Meaning in life and its relationships with intrinsic religiosity,deliberate rumination,and emotional regulation

Meaning in life is one of the core elements of well‐being. Although meaning in life has received considerable research interest over the years, much of this research did not differentiate between the two categories of meaning, that is, search for meaning and meaning in life. The present study first investigated collective explanatory powers that intrinsic religiosity, deliberate rumination, and emotional regulation – three predictors selected based on past literature – have on these two types of meaning. In addition, mediational effects of deliberate rumination and emotional regulation in the links between intrinsic religiosity and search for meaning and presence of meaning were investigated. The participants were 326 undergraduate students in Seoul, South Korea. The hierarchical regression analyses found that while intrinsic religiosity contributed significantly in explaining only presence of meaning, deliberate rumination and emotional regulation had significant contributions in explaining both search for meaning and presence of meaning. Also, double mediational analysis using structural equation modelling revealed that deliberate rumination, but not emotional regulation, mediated the relationship between intrinsic religiosity and meaning in life. The implications and directions for future studies are also discussed.     

On-call work and physicians’ turnover intention: the moderating effect of job strain

Physician shortage and turnover are major problems worldwide. On-call duties may be among the risk factors of high turnover rates among physicians. We investigated whether having on-call duties is associated with physicians’ turnover intention and whether job strain variables moderate this association. The present study was a cross-sectional questionnaire study among 3324 (61.6% women) Finnish physicians. The analyses were conducted using analyses of covariance adjusted for age, gender, response format, specialization status and employment sector. The results showed that job strain moderated the association between being on-call and turnover intention. The highest levels of turnover intention were among those who had on-call duties and high level of job strain characterized by high demands and low control opportunities. The lowest levels of turnover intention were among those who were not on-call and who had low strain involving low demands and high control. Also, job demands moderated the association between being on-call and turnover intention; turnover intention levels were higher among those with on-call duties and high demands than those being on-call and low demands. To conclude, working on-call was related to physicians’ turnover intention particularly in those with high job strain. Health care organizations should focus more attention on working arrangements and scheduling of on-call work, provide a suitable working pace and implement means to increase physicians’ participation and control over their job.     

Flexible job search behaviour among unemployed jobseekers: antecedents and outcomes

The interest in flexible job search behaviour (FJSB) among unemployed jobseekers, i.e., the extent to which jobseekers also look for jobs that deviate from their studies and earlier work experience, has grown considerably in recent years. Yet, there is large disagreement on both its consequences and drivers. Career scholars as well as policymakers believe that FJSB is important for unemployed and can improve their employment prospects. However, evidence from human resource (HR) literature raises doubts whether FJSB can enhance re-employment success. Similarly, whereas the career literature links FJSB to positive attitudes, such as career adaptability, the HR literature suggests that people searching flexibly may feel pushed into this behaviour due to more negative reasons, like few labour market perspectives. The aim of this study is examining these opposing expectations. We focus on three FJSB types: flexibility with respect to pay/hierarchical level, skill use and commuting time. Hypotheses are tested using two-wave data with 672 unemployed. Results indicate, among others, that career-adaptable people are not inclined to search more flexibly. In addition, FJSB may in certain cases hamper people’s re-employment likelihood. People searching more flexibly also more often became underemployed and as such experienced a more negative job quality.     

In defence of high-speed memory scanning

This paper reviews some of the evidence that bears on the existence of a mental high-speed serial exhaustive scanning process (SES) used by humans to interrogate the active memory of a set of items to determine whether it contains a test item. First proposed in the 1960s, based on patterns of reaction times (RTs), numerous later studies supported, elaborated, extended, and limited the generality of SES, while critics claimed that SES never occurred, that predictions from SES were violated, and that other mechanisms produced the RT patterns that led to the idea. I show that some of these claims result from ignoring variations in experimental procedure that produce superficially similar but quantitatively different RT patterns and that, for the original procedures, the most frequently repeated claims that predictions are violated are false. I also discuss evidence against the generality of competing theories of active-memory interrogation, especially those that depend on discrimination of directly accessible “memory-strength”. Some of this evidence has been available since the 1960s but has been ignored by some proponents of alternative theories. Other evidence presented herein is derived from results of one relevant experiment described for the first time, results of another described in more detail than heretofore, and new analyses of old data. Knowledge of brain function acquired during the past half century has increased the plausibility of SES. The conclusion: SES is alive and well, but many associated puzzles merit further investigation, suggestions for which are offered.     

Consequences of voluntary job changes in Germany: A multilevel analysis for 1985–2013

Analyzing the development of the consequences of voluntary job changes in Germany between 1985 and 2013, the study focuses on income gains and job satisfaction increases. Drawing on arguments of the job-search literature on the one hand and the proliferation of choices on the other we investigate whether the returns of job changes have increased or decreased. Results show that income gains have decreased over time while the job satisfaction surplus has remained stable. We further conclude that in determining the outcomes of job changes over time, structural factors seem to be more important than individual ones.     

