CONFLICT MANAGEMENT, EFFICACY, AND PERFORMANCE IN ORGANIZATIONAL TEAMS

The study empirically links conflict management literature with research on efficacy and organizational teams. Sixty-one self-managing teams with 489 employees were recruited from the production department of a leading electronic manufacturer. Structural equation analysis supports the model that a cooperative instead of competitive approach to conflict leads to conflict efficacy that in turn results in effective performance as measured by managers. Findings suggest how organizational teams can be prepared to make use of their autonomy to deal with problems and conflicts so that they are productive.     

Fear questionnaires for simple phobias: Psychometric evaluations for a Norwegian sample

The present study presents psychometric data for four different phobic fear questionnaires in a Norwegian sample of 284 subjects. The questionnaires concerned fear of flying, snakes, spiders and a questionnaire of general phobic complaints. The results showed a high estimate of internal consistency, and a very high test-retest reliability for all questionnaires. A low to moderate degree of intercorrelation between the questionnaires appeared. A clear sex difference emerged in responding to all four questionnaires. In addition, a clinical sample of phobics with fear of flying as the main symptom was compared to the larger sample on a fear of flying scale. The results showed a clear difference in responding between the samples. The present study concludes that the four different fear questionnaires yielded a high degree of reliability, and their use in clinical practice is encouraged.     

Resistance to Consultation: A Synthesis for Counselor-Consultants

The authors list and describe a number of types of consultee resistance that commonly occur during consultation and discuss methods and techniques for dealing with each. The article concludes with suggestions for empirical research to determine the effectiveness of various strategies for dealing with consultee resistance.     

Human psychobiology in Scandinavia: I. Psychophysiology—theory, method and empirical research

The present paper reviews Scandinavian contributions to the field of psychophysiology in a fifteen year perspective (1968–1983). Psychophysiology is defined as that domain within psychobiology where the investigator uses a physiological measure to indirectly assess a psychological construct, e.g. heart-rate to index anxiety. Only research that fit this definition is reviewed. Thus, research belonging to physiological psychology and behavior pharmacology is excluded. The paper is divided into several areas covering studies related to attention and the orienting response (OR); classical autonomic conditioning and biofeed-back learning; clinical psychology and behavior medicine; emotion and motivation, and methodological contributions. The review of studies related to attention and OR is focussed on the work by Näätänen and by Öhman who both have made distinguished contributions to this area of research. The so-called "prepared-learning" project is described as an example of Scandinavian conditioning studies. Other examples include Bohlin's research on attention and habituation, and the work by Schalling and by Fredrikson in clinical psychology and psychopathology. Norwegian research on muscle tension and respiratory activity done by Svebak is also reviewed. A total of 114 papers written by about 95 different researchers are reviewed. Thus, psychophysiology may be regarded as a firmly rooted research tradition in Scandinavia, both qualitatively and quantitatively. It is concluded that Scandinavian psychophysiology research is at the front line internationally concerning problem areas and methodology.     

BEHAVIORAL OBSERVATION SCALES FOR PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL PURPOSES

Behavioral items ( N = 78) critical to the job success of logging supervisors were developed from 1204 critical incidents, the frequency with which a supervisor ( N = 300) engaged in each behavior was rated on a 5-point Likert type scale by two sets of observers. A factor analysis reduced the items to 38 and 33, respectively, for the two sets of observers which in turn constituted 10 and 11 factors or criteria for performance evaluation purposes. Multiple regression equations based on composite scores were used to predict cost-related measures of logging crew effectiveness. The shrinkage in Rs after double cross-validation was moderately small. Moreover, the behavioral observation scales (BOS) that were developed by factor analyzing the observation ratings had moderately high reliability and accounted for more variance in the cost-related measures than did the BOS developed by traditional judgmental clustering techniques. The similarities and differences between BOS and BES procedures are discussed.     

STRESS AND PERFORMANCE: EFFECTS OF SUBJECTIVE WORK LOAD AND TIME URGENCY1

Subjective work load, time urgency, and other stress/motivation variables were measured for management personnel taking a demanding problem-solving exam at the end of a two-week training course. Comparing measures of precourse ability and final exam performance, the primary findings were that the corrected performance scores had strong negative linear (not inverted-U) relations with both subjective work load and time urgency. General state anxiety and task involvement did not substantially relate to performance. The results are discussed in terms of the nature of this particular task and the predictions of various stress/performance theories. In problem solving or other tasks requiring novel responses, these data suggest that increases in psychological stresses like subjectively high work load and time urgency uniformly impair performance across the whole range of these variables.