Military Leaders’ Adaptability in Unexpected Situations

This paper investigates adaptability among lower-level military leaders in unexpected threatening situations. Two studies were performed. In the first, a grounded theory approach was used, and 16 Swedish officers and soldiers with experience from international peacekeeping operations were interviewed. A model was developed based on the results. In Study 2, the model concepts from Study 1 were operationalized into a questionnaire and data was obtained from 102 respondents from the Swedish Armed Forces who had recently served in Afghanistan. Based on Study 1, the model suggests that the key aspects of adaptive leadership in such circumstances are 2 balancing acts. One is how subordinates handle structure/following rules versus their own initiatives/freedom of action. The other concerns the balance between individual decision making versus group input. Both are affected by availability of time, resulting in a favorable/unfavorable outcome. The hypotheses from Study 1 were partly confirmed in Study 2.     

The Developmental Leadership Questionnaire (DLQ): some psychometric properties

The development leadership model (Larsson et al., 2003), designed to introduce refinements to the transformational leadership model, has been adopted for use in the Swedish Armed Forces. The Developmental Leadership Questionnaire (DLQ) was constructed to measure important parts of the model. The main aim of the study was to evaluate some psychometric properties of the DLQ. Most analyses are based on two subsets of individuals from a sample mostly consisting of male Swedish, military officers, each of whom has rated a given leader (n = 450 and 449 respectively). A second sample consisted of Swedish military cadets (n = 141). The dimensionality was assessed with a confirmatory factor analysis. Most DLQ scales were reasonably well reproduced and showed high or acceptable internal consistency. When related to perceived results of leadership (self-rated by leaders and rated by subordinates), results from multiple regression analyses supported what could be predicted by the theoretical model. It was concluded that the DLQ has acceptable psychometric properties and that the theoretical refinements introduced to the developmental leadership model were empirically supported.     

A Cross‐Cultural Evaluation of a Multidimensional and Hierarchical Model of Physical Self‐Perceptions in Three National Samples1

A multidimensional and hierarchical model of self‐perceptions in the physical domain was evaluated in samples from 3 nations: Great Britain, Sweden, and Turkey. The Physical Self‐Perception Profile (PSPP; Fox & Corbin, 1989), was translated and tested for factorial and construct validity in each national sample. A first‐order confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) hypothesizing 4 latent factors representing the subdomains of sports competence, body attractiveness, physical condition, and physical strength was found to describe the PSPP data adequately for each national sample. A second‐order CFA model that hypothesized a general latent factor of physical self‐worth also exhibited good fit with the data from each sample, supporting the validity of the instrument in the national groups. Multi‐sample analyses provided support for both models across samples, although selected items exhibited disparate meanings. The subdomain mean scores were significantly higher in the British sample compared with the Swedish and Turkish samples, with the exception of the physical condition subscale, which was higher in the Swedish and Turkish samples. Overall, these findings support the factor structure of the hierarchical, multidimensional model of physical self‐perceptions across the national samples.     

A structural modeling approach to the understanding of parenting stress

Tested and cross-validated a multidimensional model of predictors of parenting stress on data from a population-based sample of Swedish mothers (N = 1,081) with children ages 6 months to 3 years. The study was a cross-sectional questionnaire study, focusing on the explanation of variance in parenting stress. Structural equation modeling procedures permitted disentanglement of total, direct, and indirect effects. A Swedish instrument based on parts of the Parent Domain in the Parenting Stress Index was used as a measure of stress. The results provided general support for the proposed model. High workload, low social support, perception of the child as fussy-difficult, negative life events, child caretaking hassles, more children in the family, and high maternal age related directly to more stress. Child irregularity contributed indirectly to mother's experienced stress. No buffering effects of social support were found. Forty-eight percent of the variance in the parenting stress measure was explained by the model. Implications for interventions were discussed.     

A direct method for multidimensional ratio scaling

A generalization of direct ratio scaling methods to multidimensional ratio scaling is described. This method requires an observer to report the proportion of a standard percept that is contained in a given percept and vice versa. The method was developed to meet requirements for experimentation in such areas as color vision, gustation, and olfaction.This investigation was supported by research grants from the Swedish Medical Research Council and the Wallenberg Foundation. The experimental work was carried out by Mr. G. Kylén.     

