The mediating effects of career indecision subtypes on career-counseling effectiveness

The purpose of this study was to test the hypothesis that career indecision subtypes serve as a mediating variable in regard to career-counseling effectiveness, and to an attempt to detect two other mediators, i.e., individual- versus group-counseling modes and direct versus indirect test interpretation. In a pre-post design conducted on 149 undergraduate clients who went through a standard counseling process it was found that: (a) Different subtype groups gained differentially in their career decidedness; clients who “lack structure” gained the most from the treatment while clients who “perceive external barrier” and who experienced “personal conflict” gained the least, (b) Neither counseling mode nor test interpretation directiveness had significant effects or interactions with career decidedness. It was proposed that career counseling should be conducted with different contents rather than processes in order to benefit clients with various problem types.     

Family Conflict and Forgiveness Among Survivors of Suicide

This study explored the lived experiences of immediate family members who were left behind and their intra- and interpersonal struggles with other family members and their coping efforts to overcome these struggles. We used interpretative phenomenological analysis for data collection and analysis and conducted in-depth interviews with 11 participants in Korea. Two superordinate themes, with two ordinate themes in each, were identified: (a) family conflict after a family member’s suicide (“discordant grieving” and “suicide loss as a catalyst for family conflict”) and (b) forgiveness (“struggling to forgive other family members, the deceased, and themselves” and “the process and importance of forgiveness”). The implications of these findings are discussed.     

CODING VERBAL CONFLICT TACTICS: NONVERBAL AND PERCEPTUAL CORRELATES OF THE “AVOIDANCE-DISTRIBUTIVE-INTEGRATIVE” DISTINCTION

Coding procedures developed by Sillars (1980a) classified statements made during interpersonal conflict into “avoidance,”“integrative,” and “distributive” categories. In the present paper we present evidence that these distinctions provide an intuitively sound and theoretically meaningful basis for coding communication during conflict. Two studies are reported. In the first study, verbal tactics correlated in the expected ways with observer perceptions of the disclosiveness and competitiveness of conflict discussions. In the second study, several predicted relationships between verbal tactics and nonverbal behaviors were confirmed, although regression analysis indicated that most of these relationships could be accounted for by the high degree of talkativeness associated with integrative tactics. Overall support for the coding distinctions was obtained from the two studies.     

Narrative Intervention in Interethnic Conflict

This article is rooted in a narrative approach to interethnic conflict which treats them principally as competing stories. On this basis, we examine experimental strategies for narrative intervention in interethnic conflict and potential tools for their reconciliation. Narrative intervention is understood here as a set of actions to identify and disseminate narratives that can reduce negative emotions and attitudes and promote reconciliation between members of conflicting groups. In terms of new solutions, we suggest a method of “Progressive Narrative Transformation” whose key element is the establishment of common points of contact between conflicting narratives and their gradual transformation such that they may converge into a new narrative accepted and shared by both sides. We present different kinds of narratives to evaluate attitudes and emotions among Azerbaijanis, including people displaced from their homes by conflict. Analyzing responses to a “common suffering” narrative, we registered that individuals and groups are able to keep sympathetic attitudes, even implicitly, toward their opponents. Results might enable scholars in conflict resolution and reconciliation to learn how to develop strategies that take advantage of these attributes of the human mind.     

Conflict performance as a function of instructional set and absolute strength

One-hundred-twenty-eight male and female introductory psychology students performed in a conflict task. It was found that neither prior knowledge of the “correct” response nor number of practice trials prior to the conflict trial (8 versus 24) had differential effects on performance on the conflict trial. However, subjects who were shocked following an incorrect response took longer to make a decision on the conflict trial than subjects who were not shocked, and females took significantly longer than males.     

“In‐Group Love” and “Out‐Group Hate” in Repeated Interaction Between Groups

Costly individual participation in intergroup conflict can be motivated by “in‐group love”—a cooperative motivation to help the in‐group, by “out‐group hate”—an aggressive or competitive motivation to hurt the out‐group, or both. This study employed a recently developed game paradigm (Halevy, Bornstein, & Sagiv, 2008) designed specifically to distinguish between these two motives. The game was played repeatedly between two groups with three players in each group. In addition, we manipulated the payoff structure of the interaction that preceded the game such that half of the groups experienced peaceful coexistence and the other half experienced heightened conflict prior to the game. Enabling group members to express in‐group love independently of out‐group hate significantly reduced intergroup conflict. Group members strongly preferred to cooperate within their group, rather than to compete against the out‐group for relative standing, even in the condition in which the repeated game was preceded by conflict. Although both “in‐group love” and “out‐group hate” somewhat diminished as the game continued (as players became more selfish), choices indicative of the former motivation were significantly more frequent than choices indicative of the latter throughout the interaction. We discuss the implications of these findings for conflict resolution. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Meaning threat can promote peaceful,not only military‐based approaches to intergroup conflict: The moderating role of ingroup glorification

