzing four interconnected pillars. The analysis begins with the broader cultural context (the “greenhouse”), proceeds to the organizational practices that thrive within it, examines the psychological mechanisms that make them viable for individuals, and concludes with the technological accelerator that reinforces the cycle. Each pillar is explicitly linked to a specific leadership failure that acts as its root cause.

For a full understanding of the “conscience dust” phenomenon, a one-dimensional approach is insufficient. The phenomenon is not a simple manifestation of individual ethical failure or isolated organizational dysfunction. It is the product of a dynamic interplay of forces operating simultaneously on multiple levels: the cultural, the organizational, the psychological and the technological. However, all these factors are shaped and, ultimately, profoundly determined by leadership. Drawing on the fundamental distinction between the leader as a “Moral Person” and a “Moral Manager” (Webb, 2016), this framework is structured around four interconnected pillars that demonstrate how specific leadership failures create and sustain systemic ethical erosion.

1. The Cultural Dimension: The Leader’s Failure as an Architect of the “Greenhouse”

The first and most critical pillar is Organizational Culture, which acts as the ecosystem or “greenhouse” where the other mechanisms flourish. This culture is the direct result of leadership action or, more commonly, inaction (Johnston, 2024). A key factor that feeds “conscience dust” is the gap between espoused values (e.g. integrity, citizen service) and values-in-practice (e.g. speed, obedience, conflict avoidance) (Hamdah et al., 2024). A leader’s failure to actively manage the ethical climate renders them, in the eyes of employees, “ethically neutral,” creating an environment where integrity is perceived not as a virtue but as naivete (Lasthuizen, 2008). This failure of the leader to fulfill the role of an active “Moral Manager” is fundamental (Treviño et al., 2000). When employees observe that unethical behavior goes unpunished or that expressing ethical concerns is met with skepticism, they internalize the message that ethics are secondary to survival (Dua et al., 2023; Zhu et al., 2025). This dynamic is exacerbated when political interference undermines the credibility of leaders, eroding their ability to act as ethical role models (Eryanto et al., 2022) and forcing them into organizational silence (Ölçer and Coşkun, 2024). This turns the organizational culture into the primary vehicle for the transmission and entrenchment of “conscience dust.”

1. The Organizational Dimension: Leadership’s Complicity in the Normalization of Deviance

Within the culture of tolerance that leadership fails to correct, the normalization of deviance becomes standard operating procedure. This theory, articulated by Vaughan (1996) in her analysis of the Challenger disaster, describes a gradual process where practices, initially recognized as deviant, become repeatedly tolerated to the point where they are redefined as the new, acceptable “normality” (Pinto, 2014; Billah et al., 2025; Banja, 2010; Entwistle and Doering, 2024). This process is fueled by the relentless pressure for efficiency and speed, often imposed by leadership itself. This pressure leads employees to perceive official rules not as guarantees of quality but as bureaucratic obstacles (Dechy et al., 2018; Rauf, 2020). The creation of “shortcuts” is not framed as a violation but as pragmatism. The absence of immediate negative consequences and, crucially, the absence of sanctions from leadership, act as a powerful reinforcement (Sedlar et al., 2023). Each time a rule is bypassed without visible harm and without consequence, the belief that the rule was unnecessary is strengthened (Pinto, 2014). The failure of leadership to serve as a credible role model (Van Eeden Jones and Lasthuizen, 2018) and to enforce accountability, even for itself (Eryanto et al., 2022), sends a powerful message to the entire organization that rules are flexible, thus normalizing deviance from the top down (Li and Ng, 2013).

1. The Psychological Dimension: How Leadership Cultivates Moral Disengagement

If the normalization of deviance describes the organizational how, moral disengagement provides the psychological why, and leadership is what provides the permission. Bandura et al.’s (1996) theory describes socio-cognitive mechanisms that allow individuals to selectively deactivate their internal moral standards, enabling them to engage in unethical behavior without guilt (Newman et al., 2020). These strategies include moral justification, the use of euphemisms, and the displacement of responsibility (Luo and Bussey, 2023; Fehr et al., 2020). An employee is far more likely to resort to such justifications when their leadership has failed to create a psychologically safe environment where ethical concerns can be voiced openly (Webb, 2016; Walumbwa and Schaubroeck, 2009). When leadership fails to demonstrate behavioral integrity, that is, when there is inconsistency between their words and actions, it fosters cynicism and provides employees with the perfect alibi to justify their own moral disengagement (Hsieh et al., 2020; Takacs Haynes and Rašković, 2021). The leader’s failure to clearly communicate ethical expectations and to consistently reinforce them (a core function of the “Moral Manager”) leaves a vacuum, which employees fill with cognitive strategies that allow them to maintain a positive self-image while participating in practices they know to be deviant (Akhtar et al., 2024).