An Expectancy-Value Approach to Determinants of Trust

An expectancy-value model was used to test determinants of trust in 5 Swedish organizations. Trust was conceptualized as an attitude, dependent on respondents' beliefs about and evaluations of the organization with respect to attributes of trustworthiness. A survey was sent out to a representative sample of the Swedish population ( N  = 347; response rate = 55.5%). It was found that the model was powerful in explaining trust in 3 of the 5 organizations. Values correlated more with observed trust in all organizations. It is discussed whether these findings could be explained by trust ratings based on ideologies. Since the expectancy-value approach was insufficient to account for data, a double-denial model ( Sjöberg & Montgomery, 1999 ) was needed.     

Evaluations of the effects of Sweden's spanking ban on physical child abuse rates: a literature review

Sweden's 1979 law banning corporal punishment by parents was welcomed by many as a needed policy to help reduce physical abuse of children. This study reviews the published empirical evidence relevant to that goal. Only seven journal articles with pertinent data were located. One study reported that the rate of physical child abuse was 49% higher in Sweden than in the USA, comparing its 1980 Swedish national survey with the average rates from two national surveys in the United States in 1975 and 1985. In contrast, a 1981 retrospective survey of university students suggested that the Swedish abuse rate had been 79% less than the American rate prior to the Swedish spanking ban. Some unpublished evidence suggests that Swedish rates of physical child abuse have remained high, although child abuse mortality rates have stayed low there. A recent Swedish report suggested that the spanking ban has made little change in problematic forms of physical punishment. The conclusion calls for more timely and rigorous evaluations of similar social experiments in the future.     

Searching for an optimal balance: Dual career experiences of Swedish adolescent athletes

ObjectivesThe paper presents a national level Swedish project aimed at examining adolescent student-athletes' dual career experiences (including sport, studies, and private life) during their first year at national elite sport schools (Swedish abbreviation RIGs will be used) with a particular focus on development of their athletic and student identities. The developmental model of transitions faced by athletes (Wylleman & Lavallee, 2004) and the athletic career transition model (Stambulova, 2003) served as underlying frameworks.DesignA longitudinal mixed-method research design was used with autumn-to-spring quantitative and qualitative parts.MethodSixteen year old student-athletes, representing 27 sports and 33 RIGs (n = 261 in the first and n = 250 in the second measurement), completed three quantitative instruments. Additionally, in-depth interviews were conducted with 10 participants.ResultsResults revealed (a) significant changes in the participants' transition/adaptation variables from the first to the second measurement accompanied by rather high perceived quality of adjustment at RIG both at the beginning and at the end of the educational year; (b) significant contributions of the transition variables to the perceived quality of adjustment with personal resources as a key predictor; (c) significantly higher athletic than student identity in both quantitative measurements, but with inter- and intra-individual differences with regard to balancing the two shown by the qualitative data.ConclusionsThe study contributes to deeper understanding of dual career experiences of Swedish adolescent athletes; the authors provide recommendations for psychological dual career support services at RIGs and outline future research in the Swedish dual career model.     

A Swedish translation of the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale: cross-validation of the factor structure

The purpose of this study was to develop a new Swedish translation of the twenty-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) and to examine if the theoretical structure that underlies the factor structure of the English version of the TAS-20 could be recovered in this Swedish translation of the instrument. A sample of 157 undergraduate students of psychology was tested. Using confirmatory factor analysis, the previously established three-factor TAS-20 model was found to be replicable in this sample. In addition, the Swedish translation of the TAS-20 showed adequate internal reliability. The present study also illustrates the importance of using back translation methodology when transposing psychometric instruments from one language to another.     

An alternative to the methodology for analysis of covariance

A general statistical model for simultaneous analysis of data from several groups is described. The model is primarily designed to be used for the analysis of covariance. The model can handle any number of covariates and criterion variables, and any number of treatment groups. Treatment effects may be assessed when the treatment groups are not randomized. In addition, the model allows for measurement errors in the criterion variables as well as in the covariates. A wide variety of hypotheses concerning the parameters of the model can be tested by means of a large sample likelihood ratio test. In particular, the usual assumptions of ANCOVA may be tested.Research reported in this paper has been partly supported by the Swedish Council for Social Science Research under project Statistical methods for analysis of longitudinal data, project director Karl G. Jöreskog, and partly by the Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation under project Structural Equation Models in the Social Sciences, project director Karl G. Jöreskog.     