Personality change via work: A job demand–control model of Big-five personality changes

Based on the job demand–control model and Gray's biopsychological theory of personality, the author proposed a model to suggest that time demand and job control can drive changes in Big-five personality traits, especially neuroticism and extroversion, by shaping an individual's stress experiences at work. Five waves of data from 1814 employees over a five-year period from the Household, Income and Labor Dynamics in Australia Survey were analyzed. Time demand, job control and job stress were measured in all five waves, and Big-five personality was assessed in the first and last waves. The results showed that time demand and job control shaped job stress positively and negatively at a given time; and over time, an increase in time demand predicted an increase in job stress, which subsequently predicted an increase in neuroticism and a decrease in extroversion and conscientiousness. Results also showed that an increase in job control predicted an increase in agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness directly, but did not predict change in neuroticism and extroversion. Finally, the buffering effect of job control on the association between time demand and job stress was only observed in two of five waves and such buffering effect was not observed in a change process. The implications on personality development and work design research are discussed.     

Women outperform men in remembering to remember

The study of gender differences in prospective memory (i.e., remembering to remember) has received modest attention in the literature. The few reported studies investigating either subjective or objective evaluations of prospective memory have shown inconsistent data. In this study, we aimed to verify the presence of gender differences during the performance of an objective prospective memory test by considering the weight of specific variables such as length of delay, type of response, and type of cue. We submitted a sample of 100 healthy Italian participants (50 men and 50 women) to a test expressly developed to assess prospective memory: The Memory for Intentions Screening Test. Women performed better than men in remembering to do an event-based task (i.e., prompted by an external event) and when the task required a physical response modality. We discuss the behavioural differences that emerged by considering the possible role of sociological, biological, neuroanatomical, and methodological variables.     

Consequences of autonomous vehicles: Ambivalent expectations and their impact on acceptance

Connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs) are within reach of widespread deployment on public roads, but public perceptions are ambivalent. The objective of the present research was to assess expectations about the consequences of CAV introduction. These expectations should explain CAV acceptance, but their relative importance is poorly understood. We conducted a survey with a representatively drawn panel sample (N = 529) from France, Germany, Italy, and the UK. The survey consisted of a large item pool of expected consequences from CAV introduction, as well as general and affective evaluation of CAVs, ease of use, and behavioral intention to use CAVs. Exploratory factor analysis revealed four facets of expected consequences: road safety, privacy, efficiency and ecological sustainability. On average, expectations were mostly positive for ecological sustainability and safety, but negative for privacy. At the same time, substantial variance existed between respondents and between countries. For safety and efficiency, improvement was expected by a third of respondents, while another third expected worsening. Respondents from Italy expected more positive consequences for safety, while respondents from both France and Germany expected more negative consequences for privacy. To different degrees, all four facets predicted the intention to use CAVs in a structural equation model, primarily via affective evaluations. For policy makers, manufacturers, and service providers, understanding the trade-offs inherent to different CAV solutions will be central to ensure citizens’ needs are respected.     

A cross-cultural comparison of where drivers choose to look when viewing driving scenes

A substantial proportion of road accidents occur as a result of drivers having poor or insufficient visual search strategies. However, the majority of research into drivers visual search comes from high income Western countries where roads are relatively safe, with less being known about the visual search of drivers from non-western, low and middle income countries with much higher crash rates. This is despite the fact that cross-cultural studies have shown differences in visual search outside of driving between Western and Eastern individuals. The current study aimed to see whether these differences were present in driving by asking UK and Malaysian drivers to select where they would look when viewing images of roads from the perspective of a driver. Results showed that all drivers selected a similar number of focal objects, however there was a difference in the type of background information drivers chose to attend to, with Malaysian drivers selecting more task irrelevant information at the expense of task relevant information. Results suggest that there are cultural differences in what drivers choose to attend to which may contribute to the increased crash rate amongst drivers from low and middle income countries.     

What are the factors determining user intentions to use AV while impaired?

In this study, we employ the Integrated Choice Latent Variable (ICLV) framework to model the public’s intention of using Autonomous Vehicles (AVs) while impaired under the influence of alcohol, medicine, or fatigue. We identify five latent constructs from psychometric indicators that define respondent’s perception and attitudes towards AVs which are i) perceived benefits, ii) perceived risks, iii) enjoy driving, iv) wheels public transport attitude, and v) rails public transport attitude. We use these latent variables along with explanatory variables to study user intentions regarding delegation of vehicle control from human driving to autonomous driving. The study uses survey data collected from 1,065 Czech residents between 2017 and 2018. Our findings indicate that user intentions are primarily defined by attitudes rather than socio-demographic attributes. However, the inclusion of both types of variables is crucial in evaluating user intentions. Despite a positive outlook towards AVs, people were found to be reluctant in using AVs while impaired which can be attributed to distrust towards the technology. Our analysis shows that with appropriate efforts from policymakers, the public’s attitude can be changed to promote adoption. The efforts will have to be emphasized towards building positive attitudes (such as perceived benefits) and diminishing existing negative attitudes (such as perceived risks).