1. The Technological Dimension: “Digital Dust” as a Modern Leadership Failure

The increasing integration of technology in public administration introduces a new, powerful accelerator for the accumulation of “conscience dust,” which we term “digital dust”: the facilitation and automation of moral disengagement mechanisms through the mediation of opaque or complex technological systems. This concept must be clearly distinguished to highlight its unique analytical contribution.

First, “digital dust” differs from “algorithmic opacity.” Opacity is a technical property of a system; it describes the objective inability of users to understand its internal logic. “Digital dust,” in contrast, describes the psychological and organizational exploitation of that opacity. Opacity is the catalyst, but digital dust is the process: it is the cognitive comfort and organizational ease that allows employees to outsource judgment and, consequently, diffuse responsibility, cloaking the ethical consequences in a “dust” of technological neutrality (Karale, 2021).

Second, and more critically, “digital dust” is distinct from “automation bias.” Automation bias is a cognitive error: the human tendency to over-trust and uncritically accept the results of an automated system. “Digital dust” is something fundamentally different: it is a moral abdication. It is the conscious or subconscious use of a machine’s perceived objectivity as an ethical shield to deflect responsibility. A public official may suspect that an algorithm’s recommendation is ethically questionable but accepts it anyway, not because they trust the system’s infallibility (automation bias), but because the system provides a convenient and defensible excuse for a morally uncomfortable decision (Liang and Shu, 2025). This represents a modern failure of leadership to ensure that digitization builds new structures of transparency instead of automating existing deviance.

This study employs a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) methodology. This approach was chosen as the most suitable because the primary objective of the research is not to generate new empirical data, but rather to systematically identify, critically evaluate and synthetically analyze the existing academic literature. Through this structured approach, the study aims to construct a new, cohesive theoretical framework that explains the phenomenon of ethical erosion in public administration, which we term “conscience dust”, as a direct consequence of leadership failures. The SLR methodology ensures transparency, replicability and objectivity, allowing for a well-documented synthesis of diverse research findings into an integrated model.

The search strategy was designed to achieve the broadest possible coverage of the relevant literature. To this end, an exhaustive search was conducted across four leading electronic academic databases: Scopus, Web of Science, Semantic Scholar and Google Scholar. In each database, complex search strings were used, combining keywords related to the central concepts of the study, such as:

(TITLE ABS KEY (“moral disengagement” OR “normalization of deviance” OR “ethical erosion” OR “ethical fading”) AND TITLE ABS KEY (“public administration” OR “public sector” OR “organizational culture”) AND TITLE ABS KEY (“ethical leadership” OR “public leadership” OR “leadership failure”)).

Beyond the initial search, the “snowballing” technique was applied, encompassing both backward citation chasing and forward citation chasing, to the studies included in the final sample. This was done to identify additional foundational or recent publications that might have been missed during the initial electronic scan. The overall study selection process follows the PRISMA 2020 standard and is illustrated diagrammatically in Figure 1.

As depicted in the PRISMA flow diagram (Figure 1), the selection process resulted in a final corpus of 49 studies included in the qualitative synthesis. The process began with an initial search that yielded 850 records. After removing 230 duplicates, 620 unique articles remained for screening. During the title and abstract screening stage, 505 articles were excluded as they were not relevant. This led to 115 articles being assessed for eligibility through full-text reading. Of these, an additional 66 articles were excluded for specific reasons (e.g. lack of relevance to the research question or theoretical overlap with already selected articles), thus forming the final sample of 49 studies. This body of 49 articles formed the basis for the thematic analysis and was used for in-text citations to substantiate the core findings and emerging themes.

To ensure the quality, relevance and validity of the final synthesis, a strict framework of inclusion and exclusion criteria was applied. A fundamental prerequisite for a study’s inclusion was its publication in a peer-reviewed academic journal, its focus on at least one of the core theoretical concepts of the research (e.g. moral disengagement, normalization of deviance), and its examination of the phenomenon within an organizational context, with an emphasis on public administration. Sources such as “grey literature,” opinion articles and publications in languages other than English were excluded. A significant number of articles were excluded during the full-text review because, although they contained relevant keywords, they did not offer any substantial theoretical or empirical contribution to the topic, serving merely as descriptive or referential pieces. The criteria that guided the selection process are summarized in Table 1.

