Psychosocial Effects of Conditions of Military Deployment

Deployment may lead the soldiers to dichotomise their profession and their family life, resulting in unwanted effects on family or career. Effects on reintegration and functioning within family are considered. Reunions may be characterized by perceived negative reception and consequences could spill over to children as parents attempt to equivocate their differences. Risks exist for fragmentation of the family system or divorce. Social support may serve to buffer families with members on deployment.     

Burnout and its relations with basic psychological needs and motivation among athletes: A systematic review and meta-analysis

ObjectivesThe present study is a review on studies about the relationships between the three basic psychological needs/motivational regulations (i.e., amotivation, controlled regulation, extrinsic autonomous regulation, and intrinsic motivation) and burnout.DesignA systematic review and meta-analysis.MethodStudies were identified through five electronic databases and manual search using combinations of three groups of keywords. Three inclusion criteria were then used to screen the searched articles.ResultsEighteen studies met the inclusion criteria and these studies varied considerably in terms of their study characteristics (e.g., characteristics of participants, study designs, and outcome measures). The results also showed that the three basic psychological needs, intrinsic motivation, extrinsic autonomous regulation, and amotivation had small to large effects on predicting global burnout and its three dimensions. However, controlled regulation showed no or weak correlations with the burnout subscales.ConclusionsSelf-determination theory was generally supported in explaining athlete burnout.     

Metanoia

SUMMARY

The author draws on her experience working with individual men who are violent to their partners to think about the problem of international violence. A parallel is drawn between a man's feeling of “entitlement” to forcefully keep his partner “in line” and feelings of national entitlement to engage in violence to force one group's agenda on another. The differences between morals and taboos are discussed underscoring the community value of that which becomes socially and ethically “unthinkable.”     

The Imagination of Images and Images of Imagination: How the Imagination Relates to Aging,Health, and Spirituality

ABSTRACT

Psychological literature suggests that religion and spirituality increase in late adulthood. Yet, operational definitions of spirituality and religiosity remain widely debated and inadequate for the concepts they are designed to measure. The empirical studies of religion and spirituality as one ages are of poor design and often measure only limited aspects of religion or spirituality. Few empirical studies exist which have been conceived to only study religiosity and spirituality in late adulthood. The purpose of this study was to determine the defining aspects of religiosity and spirituality using the Allport, Ross Intrinsic, Extrinsic Religiosity Scale, Ellison's Spiritual Well-Being Scale, and Neugarten's Life Satisfaction Instrument. Using a principal component factor analysis, the study examined the factor structure using an older adult sample of 320 individuals 65 years of age and older. Having a purpose in life combines with intrinsic religious questions for the first factor. Life satisfaction questions group together on two factors and extrinsic religiosity is clearly one factor. The scales used hold together well when combined. A new, shortened scale to measure aspects of religiosity and spirituality is proposed.     

Dwelling and Seeking in Late Adulthood: The Psychosocial Implications of Two Types of Religious Orientation

SUMMARY

This article summarizes quantitative findings and presents two illustrative case studies showing how religious dwelling and spiritual seeking evolve over the adult life course and relate to psychosocial functioning in late adulthood. The data come from the Institute of Human Development (IHD) longitudinal study of men and women. Religious dwellers tend to emphasize traditional forms of religious behavior whereas spiritual seekers emphasize innovative religious practices. In the IHD study, the religious involvement of the dwellers tended to be highly stable over the life course whereas spirituality gained in salience in the second half of adulthood. In late adulthood, religious dwelling was associated with maintaining close and warm relations with others and communal involvement, and during times of adversity, religiousness served as a buffer against the loss of life satisfaction. Spiritual seeking was associated with an emphasis on personal growth, creativity, and acquiring new knowledge. Spiritual growth was particularly characteristic of introspective individuals who in early adulthood experienced stressful life events.     

