Organization-, supervisor-, and workgroup-directed commitments and citizenship behaviours: A comparison of models

The purpose of this study was to test two competing theoretical models explaining the relationships between affective commitment to the organization, the supervisor, and the workgroup, and organizational citizenship behaviours (OCB) specifically directed toward these foci. Drawing on cohesion theory, the first model stated that commitment to the organization is a key mediating variable intervening between “local” commitments and OCB (Hunt & Morgan, 1994). Building on Lewin's (1943) field theory and the notion of psychological proximity, the second model proposed that commitment to the most proximal focus should mediate the effect of commitment to more distal entities on OCB. Data drawn from a sample of blue-collar workers and their supervisors in an iron and steel company indicated that the model of a proximal mediation best represented the relationships between commitments and OCB.     

Spatial and Temporal Processing in Healthy Aging: Implications for Perceptions of Driving Skills

ABSTRACT

Sensitivity to the attributes of a stimulus (form or motion) and accuracy when detecting rapidly presented stimulus information were measured in older (N?=?36) and younger (N?=?37) groups. Before and after practice, the older group was significantly less sensitive to global motion (but not to form) and less accurate on a rapid sequencing task when detecting the individual elements presented in long but not short sequences. These effect sizes produced power for the different analyses that ranged between 0.5 and 1.00. The reduced sensitivity found among older individuals to temporal but not spatial stimuli, adds support to previous findings of a selective age-related deficit in temporal processing. Older women were significantly less sensitive than older men, younger men and younger women on the global motion task. Gender effects were evident when, in response to global motion stimuli, complex extraction and integration processes needed to be undertaken rapidly. Significant moderate correlations were found between age, global motion sensitivity and reports of perceptions of other vehicles and road signs when driving. These associations suggest that reduced motion sensitivity may produce functional difficulties for the older adults when judging speeds or estimating gaps in traffic while driving.     

Sartre and Spinoza on the nature of mind

What surfaces first when one examines the philosophy of mind of Sartre and Spinoza are the differences between them. For Spinoza a human mind is a mode of the divine mind. That view is a far cry from Sartre’s view of human consciousness as a desire never achieved: the desire to be god, to be the foundation of one’s own existence. How could two philosophers, one a determinist and the other who grounds human freedom in the nature of consciousness itself, be seen as having any commonalities worth exploring? How could the noted user of the deductive method and one of the most important phenomenologists of the twentieth century share any philosophical ground at all? I will argue in this paper that despite the very real differences between their two philosophies, there are striking similarities between Sartre’s view of consciousness and Spinoza’s view of the mind. They become apparent when one examines each one’s analysis of the nature of mind and its relationship to itself, the body, and the world. Both are heir to a kind of Aristotelian naturalism. This commonality between them derives from their mutual rejection of Descartes’ substance dualism. I first explore the consequences of that rejection on how each one conceives of the relationship between the mind and its objects. Next I examine their view of the mind’s relation to itself and finally I look at how each one understood the mind’s relationship to the body and the world. The examination of their two views reveals how much they anticipate and support theories of mind defended by contemporary analytic philosophers of mind.     

Are today's Millennials splintering into a new generational cohort? Maybe!

A new generational cohort is emerging from the Millennial market segment as a result of cataclysmic events that have occurred since 2008. Interviews with college upperclassmen in the United States identified significant events influencing their values, the values arising from these events, and new values not associated with older Millennials. The most important events identified included the Great Recession, 9/11, and the election of the first African-American president. Values of Millennials were assessed in online surveys of college juniors and seniors in the United States in the fall of 2009 and 2010 and among older Millennials, aged 27–31, during the summer of 2010. The values most strongly differentiating the younger and older Millennials were “piety” and “thrift.” Younger Millennials in the United States are less thrifty and more secular and sexually permissive than older Millennials. They are also less patriotic and less concerned about politics, sustainability, saving, and making mistakes in life. This suggests a splintering of the Millennials cohort as a result of the Great Recession and the potential emergence of a younger “entitlement” cohort. It also suggests further investigation of cross-national value shifts among younger Millennials, prompted by the Great Recession. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Property of Peculiar Value: Land,Religion and the Constitution

