The Moderating Role of Locus of Causality in the Relationship Between Source of Information and Psychological Contract Breach Perceptions

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of information-seeking behaviors on the relationship between personality and psychological contract (PC) breach.

Approach

This study takes an interactionist (person × situation) perspective to examine how PC breach can be reduced in organizations. Survey data were obtained from 184 graduate students from psychology departments across the United States on variables related to personality, information-seeking behaviors, and PC breach.

Findings

Results indicated that external locus of causality (LoCa) is positively associated with PC breach, while information seeking from supervisors is negatively associated with breach. From an interactionist perspective, the positive association of external LoCa attribution style with breach was lessened as information seeking from supervisors increased, but heightened for participants who obtained information from peers, but not supervisors.

Implications

Such knowledge can potentially be used to help inform norm-setting strategies of organizations to possibly reduce the unwanted negative effects of PC breach.

Originality

This finding helps advance our theoretic understanding of the intersection between individual differences and situations and is the first study to examine interactions between LoCa and information sources with respect to PC breach.     

Applications of Job Component/Synthetic Validity to Construct Validity

The origin and history of job component validity (JCV) and its relationship to construct validity are presented, followed by a summarization of how the methodology has been accomplished in research using the Position Analysis Questionnaire (PAQ). Data are presented that document the capability of both PAQ-based attribute profiles and predictions of aptitude data from PAQ job dimensions to establish job requirements. Finally, two practical ap- plications of JCV are described that illustrate the unique capability of the methodology to develop selection systems to screen individuals for jobs un- dergoing design or occurring in difficult-to-study environments.     

Personality and Cognitive Ability as Predictors of Typical and Maximum Managerial Performance

Despite long-established distinctions between typical and maximum performance variables on both the predictor and criterion side, little previous research has directly addressed the extent to which these distinctions translate into differential predictor-criterion relationships. Using a sample of candidates for managerial positions, we examined relations of predictors conceptually linked to typical (i.e., broad, narrow, and compound personality traits) and maximum (i.e., broad and narrow cognitive abilities) performance with corresponding criterion measures (N = 84–873). Supervisory ratings of managerial performance served as the typical performance criterion, whereas maximum performance was assessed via an assessment center. Confirmatory factor analyses supported the distinction between typical and maximum performance. Results also confirmed our hypothesis that cognitive abilities are more strongly correlated with maximum performance than with typical performance and largely supported the expectation of the opposite pattern with personality traits as predictors.     

Assessing Personality in the Employment Interview: The Impact of Training on Rater Accuracy

We developed a training protocol to enhance interviewers' knowledge of personality-related cues and, in so doing, improve the accuracy of their personality judgments. Participants (N = 164) watched 3 videotaped mock employment interviews and judged the personality of those interviewees. The trained group was more accurate than the control group for some, but not all, of the rated traits. It was predicted that training would increase participants' dispositional intelligence (knowledge of personality) scores. This hypothesis was not supported, suggesting that trait cue knowledge and dispositional intelligence may function independently in the improvement of rating accuracy. These findings contribute to further articulation of the process underlying accurate personality inferences.     

Evaluating Attitudes and Experience With Emerging Technology in Cadets and Civilian Undergraduates

Existing research on the characteristics of digital natives, traditionally defined as those born after 1980, has shown subtle differences in how they approach technology compared with other cohorts. However, much of the existing research has focused on a limited set of conventional technologies, mostly related to learning. In addition, prior research has shown differences within this cohort in how they respond to autonomous technology (e.g., trust, reliance; Pak, Rovira, McLaughlin, &; Baldwin, 2016 Pak, R., Rovira, E., McLaughlin, A., &; Baldwin, N. (2016). Does the domain of technology impact user trust? Investigating trust in automation across different consumer-oriented domains in young adults, military, and older adults. Theoretical Issues in Ergonomics Science, 18, 199–220. 10.1080/1463922x.2016.1175523[Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). The purpose of this short report, representing the first wave of data collection in a larger study examining technology experience and attitude change, is to directly address 2 shortcomings in the literature on digital natives which tends to emphasize: (a) civilian students; and (b) conventional, often learning technologies. We addressed these 2 issues by recruiting 2 subgroups of digital natives (students and military cadets) and assessing attitudes and experience with a wide range of technology spanning from conventional (e.g., mobile) to emerging (e.g., robotics). The results showed that that both groups were surprisingly unfamiliar with emerging consumer technologies. Additionally, contrary to expectations, cadets were significantly, albeit only slightly, less experienced with mobile technologies, VR/augmented reality, social media, and entertainment technology as compared to civilian undergraduates.     

