Multi-dependence in the formation and development of the distributed psychological contract

The psychological contract (PC) describes the implicit and explicit promises and obligations exchanged by individuals and organizational agents in an employment relationship. While it has typically been assumed that each employee establishes the PC with a single agent (i.e., the organization), it seems more realistic to treat PCs as multi-focused, involving various organizational agents. In a qualitative study of 41 professors employed at two public universities in Spain, we investigate the organizational agents involved in the formation and development of PCs, the mutual promises and obligations made by each party and the degree of PC fulfilment. Our findings reveal the multiplicity of organizational sources involved in the development of PCs and the complications that arise owing to multiple dependence. Based on our results, we discuss the need for a deeper examination of PCs from a multi-foci perspective in order to more fully understand the complex nature of the PC.     

Academic self-confidence effects on test anxiety among Nigerian university students

The study investigated academic self-confidence effects on test anxiety indicators of performance impairment and intrusive worry. Respondents were 206 Nigerian undergraduate students (mean age = 20.29, SD = 2. 22; female = 43.2%). The students took the Westside Test Anxiety Scale (Driscoll, 2004) and the Academic Self-confidence Scale (Jones, 2001). Data were analysed to predict performance impairment and intrusive worry from academic self-confidence, taking into account students’ year of study and gender. Results suggest that academic self-confidence influenced both performance impairment and intrusive worry dimensions of test anxiety. Students who were high in academic self-confidence reported lower performance impairment or intrusive worry. Also, first year students reported higher intrusive worry than those in second, third, or fourth year of study. High manifestation of academic self-confidence is an asset for coping with test anxiety.     

Emotion regulation strategies in daily life: mindfulness,cognitive reappraisal and emotion suppression

Most empirical studies of emotion regulation have relied on retrospective trait measures, and have not examined the link between daily regulatory strategies and every day emotional well-being. We used a daily diary methodology with multilevel modelling data analyses (n = 187) to examine the influence of three emotion regulation strategies (mindfulness, cognitive reappraisal and emotion suppression) on the experience of daily negative and positive affect. Our results suggested that daily mindfulness was associated with lower negative and higher positive affect whereas the converse pattern was found for daily emotion suppression; cognitive reappraisal was related to daily positive, but not negative affect. When daily mindfulness, suppression and reappraisal were included in the same models, these strategies predicted unique variance in emotional well-being. Random slope analyses revealed substantial variability in the utility of these strategies. Indeed the presumably “adaptive” cognitive reappraisal strategy seemed to confer no benefit to the regulation of negative affect in approximately half the sample. Additional analyses revealed that age moderates the effect of cognitive reappraisal on daily negative affect: Higher use of reappraisal was associated with more negative affect for adolescents (aged 17 to 19) but became associated with less negative affect with increasing age. We interpret these results in line with a contextual view of emotion regulation where no strategy is inherently “good” or “bad”.     

一年级汉语儿童语素意识与口语词汇的双向关系:追踪研究的证据

以145名小学一年级儿童为被试,进行为期6个月的追踪,考察了儿童复合、同音和同形等不同层面语素意识与口语词汇的双向关系。结果发现:(1)控制了年龄、一般认知能力、语音意识及口语词汇的自回归效应后,同音和复合语素意识对口语词汇的发展具有显著的预测作用。(2)控制了相关变量及自回归效应后,口语词汇能够显著预测复合、同音和同形语素意识的发展。     

Gender differences in severity of writing and reading disabilities

Gender differences in mean level of reading and writing skills were examined in 122 children (80 boys and 42 girls) and 200 adults (115 fathers and 85 mothers) who showed behavioral markers of dyslexia in a family genetics study. Gender differences were found in writing and replicated prior results for typically developing children: Boys and men were more impaired in handwriting and composing than were girls and women, but men, who were more impaired in those writing skills, were also more impaired in spelling than women. Men were more impaired than women in accuracy and rate of reading passages orally, but boys were not more impaired than girls on any of the reading measures. Males were consistently more impaired than females in orthographic skills, which may be the source of gender differences in writing, but not motor skills. Population-based studies that report gender differences in reading in children with dyslexia may be confounding reading and writing disorders—the latter being the true source of gender differences in both children and adults with dyslexia.     

Asian American career development: A qualitative analysis

This study used a modified version of consensual qualitative research design to examine how contextual, cultural, and personal variables influence the career choices of a diverse group of 12 Asian Americans. Seven domains of influences on career choices emerged including family, culture, external factors, career goals, role models, work values, and self-identity. Furthermore, several overarching themes were discovered that expressed elements of many of these domains. These themes highlighted the pervasive and influential role that both culture and family of origin play in the construction of meaning that these Asian American participants made from their career choices. Implications of these domains and themes and suggestions for future research are discussed.     

From Environmental to Ecological Ethics: Toward a Practical Ethics for Ecologists and Conservationists

Ecological research and conservation practice frequently raise difficult and varied ethical questions for scientific investigators and managers, including duties to public welfare, nonhuman individuals (i.e., animals and plants), populations, and ecosystems. The field of environmental ethics has contributed much to the understanding of general duties and values to nature, but it has not developed the resources to address the diverse and often unique practical concerns of ecological researchers and managers in the field, lab, and conservation facility. The emerging field of “ecological ethics” is a practical or scientific ethics that offers a superior approach to the ethical dilemmas of the ecologist and conservation manager. Even though ecological ethics necessarily draws from the principles and commitments of mainstream environmental ethics, it is normatively pluralistic, including as well the frameworks of animal, research, and professional ethics. It is also methodologically pragmatic, focused on the practical problems of researchers and managers and informed by these problems in turn. The ecological ethics model offers environmental scientists and practitioners a useful analytical tool for identifying, clarifying, and harmonizing values and positions in challenging ecological research and management situations. Just as bioethics provides a critical intellectual and problem-solving service to the biomedical community, ecological ethics can help inform and improve ethical decision making in the ecology and conservation communities.

New age advice: ticket to happiness?

The ‘New Age’ movement emerged in the second half of the 20th century and New Age ideas became the vogue in the Western world. New Age is much concerned with personal quality of life and offers both a philosophy of life and various therapeutic practices, presumed to raise happiness. This paper first describes the main recommendations to be found in New Age books. Next it considers the probable effects on happiness of these, by examining both the theoretical plausibility and the empirical conditions of happiness. This paper concludes that several recommendations are likely to produce beneficial consequences. It is argued, however, that the advice will not fit everybody equally well and that some New Age practices may reduce happiness, e.g., practices that undermine a realistic outlook on reality.     

Description of Exemplar Cases in the Intensive Mental Health Program: Illustrations of Application of the Therapeutic Model

We describe cases from the clinical records in the Intensive Mental Health Program to illustrate the diverse presenting problems, intervention strategies, therapeutic process, and outcomes for children receiving services in this school-based, community-oriented treatment model. Cases reflect varying degrees of treatment response and potential factors that influence the fluctuating levels of emotional disturbance and impaired functioning in the home, school, and community.     

经验合作教学对教师教学准备影响的实验研究

本研究以"经验合作教学"的校本教师培训的新思路为依据,以经验合作教学的操作性方案为干预手段,运用教育实验法考察经验合作教学计划对教师教学准备的影响。研究表明:(1)《教师教学准备评价问卷》的信、效度均达到心理测量学要求,可以作为评价教师教学准备的工具;(2)经验合作教学对教师的教学准备具有积极促进作用;(3)经验合作教学对不同教龄、性别、职称教师教学准备的影响不同。