Most research on threat documents its negative consequences. Similarly, most research on intergroup contexts has emphasized their negative behavioral effects. Drawing on the Meaning Maintenance Model and recent perspectives on the potential for positivity in intergroup conflict, we predicted that meaning threat can produce both antisocial and prosocial responses to intergroup conflict, depending on people's preexisting meaning frameworks. Studies 1 and 2 demonstrated that under meaning threat, low ingroup glorifiers strengthened their support for peaceful conflict resolution, whereas high ingroup glorifiers strengthened their support for military‐based conflict resolution. In the context of the Israel–Palestinian conflict, Study 3 found that low glorification was associated with greater support for peace during “hot” (but not “cold”) conflict, because hot conflict reduced their meaning in life. These findings are consistent with the notion that when meaning is threatened, people affirm their preexisting values—whether prosocial or antisocial—even in the context of intergroup conflict.     

Two-month-old infants’ sensitivity to allophonic differences

The present study investigated 2-month-olds’ abilities to discriminate allophonic differences that are potentially useful in segmenting fluent speech. Experiment 1 investigated infants’ sensitivity to the kind of distinction that may signal the presence or absence of a word boundary. When tested with the high-amplitude sucking procedure, infants discriminated pairs of items, such as “nitrate” versus “night rate” and “nikrate” versus “nike rate.” By greatly reducing the potential contribution of prosodic differences to these contrasts, Experiment 2 evaluated whether the allophonic differences for /t/ and /r/ were sufficient for infants to distinguish the “nitrate” versus “night rate” pair. Infants distinguished “nitrate” from a cross-spliced version of “night rate,” which differed only in the allophones for /t/ and /r/ that it included. Thus, infants appear to possess one of the prerequisite capacities (i.e., the ability to discriminate allophonic distinctions) necessary to use allophonic information in segmenting fluent speech.     

« Porosité » entre travail et vie privée,conflits et aménagements : une étude comparative de deux populations de femmes

At present, little research has been done regarding the links between work and private life from the standpoint of subjective perceptions. The authors present a qualitative research focused on this issue involving women working in the fields of health and management. The content analysis revealed a double dynamic implying autonomy as well as “permeability” between the two worlds. Three subjective dimensions define this paradoxical movement: “dynamics in social relations”, the “subjective function of the body”, and the “perception of a certain mastery”. Outcomes show how psychological conflict can play an essential role in the personalization process. This was described by participants in terms of satisfaction, yet only under certain conditions.     

Konfliktsituationen im Coaching

This article describes useful consultation practices for individual coaching in typical workplace conflict situations. Our approach for understanding of workplace conflicts is based on the differentiation between various “toxic” conflictual constellations (e.g. contradiction, conflict, dilemma and double bind), between difficulties that can and cannot be resolved (e.g. problems and restrictions) and between problem solving attempts that unintentionally worsen the problems (e.g. individualizing, polarizing and evading responsibility). A sufficient readiness of the company to balance it’s own criteria for management success (e.g. profit versus workers health) and a sufficient openness to try out reflexively found solutions in the coaching process are crucial for successful coaching outcomes. Similarly, a reflexive attitude of the coach, self-critical vis a vis any ideological terms, which also acknowledges and overcomes the anxiety of the coach during the coaching process, can help coachees to find their own attitudes vis a vis the workplace conflict situation that balance cooperation and resistance.     

Response interference between functional and structural actions linked to the same familiar object

Viewing objects with the intention to act upon them may activate task-irrelevant motor responses. Many manufactured objects are associated with two action classes: grasping in accordance with object structure and skillful use consistent with object function. We studied the potential for within-object competition during action selection by comparing initiation latencies for “conflict” objects (with competing structure and function responses) to “non-conflict” objects (with a single response). We demonstrated a novel pattern of within-object interference wherein actions involving conflict objects were slowed when participants skillfully used those objects (grasp-on-use interference) as well as a second pattern of interference when conflict objects were grasped after skillfully using the same objects in previous blocks (long-term use-on-grasp interference). These data suggest that actions to common objects are influenced by competition between rapid but briefly maintained grasp responses and slower but longer-lasting use responses, and advance our understanding of the process and neural substrates of selection for action.     

