The role of future time perspective in psychological contracts: A study among older workers

Using a sample of post-retirement workers (N = 176), this study investigated the role of future time perspective (FTP) in psychological contracts. The study aimed to test: (i) whether future time perspective is related to employer psychological contract fulfillment and (ii) whether it moderates relations between psychological contract fulfillment and employee obligations. Based on previous work, three types of employer psychological contract fulfillment are examined: economic, socio-emotional, and developmental fulfillment. FTP was expected to relate positively to developmental fulfillment. Moreover, people with limited future time perspective were hypothesized to manifest a stronger relationship between economic and socio-emotional fulfillment and employee obligations. Results showed that future time perspective is indeed significantly related to developmental fulfillment, and also moderated the relations between contract fulfillment and employee obligations. More specifically, economic and socio-emotional fulfillments were significantly stronger related to obligations among older workers with high FTP.     

Psychological contracts and their implications for commitment: A feature-based approach

Two studies were conducted to examine the link between employee perceptions of the psychological contract and their affective and normative commitments to the organization. The authors adapt a new approach to the study of psychological contracts by developing a generalizable measure of contract features (e.g., scope; time frame). In Study 1 (N = 301), the authors predicted and found that employees’ perceptions of the contract’s features contributed beyond perceptions of contract type (i.e., transactional; relational) and fulfillment to the prediction of affective and normative commitment. In Study 2 (N = 147), the features measure was refined and results from the first study were largely replicated. In both studies, affective and normative commitment were greater when employees viewed the contract as broad, trust-based, equal, negotiated, tangible, and long-term, and weaker when they saw it as unequal, imposed, and short-term. We also found evidence for patterns of features that correspond to transactional and relational contracts, as well as to recently proposed balanced contracts and I-Deals. Implications for theory and the management of psychological contracts are discussed.     

Why be my colleague’s keeper? Moral justifications for peer review

Justifying ethical practices is no easy task. This paper considers moral justifications for peer review so as to persuade even the sceptical individualist. Two avenues provide a foundation for that justification: self-interest (the right behaviour is that which maximally serves one’s own interests) and social contract theory (the right behaviour is that which best meets obligations set in binding social contracts). A wider notion of “interest” permits the self-interest approach to justify not only submitting one’s own work to peer review but also removing oneself momentarily from the production of primary knowledge to serve as a rigorous, independent, and honest referee. The contract approach offers a non-selfish alternative and relies on four types of binding social contracts: those implicit in accepting funds, those implicit in asserted professional status, those to contribute what is of most value to society, and those to defend the ideals of the Academy. Efforts to restore respect for rigorous, independent, honest peer review should begin in earnest.     

Implicit and explicit false belief development in preschool children

The ability to represent the mental states of other agents is referred to as Theory of Mind (ToM). A developmental breakthrough in ToM consists of understanding that others can have false beliefs about the world. Recently, infants younger than 2 years of age have been shown to pass novel implicit false belief tasks. However, the processes underlying these tasks and their relation to later‐developing explicit false belief understanding, as well as to other cognitive abilities, are not yet understood. Here, we study a battery of implicit and explicit false belief tasks in 3‐ and 4‐year‐old children, relating their performance to linguistic abilities and executive functions. The present data show a significant developmental change from failing explicit false belief tasks at 3 years of age to passing them at the age of 4, while both age groups pass implicit false belief tasks. This differential developmental trajectory is reflected by the finding that explicit and implicit false belief tasks do not correlate. Further, we demonstrate that explicit false belief tasks correlate with syntactic and executive functions, whereas implicit false belief tasks do not. The study thus indicates that the processes underlying implicit false belief tasks are different from later‐developing explicit false belief understanding. Moreover, our results speak for a critical role of syntactic and executive functions for passing standard explicit false belief tasks in contrast to implicit tasks.     