The circumplex structure of affect: A Swedish version

The taxonomy of a circumplex model has been widely applied in the emotion domain and especially by researchers advocating a systematic arrangement of conscious emotional experience (see Fabrigar, Visser & Browne, 1997; Feldman Barett & Russell, 1999 for recent reviews). To rule out some of the lexical problems in the naming of affective states in the circumplex space, Larsen and Diener (1992) suggested a labeling system with forty-eight English adjectives representing eight affective states. The objective of the present study was to examine how well Swedish adjectives map onto a dimensional model of this kind, in doing so, to compose a Swedish measure for self-reported affect. The forty-eight Swedish adjectives translated from Larsen and Diener (1992) failed to capture a pure circumplex structure. However, when approximately two thirds of these adjectives were reanalyzed, a reasonable consistency with the circumplex model was reached. This suggested a composite Swedish measure for self-rated affect, with up to four adjectives representing each of the eight affective states in the circumplex space.     

Religiosity and Swedish Opinion on the European Union

This article examines whether religiosity affects Swedish opinion on the European Union (EU) using survey data from 1998 conducted by the SOM Institute, Göteborg University. The findings support the notion that religiosity affects Swedish EU opinion. Members of the free churches (nonconformist Protestants) tend to oppose Swedish EU membership, whereas no such tendency is visible among active members of the Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Sweden (the traditional state church). Members of immigrant churches and adherents to non-Christian religions tend to support Swedish EU membership. The difference between the Church of Sweden and the free churches is explained by the uneven distribution of evangelical values. Support for Swedish EU membership is on the same low level among evangelicals and equally high among mainline Protestants in both religious orientations. Controlling for demographic factors does not change the conclusions.     

Empathizing, systemizing and finger length ratio in a Swedish sample

von Horn, A., Bäckman, L., Davidsson, T. & Hansen, S. (2010). Empathizing, systemizing and finger length ratio in a Swedish sample. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 51, 31–37.
The Empathy- and Systemizing Quotients (EQ and SQ, respectively; Baron-Cohen, 2003 ) were determined in a Swedish sample consisting mainly of university undergraduates. Females had significantly higher EQ than males, who in turn scored higher on the SQ inventory. Gender explained 12–14% of the variation. Males were strikingly overrepresented in the group defined by a high SQ/low EQ profile or by a large SQ – EQ difference; females dominated among people with a low SQ/high EQ profile or by a large EQ – SQ difference. Students majoring in the natural sciences had higher SQs than psychology majors, but in both groups the gender difference in SQ and EQ was strong. For each participant a weighted composite score was generated by multivariate processing of the EQ and SQ data (Partial Least Square Discriminant Analysis). These scores were associated in a sex-linked fashion to a biometric measure reflecting prenatal testosterone exposure, i.e. the ratio between index (2D)- and ring (4D) finger lengths. In males a high (female-typical) 2D:4D ratio predicted an enhanced tendency to empathize and a reduced tendency to systemize; in women, by contrast, the 2D:4D ratio was unrelated to these traits. The present research confirms earlier work of a gender difference in EQ and SQ. The difference appears robust as it appears as large in Sweden (a country with high cultural gender-equality) as in countries with considerably lower gender-equality.     

Time errors are perceptual

Summary Methods for the measurement of time-errors (TEs) in the comparison of successive stimulus magnitudes are discussed. Combining a Thurstonian scaling method with the assumption of a fixed subjective width of the equal category, independent of stimulus level, a ratio scale for subjective differences within pairs of successive stimuli is derived. In a tone duration comparison experiment, with the TE defined in the terms of these subjective duration differences, data from four experimental groups were compared, the groups using different modes of judging and responding. Only minor effects of this factor were found, and hence it is concluded that the TE is a true perceptual phenomenon rather than an effect of response bias, criterion bias, or mediating verbal responses to the absolute level of stimulation. The quantitative results are interpreted in terms of a general model for the comparison of successive stimuli, employing the concepts of adaptation and differential weighting of sensation magnitudes.This investigation was supported by grants to the author from the University of Stockholm and from the Swedish Office of Administrative Rationalization and Economy (for computer time), and by grants to Mats Björkman and Hannes Eisler from the Swedish Council for Social Science Research, whose free consultation service at the Department of Statistics, University of Stockholm, also benefited the author.     

