Are we certain about which measure of intolerance of uncertainty to use yet?

Intolerance of Uncertainty (IU) has been understood as a dispositional tendency to view the presence of negative events as unacceptable and threatening, regardless of the likelihood of those events occurring. The preference over the 12-item vs. 27-item of the IUS has been central to debate. The goals of the present study were to evaluate two competing models of measuring IU with model-fitting analyses and explore model invariance of gender (e.g. men vs. women). A sample of 980 individuals completed an online IUS survey. Results indicated that the two-factor short-form model provided better fit to the data compared to the full-length two-factor model proposed by. Results also indicated that the short-form IUS is gender invariant, suggesting acceptable use among men and women. These findings provide further support of a two-factor structure and suggest that the IUS is appropriate for men and women.     

Where Men Appear More Religious Than Women: Turning a Gender Lens on Religion in Israel

Past research, typically focused on Christians in Christian nations, has found that women tend to be more religious than men. This study uses original nationally representative data (N = 5,601) with strategic oversamples of minority groups to examine variation in how religion and gender intersect across ethnoreligious identities in Israel. We demonstrate that Israel diverges from the typical pattern of women appearing more religious than men. In fact, Israeli men are consistently more religious than Israeli women on commonly used measures and frequently more religious on a broader set of questions specific to Judaism and Israel. Subgroup analyses highlight the intersectional nature of gender and religion, showing that men's greater religiosity in Israel is limited to Jews, and, more specifically, nonsecular Jews. We suggest that gender gaps arise, at least in part, because religions are gendered institutions with gendered norms, expectations, and incentives, and that these norms, expectations, and incentives vary from religion to religion.     

Living with Contradictions: The Taken-for-Granted in Israeli Political Discourse

Two apparently contradictory ideas are closely linked in Israeli political discourse: Israel is powerful and independent and Israel is vulnerable and dependent. This study used content analysis and focus groups, as well as existing survey data analyzed by others, to explore how this paradox has been reflected in newspapers and conversations during six different time periods from 1948 to 1996. The goal was not to explain the paradox but to examine its consequences for Israeli perceptions of U.S. policy in the Middle East—and, in the process, to explore Israeli self-images. The nature of U.S. strategic interests was originally treated as problematic and in need of political discussion, but in the past 25 years these interests have become taken for granted. Surprisingly, even after the end of the Cold War, a critical discourse moment in which a reexamination of U.S. interests in the Middle East would seem inevitable, the U.S. role remains taken for granted and largely unexamined. The strong/vulnerable paradox explains this absence of discussion: Examining U.S. interests too closely upsets the delicate balance that keeps the sense of vulnerability in check.     

The Factor Structure and Measurement Invariance of the Daily Spiritual Experiences Scale

The current study has two main goals: (a) to identify a factor structure of the Daily Spiritual Experiences Scale (DSES) on a large archival data, collected from 1,325 adults in the United States (709 women, 616 men) by the U.S. General Social Survey in 2004 and (b) to examine the measurement invariance of the 16 DSES items between women and men in the same data to see whether any of the items are favoring or biased toward either women or men. The one-factor confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) model fit our data better than the two-factor CFA models because of high correlations between the two factors (r > .90). The fit of the one-factor CFA to our sample data was improved when we specified seven correlated residuals suggested by overlapping item content and large modification indices. The ensuing measurement invariance testing of the one-factor CFA model with seven correlated residuals supported full measurement invariance of factor loadings, thresholds, and residual variances, as well as factor variances between the women and the men. Yet the factor mean for the women was .841 units (Cohen’s d = .496) higher than it was for the men, indicating that higher levels of daily spiritual experiences for women reported in gender comparison studies in the United States are not likely to be an artifact of bias in the questionnaire.     

Reliability and validity of japanese children's trait and state worry and emotionality scales

There is a belief in both Japan and the U.S. that high levels of test anxiety interfere with performance. However, there are no measures of anxiety (i.e., worry or emotionality) for Japanese children. In this study, since the consequences of testing are even more salient in Japan than the U.S., it was expected that levels of anxiety, both trait and state, would be higher in Japan than the U.S. Further, we expected that the two-factor structure (worry and emotionality) of both trait and state anxiety scales would be verified and that females would exhibit more anxiety than males. In general, the results for the state worry and emotionality scale were consistent with expectations. On the trait scales, anxiety was less than the United States version. Further, there was not a two-factor structure. There was no effect of sex on any of the anxiety measures.     