职业院校教师情感承诺与职业倦怠的关系：情感承诺的中介作用和职称的调节作用

通过整群取样法对全国14个省市36所职业院校共1237名专职或兼职专业教师进行测查,探讨心理契约履行对教师职业倦怠的影响作用机制,即情感承诺在其中的中介作用,以及职称对上述关系的调节效应。结果表明：（1）情感承诺在心理契约履行对职业倦怠的影响关系中起了部分中介作用;（2）教师职称对心理契约履行对职业倦怠的影响作用具有调节效果;使用总效应调节模型对情感承诺在心理契约履行对教师职业倦怠的中介效应及教师职称的调节作用进行综合性分析,发现教师职称主要在第一阶段,即心理契约履行对情感承诺的影响作用上调节效果显著。当教师的职称较低时,上述关系及效应也越强。     

Do they know how hard I work? Investigating how implicit/explicit achievement orientation,reputation, and political skill affect occupational status

Researchers have yet to precisely test the Socioanalytic proposition that social skill moderates the personality identity–personality reputation relationship. Further, although research has found personality to have both explicit and implicit aspects, scholars have not examined these differences with respect to the Socioanalytic perspective on personality. The present study investigates how explicit and implicit achievement orientation identities relate to one’s reputation for that trait in the workplace and to career success, as measured by occupational status. We propose that explicit and implicit achievement orientation, political skill and their interplay positively relate to reputation of achievement orientation at work, which, in turn, is positively related to occupational status. We found that (1) both explicit and implicit achievement orientation were positively associated with its reputation, as rated by co-workers; (2) reputation mediated both relations between implicit/explicit achievement orientation and occupational status and (3) heightened political skill strengthened the relationship between explicit achievement orientation and its reputation, as well as its indirect effect on occupational status via reputation (first stage moderated mediation). Our research provides a potential explanation for why observer ratings of personality are more strongly associated with outcomes than self-ratings: Observers perceive both implicit and explicit personality behaviours.     

Together we are strong: Explicit and implicit paranormal beliefs predict performance in a knowledge test of paranormal phenomena better than explicit beliefs alone

The belief in paranormal phenomena is a frequently studied topic. Studies predominantly assess explicit (i.e., conscious) parts of paranormal belief (PB) using questionnaire-based self-report measures which are prone to impression management and social desirability tendencies. In order to investigate the usefulness of measuring implicit (i.e., automatic) PB, we developed a PB Implicit Association Test (PB-IAT). Implicit PB was uncorrelated with explicit PB, but moderated the relationship between explicit PB and participants’ knowledge of paranormal phenomena. Participants with a weak implicit PB did not differ in their knowledge scores regardless of whether they had strong or weak explicit PB. But participants with strong implicit PB had higher scores when they also had strong explicit PB compared to participants with weak explicit PB. These results suggest that discrepant configurations of PB impair performance in a knowledge test about paranormal phenomena.     

Full-Time versus Part-Time Employees: Understanding the Links between Work Status, the Psychological Contract, and Attitudes

Research findings comparing the work attitudes of full-time and part-time employees have been inconsistent and inconclusive. Furthermore, empirical studies have tended to be atheoretical, and there are few convincing psychological explanations to explain differences where found. This article tests the psychological contract as an explanatory framework for attitudinal differences across work status (i.e., whether employed on a part-time or full-time basis). The model is tested across samples from two different organizations using structural equation modeling. The analysis reveals that part-time and full-time employees differed on a number of attitudes and that psychological contract fulfillment could be used to explain differences in certain attitudes (e.g., satisfaction) but not others (e.g., affective commitment). Analyses also show that the relationships between psychological contract fulfillment and outcomes were rarely moderated by work status, suggesting that part-time employees will respond in a similar way as full-time employees to adjustments in their psychological contract.     

Dimensions of Success and Motivation Needs Among Managers

In this study, we examined the relationship between needs for achievement (n Ach) and power (n Pwr) and the importance of six dimensions of life success among a sample of 454 managerial women and men in southeastern Florida. Results showed that n Ach was significantly correlated with all four work-related success dimensions: status/wealth, personal fulfillment, and professional fulfillment (positively), and with security (negatively). N Ach was not correlated with either of the two nonwork-related success dimensions of family relationship and social contribution. N Pwr was significantly correlated with all the same work-related success dimensions except professional fulfillment; it was also correlated significantly with the non work-related dimension of social contribution but not with family relationships.     

Cultural variation in implicit independence: An extension of Kitayama et al. ()

Previous research shows that European Americans are consistently more independent (or less interdependent) than Japanese when implicit indices are used to assess independence (vs. interdependence). The present work extended this evidence by including a novel implicit association test (IAT), as an index of implicit attitude towards independence and interdependence. Consistent with the previous findings, as compared to Japanese, Americans were significantly higher in multiple indices of implicit independence (vs. interdependence) including personal (vs. social) self‐definition, experience of disengaging (vs. engaging) emotions and personal (vs. social) form of happiness. Furthermore, as compared to Japanese, Americans had a significantly more positive implicit attitude towards independence assessed with the IAT. As also observed in the previous research, explicit measures showed inconsistent cross‐cultural patterns. Lastly, we observed little statistical within‐culture coherence among the implicit measures of independence (vs. interdependence), consistent with a view that the implicit indices capture alternative ways for individuals to achieve the cultural mandate of independence or interdependence.     

