The role of the formal employment contract in the range and fulfilment of the psychological contract: Testing a layered model

This study investigates the employment contract (temporary vs. permanent) in relation to psychological contract content and fulfilment. The psychological contract includes employees' perceptions of their obligations and their entitlements. We hypothesize that transactional elements constitute a common core that is shared both by temporary and permanent workers. Relational elements are added to this core to show employees' and employers' loyalty, and their intentions to do more than necessary. These elements are more likely to be perceived by permanent workers as compared to temporary workers. Additionally, we suggest that relational elements are difficult to fulfil. Accordingly, we expect lower levels of perceived fulfilment for permanent workers as compared to temporary workers. Based on exchange theory, we furthermore hypothesize that these perceptions follow a similar pattern in how employees report entitlements (i.e., what they receive from the company) and reports of their own obligations (i.e., what they give in return). Results based on a seven-country sample (N _permanent = 3354; N _temporary = 1980) show that permanent workers as compared to temporary workers perceive more relational entitlements and obligations but a similar level of transactional entitlements and obligations. Thus, these results supported the idea of a layered model. The relationship between contract type and fulfilment of the psychological contract was only partly in line with expectations. Temporary workers reported higher fulfilment of entitlements and transactional obligations, but no difference was found for fulfilment of relational obligations.     

The Job Insecurity Scale: A psychometric evaluation across five European countries

Multiple instruments have been developed and used to measure quantitative job insecurity (i.e., insecurity to lose the job as such), often without systematic evaluation of their psychometric characteristics across countries and language barriers. This may hamper consistent and reliable cross-study and cross-country comparisons. This study's aim was to introduce and validate the four-item Job Insecurity Scale (JIS) developed by De Witte across five European countries (i.e., Belgium, The Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and the UK). Overall, the results demonstrated the construct validity (i.e., configural invariance and invariance of the measurement model parameters), the reliability (internal consistency of the items), and the criterion validity (with respect to affective organizational commitment, perceived general health, and self-reported performance) of the JIS. The different translations of the JIS can thus be considered as valid and reliable instruments to measure job insecurity and can be used to make meaningful comparisons across countries. Furthermore, the JIS translations may be utilized to assess how job insecurity is related to outcomes.     

Minority-Specific Determinants of Mental Well-Being Among Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Youth

This study discusses the impact of stress specific to being lesbian, gay, or bisexual (LGB)—measured by means of the concepts of stigma consciousness and internalized homonegativity—on the mental well-being of LGB youth. Also, the effects of positive and negative social support were considered within the model. The sample consisted of 743 LGBs less than 26 years old who were recruited during the online ZZZIP survey in Flanders, Belgium. Hierarchical regression shows that LGB-specific unsupportive social interactions have the greatest direct effect on mental well-being of LGB youth, followed respectively by stigma consciousness, internalized homonegativity, and confidant support.     

Reliability and validity of the Leuven Perceptual Organization Screening Test (L‐POST)

Neuropsychological tests of visual perception mostly assess high‐level processes like object recognition. Object recognition, however, relies on distinct mid‐level processes of perceptual organization that are only implicitly tested in classical tests. Furthermore, the psychometric properties of the existing instruments are limited. To fill this gap, the Leuven perceptual organization screening test (L‐POST) was developed, in which a wide range of mid‐level phenomena are measured in 15 subtests. In this study, we evaluated reliability and validity of the L‐POST. Performance on the test is evaluated relative to a norm sample of more than 1,500 healthy control participants. Cronbach's alpha of the norm sample and test–retest correlations for 20 patients provide evidence for adequate reliability of L‐POST performance. The convergent and discriminant validity of the test was assessed in 40 brain‐damaged patients, whose performance on the L‐POST was compared with standard clinical tests of visual perception and other measures of cognitive function. The L‐POST showed high sensitivity to visual dysfunction and decreased performance was specific to visual problems. In conclusion, the L‐POST is a reliable and valid screening test for perceptual organization. It offers a useful online tool for researchers and clinicians to get a broader overview of the mid‐level processes that are preserved or disrupted in a given patient.     

Employable,committed, and thus well-performing: a matter of interdependent forward-looking social exchange

This study probes the relationship between perceived external employability (i.e., the individual’s perception of available jobs on the external labour market) and affective commitment and performance within the framework of social exchange. An innovative feature is that we advance perceived external employability as a commodity of interdependent forward-looking exchange: employees who perceive themselves as externally employable anticipate successful exchange, which drives further responses, both relational (i.e., affective organizational commitment) and behavioural (i.e., performance). Strong features of this study are that we include (a) both the organization and the workgroup as foci of affective commitment, and (b) task, helping, and counterproductive behaviour as indicators of performance. Results from cross-lagged, structural equation modelling (SEM) analyses on two-wave survey data (N = 458 Belgian employees) largely align with our idea: perceived external employability has a positive cross-lagged effect on affective organizational and workgroup commitment. The two foci of commitment in turn have a cross-lagged effect on performance, positive in the case of helping behaviour and negative in the case of counterproductive behaviour. No significant cross-lagged effects were found in relation to task behaviour. We discuss these results in the light of Social Exchange Theory and potential routes for future research.     