Psychological Entitlement and Ambivalent Sexism: Understanding the Role of Entitlement in Predicting Two Forms of Sexism

Recent research has shown that narcissistic men in the United States express more ambivalent sexism than their non-narcissistic counterparts. The present study sought to extend these findings by hypothesizing that psychological entitlement would be a predictor of ambivalent sexism but that that this relationship may vary by gender. Given entitlement’s associations with hostility and aggression and the previously established link between narcissism and sexism in men, we hypothesized that entitlement would predict hostile sexism in men. Given that entitlement is characterized by a pervasive sense of deservingness for special treatment and goods, we expected that entitled women would endorse attitudes of benevolent sexism. These hypotheses were tested using two cross-sectional samples in the U.S.—a sample of undergraduates from a private university in the Midwest (N?=?333) and a web-based sample of adults across the U.S. (N?=?437). Results from regression analyses confirmed that psychological entitlement is a robust predictor of ambivalent sexism, above and beyond known predictors of sexism such as low openness and relevant covariates such as impression management. In addition, entitlement was a consistent predictor of benevolent sexism in women, but not in men, and a consistent predictor of hostile sexism in men, but not in women. These relationships were largely robust, persisting even when relevant covariates (e.g., socially desirable responding, trait openness) were controlled statistically, although in one sample the link between entitlement and hostile sexism in men was reduced to non-significance when benevolent sexism was controlled for statistically. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

Nothing New Under the Sun? A Comparison of Images of Women in Israeli Advertisements in 1979 and 1994

The changing role of women in society hascreated a challenging task for advertisers — howto portray women in advertisements. The subject of thisarticle is a comparison of two studies undertaken in1979 and 1994 of the portrayal of women and men inprinted Israeli advertisements. These studies respond,in part, to the need articulated by Durkin (1985) forthe analysis of advertisements from countries other than the United States. While Durkin focused ontelevision, however, this study concentrates onadvertisements in the print media because Israelicommercial television is very young, having made itsdebut only at the beginning of the 1990s. The purposeof this paper is essentially twofold: first, to provideevidence about gender display in advertising in Israel— a non-English speaking, capitalist, Western democracy that nevertheless possesses strongtraditional normsand second, to provide a comprehensivepicture of Israel's advertising print output byanalyzing various daily newspapers andmagazines.     

The structure of women's mood in the early postpartum

The "postpartum blues" is a mild, predictable mood disturbance occurring within the first several days following childbirth. Previous analyses of the "blues" symptom structure yielded inconclusive findings, making reliable assessment a significant methodological limitation. The current study aimed to explicate the symptom structure of women's mood following childbirth, and to examine psychometric properties of the Daily Experiences Questionnaire (DEQ), an adapted version of the Kennerley Blues Questionnaire that included additional items from the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule. Mothers who recently delivered (N = 216) were recruited from a university hospital and asked to complete mood ratings on six consecutive days using the DEQ. Exploratory factor analysis yielded an interpretable two-factor solution identified as Negative Affect and Positive Affect. Scale reliability indices were excellent, with a high level of agreement in factor structure over time. This two-factor model provides reliable assessment of women's mood in the early postpartum, informing the study of reproductive-related mood disorders.     

Gender Group Differences in Coping with Chronic Terror: The Israeli Scene

Gender group differences in terror–stress, cognitive appraisals, ways of coping with terror, and stress reactions were explored in a sample of Israeli adults following prolonged exposure to political violence. Data were gathered at the height of the Al-Aqsa Intifada uprising (May/July 2002) from a sample of 707 adult participants (60% women and 40% men) residing in Haifa and northern Israel. Israeli women reported that they were more distressed by political violence than the men did, and they also appraised the crisis situation as more threatening and less manageable. Women reported using more problem-focused as well as emotion-focused coping than men did; both men and women used a mixture of coping strategies. Compared to men, women reported that they experienced more somatic symptoms and more frequent posttraumatic stress symptoms than men did. Negative affectivity was found to mediate gender differences in appraisals, coping, and outcomes. Overall, the nexus of relations among key variables was found to be highly similar for men and women. These data suggest that women may be more reactive to chronic political violence situations than men are. The data are discussed and explicated in the context of stress and coping theory and prior research on political violence and community disasters.     

