Can job seekers achieve more through networking? The role of networking intensity,self-efficacy,and proximal benefits

The authors develop and evaluate an online networking intervention, Building Relationships and Improving Opportunities (BRIO), built in conjunction with the networking literature and social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1986, 1999). A field experiment using 491 unemployed job seekers shows that the intervention increases networking intensity, networking self-efficacy, and proximal networking benefits. Further, the intervention generates higher quality reemployment through its positive effects on networking self-efficacy. Individuals who completed the intervention and were also lower in extraversion showed the most positive improvements in networking self-efficacy and reemployment quality. The study advances the literature by uncovering the mechanisms through which a networking intervention may result in improved reemployment success, and demonstrating the moderating role of individual differences in affecting intervention outcomes. The study helps practice by providing a publicly available, research-based training to improve job search networking.     

Resilient,Overcontrolled, and Undercontrolled Personality Types: Issues and Controversies

Personality types refer to common or typical configurations of the dispositional attributes that define the individual. Research over the last 20 years has identified a set of three replicable personality types: resilient, overcontrolled, and undercontrolled personalities. Resilient individuals are characterized by self-confidence, emotional stability, and a positive orientation toward others. Overcontrolled individuals are emotionally brittle, introverted, and tense, whereas undercontrolled individuals are disagreeable and lack self-control. In this article, we provide a brief history of current research on the three personality types and identify key areas of controversy. We also outline several directions for future research and discuss the importance of maintaining both attribute- and person-centered perspectives in contemporary personality psychology.     

Inferring task performance and confidence from displays of eye movements

Eye movements reveal what is at the center of people's attention, which is assumed to coincide with what they are thinking about. Eye-movement displays (visualizations of a person's fixations superimposed onto the stimulus, for example, as dots or circles) might provide useful information for diagnosing that person's performance. However, making inferences about a person's task performance based on eye-movement displays requires substantial interpretation. Using graph-comprehension tasks, we investigated to what extent observers (N = 46) could make accurate inferences about a performer's multiple-choice task performance (i.e., chosen answer), confidence, and competence from displays of that person's eye movements. Observers' accuracy when judging which answer the performer chose was above chance level and was higher for displays reflecting confident performance. Observers were also able to infer performers' confidence from the eye-movement displays; moreover, their own task performance and perceived similarity with the performer affected their judgments of the other's competence.