Oculomotor bias induced by number perception

Previous research with manual response methods has found evidence for an association between numbers and space. The present study investigated whether eye movements also show this association. Eye movement responses were recorded from 15 healthy participants as they categorized the digits 0-9 as odd or even. Responses were initiated faster to the left in response to small digits and faster to the right in response to large digits. Movement amplitudes were not systematically affected by either number magnitude or parity. These results provide further evidence for a spatially oriented "mental number line".     

Does Age Make a Difference? Age as Moderator in the Association Between Time Perspective and Happiness

A balanced time perspective can help retaining or improving happiness. Research shows shifts in time perspective while ageing. In order to reach a better understanding of the value of time perspective in different age groups, results are reported of a survey (n = 525), which examines the moderating role of age in the association between time perspective and happiness. Time perspective was measured by the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory (ZTPI) (Zimbardo and Boyd in J Personal Soc Psychol 77:1271–1288, 1999) and to measure happiness, the Subjective Happiness Scale of Lyubomirsky and Lepper (Soc Indic Res 46:137–155, 1999) was used. Regression analysis shows that time perspective is indeed associated with happiness and that, although the assumed shifts in time perspective over time were not found, age does act as a moderator of this association. With ageing, the negative association between a past-negative time perspective and happiness weakens. These results add to our understanding of the theoretical concept of time perspective and shed new light on the value of a balanced time perspective for someone’s wellbeing. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.     

Dirty work,dirty worker? Stigmatisation and coping strategies among domestic workers

Domestic work can be perceived to be ‘dirty work’ in several ways: it is associated with dirt handling, low occupational prestige, and domestic workers have a servile relationship to their clients/employers. This stigma may negatively affect domestic workers' sense of self, and thus coping strategies appear to be critical. In this article, we explore the coping strategies that moderate the relation between the stigma of dirty work and domestic workers' sense of self, based on the analyses of 43 interviews with domestic workers in Belgium. By using a social stress approach in which stigma is considered a stressor, our results reveal a range of maladaptive and adaptive coping strategies that contribute to a negative or a more positive sense of self. Four main categories of coping strategies are discussed: confronting or countering perceptions and behaviours, occupational ideologies, social weighting and defensive tactics. The first two categories are adaptive coping strategies; the last two can be adaptive or maladaptive. We also reveal that workers used adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies simultaneously, leading to mixed implications for their sense of self.     

Distributed and focused attention: neuropsychological evidence for separate attentional mechanisms when counting and estimating

Evidence is presented for 2 modes of attention operating in simultanagnosia. The authors examined visual enumeration in a patient, GK, who has severe impairments in serially scanning across a scene and is unable to count the numbers of items in visual displays. However, GK's ability to judge the relative magnitude of 2 displays was consistently above chance, even when overall luminosity did not vary with the number of items present. In addition, several variables had a differential impact on GK's counting and magnitude estimation. Magnitude estimation but not counting was facilitated by using elements that grouped more easily and by presenting the elements in regular configurations. In contrast, counting was facilitated by placing the elements in different colors while magnitude estimation was disrupted. Also GK's performance on magnitude estimation tasks was disrupted by asking him to count the elements present. The data suggest that GK can process visual stimuli in either a focused or distributed attention mode. When in a focused attention mode, performance is limited by poor serial scanning of attention due to an impaired explicit representation of visual space.     

Transverse diffusivity of cerebral parenchyma predicts visual tracking performance in relapsing–remitting multiple sclerosis

This study investigated the relation between cerebral damage related to multiple sclerosis (MS) and cognitive decline as determined by two classical mental tracking tests. Cerebral damage in 15 relapsing–remitting MS patients was measured by diffusion tensor imaging (DTI). Fractional anisotropy, longitudinal and transverse diffusivity were defined in the cerebral parenchyma. Cognitive performance of the MS patients was assessed with the oral response format of the Symbol Digit Modalities Test (SDMT) and the Paced Auditory Serial Addition Test (PASAT). A significant correlation was found between performance on the SDMT and the fractional anisotropy in the brain. This correlation was predominantly induced by transverse diffusivity. Transverse diffusivity refers to the diffusion across fibers rather than along the fibers and is believed to be a specific marker for axonal loss and demyelination associated with MS. No significant association between DTI-measures and PASAT performance was found and this negative finding was mainly attributed to psychometric qualities. These results indicate that diffusivity along the non-principal diffusion direction, a possible signature of MS-related white matter pathology, contributes to information processing speed as measured with the SDMT, a task that requires close visual tracking and a widely used clinical marker for cognitive decline in MS.