Adult Israeli Community Norms for the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI)

The study aim is to establish Israeli norms for the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI). A nationwide representative sample of 510 community respondents (age range 35–65, 51.4% women) completed the Hebrew version of the BSI. The data showed high internal reliabilities for the 9 BSI scales, as well as for their total score, indicated by the General Severity Index (GSI). Higher levels of GSI were found for widowed, divorced, and single respondents than for married respondents. Higher GSI was also found for unemployed and retired men than the self-employed and employees, validating the GSI as a measure of distress. Most importantly, the scores of the Israeli GSI, as well as each of the 9 scales, were higher than those reported in either the U.S. or the British norms. These findings may indicate that Israeli society is experiencing relatively high distress, highlighting the need for establishing BSI norms for each culture.     

An invariant dimensional liability model of gender differences in mental disorder prevalence: evidence from a national sample

Epidemiological studies of categorical mental disorders consistently report that gender differences exist in many disorder prevalence rates and that disorders are often comorbid. Can a dimensional multivariate liability model be developed to clarify how gender impacts diverse, comorbid mental disorders? We pursued this possibility in the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC; N = 43,093). Gender differences in prevalence were systematic such that women showed higher rates of mood and anxiety disorders, and men showed higher rates of antisocial personality and substance use disorders. We next investigated patterns of disorder comorbidity and found that a dimensional internalizing-externalizing liability model fit the data well, where internalizing is characterized by mood and anxiety disorders, and externalizing is characterized by antisocial personality and substance use disorders. This model was gender invariant, indicating that observed gender differences in prevalence rates originate from women and men's different average standings on latent internalizing and externalizing liability dimensions. As hypothesized, women showed a higher mean level of internalizing, while men showed a higher mean level of externalizing. We discuss implications of these findings for understanding gender differences in psychopathology and for classification and intervention.     

Acculturation models of immigrant Soviet adolescents in Israel

This study probed acculturation in Israel of immigrant students from the former U.S.S.R. from the perception of the host society and the students. The finding from a questionnaire distributed to Israeli-born and immigrant students indicated that most but not all of the Israel-born students applied an assimilatory model while the immigrants were split between those who accepted the Israeli students and those who resisted them. Thus, ethnic relation typologies and critical sociology of education concepts can explain only part of the immigrants' attitudes. It was found that both the host society and the immigrants have different attitudes toward the culture of the other, and thus use different acculturation strategies.     

A TEST OF SHAVELSON'S HIERARCHICAL MULTIFACETED SELF-CONCEPT MODEL IN A FILIPINO COLLEGE SAMPLE

Shavelson's hierarchical, multifaceted self-concept model (HMFM) has proven useful to educational and psychological researchers. The reliability and factorial validity of a well-known HMFM instrument - the Fleming-Courtney Self-Rating Scales (SRS) - were examined for a sample of 198 Filipino college students. Confirmatory factor analysis compared six structural models. A six-factor, oblique model that included two social factors (Social Acceptance and Social Anxiety) fit the data best, and a second-order factor analysis supported the hierarchical structure of the SRS. The men were significantly higher than the women on three self-concept scales, but the only large effect was for Physical Abilities, consistent with findings in a U.S. college sample. Results provided some support for the utility of both the SRS and HMFM for Filipinos.     

When Civic Virtue isn’t Seen as Virtuous: The Effect of Gender Stereotyping on Civic Virtue Expectations for Women

We examined the extent to which observers’ expectations of target employees’ civic virtue organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) are a function of both observer- (gender stereotype activation, threat) and target-related (gender) influences. Consistent with a role congruity perspective, we proposed that civic virtue (constructive involvement in the political governance process of the organization) will be expected to a lesser extent of women, but only when gender stereotypes are activated. We confirm this hypothesis across two studies. In Study 1, based on a sample of 187 U.S. undergraduate students (101 women, 86 men), we show that less civic virtue is expected of women when observers’ gender stereotypes are experimentally activated (vs. the non-activated condition). Using an additional sample of 197 U.S. undergraduate students (Study 2; 118 women, 79 men), we extend our findings by demonstrating that less civic virtue was expected of women in a high (vs. low) threat (manipulated) condition. Findings for men are included for comparative and general informational purposes only. We observed no significant changes in civic virtue expectations for men due to our study manipulations. Our research extends prior studies by showing that expectations for civic virtue are diminished for women, but only when gender stereotypes and threat are activated.     

