Employees’ perceived institutional importance,organizational norms,and organizational citizenship behavior: Insights from a multilevel assessment of the institutional anomie theory

ABSTRACT

This study contributes to the understanding of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) and extending the application of institutional anomie theory (IAT). Employing a multilevel moderation framework, this paper explored the influence of employees’ perceived institutional importance to their demonstration of OCB and the moderating impacts of organizational norms on this relationship. Utilizing data of 243 employees from 34 banks in the Philippines, results of the hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) analysis revealed the positive influence of the importance of the economy, family, polity, and religion on employees’ citizenship acts. Furthermore, goal emphasis and socio-emotional support have significant interacting effects on the association between perceived institutional importance and OCB.     

Risk- and protective factors for memory plasticity in aging

ABSTRACT

Risk and protective factors for cognitive function in aging may affect how much individuals benefit from their environment or life experiences by preserving or improving cognitive abilities. We investigated the relations between such factors and outcome from episodic-memory training in 136 healthy young and older adults. Tested risk factors included carrying the ?4 variant of the apolipoprotein E allele (APOE), age, body mass index, blood pressure, and cholesterol. Protective factors included higher levels of education, intelligence quotient (IQ), physical activity, fatty acids, and vitamin D. Average increases in memory performance were seen after training, with ample variation between individuals. Being young, female, and having higher IQ were positive predictors of memory improvement. No other relationships were observed. Similar benefit was observed across APOE allelic variation. This indicates that beyond IQ, age, and sex, known risk -and protective factors of cognitive function in aging were not significantly related to memory plasticity.     

Introduction

This special issue focuses on contextual factors that contribute to cognitive aging, as they have important implications for prevention and intervention strategies to reduce the global burden of age-related cognitive impairment. Context is defined broadly in terms of geographic residence, socioeconomic conditions, social network characteristics, and the spousal/partner relationship. Each of these lifetime contextual factors has been linked to variability in cognitive development, and the included papers advance this extant literature by examining how these lifespan contexts interact with person-level characteristics in the largest, nationally representative study of aging in the United States (U.S.), the Health and Retirement Study (HRS).     

Race/Ethnic Differences in Social Resources as Cognitive Risk and Protective Factors

Overall social network size, often the sum of common lifetime relationships, including children, family, and friends, has been linked to cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s Disease. However, little research has examined the association between network size composition and cognitive function in middle-aged and older adults in the context of race/ethnicity. We investigated the associations between the number of close children, family, and friends independently with executive function (EF) and memory across a subsample of non-Hispanic Black, Hispanic, and non-Hispanic White participants who completed the Health and Retirement Study Harmonized Cognitive Assessment Protocol (N = 2,395). We found that network size composition was more closely linked to EF than memory and that these associations varied by race/ethnicity. Specifically, the strongest associations existed between EF and quadratic estimates of the number of close children of non-Hispanic Black participants, and number of close family members for Hispanic participants. Among Black participants, a curvilinear relationship indicated that two close children were associated with greater EF, while a smaller or larger number of close children were associated with lower EF. On the other hand, among Hispanic participants, higher EF was associated with fewer (0–1) and greater (4-5+) numbers of family member contacts. Overall, these results indicate that examining children, family, and friends independently may be more useful than the common practice of aggregation of overall network size, especially in the context of race/ethnicity.     

ACQUISITION,MAINTENANCE, AND TRANSFER OF A QUESTIONING STRATEGY IN SECOND- AND THIRD-GRADE STUDENTS TO LEARN FROM SCIENCE TEXTBOOKS

Acquisition, maintenance, and transfer of a questioning strategy was examined in second- and third-grade students (N = 16) using a multiple-baseline design. Students were taught to identify text structures (comparison-contrast, cause-effect, and problem-solution) during the first week of instruction, and then they were taught to ask questions appropriate to each structure during the second week of instruction. Results indicated that knowledge of text structure increased and that students could reliably differentiate text structure. The mean proportion of correct questions students asked to guide reading ranged from .93 to .96. Increases in literal and inferential comprehension were observed. Students deployed the strategy on their own in the classroom.