Individual, Congregational, and Denominational Effects on Church Members' Civic Participation

Previous research demonstrates two aspects of religion that affect civic activity—church participation and religious conservatism. Conservative religious beliefs and membership in conservative denominations are often associated with low levels of civic activity while church participation is said to increase civic activity. This article advances the discussion of the relationship between religion and civic participation by introducing the congregational context. Data from the 1987 Church and Community Planning Inventory show that congregations vary in their members' civic activity—congregational factors associated with conservative Christianity (high levels of biblical literalism and within-church friendships) are strongly and negatively associated with church members' activity in nonchurch organizations. At the individual level, the data show that education and participation in church activities other than religious services have particularly strong, positive effects on church members' activity in nonchurch organizations. The findings demonstrate that a conservative congregational context limits church members' activity in nonchurch organizations, potentially limiting their opportunities to build heterogeneous social networks and social capital that bridges church members to other people in their communities.     

CHALLENGE‐ORIENTED ORGANIZATIONAL CITIZENSHIP BEHAVIORS AND ORGANIZATIONAL EFFECTIVENESS: DO CHALLENGE‐ORIENTED BEHAVIORS REALLY HAVE AN IMPACT ON THE ORGANIZATION'S BOTTOM LINE?

Virtually all of the studies that have examined the relationship between organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs) and unit or organizational effectiveness have focused on affiliation‐oriented as opposed to challenge‐oriented forms of OCB, and no study has examined the mechanisms through which OCBs influence unit or organizational effectiveness. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to examine the main and interactive effects that challenge‐oriented and affiliation‐oriented OCBs have on organizational effectiveness through their impact on workgroup task performance. Results from a sample of 150 limited‐menu restaurants showed that the relationship between challenge‐oriented OCBs and workgroup task performance has an inverted‐U shape and is moderated by affiliation‐oriented OCBs, and that workgroup task performance completely mediated the impact of challenge‐ and affiliation‐oriented OCBs (and their interaction) on organizational outcomes (i.e., sales dollars, profit as a percentage of sales, and employee turnover). Specifically, the findings showed that challenge‐oriented OCBs have a positive impact on workgroup task performance up to a point, and beyond that point only when certain enabling conditions (i.e., high levels of affiliation‐oriented OCBs) are present. Implications are discussed.     

APPLICANT REACTIONS TO SELECTION: DEVELOPMENT OF THE SELECTION PROCEDURAL JUSTICE SCALE (SPJS)

This paper describes research that fills a void in the applicant reactions literature by developing a comprehensive measure of Gilliland's (1993) procedural justice rules, called the Selection Procedural Justice Scale (SPJS). Five separate phases of scale development were conducted. In Phase 1 we generated and refined the items. For Phase 2 we reduced the items through exploratory factor analysis using data gathered from 330 applicants for the job of court officer and found higher-order factors consistent with Greenberg (1993a, 1993b). In Phase 3 we confirmed the factor structure using a separate sample of 242 applicants and trainees for the court officer job. In Phase 4 we assessed the initial convergent and divergent validity of the scale. In Phase 5 we tested the generalizability of these items in general and for those receiving positive and negative selection outcomes using 2 student samples. The results demonstrated the usefulness of the SPJS in differentiating each of Gilliland's procedural justice rules and relating them to outcomes included in his model of applicant reactions. A copy of the SPJS is included in the Appendix.     

DIETRICH BONHOEFFER—AN ETHICS OF GOD'S APOCALYPSE?

Bonhoeffer's theology generally and his Ethics in particular have not commonly been thought to be ‘apocalyptic’. Indeed, many have adjudged him to be “almost immunized” against such eschatology. Yet, a close reading of Bonhoeffer's Ethics shows unmistakable resonances between the themes, tasks and argumentative forms of his theological ethics and the contours of pauline apocalyptic as set forth recently in the work of J. Louis Martyn and others. In this text, Bonhoeffer confronts the question ‘What has paraenesis to do with apocalypsis?’ and experiments with answers which acknowledge that ‘the incursion of a new world’ in Christ ‘renders ancient good uncouth.’ Seeing this illumines several aspects of Bonhoeffer's theological ethics, clarifies the importance of the doctrine of justification therein, and emphasises its dynamic, dialectical and pauline character.     

Spatiotemporal integration and contour interpolation revealed by a dot localization task with serial presentation paradigm

The visual system seems to integrate information that is presented over time in a spatially fragmented fashion, with the result that observers are able to report the whole shape of objects. This research considers relations in space and time that allow the integrated percepts of complete objects. Specifically, temporal characteristics for spatiotemporal integration of illusory contour and spatial characteristics of interpolated contour are examined. A serial presentation paradigm and a dot localization task were used in two experiments; observers localized a probe dot relative to a perceived contour of an illusory object. Each of four inducing figures was briefly presented in a serial order to observers and the total time of the series was manipulated. In Experiment 1 short time ranges varied up to 180 ms, whereas longer times were examined in Experiment 2. Overall, the results demonstrate that a short time allows spatiotemporal integration, and that the perceived location of contour consistently shifts with time range. These experiments suggest that the mechanism of spatiotemporal integration operates on spatial integration as a limiting case.