The effect of construal level on unethical behavior

Construal level theory predicts that people will judge immoral events more harshly when these are presented in a way that elicits a higher construal level, relative to a lower construal level. Previous research supported this prediction using an Israeli sample but not a U.S. sample. This article compared Israeli and U.S. samples with respect to the interactive effect of utility and construal level on unethical behavioral intentions. We found that construal level did not affect unethical behavioral intentions in either the U.S. samples for low-utility level or the Israeli samples for low- and high-utility levels. In contrast, construal level affected unethical behavioral intentions in the U.S. sample for high-utility level: unethical behavioral intentions were higher in the low-construal level compared to the high-construal level. We discuss these findings and suggest additional factors that challenge arguments concerning the direct effect of construal level on unethical behavior.     

Concurrent Use of Cigarettes,Alcohol, and Coffee1

The interrelationships between cigarette, alcohol, and coffee use were examined in 307 U.S. army trainees and 304 U.S. enlisted army personnel. Usage patterns indicated distinct gender differences in this occupational setting. Among women, cigarette use and alcohol consumption were positively correlated; whereas for men, cigarette and coffee use were positively related. For both males and females, alcohol and coffee use were only weakly correlated. As demonstrated in other studies, nonsmokers showed a consistent pattern of abstention from coffee and alcohol or moderate alcohol use.     

Rights and rites: Women's roles in liberal religious movements in Israel

A study of the Reform and Conservative movements in Israel indicates that the question of women's rights in these Jewish denominations is essentially dormant. This is in contrast with the lively discussion of the role of women in American Jewish life. The demand for greater roles in the synagogue may be affected by the general societal orientation toward women's rights. In the Israeli case, there is no stimulant from a general movement for women's rights to lead to such demands among religious adherents.The field work upon which this study is based was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health, U.S. Public Health Service (Grant Number IR03 MH124072-01A1). Gratitude is also expressed to the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture and to Bar Ilan University for fellowships during the study period. The author is also grateful to Bernard Lazerwitz, Michael Harrison, David Glanz, J. Alan Winter, and an anonymous reviewer of this journal for their comments to a draft of this article.     

The ideological manipulation of Hebrew literature in English translation in the 1970s and 1980s

In the past two decades, the field of translation studies has increasingly focused on the role of ideology in literary translation and cross-cultural transfer. This paper presents findings from the close textual comparison of original works of Hebrew literature and their English translations published in the United States during the 1970s and 1980s. I specify translation strategies that have had ideological effects on the source texts, and demonstrate how historically or ethically charged subject matter was manipulated so as to subdue “problematic” aspects of the text for the (largely Jewish) target audience. The two major categories of manipulations had to do with the moral dimension of the portrayal of Israel and Israeli society, particularly in subject matter related to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict; and with the relationship between Israel and other nations, and between Israel and Diaspora Jews. As stressed by recent sociological studies of translation, the translations can be seen both as reflective of contemporary socio-political trends of thought, and as practices playing an unseen role in strengthening these trends.     

Morning Passages from Home to Work Among Managers in Israel: Intergender Differences

This paper presents a study on morning passages from home to work. The sample consisted of 226 Israeli parents working in managerial positions (136 men and 90 women). Eighty percent of the participants were Israeli-born, and the rest immigrated to Israel at a young age. In the study, I examined gender differences in emphasis on domestic and work activities at 3 main transitional stages in the morning: home transitions (30 min before leaving for work), on the way to work, and at work (the first 30 min after arrival at work). The findings indicate that in the home-transition women focused more on domestic tasks than on work tasks, whereas men showed the opposite tendency. On the way to work, women tended to intensify their involvement in work activities, but remained strongly concerned with domestic activities. Men, however, focused primarily on work tasks during this transition. In the work transition, both men and women were more concerned with work tasks than domestic tasks. Therefore, even though men and women focused on different tasks in the initial transition, by the time they arrived at the workplace, they were immersed to the same extent in work activities. Furthermore, the participants' age, children's ages, and years of marriage correlated negatively with emphasis on domestic tasks during the home transition regardless of gender.