Differentiation is key: should employers offer something unique or the same yet better?

ABSTRACT

Researchers agree that employers should differentiate themselves from their competitors to become the employer of choice. However, from the recruitment literature, it is not clear how employers should differentiate their employment offers. Building upon the structural alignment theory, we investigated in two experimental studies whether offering something unique (i.e., non-alignable attributes; e.g., offer a benefit package when competitors do not) or offering the same yet better (i.e., alignable attributes; e.g., offer a bigger benefit package than competitors) is the most effective differentiation strategy for employment offers and whether this depends on job seekers’ work experience. Offering the same yet better affected job seekers’ preferences more positively than offering something unique in lowly complex judgement and decision-making situations (Study 1) as well as in highly complex judgement and decision-making situations if job seekers had more work experience (Study 2). Hence, our findings suggest that differentiation strategies matter: employers should differentiate by offering the same yet better, particularly when they look for highly experienced job seekers in highly complex judgement and decision-making situations.     

Maternal and paternal infant-directed speech to girls and boys: An exploratory study

ABSTRACT

We compared systematically the structure and the content of maternal and paternal speech to infant boys and girls while we also investigated the effect of infant’s age. Six girls and five boys were observed in the interaction with their mothers and their fathers (dyads came from the same families) at home from the second to the sixth month after birth at 15- day intervals. Detailed analysis of time revealed that fathers favour systematically the temporal structure of their speech to both girls and boys, while mothers favour boys in infant emotion/attention thematic sequences and girls in infant attention speech. Variations are counterbalanced in the way mothers and fathers respond sensitively to known marked changes in infant- parent communication over the first 6 months of life. These results are discussing in relation to the theory of innate intersubjectivity and the complementary company and care both parents give to developing infant girls and boys.     

知识密集型组织的雇佣关系民主治理和员工创造力研究

本文探讨了雇佣关系民主治理对员工创造力影响的中介机制和边界条件,并利用跨层次的调查数据进行实证研究。研究结果发现:(1)雇佣关系民主治理显著正向影响员工创造力;(2)内在动机在雇佣关系民主治理与员工创造力间起部分中介作用;(3)组织知识密集度对雇佣关系民主治理与员工内在动机的正向关系间有着显著强化作用;(4)雇佣关系民主治理和组织知识密集度的交互作用通过内在动机的中介作用,进而影响员工创造力。     

Effects of maternal depressive symptoms on sensitivity to infant distress and non-distress: Role of SES and race

The goals of the present study were to examine the extent to which (a) maternal depressive symptoms (prenatal vs. postnatal depressive symptoms) undermine maternal sensitivity toward both infant distress and non-distress; (b) such effects are stronger in the context of socioeconomic risk. SES risk and depressive symptoms interacted such that depressive symptoms, both pre and postnatal, only predicted lower sensitivity among mothers at heightened SES risk. The effects were comparable for sensitivity to distress and non-distress and did not vary by maternal race.     

Making the transition: How finding a good job is a risky business for military Veterans in Northern Ireland

ABSTRACT

Veterans transitioning from the military to civilian life may encounter difficulties in different domains of functioning. Most research in this area comes from the US and Israel, with Veterans in Northern Ireland (NI) in the United Kingdom, remaining an understudied population. This qualitative study aimed to examine the nature of transition experiences of NI Veterans by analyzing responses (N = 252) to an open-ended question related to the transition process, in a self-report survey. Thematic analysis highlighted both positive and negative experiences across high-level themes. These were related to (1a) how good the military life had been, (1b) the transition had been easy for some Veterans, and (1c) the skills gained in the military have been valuable; (2) it was hard to adjust to civilian life/still adjusting; (3) negative employment experiences; (4) lack of trust; (5) transitioning is hard in NI; and (6) inadequate support, post-service. The findings highlight that NI Veterans share some of the same challenges as other Veterans; however, the challenges in NI are compounded by ongoing security concerns and political tensions, which means living under the radar is a reality for many, making finding meaningful work and community integration difficult. The findings indicate that preparation for civilian life and the acculturation process needs to start many months before discharge. Perhaps more crucially, regiments should work closely with and support civilian employers to equip them to recognize and value the skills ex-Services Veterans can offer, and find a good fit for their skills within their organizations.     

Birth order,stimulating environment,and maternal factors in developmental outcomes: A longitudinal Mexican study

This study longitudinally examined the interplay between birth-order and well-known risk factors in impoverished environments such as inadequate environmental stimulation, low maternal education, and young maternal age in children from birth to 36 months. In the developmental motor domain, the effect of the stimulating environment over time, favored first-borns. In the adaptive domain, maternal education privileged first-born boys. In language development, first-borns reached higher scores over time than laterborn identifying a positive impact of stimulation. In the personal-social domain, firstborns obtained higher averages overall, but stratified models revealed that later-borns reached the first-borns scores as maternal age increased.     

The temporal dimension in the understanding of maternal sensitivity in caregiver-infant interactions: The ‘Early Mother-Child Interaction Coding System’

Caregiver-child interaction is known to play a central role in children’s socioemotional development, yet the diversity of measures commonly used to evaluate it call into question the nature of the construct being assessed. Contingency within caregiver-child interactions has been identified as a key dyadic process that requires taking a temporal perspective to evaluating interactions. The Early Mother-Child Interaction Coding System is a psychometrically sound measure that sequentially code the flow of interactive and non-interactive behaviours within a caregiver-infant system. Its use of the framework of nonlinear dynamical systems (NDS) expands our understanding of contingent caregiver-infant dyadic behaviour.