The data extraction process from the 49 studies included in the final sample was conducted independently by two researchers to minimize subjectivity and enhance reliability. A standardized data extraction form was used in a spreadsheet environment, designed for the systematic recording of specific information from each article. The fields of the form included: (a) full bibliographic details (authors, year, title, source), (b) methodological approach and context (e.g. quantitative, qualitative, country), (c) key theoretical definitions, (d) documented mechanisms linking leadership practices to ethical erosion and (e) main conclusions and suggestions for future research.

For the synthesis of the findings, the method of inductive thematic analysis was followed, which allows themes to emerge directly from the data without preconceived categories. The process, guided by the principles of Braun and Clarke (2006), evolved through six distinct stages: (1) familiarization with the data through repeated and thorough reading of the articles, (2) generation of initial codes that captured the basic meanings of the text, (3) searching for broader themes by grouping related codes, (4) reviewing and re-evaluating candidate themes to ensure their internal coherence and external distinction, (5) defining and naming the final themes and (6) writing the final analysis. Throughout the process, the two researchers consulted regularly to discuss the coding and interpretation of themes, resolving any disagreements through dialogue to achieve consensus.

Beyond data extraction, each study included in the final sample underwent a critical appraisal of its quality to ensure the integrity and validity of the final synthesis. For this purpose, an adapted 8-criterion quality checklist was used, covering three primary areas: Clarity & Focus, Methodological Rigor and Validity & Significance. The appraisal process was conducted independently by the two researchers, with a planned procedure for calibration and resolution of disagreements.

To ensure the reliability of the thematic coding process, an inter-rater reliability check was conducted using the statistical software SPSS. The analysis revealed an exceptionally high degree of agreement, with the Cohen’s Kappa coefficient for the first descriptive theme being 0.974 (p < 0.001) for a total of 49 cases. For the 7 descriptive themes, the Cohen’s Kappa values ranged from 0.625 to 0.974. This high reliability was further corroborated by a statistically significant Chi-Square (x²) test and strong correlation coefficients (e.g. Pearson’s R). The combined interpretation of these indicators confirms the high reliability of the process.

The final mapping of the descriptive themes to their corresponding analytical themes, along with indicative bibliographic sources, is presented in Table 2.

The systematic review and synthesis of the literature reveal that “conscience dust” is not a vague metaphor but a complex phenomenon arising from the interaction of four distinct but mutually reinforcing mechanisms, which are triggered and sustained by specific leadership failures. The following results are not merely a list of findings from the literature but constitute the very construction of a new, integrated diagnostic tool that places leadership at the epicenter of systemic ethical erosion.

The study selection process, detailed in the PRISMA 2020 flow diagram (Figure 1), resulted in a final corpus of 49 studies for qualitative synthesis. The process began with an initial database search that identified 850 records. After the removal of 230 duplicates, 620 unique articles remained for screening. During the title and abstract screening phase, 505 articles were excluded as they did not meet the predefined inclusion criteria. This left 115 articles for full-text eligibility assessment. Following the full-text review, an additional 66 articles were excluded for specific reasons, such as a lack of relevance to the central research question or insufficient theoretical analysis. This multi-stage filtering process led to the final selection of 49 studies deemed highly relevant and of sufficient quality for inclusion in the final analysis.

The thematic analysis of the 49 studies reveals not just four factors, but a dynamic process, a vicious cycle fueled by leadership failures. This process often begins with a Tolerant Organizational Culture, which is a direct consequence of the leader’s failure to act as a “Moral Manager.” This culture of silence and inaction creates the necessary ground for the next, inevitable link in the chain: the Normalization of Deviance, where bypassing rules gradually becomes an accepted operational practice. This organizational slide, however, is made psychologically viable for individuals only through the activation of Moral Disengagement mechanisms, which function as cognitive self-justification tools. Finally, “Digital Dust” acts as a catalytic accelerator, automating the concealment of responsibility and thus further reinforcing the initial tolerant culture, closing and perpetuating the cycle. This synergy is captured in the conceptual model presented in Figure 2.

The conceptual model of the “Anatomy of Conscience Dust” as a result of leadership failure differs substantially from the current state-of-the-art precisely because of its integrated, dynamic, and leadership-centric nature. The existing literature tends to examine the mechanisms of ethical erosion in isolation, offering powerful but fragmented explanations. The innovation of our framework lies not in introducing a new mechanism, but in revealing the collaborative architecture and self-feeding feedback loops that connect the already known mechanisms, positioning leadership failure as the primary driving force.