The protective role of compassion satisfaction for therapists who work with sexual violence survivors: an application of the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions

Therapists who work with trauma survivors, such as survivors of sexual violence, can experience compassion satisfaction while experiencing negative effects of trauma work, such as secondary traumatic stress. We examined whether the negative effects of secondary traumatic stress on therapist adjustment would be buffered by compassion satisfaction and whether the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions could be applied to examine the factors (positive emotions and positive reframing) that relate to compassion satisfaction. Sixty-one therapists who work with sexual violence survivors completed measures of secondary traumatic stress, compassion satisfaction, adjustment, positive emotions and positive reframing. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses found that compassion satisfaction buffered the negative impact of secondary traumatic stress on therapist adjustment when adjustment was conceptualised as anxiety. Using non-parametric bootstrapping, we found that the relationship between greater positive emotions and greater compassion satisfaction was partially mediated by positive reframing. The findings indicate that compassion satisfaction is likely to be helpful in ameliorating the negative effects of secondary traumatic stress on anxiety in therapists who work with sexual violence survivors and that the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions may provide a strong theoretical basis for the further examination of compassion satisfaction in trauma therapists.     

Keep the fire burning: Reciprocal gains of basic need satisfaction,intrinsic motivation and innovative work behaviour

Drawing on insights from self-determination theory, we explored the dynamic relationship between intrinsic motivation and innovative work behaviour (IWB) over time. Specifically, we investigated how basic need satisfaction influences IWB through its effect on intrinsic motivation and how IWB in turn affects basic need satisfaction as measured the next day (i.e., a reciprocal relationship). The current study used a longitudinal design comprising a 6-day period and relied on multi-source data from 76 students in industrial product design and electronic engineering who participated in an innovation boot camp. In general, results provided support for the mediating role of intrinsic motivation in the relationship between basic need satisfaction and IWB, as well as the reciprocal relationship between basic need satisfaction and IWB.     

The third dimension: Value‐oriented contents in psychological contracts

We propose value-oriented content of psychological contracts as being distinct from transactional and relational content, which we affirm using confirmatory factor analysis for employee, as well as organizational obligations. In a sample of 171 German parish volunteers, value-oriented volunteer and relational organizational obligations are significantly and positively related to job satisfaction as well as to time spent volunteering. The distinctive role of value-oriented content is reinforced by the finding that its associated employee obligations were the only ones that were significantly and positively related to both outcomes. Thus, value-oriented obligations may foster favourable work relationships and may even have the potential to stabilize work relationships during crises if obligations regarding an organization's core values are fulfilled. Examining the generalizability of these findings to nonvolunteer samples in future research is recommended.     

No time for compromises: Age as a moderator of the relation between needs–supply fit and job satisfaction

In the light of the current demographic change, organizations need to be aware of factors influencing job satisfaction of older workers in order to maintain high motivation and commitment. The present study addresses this issue by examining the moderating effect of age on the relationship between needs–supply fit and job satisfaction. Based on the general assumption that older workers are more sensitive to circumstances that threaten their well-being (Carstensen, 2006 Carstensen, L. L. 2006. The influence of a sense of time on human development. Science, 312: 1913–1915. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), we hypothesize that older as compared to younger workers should react more negatively to a misfit between their needs and available job supplies. Hence, older as compared to younger workers should report lower levels of job satisfaction when experiencing a misfit between needs and supplies. This hypothesis was tested in a sample of 471 employed workers from different occupational areas. Results confirmed our hypothesis for four out of five domains of needs–supply fit: Significant three-way interactions between needs, supply, and age were observed. The present result that older as compared to younger workers react more strongly to needs–supply misfits additionally underlines the benefits of considering age-related changes in work values and needs in age-sensitive human resource practices.     

Job insecurity climate's influence on employees' job attitudes: Evidence from two European countries

An important amount of literature about job insecurity and its consequences has been developed during the past few decades (Sverke, Hellgren, & Näswall, 2002 Sverke, M., Hellgren, J. and Näswall, K. 2002. No security: A meta-analysis and review of job insecurity and its consequences. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 7(3): 242–264. [Crossref], [PubMed] , [Google Scholar]). Most of this research has focused on an individual-analysis perspective, without taking into account social context. Although job insecurity climate has not been empirically examined, several authors have implicitly assumed that job insecurity contexts exist in some organizations where layoffs have occurred. Therefore, they examined layoff survivors' reactions. From this perspective, the aim of this study was to validate the job insecurity climate concept and examine its influence on employees' job attitudes. In order to provide additional support, this objective was examined in two samples: 428 employees belonging to 20 Spanish organizations and 550 employees in 18 Belgian organizations. The results showed that job insecurity climate emerged within the organizations in both samples, and that it influenced employees' job satisfaction and organizational commitment above and beyond individual perceptions of job insecurity in the Spanish sample. The implications and limitations of this study are discussed.