Proactive Personality and Innovative Work Behavior: the Mediating Effects of Affective States and Creative Self-Efficacy in Teachers

The purpose of the current study was to examine the influence proactive personality on innovative work behavior in teaching profession and investigate the potential mediating effects of affective states and creative self-efficacy on this relationship. Proactive Personality Scale, Positive and Negative Affect Schedule, Creative self-efficacy Scale and Teachers’ Innovative Work Behavior Scale were administered to 352 primary and middle school teachers in China. Results showed that proactive personality was significantly positively associated with teachers’ innovative work behavior. Furthermore, mediation analyses revealed that the impact of proactive personality on teachers’ innovative work behavior were simply mediated by positive affect and creative self-efficacy and sequential mediated by positive affect–creative self-efficacy and negative affect–creative self-efficacy. These findings provide a new perspective in understanding the intervening mechanisms underlying proactive personality on innovative work behavior. The possible explanations and limitations are discussed.     

实物形状的知觉相似性对视觉隐喻加工的影响

视觉隐喻是众多研究者比较关注的领域, 当前多以物体简笔画、漫画及广告等方面的研究为主, 但对与生活密切相关的实物的视觉隐喻研究甚少。因此研究采用掩蔽启动范式、李克特9点量表及语音生成等研究方法, 在物体概念类型(概念相同、概念相异)及形状类型(形状相似、形状相异)条件下, 针对实物图片的形状知觉相似性是否对视觉隐喻加工产生影响进行探讨。结果发现无论物体概念是否相同, 形状相似性对个体的物体识别具有“促进”作用, 并有利于视觉隐喻加工; 在物体识别中, 当两个物体概念不同时, 个体会试图建立一个特设类别来对形状相似的物体进行归类, 从而实现了视觉隐喻的加工。因此研究进一步证明了实物形状的知觉相似性有利于视觉隐喻的加工。     

主管威权领导与下属前瞻行为：一个被中介的调节模型构建与检验

采用214份主管-下属配对调查数据, 考察了威权领导这一华人企业组织中特有的领导方式对下属前瞻行为的影响, 尤其是检验了下属对领导者信任的中介作用与权威主义和集体主义这两种传统价值取向的调节作用。层次回归分析结果表明：(1)威权领导与下属的前瞻行为呈显著负相关; (2)对领导者的信任在威权领导与下属前瞻行为之间起完全中介作用; (3)下属权威主义取向对威权领导与下属对领导者信任和前瞻行为之间的负向关系均具有显著的弱化效应, 并且下属对领导者的信任完全中介了威权领导与下属权威主义取向之间的交互作用对前瞻行为的影响; (4)下属集体主义取向对威权领导与下属对领导者的信任之间的负向关系具有显著的增强效应。     

Lexical- and perceptual-based object effects in the two-rectangle cueing paradigm

Previous studies demonstrate that attentional selection can be object-based, in which the object is defined in terms of Gestalt principles or lexical organizations. Here we investigate how attentional selection functions when the two types of objects are manipulated jointly. Experiment 1 replicated Li and Logan (2008) by showing that attentional shift between two Chinese characters is more efficient when they form a compound word than when they form a nonword. Experiment 2A presented characters either alone or within rectangles (Egly, Driver, & Rafal, 1994) and the characters in a rectangle formed either a word or a nonword. Experiment 2B differed from Experiment 2A in that the two characters forming a word were in different rectangles. Experiment 3A presented the two characters of a word either within a rectangle or in different rectangles. Experiment 3B used the same design as Experiment 3A but presented stimuli of different types in random orders, rather than in blocks as in Experiments 2A, 2B and 3A. In blocked presentation, detection responses to the target color on a character were faster when this character and the cue character formed a word than when they did not, and the size of this lexical-based object effect did not vary according to whether the two characters were presented alone or within or between rectangles. In random presentation, however, the lexical-based object effect was diminished when the two characters of a word were presented in different rectangles. Overall, these findings suggest that the processes that constrain attention deployment over conjoined objects can be strategically adjusted.     

