Dispositional Hardiness And Women'S Well-Being Relating To Gender Discrimination: The Role Of Minimization

Three studies examined whether personality-based hardiness would be associated with mental health benefits in contexts of gender discrimination. Hardy women encountering both a laboratory simulation and a hypothetical scenario of discrimination showed greater self-esteem and less negative affect than low hardy women. However, these benefits were mediated by the use of specific attributions, suggesting that well-being in hardy women may have been achieved through minimizing the pervasiveness of discrimination. The third study showed this mediation pattern occurred only for participants exposed to higher threat scenarios versus lower threat scenarios of discrimination. Thus, minimizing the pervasiveness of discrimination may have been a threat-reducing tool for high hardy women. Bandura's (1997) self-efficacy theory was used as a possible explanation for this finding.     

Rule breakers and attention seekers: Personality predictors of integrity and accountability in leaders

Unethical leadership behavior can encourage follower CWBs and have costly organizational impacts. In this meta-analysis, we use data from 3,000 managers and executives to identify antecedents of ethical behaviors: integrity and accountability. Results suggest that many five factor model (Big Five) personality scales, personality derailers (dark side attributes), and values predict integrity and accountability. Leaders who are more conscientious, professional, and rule following and less attention seeking receive higher ratings of integrity and accountability. The strongest relationships were often for personality derailers (Excitable, Leisurely, Mischievous, Imaginative). Values and preferences (Aesthetics, Hedonism, Recognition) also had notable relationships. We discuss our results and their implications for organizations seeking to reduce CWBs, promote OCBs, or establish a climate of ethical behavior.     

Why Don’t We Report Sexual Harassment? An Application of the Theory of Planned Behavior

The study found that an individual’s attitudes toward the behavior, normative beliefs, and perceived behavioral control predicted an individual’s intention to report an incident of hostile environment sexual harassment. Even though women indicated a greater intention to report, there was not a gender difference in whether an individual reported an incident of hostile environment sexual harassment. Our findings provide support for the theory of planned behavior as a model for predicting an individual’s intention to report sexual harassment. These findings provide insight for the formulation of policy and procedures and the development of training programs to facilitate reporting of incidents.     

Sedation threshold and Archimedes spiral after-effect: A follow-up of their use with civilian psychiatric patients

In the study reported here an attempt was made to confirm, on a more heterogeneous group of civilian patients, some previous work on sedation threshold and spiral after-effect in young military patients. Sedation threshold and spiral after-effect data were collected in thirty-eight neurotic and nine psychotic patients. The main findings of the study were as follows: (1) The practicability and reliability of the sedation threshold technique used is not restricted to the experimental setting in which it was originally devised. The method can on the contrary be applied under a variety of clinical conditions. (2) No significant differences were found in the uniformly high sedation threshold and spiral aftereffect scores of patients suffering from neurotic depression, obsessional neurosis, and chronic anxiety. Further, civilian dysthymics as a whole did not differ significantly on either test from military dysthymics. The previous work on neurotics was thus confirmed. (3) Previous findings (with military psychotics) of a significant negative correlation between sedation threshold and spiral after-effect were confirmed in the present group of schizophrenic patients.

The advantages of a psychophysiological approach to personality were reaffirmed and the possible usefulness of the sedation threshold and spiral after-effect as tools for differential diagnosis was discussed.     

False reports of childhood events in appropriate interviews

The present study employed the "parental misinformation" paradigm to examine whether individuals report false events from their childhood even when they are interviewed in an appropriate manner by a trained interviewer. Each participant was interviewed on three occasions. By the final interview, one participant produced a "full" report, and six participants produced "partial" reports, of childhood events that did not occur. Although participants reported perceiving greater pressure to report the false events than the real events, independent judges' ratings of social pressure in the interviews did not differ as a function of what type of event participants were being asked about. Participants also reported higher confidence in their parents', compared to their own, recall of events from their childhood. False reports were also positively correlated with scores on both the full and the revised versions of the Dissociative Experiences Scale, and negatively correlated with score on the Self-Monitoring scale. These results indicate that, despite being interviewed in an appropriate manner by a trained interviewer, some participants will falsely report events from their childhoods.