For example, while the work of Thornberg (2023) offers a deep analysis of the psychological mechanisms of Moral Disengagement, our framework connects this process to the organizational context that gives rise to it: the failure of leadership to address the pressure for efficiency and the gradual acceptance of rule-bending (Pinto, 2014). In this context, moral disengagement is not an abstract psychological failure but a necessary cognitive strategy enabled by leadership itself. This dynamic is further legitimized by a toxic organizational culture (Johnston, 2024), where silence functions as a “structure of social permission,” signaling that deviant practices will be tolerated. It is this emergent, self-reinforcing cycle that isolated analytical approaches fail to capture. To make this contribution clear, the table below (Table 3) contrasts our integrated model with the dominant, specialized approaches.

The analysis in the Results section revealed that “conscience dust” is not a static condition but a dynamic, self-reinforcing cycle initiated and sustained by the failure of leadership to act as an active “Moral Manager.” The systemic nature of this problem demands an equally systemic and, above all, leadership-driven response. This is the solution proposed by the present study through the “Architecture of Integrity,” a framework designed not as a general set of ethical guidelines, but as a precise antidote to the mechanisms of “conscience dust.” This framework attempts to bridge the false dichotomy between compliance-based and integrity-based approaches, arguing that resilience against a cynical culture requires a systemic interdependence of strong rules and cultivated values, a synergy actively built and maintained by leadership at all levels.

The practical value of our therapeutic framework lies in the explicit, causal link between the proposed interventions and the diagnosed pathologies. Each pillar of the “Architecture of Integrity” is specifically designed to dissolve or neutralize one or more core components of the “Anatomy of Conscience Dust,” creating a multi-layered defense against ethical erosion, as shown in Table 3.

This pillar serves as the direct antidote to the Tolerant Organizational Culture and reduces the need for Moral Disengagement. As Van Eeden Jones and Lasthuizen (2018) emphasize, effective public leadership must operate at three interconnected levels. At the Political level, it shields organizations from interventions that erode ethical credibility (Eryanto et al., 2022). At the Top-Executive level, it demonstrates the autonomy and moral courage to defend integrity (Quynh et al., 2025). And at the Managerial level, the “Moral Manager” actively shapes the culture, rewarding ethical voice and cultivating psychological safety (Walumbwa and Schaubroeck, 2009). This active shaping of norms disrupts the ecosystem that allows dust to settle (Kim, 2021; Lameck, 2022).

This pillar acts as a powerful antidote to the Normalization of Deviance and Moral Disengagement. Unlike sterile compliance training, critical education, through realistic dilemmas, trains employees to recognize the “slippery slope” of ethical erosion before it becomes entrenched (Zhou, 2023; Meyer, 2021). It immunizes employees against rationalizations, making the cognitive mechanisms of moral disengagement (e.g. euphemistic labeling, diffusion of responsibility) the object of explicit discussion and critique (Dobrowolski et al., 2022). When an employee can recognize and name the justification strategy they are tempted to use, that strategy loses much of its psychological power (Lasthuizen and Badar, 2023).

This pillar creates a structural and technical bulwark against Digital Dust and the Normalization of Deviance. It incorporates the principle of “ethics by design” (da Costa Alexandre and Pereira, 2023), ensuring that systems and processes make integrity the path of least resistance (Pakhnenko and Kuan, 2023). To counter digital dust, it requires redesigning opaque algorithms to be transparent (Zhang and Zhang, 2023). A key component of this pillar is robust Whistleblower Protection, which provides a secure, formal channel for employees to report misconduct without fear of reprisal. This acts as a critical safety valve, disrupting the culture of silence that allows deviance to become normalized. To combat the normalization of deviance more broadly, this pillar focuses on simplifying overly complex regulations that provide incentives for “workarounds” (Rauf, 2020). In this context, leaders are called to balance the pressure for efficiency (exploitation) with the need for ethical deliberation (exploration), a core principle of organizational ambidexterity (Hamblin et al., 2024).

Despite its theoretical coherence, implementing the “Architecture of Integrity” is not a linear process but a continuous exercise in balancing potentially conflicting principles. These challenges are often rooted in the competing institutional logics that characterize public administration, such as the tension between bureaucratic efficiency and democratic accountability. The pressure to meet performance targets, for instance, can create an environment where ethical shortcuts are implicitly encouraged, undermining the “Ethical Leadership” pillar. The role of middle managers becomes critical here, as they are tasked with translating high-level ethical policies into daily practice while navigating these contradictory pressures. Their ability to foster psychological safety for ethical concerns is paramount. A summary of these core implementation challenges is provided in Table 4.