Preference for local or general anesthesia,coping dispositions,learned resourcefulness and coping with surgery

Abstract

People were found to differ in their coping dispositions (as measured with the MBSS, Miller, 1987): those who habitually attend to threatening cues (“monitors”) and those who distract themselves from these cues (“blunters”). However, some people are equally high on both coping dispositions and they were considered to be in a “dispositional conflict”. Furthermore, under certain circumstances people may prefer to act in a way that is inconsistent with their coping disposition; monitors who prefer blunting strategies and blunters who prefer monitoring strategies (labeled here as “disposition-behavior conflict”). Both conflicts were hypothesized to be associated with higher levels of trait anxiety and poorer coping. 59 men scheduled for surgery were assessed as to their coping disposition (monitors or blunters) and their preference for local or general anesthesia, and their learned resourcefulness (selfantrol skills). Monitors who chose general anesthesia (and thus were unable to monitor their own surgery) and blunters who chose local anesthesia (and thus were unable to blunt) were defined as being in a disposition-behavior conflict. Re- and post-surgery measures of anxiety and dysphoria and post-surgery nurses' ratings were used for assessing coping with surgery. Patients who were either high on dispositional conflict or showed a disposition-behavior conflict were higher on trait anxiety and showed poorer post-surgery coping in comparison to patients without such conflicts. Learned resourcefulness was not related to better coping nor to the two conflicts with the exception that patients with a disposition-behavior conflict reported less confidence in their self-control abilities. Overall, preference for local anesthesia predicted better post-surgery coping.     

Entertainment events in shopping malls—profiling passive and active participation behaviors

This paper presents an empirical framework for operationalizing passive versus active participation in the context of shopping mall entertainment events (e.g., school holiday events and fashion shows) and assesses the framework's utility for segmenting and profiling shopping mall entertainment audiences. Exploratory factor analysis of data collected at shopping mall events revealed two distinct dimensions, “relax and be entertained” and “socialize and explore,” reflecting passive and active participation, respectively. From nine activities operationalizing passive versus active participation, two distinct audience segments reporting different levels of immediate and future shopping behaviors were identified. The “engage me” segment (active‐dominant audience) was more likely to stay longer at the mall, purchase food and nonfood items, share the event experience with others, and attend similar entertainment events in the future than the “entertain me” segment (passive‐dominant audience). The activities operationalizing passive versus active participation were tested with 280 participants at two family‐oriented shopping mall entertainment events. This paper extends the knowledge in the retail event marketing literature whereby it confirms passive versus active participation levels at retailing events, and verifies that passive and active participation levels can be measured and differentiated operationally. The findings provide insights on the utility of shopper participation level as a meaningful segmentation variable, pertinent to both the marketing and management of shopper experiences within a retailing entertainment event. Managerial implications and limitations of this paper are discussed. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Dominance in Marital Decision Making in Women's Liberation and Non-Women's Liberation Families

Fourteen couples of whom the wife was associated with the Women's Liberation Movement (WLM) and 14 “traditional” couples were interviewed using a modified version of the Revealed Differences Technique. The WLM-associated wives differed significantly from the control group in the dominance indices of “Speaks Last” (p < .001) and “Time Spoken” (p < .05) and in the content of responses to two of the ten interview questions. Analysis indicated that the WLM wives were more self-reliant, while the control-group wives were more passive and dependent. The two groups did not differ significantly on the “Speaks First” and “Decisions Won” indices of dominance and the conflict measures.     

