Job-seeking and job-acquisition in high school students

We surveyed 225 Year 9 and 10 students at T1 regarding their attitude, social norms, control, experience, plans and intentions to find a part-time job while at school. Of these, 149 did not have a job and were surveyed again four months later about their job-seeking and job outcomes (104 responded at T2). Job-seeking intentions at T1 were associated with past experience, plans and beliefs that getting a job was the right thing to do. Job-seeking at T2 was associated with beliefs about the value of job-seeking. Job interviews attended were related to job-seeking, and job offers were related to interviews attended. Students with higher job-seeking intentions and behaviours differed on most variables from students with lower intentions and behaviours. Students need to be aware of the relationship between job-seeking, interviews and offers, and be provided with strategies that increase their interviews and assist to manage unsuccessful job attempts.     

Work, family and life-course fit: Does control over work time matter?

This study moves from “work-family” to a multi-dimensional “life-course fit” construct (employees’ cognitive assessments of resources, resource deficits, and resource demands), using a combined work-family, demands-control and ecology of the life course framing. It examined (1) impacts of job and home ecological systems on fit dimensions, and (2) whether control over work time predicted and mediated life-course fit outcomes. Using cluster analysis of survey data on a sample of 917 white-collar employees from Best Buy headquarters, we identified four job ecologies (corresponding to the job demands-job control model) and five home ecologies (theorizing an analogous home demands-home control model). Job and home ecologies predicted fit dimensions in an additive, not interactive, fashion. Employees’ work-time control predicted every life-course fit dimension and partially mediated effects of job ecologies, organizational tenure, and job category.     

Power gained,power lost

Changes in power almost invariably lead to changes in behavior. This research investigates the effects of power increases and power decreases for individuals who are in strong or weak positions. We hypothesized that individuals will have strong reactions to gains in power (their demands will increase markedly) but they will act almost as though they do not recognize losses in power (their demands will not drop much) when they lose power. Four experiments track individuals’ actions when they move from ultimatum to dictatorship games, from dictatorship to ultimatum games, or when they have the same power position repeatedly. The data consistently show that people over-react to an increase in power, but that they react appropriately to a loss in power. The discussion explores the behavioral disconnect between increases and decreases in power.     

Coherence and recurrency: maintenance,control and integration in working memory

Working memory (WM), including a ‘central executive’, is used to guide behavior by internal goals or intentions. We suggest that WM is best described as a set of three interdependent functions which are implemented in the prefrontal cortex (PFC). These functions are maintenance, control of attention and integration. A model for the maintenance function is presented, and we will argue that this model can be extended to incorporate the other functions as well. Maintenance is the capacity to briefly maintain information in the absence of corresponding input, and even in the face of distracting information. We will argue that maintenance is based on recurrent loops between PFC and posterior parts of the brain, and probably within PFC as well. In these loops information can be held temporarily in an active form. We show that a model based on these structural ideas is capable of maintaining a limited number of neural patterns. Not the size, but the coherence of patterns (i.e., a chunking principle based on synchronous firing of interconnected cell assemblies) determines the maintenance capacity. A mechanism that optimizes coherent pattern segregation, also poses a limit to the number of assemblies (about four) that can concurrently reverberate. Top-down attentional control (in perception, action and memory retrieval) can be modelled by the modulation and re-entry of top-down information to posterior parts of the brain. Hierarchically organized modules in PFC create the possibility for information integration. We argue that large-scale multimodal integration of information creates an ‘episodic buffer’, and may even suffice for implementing a central executive.     

Coparenting Conflict and Cooperation between Parents and Grandparents in Vietnamese Families: The Role of Grandparent Psychological Control and Parent–Grandparent Communication

Shared care between parents and grandparents is common in Asian cultures. This cocare practice provides many benefits to families but is also particularly complex, as both parents and grandparents must simultaneously fulfill their roles as cocaregivers as well as maintain their relationship with each other. This study aims to explore the determinants of coparenting relationships between parents and grandparents in Vietnam. Data were collected from 501 Vietnamese parents whose aging parents are active carers for their children. The results indicated that grandparent psychological control and parent–grandparent quality of communication explain the largest variance in both parent–grandparent coparenting conflict and cooperation. The results suggest that parenting interventions aimed at the Asian cultures, where grandparent care is common, may benefit from the inclusion of a content focus on promoting the coparenting relationship between parents and grandparents.     

On an Unidentified Fixed-Effects Three-Parameter Logistic Model

For the fixed-effects three-parameter logistic model in item response theory, the necessary and sufficient condition of the model identification is presented synthesizing known results. An optimal transformation of parameters for model identification in Maris's unidentified case to remove or reduce the skewness of abilities is shown. In many cases, the vanishing skewnesses are obtained in the possible range of transformation for parameters with some improvements in the test response and information functions.     