Psychological Contracts, Organizational and Job Commitment

Increased use of time-limited contracts as the mainstay of employer-employee relations has implications for the psychological character of the exchange relationship. To investigate this, the current study is framed by Rousseau's (1995) psychological contract model (PCM). The psychological contract pertains to beliefs held by individuals about their contractual terms and conditions. The findings yield evidence for Rousseau's distinction between two types of contractual belief (relational and transactional), as well as the explanatory potential of the PCM over and above the concept of organizational commitment. As predicted. temporary workers were more transactional than relational in their contractual orientation. The findings are discussed with reference to a need to develop a theoretical basis for research on organizational involvement.     

Can you get a better deal elsewhere? The effects of psychological contract replicability on organizational commitment over time

Previous research on psychological contracts has focused on whether or not employees feel their employers have fulfilled the promises made to them. Instead, here we examine how perceptions of the external labor market, particularly about whether present psychological contracts could be replicated elsewhere, influence employees’ attachment to their current employers. In a longitudinal study of a diverse employee sample, we found perceptions that psychological contracts could not be replicated elsewhere accounted for a substantial amount of the variance in affective commitment (.38) and normative commitment (.29) and a smaller, but significant, amount of the variance in continuance commitment (.04). We also found significant moderating effects of age, work experience, and career stage on these relationships. The article concludes with implications for psychological contract theory, organizational commitment theory, and management practice.     

Foxhole atheism,revisited: The effects of mortality salience on explicit and implicit religious belief

Although fear of death features prominently in many historical and contemporary theories as a major motivational factor in religious belief, the empirical evidence available is ambivalent, and limited, we argue, by imprecise measures of belief and insufficient attention to the distinction between implicit and explicit aspects of cognition. The present research used both explicit (questionnaire) and implicit (single-target implicit association test; property verification) measurement techniques to examine how thoughts of death influence, specifically, belief in religious supernatural agents. When primed with death, participants explicitly defended their own religious worldview, such that self-described Christians were more confident that supernatural religious entities exist, while non-religious participants were more confident that they do not. However, when belief was measured implicitly, death priming increased all participants' beliefs in religious supernatural entities, regardless of their prior religious commitments. The results are interpreted in terms of a dual-process model of religious cognition, which can be used to resolve conflicting prior data, as well as to help explain the perplexing durability of religious belief.     

Loneliness, social support and cardiovascular reactivity to laboratory stress

Self-reported or explicit loneliness and social support have been inconsistently associated with cardiovascular reactivity (CVR) to stress. The present study aimed to adapt an implicit measure of loneliness, and use it alongside the measures of explicit loneliness and social support, to investigate their correlations with CVR to laboratory stress. Twenty-five female volunteers aged between 18 and 39 years completed self-reported measures of loneliness and social support, and an Implicit Association Test (IAT) of loneliness. The systolic blood pressure (SBP), diastolic blood pressure (DBP) and heart rate (HR) reactivity indices were measured in response to psychosocial stress induced in the laboratory. Functional support indices of social support were significantly correlated with CVR reactivity to stress. Interestingly, implicit, but not explicit, loneliness was significantly correlated with DBP reactivity after one of the stressors. No associations were found between structural support and CVR indices. Results are discussed in terms of validity of implicit versus explicit measures and possible factors that affect physiological outcomes.     

Priming meritocracy and the psychological justification of inequality

The belief that status in society is based on merit is a central feature of the American Dream. This belief system justifies status inequalities by locating the cause of status differences in the individual talents and efforts of group members. We hypothesized that activating meritocratic beliefs increases the extent to which individuals psychologically justify status inequalities, even when those inequalities are disadvantageous to the self. Specifically, we hypothesized that priming meritocracy prompts individuals to engage in system-justifying psychological responses when they experience threat either at the personal or group level. Across two studies, priming meritocracy led members of a low status group to justify both personal and group disadvantage by decreasing perceptions of discrimination (Studies 1 and 2) and increasing the extent to which they stereotyped themselves and their group in status-justifying ways (Study 2).     

