Navigating conflict and power at work: the effects of power and interdependence asymmetries on conflict in organizations

Many of the most difficult conflicts people face at work are up and down; with bosses, supervisors, and important clients, or with direct reports, staff, or other employees who differ from them in terms of their power and interests. However, much of the research on power differences and conflict tends to be piecemeal, decontextualized, and focused on negative consequences. This paper presents 2 studies that investigated a new situated model of conflict and power at work. They build on classic areas of research on social conflict, power, and interdependence; and integrate them into a coherent framework for organizational conflict research. The study methods and findings are presented, and their implications for research on work conflict are discussed.     

Neurophysiological Markers That Predict and Track Treatment Outcomes in Childhood Anxiety

The present study examined the cortical processes that mediate cognitive regulation in response to emotion-eliciting stimuli, before and after anxious children participated in a cognitive behavioral therapy program. Electroencephalographic activity was recorded from anxious children (n?=?24, 8 males) and comparison children (n?=?16, 7 males) at pre-and post-treatment sessions. The change in anxiety T-scores from pre- to post-treatment was used to signify clinical improvement among anxious children (Improvers: n?=?11 vs. Non-improvers: n?=?13). Event-related potential components were recorded while children performed a Go/No-go task using emotional facial expressions. For the P1 component, believed to reflect attention and/or arousal processes, Non-improvers had greater activation levels relative to Improver and comparison groups at both sessions. Greater P1 amplitudes at pre-treatment predicted non-improvement following treatment. For the frontal N2 component, thought to reflect cognitive control processing, Improvers recruited greater activation from pre- to post-treatment, a change in activation that was predictive of treatment outcome. Non-improvers showed increased cortical activation within the time window of the P1, whether at pre- or post-treatment. These data suggest that heightened perceptual vigilance may have led to poorer outcomes. Improvers showed increased prefrontal activation within the time window of the N2 from pre- to post-treatment. These data suggest that increased cognitive control may have led to improved treatment outcomes. In sum, P1 activation may serve as a predictor of treatment outcome, while N2 activation may serve as an indicator of treatment response.     

Disfluency Meets Cognitive Load in Multimedia Learning: Does Harder‐to‐Read Mean Better‐to‐Understand?

In a series of four experiments, we examined the impact of disfluency in multimedia learning by testing contrasting predictions derived from disfluency theory and cognitive load theory against each other. Would a less legible text be beneficial to learning when accompanied by pictures, and what would be the role of less legible pictures? Students (N = 308) learned with text and pictures that were either easy‐to‐read (i.e., fluent) or harder‐to‐read (i.e., disfluent) about how a toilet flush works (Experiments 1–3) and about how lightning develops (Experiment 4). In line with disfluency theory, a disfluent text led to better performance in the transfer test and to more invested mental effort in Experiment 1. However, these beneficial effects could not be replicated in Experiments 2, 3, and 4, leaving open questions regarding the stability and generalizability of the disfluency effect, and thus raising concerns regarding its impact for educational practice. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Exposition und Psychoedukation in der psychodynamischen Therapie

Psychotherapy is a complex process of understanding and action. In order to adequately realize this, reference to only a single therapy school or monotheoretical reference framework would be insufficient, but an appropriate reduction in complexity cannot be dispensed with. A psychotherapy process is composed of a large number of multifaceted elements: image of humanity and value orientation, personality variables of patients and therapists, relationship parameters, diagnostic categories with a spectrum of disorders and disorder symptoms, indications, approach or disorder-specific techniques and therapeutic competence. Other factors including context of life, time windows and frequency also determine the individual therapy process. The logic of the therapeutic understanding and action should be governed a far as possible by a process and patient-related and/or disorder-specific theory and should bind both together in a meaningful way.     

Visual snake aversion in Octodon degus and C57BL/6 mice

Animal Cognition - Phobia against spiders or snakes is common in humans, and similar phobia-like behaviors have been observed in non-human animals. Visual images of snakes elicit phobia in humans,...     

Abusive Supervision from an Integrated Self‐Control Perspective

We investigate the relationship between supervisors’ irritation and follower perceptions of abusive supervision. Based on the integrated self‐control framework, we propose a positive relationship between supervisor irritation and abusive supervision. Moreover, we propose this relationship to be buffered by supervisors’ self‐control capacities and by external monitoring of the supervisor by upper management. We tested our hypotheses in a two‐source survey study with 96 supervisor‐follower dyads. Our results show a positive relationship between supervisor irritation and abusive supervision and an interaction between supervisor irritation and supervisor self‐control. The interaction pattern revealed a positive relationship between supervisor irritation and abusive supervision if supervisor self‐control is low. We also found an interaction between supervisor irritation and external monitoring in predicting active but not passive forms of abusive supervision. Our findings underline the role of self‐control processes in explaining abusive supervision.     

Persistent career indecision over time: Links with personality,barriers, self-efficacy,and life satisfaction

Taking control over one's career requires the ability to make career decisions; thus, remaining in a state of career indecision is problematic. However, the stability of career indecision has not yet been investigated using advanced statistical modeling approaches. We present two studies of German university students applying three-wave, longitudinal designs. Study 1 investigated the stability of career indecision by means of latent state-trait analysis within two samples with different time lags (Sample 1: N = 363, 7 weeks; Sample 2: N = 591, 6 months). The results indicated that career indecision was determined by a stable component (i.e., trait career indecisiveness) that was associated with lower core self-evaluations, lower occupational self-efficacy, and higher perceived career barriers. Study 2 (N = 469) examined career indecision over one year. We found that the stable career indecision component explained 5% of the variance in student life satisfaction beyond self-evaluated generalized indecisiveness.     

Making and Unmaking Prejudice: Religious Affiliation Mitigates the Impact of Mortality Salience on Out‐Group Attitudes

Research inspired by terror management theory has established that being reminded of the inevitability of death (i.e., “mortality salience”) leads people to express more negative attitudes toward out‐groups. We examined the hypothesis that being affiliated with a religion may buffer individuals against this negative impact of mortality salience. Two studies, conducted in two cultures that differ in their emphasis on religiosity (the United Kingdom and Italy), supported this hypothesis. Specifically, we found that mortality salience resulted in more negative out‐group attitudes only among participants not affiliated with any religion. Further, this buffering effect of religious affiliation was not moderated by participants’ specific religious orientations or by their levels of social dominance orientation. In addition, the buffering effect did not hold when prejudice against the target out‐group was not proscribed by religious authorities. Implications for research on religion, prejudice, and terror management are discussed.     

The Spatial Power Motivation Scale: A Semi-Implicit Measure of Situational Power Motivation

We introduce a new nonverbal and unobtrusive measure to assess power motive activation, the Spatial Power Motivation Scale (SPMS). The unique features of this instrument are that it is (a) very simple and economical, (b) reliable and valid, and (c) sensitive to situational changes. Study 1 demonstrates the instrument's convergent and discriminant validity with explicit measures. Study 2 demonstrates the instrument's responsiveness to situational power motive salience: anticipating and winning competition versus losing competition and watching television. Studies 3 and 4 demonstrate that thoughts of competition result in higher power motivation specifically for individuals with a high dispositional power motive.