The influence of alcohol (0.5‰) on the control and manoeuvring level of driving behaviour,finding measures to assess driving impairment: A simulator study

ObjectiveThe influence of psychoactive substances on driving performance and traffic safety has been extensively studied. Research on the influence of alcohol at the control level of behaviour (i.e. automated processes) has been well established and has shown that the ability to operate a vehicle decreases with rising alcohol levels. However, results one level higher at the manoeuvring level (i.e. conscious processes), are inconsistent. The current study aimed to replicate findings on the influence of alcohol on the control level of behaviour and investigate effects on the manoeuvring level in order to find suitable measures to assess driving impairment.MethodThe study was double-blind, placebo-controlled with a counterbalanced treatment order and a two-way crossover design. Thirty participants performed tasks in a driving simulator under the influence of alcohol (0.5‰) and a placebo. In the driving tasks the control level of behaviour (swerving, average speed, and speed variation) was investigated, as well as the manoeuvring level of behaviour (distance to other traffic during an overtaking manoeuvre, reaction time to a traffic light turning amber, and response to a suddenly merging car).ResultsAs expected, alcohol affected the control level of behaviour negatively. Participants swerved more and showed more speed variation after alcohol intake. The manoeuvring level of driving behaviour was also affected by alcohol. The distance to other drivers during an overtaking manoeuvre was smaller under the influence of alcohol. Results on reaction time were however less straightforward. Reaction time increased significantly under the influence of alcohol when reacting to a traffic light but not in reaction to a car unexpectedly merging into traffic. When analysing behaviour in reaction to these different events in more detail it became clear that they were responded to in varying manners, making it difficult to find an average impairment measure.ConclusionsThe deteriorating effect of alcohol at the control level of driving behaviour was replicated, confirming the suitability of the standard deviation of lateral position and the variation in speed as measures of impairment. At the manoeuvring level, the kept distance to the leading car during an overtaking manoeuvre appeared to be a suitable measure to assess impairment as well as reaction time to a traffic light. The current study also confirms the difficulties in evaluating complex driving behaviour and the need for more research on this subject.     

Less precise motor control leads to increased agonist-antagonist muscle activation during stick balancing

Human motor control has constraints in terms of its responsiveness, which limit its ability to successfully perform tasks. In a previous study, it was shown that the ability to balance an upright stick became progressively more challenging as the natural frequency (angular velocity without control) of the stick increased. Furthermore, forearm and trunk agonist and antagonist muscle activation increased as the natural frequency of the stick increased, providing evidence that the central nervous system produces agonist-antagonist muscle activation to match task dynamics. In the present study, visual feedback of the stick position was influenced by changing where subject focused on the stick during stick balancing. It was hypothesized that a lower focal height would degrade motor control (more uncertainty in tracking stick position), thus making balancing more challenging. The probability of successfully balancing the stick at four different focal heights was determined along with the average angular velocity of the stick. Electromyographic signals from forearm and trunk muscles were also recorded. As expected, the probability of successfully balancing the stick decreased and the average angular velocity of the stick increased as subjects focused lower on the stick. In addition, changes in the level of agonist and antagonist muscle activation in the forearm and trunk was linearly related to changes in the angular velocity of the stick during balancing. One possible explanation for this is that the central nervous system increases muscle activation to account for less precise motor control, possibly to improve the responsiveness of human motor control.     

Powered-Two-Wheelers kinematic characteristics and interactions during filtering and overtaking in urban arterials

The present paper focuses on the Powered-Two-Wheelers (PTWs) kinematic characteristics and their interactions with the rest of traffic in urban arterials. The factors that may affect the likelihood of PTW drivers to accept critical spacing during filtering and overtaking are also investigated using trajectory data collected from video recordings. The distributional characteristics of the PTW kinematic parameters showed that the patterns of filtering and overtaking have several differences. Further results using Logit models show that PTW speed difference with the rest of traffic, spacing, the existence of heavy vehicles and the occurrence of platoon of moving PTWs (in which the leader is the reference PTW) are significant factors related to the probability of driving in critical spaces through traffic. The likelihood of accepting critical lateral distance from the vehicle being overtaken may be related to the adjacent lane spacing, the speed difference and the existence of a platoon of PTWs. A comparative study between Logit models and equivalent structures of neural networks showed that, in the specific application, neural networks were found to perform better than the Logit models in terms of the model’s discrimination power.