The combined and mutually reinforcing function of these three pillars, which compose the “Architecture of Integrity,” is depicted schematically in Figure 3.

The primary limitation of this study is its conceptual nature. While grounded in a systematic literature review, the “Architecture of Integrity” lacks direct empirical validation. Consequently, its generalizability remains a theoretical proposition, pointing to clear directions for future research. The practical and social implications of this work are significant. Addressing the leadership failures that cultivate “conscience dust” is not merely an administrative exercise; it is fundamental to tackling broader societal challenges. Rebuilding the ethical foundation of public service is critical for restoring citizen trust, strengthening democratic legitimacy and ensuring the equitable delivery of public services.

Future research should prioritize the empirical testing of this model. A comparative analysis across administrative systems with similar characteristics, such as those in Southern Europe with traditions of clientelism and low institutional trust (Lasthuizen et al., 2019), would be particularly valuable. Such research could distinguish between universal and context-dependent drivers of ethical erosion. Furthermore, quantitative studies could explore the interaction of individual characteristics, such as gender and age (Lasthuizen and Badar, 2023), with leadership styles in predicting ethical outcomes. Validating and refining this framework can provide policymakers with a more robust, evidence-based tool for enhancing integrity and accountability in public institutions.

To illustrate the dynamic interplay of these mechanisms in practice, the following synthetic, hypothetical case is presented. Its purpose is not the empirical verification of the model, but its conceptual clarification and the depiction of its functioning within a specific administrative context. While the diagnostic model is universally applicable, the Hellenic Public Administration (HPA) provides fertile ground where the described feedback loops are particularly visible. The importance of understanding ethical leadership within its specific cultural and institutional context cannot be understated (Lasthuizen et al., 2025).

Eleni, an experienced director in a public organization, is under intense political pressure to quickly procure IT equipment for a new digital service. The official tender process is very slow. The widely accepted “solution” is contract splitting. Eleni divides the €70,000 procurement into three smaller contracts to use the faster direct award procedure. This is a clear case of Normalization of Deviance, permitted by a leadership that either silently encourages it or fails to prevent it. To reconcile this act with her professional self-image, Eleni resorts to Moral Disengagement, using moral justification (“This is for a valuable public service”) and diffusion of responsibility (“My director supports it”). The act is carried out through an electronic procurement platform that cannot detect the contract splitting, creating Digital Dust. Finally, when a younger colleague questions the process, Eleni replies: “If you want things to get done around here, this is how we do it.” With this response, Eleni, acting as a representative of failed leadership, reinforces the Tolerant Culture.

This hypothetical case echoes dynamics that are frequently documented in the literature and identified in reports by supervisory bodies on the Hellenic Public Administration. Contract splitting is a recurring finding of national oversight bodies. Eleni’s justification reflects a clientelistic mindset that often overrides formal rules, a pressure exacerbated by political interference, which undermines the credibility and autonomy of ethical leaders (Eryanto et al., 2022). Her final remark is an act of cultural reproduction, reinforcing an unwritten code where systemic flaws are not challenges to be solved, but conditions to be navigated.

The application of the “Architecture of Integrity” would radically alter this scenario. In such a context, Eleni’s leadership (Ethical Leadership at a senior level) would have provided her with the necessary political cover to resist the pressure, emphasizing the importance of adhering to the rules. The younger colleague, having received Critical Administrative Education, would not just express a vague concern but could articulate a well-founded argument about the risks of normalizing deviance. Finally, the procurement process itself, designed with the principles of Institutional Shielding (“ethics by design”), would make contract splitting technically more difficult and more easily detectable, discouraging the bypass from the outset. Eleni, instead of reinforcing a tolerant culture, would act as a model of integrity, breaking the cycle of erosion.

This study has reframed the phenomenon of ethical erosion as a pathology of leadership failure. The concept of “conscience dust” serves as a powerful analytical tool for understanding the gradual and systemic decay fueled by a vicious cycle of interactions between a tolerant culture, normalized deviance, moral disengagement, and technological mediations. The analysis reveals that this cycle of ethical decay is not inevitable; rather, it is initiated and sustained by the failure of leaders to fulfill their role as active “Moral Managers.” In response to this diagnosis, the study proposes the “Architecture of Integrity,” a prescriptive framework for cultivating integrity through targeted, level leadership interventions. Ultimately, confronting “conscience dust” requires a continuous process of ethical vigilance and institutional self-correction, guided by leaders at all levels who understand that their primary duty is to build and protect the ethical foundation of public service.

This study is a conceptual work based on a systematic literature review and does not involve human or animal subjects.