Testing the differential effects of changes in psychological contract breach and fulfillment

Rousseau (1989 and elsewhere) argued that a defining feature of psychological contract breach was that once a promise had been broken it could not easily be repaired and therefore that the effects of psychological contract breach outweighed those of psychological contract fulfillment. Using two independent longitudinal surveys, this paper investigated whether changes in breach and fulfillment differentially affected work-related attitudes and affective well-being outcomes. Results generally supported differential effects, where increases in reported breach had greater effects on outcomes than increases in fulfillment, for the outcomes of affective wellbeing, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment. The present study underlined the importance of breach as a determinant of negative affect and attitudes. However, fulfillment had a lesser impact, in that it maintained (i.e., had no effect) or had only a modest positive effect on wellbeing and attitudes.     

Is the Implicit Association Test a Valid and Valuable Measure of Implicit Consumer Social Cognition?

This article discusses the need for more satisfactory implicit measures in consumer psychology and assesses the theoretical foundations, validity, and value of the Implicit Association Test (IAT) as a measure of implicit consumer social cognition. Study 1 demonstrates the IAT's sensitivity to explicit individual differences in brand attitudes, ownership, and usage frequency, and shows their correlations with lAT‐based measures of implicit brand attitudes and brand relationship strength. In Study 2, the contrast between explicit and implicit measures of attitude toward the ad for sportswear advertisements portraying African American (Black) and European American (White) athlete–spokespersons revealed different patterns of responses to explicit and implicit measures in Black and White respondents. These were explained in terms of self‐presentation biases and system justification theory. Overall, the results demonstrate that the IAT enhances our understanding of consumer responses, particularly when consumers are either unable or unwilling to identify the sources of influence on their behaviors or opinions.     

What do you think about ink? An examination of implicit and explicit attitudes toward tattooed individuals

Tattoos are increasing in popularity, yet minimal research has examined implicit attitudes or the relationship between implicit and explicit attitudes toward tattooed individuals. Seventy-seven online participants (Mage = 36.09, 52% women, 78% white, 26% tattooed) completed measures assessing implicit and explicit attitudes toward tattooed individuals. Results revealed evidence of negative implicit attitudes, which were associated with less perceived warmth, competence, and negative explicit evaluations. However, implicit attitudes were not correlated with measures of disgust or social distance. In addition, age predicted implicit prejudice, but other individual difference measures—such as personal tattoo possession, political identity, and internal/external motivations to respond without prejudice—did not. These findings are discussed in terms of how attitudes toward tattooed individuals may be multifaceted, and research may benefit from measuring implicit and explicit attitudes.     

British Olympic hopefuls: The antecedents and consequences of implicit ability beliefs in elite track and field athletes

ObjectivesThis study provided an in-depth examination of the implicit ability beliefs held by elite British track and field athletes, including the antecedents and consequences of these beliefs.Design and MethodsA qualitative design was employed involving semi-structured interviews with 4 Olympic hopefuls in the sport of track and field athletics. Thematic analysis was utilised to interpret the results of the study, involving a combination of inductive and deductive approaches.ResultsThe core components of ability beliefs included beliefs that ability is stable, ability is malleable, and that it is possible to build on natural ability. A variety of personal, social and environmental antecedents appeared to influence the athletes' ability beliefs. The consequences of implicit beliefs encompassed three major themes, which were achievement motivation, setbacks and attributions for success and failure.ConclusionsThe results from the analysis indicated that the athletes' implicit beliefs were very specific, as their beliefs about ability appeared to underpin sport-specific performance. The belief that ability was malleable was universal amongst the athletes and this may be related to their age, experience, high perceived ability and the high level at which they compete. However, the athletes believed that although natural ability is useful, talent is only a small part of the equation as learning, improving and working hard are all necessary for success at the highest level.     

Moderators of the relationship between implicit and explicit evaluation

Automatic and controlled modes of evaluation sometimes provide conflicting reports of the quality of social objects. This article presents evidence for 4 moderators of the relationship between automatic (implicit) and controlled (explicit) evaluations. Implicit and explicit preferences were measured for a variety of object pairs using a large sample. The average correlation was r=.36, and 52 of the 57 object pairs showed a significant positive correlation. Results of multilevel modeling analyses suggested that (a) implicit and explicit preferences are related, (b) the relationship varies as a function of the objects assessed, and (c) at least 4 variables moderate the relationship: self-presentation, evaluative strength, dimensionality, and distinctiveness. The variables moderated implicit-explicit correspondence across individuals and accounted for much of the observed variation across content domains. The resulting model of the relationship between automatic and controlled evaluative processes is grounded in personal experience with the targets of evaluation.