Job attachment,satisfaction, and turnover among public sector employees

This study sought (1) to compare the relative predictive powers of job attachment and job satisfaction with respect to turnover among a sample of public employees; and (2) to examine individual and job-related influences on both attitudes. It was found that attachment was a more effective predictor of turnover than overall satisfaction (or any facet of satisfaction), even when the alternative attitude was partialled out. In addition, it was found that individual employee characteristics were more strongly related to attachment than were job characteristics, while the opposite was found for satisfaction. The findings are discussed in the light of previous evidence, and implications are drawn for research in vocational behavior.     

Depth of processing: When the principle of congruity fails

Two factors, level of processing (Craik & Lockhart, 1972) and congruity (Schulman, 1974), known to have large effects on the recall of experimenter-provided responses to questions, were examined in a series of five incidental learning experiments using subject-generated responses. The data show that manipulation of level of processing has the same effect on recall of subjectgenerated responses as it does on experimenter-provided responses. However, the effect of congruity is reversed for subject-generated responses. The data suggest that the difficulty of generating unrelated responses (“incongruous“ items) may account, at least in part, for the failure of the “principle of congruity“ with subject-generated responses.     

Comment on "personality organization as an aspect of back pain in a medical setting".

The methodology and results of a recent investigation by Louks, Freeman, and Calsyn (1978) are reviewed. It is demonstrated that the results may have been confounded by inappropriate experimental procedures. Regardless of the methodological deficiencies associated with the experimental procedures, the results do not provide adequate support for the continued differentiation of individual low back pain patients with respect to the etiology of their pain. It is suggested that psychologists may best contribute to the assessment and treatment of individual pain patients by developing actuarial rules regarding the pain-related behavioral characteristics shared by members of various patient subgroups and the specific treatments to which subgroup members best respond.     

On the structure of motor recognition memory

Two experiments determined the influence of the range and number of auditory sensory consequences, associated with a rapid timing task, on the development of motor recognition. Experiment 1 observed no beneficial effect upon subsequent movement-transfer performance from experience with the criterion-movement-time sound compared to experience with either a narrow or a wide range of sounds that bracketed the criterion sound (not including the criterion); 60 sound trials prior to transfer did not produce better transfer than did six sounds. The second experiment examined transfer outside of the range of previous listening experience by having subjects transfer to one of two possible criterion movement times after having received either constant, or one of two types of variable, listening experience. Transfer performance was influenced by the amount of variability in listening experience. These results were seen as support for a schematic representation for motor recognition memory (Schmidt, 1975)     

A test of Weiner's attribution theory inertial motivation hypothesis1

This study (N= 160 males) examined the cognitive and inertial motivation effects of overt success feedback on subjects high and low in resultant achievement motivation. The cognitive effects of overt success feedback were investigated by requesting attributions to effort, ability, luck, and task difficulty concerning performance on a digit symbol substitution task. The inertial motivation effects of overt success feedback were investigated through a transfer design. Results indicated overt success feedback to have an inertial motivation effect on performance efficiency at a subsequent verbal learning task. The results provided evidence against Weiner's (1972) attribution theory version of the inertial motivation hypothesis, and were interpreted within the general learning theory framework combined with the achievement and test anxiety models of Atkinson and Sarason. The interpretation offered considers the various experimental conditions as sources of motivation.     

AN INDEX FOR ASSESSING WEIGHT CHANGE IN CHILDREN: WEIGHT/HEIGHT RATIOS1

Weight and height data from two studies were recomputed, and original data were computed using a Weight Index formula that accounts for the interaction of actual weight/height changes in growing children and compares this ratio with that of normed weight/height ratios for equal-aged children. Recomputing the data of one study showed that the Weight Index is a more sensitive procedure for assessing long-term behavioral treatment of obesity for girls than weight alone. Recomputing the data of a second study showed that the Weight Index formula is consistent for boys and girls and is a more sensitive procedure for assessing long-term effects of a variety of medical treatments for obesity than the Ponderal Index or weight alone. Computation of the data for 17 “normal” children in a preschool class showed a zero Weight Index score before and after a six-month interval elapsed without treatment. The procedure may be useful in assessing ponderosity or anorexia over intervals of six months or more with growing children or difference between actual and normed weight over shorter intervals.