Evaluation of a preventive intervention for child anxiety in two randomized attention-control school trials

The present research examined the effectiveness of a cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) based intervention program, FRIENDS, for children from grades 4 to 6, using random assignment at the school-level and an attention-control design in two longitudinal studies. The first study targeted children with anxiety symptoms (N = 191, mean age = 10.1) as screened with self, parent, and teacher-reports; the second study took a universal approach with full classrooms of children participating (N = 253, mean age = 9.8). The results showed no intervention effect in both studies, with children’s anxiety symptoms decreasing over time regardless of whether they were in the story-reading (attention control) or FRIENDS condition. The findings also indicated that girls reported a higher level of anxiety than boys and children in higher grades reported lower anxiety relative to younger children in both studies. In addition, similar patterns were found using a subgroup of children with high-anxiety symptoms from both studies.     

The effect of covariate mean differences on the standard error and confidence interval for the comparison of treatment means

The use of covariates is commonly believed to reduce the unexplained error variance and the standard error for the comparison of treatment means, but the reduction in the standard error is neither guaranteed nor uniform over different sample sizes. The covariate mean differences between the treatment conditions can inflate the standard error of the covariate‐adjusted mean difference and can actually produce a larger standard error for the adjusted mean difference than that for the unadjusted mean difference. When the covariate observations are conceived of as randomly varying from one study to another, the covariate mean differences can be related to a Hotelling's T². Using this Hotelling's T² statistic, one can always find a minimum sample size to achieve a high probability of reducing the standard error and confidence interval width for the adjusted mean difference.     

Effects of a ‘Learn to Think’ intervention programme on primary school students

Background. Methods for teaching thinking may be described as out‐of‐context or infusion. Both approaches have potential to raise students’ general cognitive processing ability and so raise academic achievement, but each has disadvantages. Aims. To describe and evaluate a theory‐based learn to think (LTT) curriculum for primary school students, which draws on the strengths of both out‐of‐context and infusion approaches. Sample. One‐hundred and sixty‐six students in three classes of Grade 1 (6+ years old), Grade 2 (7+ years old), and Grade 3 (8+ years old) in a primary school in Shanxi province, China, randomly ascribed to experimental (90) and control (76) groups. Methods. All students were pre‐tested for non‐verbal intelligence and academic achievement. Experimental students followed the LTT curriculum (one activity every 2 weeks) for 4 school years. All were post‐tested on three occasions for thinking ability and four times for academic achievement. Results. Grade 1 and Grade 2 students showed effects of LTT from 1 year after their start and increasing: on thinking ability d= .78–1.45; on Chinese d= .68–1.07; on maths .58–.87. Grade 3 students showed effects from 6 months after their start: on thinking ability .90–1.37; Chinese .77–1.32; maths .65–1.29. The effects were concentrated in students in the middle band of initial ability. Conclusions. A curriculum for teaching thinking based on a structured theoretical model that combines elements of out‐of‐context and infusion methods has been shown to have long‐term far transfer effects on students’ thinking ability and academic achievement. More work is needed to meet the needs of a wider range of abilities.     

The effects of autonomy and empowerment on employee turnover: test of a multilevel model in teams

Extending research on voluntary turnover in the team setting, this study adopts a multilevel self-determination theoretical approach to examine the unique roles of individual and social-contextual motivational precursors, autonomy orientation and autonomy support, in reducing team member voluntary turnover. Analysis of multilevel time-lagged data collected from 817 employees on 115 teams indicates that psychological empowerment mediates the main effect of autonomy orientation and the interactive effect of autonomy support and its differentiation on a team member's voluntary turnover. The findings have meaningful implications for the turnover and self-determination literatures as well as for managers who endeavor to prevent voluntary turnover in teams.     

Psychometric properties of the Padua Inventory in Chinese college samples

The aim of the present study was to investigate the psychometric properties of the Padua Inventory in Chinese college samples. Three different samples (N1 = 1,939, N2 = 1,341, and N3 = 298) of Chinese college students were recruited. Exploratory factor analyses yielded a four-factor structure which was similar to that found in previous studies. Further, present results showed good internal consistency as well as convergent and divergent validity with the subscales of the Symptom Checklist-90 and the Penn State Worry Questionnaire. Although no sex difference was found on total score, women had significantly higher scores on Factor 2 (Urges and worries of losing control over motor behaviors) and Factor 4 (Checking), while men had significantly higher scores on Factor 3 (Contamination). Implications of ter the results and directions for research are discussed.