Sleep Symptoms as a Partial Mediator Between Combat Stressors and Other Mental Health Symptoms in Iraq War Veterans

Sleep symptoms are a prominent feature of mental health disorders like PTSD and depression. However, it is unknown whether sleep symptoms mediate the relationship between combat stress and these disorders. We examined the mediating role of sleep symptoms on the relationship between combat stress and PTSD; and the relationship between combat stress and depression using data from 576 Army veterans of the Iraq War surveyed in 2004. Correlational analyses revealed that when insomnia was included in the model, the correlation between combat stressors and other depression symptoms decreased by 65%; and when nightmares were included in the model, the correlation between combat stressors and other PTSD symptoms decreased by 69%. We replicated these analyses using individual items assessing PTSD and depression and found that the insomnia and nightmare items had the largest and second largest mediation effect between combat stressors and PTSD and depression symptoms. Our result support the theory that sleep symptoms contribute to the development and/or maintenance of other mental health symptoms and that early treatment of sleep symptoms may mitigate the other mental health consequences of combat stress.     

Neuropsychological sequelae following pediatric stroke: A nonlinear model of age at lesion effects

Aim: The distribution and quality of brain recovery following pediatric arterial ischemic stroke remains controversial. The literature suggests that age at stroke may be an important modulator of neuropsychological outcome, with reports inferring either greater vulnerability or plasticity in the nascent brain. Our aim was to investigate neuropsychological outcomes following pediatric stroke in a clinical sample with reference to age at lesion, lesion laterality, elapsed time from stroke to assessment, and persistent neurological sequelae.

Methods: Using comprehensive neuropsychological assessment batteries, we investigated retrospectively a large (n?=?44) and evenly distributed group of children who had ischemic stroke during “infancy” (1 month to 1 year), “early childhood” (1 to 6 years), and “late childhood” (6 to 16 years).

Results: Children who suffered a stroke performed significantly worse on a range of neuropsychological measures when compared to a normative sample. However, children who suffered a stroke between 1 and 6 years old demonstrated better preserved neuropsychological profiles than either the earlier (before age 1) or later (after age 6) age groups. In addition, those children suffering a left hemisphere lesion performed more poorly on a range of neuropsychological measures than did children with right hemisphere lesions.

Interpretation: Age at stroke is an important determinant of recovery following insult and may modulate neuropsychological and cognitive outcome.     

Emerging from the causal drain

For over 20 years, Jaegwon Kim’s Causal Exclusion Argument has stood as the major hurdle for non-reductive physicalism. If successful, Kim’s argument would show that the high-level properties posited by non-reductive physicalists must either be identical with lower-level physical properties, or else must be causally inert. The most prominent objection to the Causal Exclusion Argument—the so-called Overdetermination Objection—points out that there are some notions of causation that are left untouched by the argument. If causation is simply counterfactual dependence, for example, then the Causal Exclusion Argument fails. Thus, much of the existing debate turns on the issue of which account of causation is appropriate. In this paper, however, I take a bolder approach and argue that Kim’s preferred version of the Causal Exclusion Argument fails no matter what account one gives of causation. Any notion of causation that is strong enough to support the premises of the argument is too strong to play the role required in the logic of the argument. I also consider a second version of the Causal Exclusion Argument, and suggest that although it may avoid the problems of the first version, it begs the question against a particular form of non-reductive physicalism, namely emergentism.