Dimensions of Peer Sexual Harassment in Swedish High Schools: What Factor Structures Show the Best Fit to Girls' and Boys' Self-Reports?

Dimensions of peer sexual harassment in schools were analyzed with confirmatory factor analyses of data from a questionnaire study of 980 Swedish high-school students. The factorial structures suggested in the literature on sexual harassment in the workplace showed a bad fit to the student data, especially for boys. A nested structure, with one general factor and two specific factors (closest to the hostile environment and sexual attention categories), appeared to offer the best fit-to-data for female students. For male students, however, the structure was less clear, and the fit worse, but the presence of a general sexual harassment factor was supported also there. No acceptable model common to boys and girls could be identified.     

Five Facets Mindfulness Questionnaire—Reliability and Factor Structure: A Swedish Version

Two studies were conducted to assess the Swedish version of the Five Facets Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ), which was originally created by Baer et al. (2006). The aim of Study 1 was to examine the psychometric properties of the FFMQ using data from 495 individuals. Quantitative and qualitative analyses resulted in a reduction of the scale by 10 items. Psychometric properties, including internal consistency of the revised instrument, were examined. The Swedish FFMQ provides results comparable to those obtained by Baer. Cronbach's alphas were high for all the facets. The Swedish FFMQ appears to be a potentially useful tool in measuring mindfulness among Swedish participants. The aim of Study 2 was to test the suggested hierarchical five-factor solution and construct validity, using a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Similar to findings for the English version of the FFMQ, the CFA showed that the Observing facet was not a significant part of an overall self-reported mindfulness structure in a Swedish population with little meditation experience.     

Parents' description of conduct problems in their children - a test of the Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory (ECBI) in a Swedish sample aged 3-10

The Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory (ECBI) is a widely used 36-item uni-dimensional parent rating scale constructed to measure disruptive behavior problems in children. However, in an American sample a 22-item version, including three subscales, has been suggested in order to increase the usefulness of the ECBI. Two studies were conducted to test the ECBI in a Swedish sample (N = 841). The aims of Study I were (a) examine the psychometric properties of the ECBI (b) to investigate the correspondence between mothers' and fathers' ratings, and (c) to obtain Swedish norms. The aim of Study II was to test the suggested three-factor solution in the Swedish sample using a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). The ECBI showed good psychometric properties also in the present study, and Swedish normative data is presented. The best-fitting CFA-model was identical to the previously suggested three-factor model, which thus might be a useful alternative to the 36-item version.     

A FURTHER STUDY OF DIRECT AND INDIRECT SCALING METHODS

The direct method of ratio estimation and the indirect method of pair comparisons were used to construct scales of the political importance of eleven Swedish monarchs. The scale from pair comparisons on the assumption of Case V was a logarithmic transformation of the ratio estimation scale. This is in line with the results obtained in several previous studies.     

Representations for biased numerical judgments

Models are presented that introduce bias parameters into the numerical representations for ratio and interval judgments. An interval bias model is considered that has the capability of accounting for both interval and ratio judgments. A contrasting ratio bias model—a simple generalization of the classical model that accepts ratio judgments at face value—is also considered, and both models are tested with brightness data. The ratio estimation data lead to the conclusion that the constraints placed on the structure of the data by the classical model are too strong. In terms of goodness-of-fit and certain theoretical criteria, the interval bias model accounts for the ratio estimation data better than the ratio bias model. The interval estimation data are supportive of recent efforts directed toward the development of direct interval scaling theory.     

The interactive effect of job involvement and organizational commitment on job turnover revisited: a note on the mediating role of turnover intention

This study extends previous theoretical and empirical research on Blau and Boal's (1987) model of the interactive effect of job involvement and organizational commitment on employee withdrawal. Using longitudinal data from a survey among the nursing staff of a Swedish emergency hospital (N = 535) and register information on actual turnover, the results showed, in contrast to the statement of the original theoretical model, that turnover intention mediates the additive and multiplicative effects of job involvement and organizational commitment on actual turnover. The study suggests that the proposed involvement by commitment interaction is theoretically justified, and underscores the pertinence of investigating intermediate linkages in turnover research.