In 1792, James Madison wrote that a man's ‘property of peculiar value [is] in his religious opinions, and in the profession and practice dictated by them’.1 1. James Madison in the National Gazette (27 March 1792). Quoted in Hall (1998 Hall T 1998 Separating church and state: Roger Williams and religious liberty Champaign, IL University of Illinois Press  , 135). View all notes In view of the ensuing 200 years, the phrase is telling in ways Madison would not have anticipated. For it is in relation to land and private property that the constitutional concept of religion—a concept designed in significant part by Madison himself—arose and is now in decline. This article traces the origins, development and decline of religion as a constitutional concept in relation to land and private property. The experience of Native Americans is a particularly important illustration of this history, because it is in response to them that the constitutional relations of land and religion have been debated in most detail. I begin therefore with the unsuccessful efforts of Native Americans in 1988 to claim Free Exercise protection for lands they regard as sacred. The second section briefly explores the joint origins of private land ownership and the modern Western concept of religion, which in turn impacted the European treatment of the land and religions of conquered and colonised peoples. Moving into the American constitutional period, the third section sketches the inter-related notions of land and religion that appeared in key framers, which again had profound implications for indigenous peoples. Arriving at the present day, the fourth section outlines the deterioration of the constitutional concept of religion, along with the democratic public sphere itself, in the age of privatisation. The final section, using the Faith-Based Initiatives movement as an illustration, argues that new and supposedly public roles for religion actually advance and protect privatisation. In conclusion, I will review and assess very briefly the prospects for religion as a constitutional construct.     

A Longitudinal Examination of the Moderating Influence of Peer and Parental Socialization on Alcohol-Related Social Media Self-Effects Among Late Adolescents

ABSTRACT

This study is the first to empirically and longitudinally demonstrate that alcohol-related social media self-effects may occur via attitudes, and that the strength of this association is dependent on peers and parents. A 2-wave panel study with a 1-year interval (N = 1006) among late adolescents (age 16–20 at baseline) showed that especially individuals whose peers and parents engaged in alcohol-positive socialization behaviors, held more positive alcohol-related attitudes one year later when they shared alcohol-related self-presentations on social networking sites (SNS). The strength of the alcohol-related social media self-effect was dampened when peers and parents engaged in more negative alcohol-related socialization behaviors. Overall, these results do not only provide support for the idea that some individuals can affect themselves through displaying certain content on SNS, they also suggest that peers and parents continue to play a socializing role, even when adolescents transition into emerging adulthood.     

Reading Ability as a Predictor of Academic Procrastination Among African American Graduate Students

The present study examined the relationship between reading ability (i.e., reading comprehension and reading vocabulary) and academic procrastination among 120 African American graduate students. A canonical correlation analysis revealed statistically significant and practically significant multivariate relationships between these two reading ability variables and graduate students' levels of academic procrastination. Specifically, the first canonical correlation analysis revealed a statistically significant and practically significant multivariate relationship between reading ability and academic procrastination resulting from fear of failure. The second canonical correlation analysis revealed a statistically significant and practically significant multivariate relationship between reading ability and academic procrastination associated with writing a term paper, performing administrative tasks, attending meetings, keeping up with weekly reading assignments, and, most notably, performing academic tasks. Implications are discussed in the context of designing and implementing strategies designed to improve African American student performance and instruction in graduate-level courses.     

No evidence for ethnic and racial bias in the Tryout Edition of the Merrill-Palmer Scale-Revised

This research examined a revised version of the Merrill-Palmer Scale, a test of childhood development, to assess the cultural validity of items, i.e., Differential Item Functioning. Archival data were used to determine the Differential Item Functioning of items for 245 African-American, Euro-American, and Hispanic children, ages 3-6 years. Subjects were gathered from all four regions of the United States. Potential bias was examined through the use of partial correlations. Statistical analyses suggest that the Tryout Edition of the Merrill-Palmer Scale-Revised was not systematically biased toward any of the three racial groups examined.     

Group interventions for patients with cancer and HIV disease: part IV. Clinical and policy recommendations

Group interventions have assumed a growing role in primary prevention and supportive care for cancer and HIV disease. Earlier sections of this Special Report examined empirical findings for these interventions and provided recommendations for future research. The current section offers brief recommendations for service providers, policymakers, and stakeholders. Group services now occupy an increasingly prominent place in primary prevention programs and medical settings. In previous sections of this Special Report (Sherman, Leszcz et al., 2004; Sherman, Mosier et al., 2004a, 2004b) we examined the efficacy of different group interventions at different phases of cancer or HIV disease, considered characteristics of the intervention and the participants that might influence outcomes, and discussed mechanisms of action. Methodological challenges and priorities for future research were highlighted. In this, the final section, we offer brief recommendations for service providers, policymakers, and other stakeholders. We consider some of the barriers that constrain use of empirically-based group interventions and note how these programs might be implemented more widely and effectively.