Career definition and denial: A discourse analysis of graduate trainees’ accounts of career

The concept of ‘career’ has long been investigated in the social sciences. It has been described as being in relationship with identity and providing a residual trace of the individual’s relationship with work. A constructionist approach to research enables a focus on the language of career-talk as an opaque phenomenon. The analysis of 54 interviews with university graduates employed by one large, UK based, high street retailer provides an illustration of how common sense understandings surrounding career work as a backdrop to individual accounts. Career as a strategic plan is denied, yet negotiated as a legitimate, even desirable, behaviour of the employing organization. Although the focus of analysis is on the tools and practices of interaction, situated at a micro level, this analysis illustrates how specific constructive practices make macro notions of career relevant and up for re-negotiation in interaction. This adds to understanding of career in terms of highlighting its fluid and contestable properties on which, in growing awareness of the constructed nature of the term ‘career,’ individuals draw in their accounts of themselves as people who work.     

The impact of life role salience on life satisfaction

The authors examined the relationships among life role salience, role strain, coping efficacy, and life satisfaction for adults (N = 125) who combine multiple life roles. Causal modeling procedures were used to test hypotheses based on D. E. Super's (1980, 1990) life‐span, life‐space theory and the social cognitive career theory (R. W. Lent, S. D. Brown, & G. Hackett, 2000). They hypothesized that high role salience would be related to high levels of role strain and that coping efficacy would mediate the impact of role strain on participants' life satisfaction. Results indicated that the proposed model fit the data for the present sample.     

Inner and outer face perception in children with autism.

Possible peculiarities in face perception in the autistic population were explored through two experiments. Fourteen autistic children (mean age=10 years 1 month) were individually matched to verbal mental age (VMA) and chronological age (CA) subjects. In a first experiment, subjects were to match faces on the basis of either their outer (hair, chin, ears) or their inner (eyes, nose, mouth) aspects. Autistic children performed equally well in both conditions, while VMA-matched children performed better in the outer than the inner part condition. In a second experiment, chimeric faces consisting of the outer part of an individual's face and the inner part of another individual's face were presented to the subjects. None of the groups showed a preference for neither the outer nor the inner part of the face in this condition. Results were discussed in terms of the existence of a local visual processing strategy in this population.     

International students' reported English fluency,social support satisfaction,and social connectedness as predictors of acculturative stress

This study explored age, gender, reported English fluency, social support satisfaction and social connectedness as predictors of acculturative stress among a sample of 359 international students. Results indicate that international students from Europe experienced less acculturative stress than their counterparts from Asia, Central/Latin America, and Africa. Moreover, English fluency, social support satisfaction, and social connectedness were all predictors of acculturative stress. Implications for counselling and research are discussed.     

Putting the Protest Back into Protestant

When Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Wittenberg Castle Church on 31 October 1517, he did so in protest at abuses in Catholic theology and practice. Contemporary times, too, call for protest. The first “protest” concerns the revitalization of education and an increased commitment to intellectual excellence. The second “protest” concerns a recovery of Luther as a figure of protest. While scholars have tamed Luther's dangerous doctrines, the popular imagination still perceives him as an urban legend who spoke truth to power. An expansive notion of scholarship on Luther is required in order to approach a Luther who continues to inspire people around the world. The third “protest” is a critical protest of Luther's religious intolerance, specifically his anti‐Judaism. Christian theologians must acknowledge Luther's anti‐Judaism as central to his theology and radically revise this legacy to promote justice in inter‐religious relations.     

The Less is More: The 17-Item Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory

In this article the goal was the examination of the factorial structure of a short, Hungarian version of Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory (ZTPI; Zimbardo and Boyd Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77(6), 1271–1288, 1999) in a sample of 1370 participants, comparing alternative factor structures through confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). According to the results the short, 17 item version of ZTPI includes the original five factors and has appropriate model fit indices. Furthermore, it is reliable in terms of internal consistency and temporal stability. In the light of previous ZTPI validations with severe shortcomings, the present results might encourage radical shortening of the original ZTPI scale.