Analysis of the occurrence and severity of vehicle-pedestrian conflicts in marked and unmarked crosswalks through naturalistic driving study

BackgroundAlthough many studies have been conducted on the safety of pedestrian crossings, few researches have been focused on drivers' behavior in unmarked crosswalk and marked crosswalk areas. Considering that statistics of pedestrian accidents are not the same in the two types of crossing area, based on the last report of the World Health Organization, it is very critical to evaluate driver yielding behavior to determine the differences in the actions of drivers when encountering pedestrians in the two areas.MethodsThis study was conducted based on surrogate measures of safety (SMoS) collected through a Naturalistic Driving Study on 52 participants in Iran. The study was carried out from April 2017 to April 2018 using the installation of cameras in the private vehicle of the participants. The analysis of the recorded films showed that 956 conflicts have occurred in unmarked crosswalks and 392 conflicts in marked crosswalks, respectively.ResultsA model was developed for driver yielding behavior using binary logistic regression, and showed that yielding rates in unmarked crosswalsk were about fifty percent of the yielding rates in marked crosswalks. Based on the model, it is indicated that the aggressive behavior of pedestrians during the crossing, such as running, zigzag and diagonal crossing, as well as the late detection of pedestrians by drivers resulting from high-speed driving in the unmarked crossing areas, will reduce the yielding behavior rate. Also, using the Swedish traffic conflicts technique, the severity of the conflicts was classified into four general categories: encounter, potential, slight, and serious conflict, through 30 different levels on the basis of conflicting speed and time to the accident. The results showed that pedestrians behavior during conflicts of the group “encounter” and drivers’ behavior during conflicts of the groups of “potential”, “slight” and “serious”, were the principal factors in preventing collision through an evasive maneuver. The results showed that increasing the level of conflict severity, which indicates an increase of the conflicting speed and a decrease of the time remaining to point of a possible collision with pedestrian, causes drivers to yield a harsh-maneuver to prevent collision. Soft-maneuvers such as deceleration and acceleration, as well as harsh-maneuvers such as changing the lane/stop during conflicts were most driver yielding behavior during conflict groups of slight and serious. According to the results of the analysis, the behavior of drivers in marked crossing areas is better than in the unmarked crossing area, leading to safer crossing for pedestrians.ConclusionsThis study suggests that the significant differences in driver yielding behavior in the two areas is due to the late detection of pedestrians by drivers and also the less proper action by them in unmarked crosswalk areas. Thus, the probability of accidents in Unmarked Crossing areas is higher than in marked crossing areas. Consequently, the design of improved advanced driver assistance systems to identify the risk of pedestrian accident may improve the driver yielding behavior and thus increase the safety of pedestrians.     

From “blame by praise” to “praise by blame”: Analysis of vocal patterns in ironic communication

From a communication psychology point of view, irony is not only a rhetorical figure or a cunning linguistic device, but also an articulated strategy for a flexible negotiation of meaning, as well as for establishing and maintaining relations with others. Within the “irony family” phenomena our attention is focused on the sarcastic irony generated in a conflict context (“praise by blame”) and on the kind irony produced in a cooperation context (“blame by praise”). The effects of the variability of contextual cues on the vocal variables (Fo, energy, time) of irony were studied. Through the analysis of the vocal features of standard phrases in a conflict or cooperation context, an ironic dominant pattern has been found consisting of caricatured vocal traits, although differences referring to the two ironic expressions came out. From a subject‐by‐subject analysis, four ironic patterns were obtained: (1) in the cooperation context (a) a rather high and changeable pitch and strong energy (“bantering” joy) were observed, as well as (b) a low and monotone pitch and strong energy (emphatic mark of tenderness); (2) in the conflict context (a) a very high and changeable pitch, strong energy, and slow rate of articulation (“accented banter”) were found, as well as (b) a low and not very changeable pitch, slow rate of articulation, and steadily soft energy (like scorn and cold anger). Following these four vocal patterns, the ironic voice could be defined as a “voice of banter.” In such a way, irony appears as a method used to manipulate the weight of indirect speech, which allows the efficacy of the word and the innocence of silence. Moreover, the ironist can be described as an able director of his own image, able to play with the voice. Within social relationships, in fact, he can use his own voice for calibrating strategically his ways of (un)masking himself to the others.     

RELATIONAL DISTANCE IN MANAGING CONFLICT

This study assessed the extent to which providing a problem-solving structure to conflicting dyads might impact members' use of language to mark their relational distance. It was hypothesized that conflicting subjects instructed to use a set of decision rules to resolve the conflict would use less immediate and more formal relational code choices than conflicting subjects free to resolve the conflict in any manner they chose. This hypothesis was confirmed for the immediacy, but not the formality variable. The discussion section suggested that because decision rules may encourage conflicting dyads to use less “liking” language to resolve their dispute, such rules may serve to discourage participants from creating more integrative solutions to conflicts.