Cognitive competencies and aggressive behavior: A developmental study

A number of studies have demonstrated that increased socially related cognitive skills are associated with decreases in aggressive behavior. However, the link between aggression and intelligence or academic skills is less evident. While some research indicates that poor academic performance is related to aggression, it is unclear which components of intellectual ability and performance are critical to the management of aggressive behaviors. In two independent longitudinal studies of elementary school-age children, the relationship among several aspects of cognitive competence and several aspects of aggressive behavior were examined. The results of the first study showed that aggressive behavior observed in kindergarten children was more closely related to academic performance in the first and second grades than to general cognitive ability (IQ). The results of the second study, a comprehensive three-year investigation of upper elementary school-age children, indicated that teachers' assessments of aggression and parents' ratings of cruelty were consistent over time for boys, but not for girls. The intercorrelations among aggression measures within each of the three years also revealed stable sex differences. Boys identified as aggressive in the classroom were more likely to be perceived as aggressive, cruel, and/or delinquent at home, but for girls, there was little correlation between aggression at school and in the home. The analyses relating measures of cognitive functioning to indices of aggressive behavior made clear the importance of discriminating among various facets of these psychological constructs. IQ had a negligible relationship with aggression and a weak inverse relationship to delinquency. An overall index of cognitive functioning was a somewhat more consistent negative correlate of aggression, cruelty, and delinquency, especially for boys. A similar pattern was found for the correlates of academic performance. Academic disability was strongly related to delinquency in boys, and to a lesser degree to aggression in boys. Of the several cognitively related factors that were explored, Low Need Achievement manifested the strongest and most consistent relationships with the different facets of aggression and antisocial behavior, especially in boys. The implications of these results for psychological interventions in the school are discussed.     

组织中绩效压力的双刃剑效应

市场经济的复杂多变给组织生存与发展带来诸多挑战,组织往往对员工提出高的绩效要求,绩效压力已成为普遍现象。现有研究大多关注绩效压力的消极效应,存在忽视其积极结果及理论视角较窄等不足。因此,系统、全面地认识绩效压力的双刃剑效应,有助于组织充分发挥绩效压力的积极效应及阻遏其消极效应。通过系统地回顾和梳理相关研究,在将绩效压力影响效果的研究分为积极、消极和二者并存的曲线效应三个类别后,引入压力认知评价理论、资源保存理论等理论厘清研究背后的解释机制。最后,基于以上梳理分析,未来研究应进一步拓展组织中绩效压力的双刃剑效应及其边界条件,从而更全面地认识组织中绩效压力所产生的影响。     

个性化工作协议对员工主动性职业行为和创造力的影响

个性化工作协议是员工和组织通过谈判协商,自愿达成的非标准化工作协议。基于自我决定理论,本文探讨了个性化工作协议对员工主动性职业行为和创造力的影响机制及其边界条件。通过分析230对"员工-主管"匹配数据,本研究发现:个性化工作协议增强了员工基本心理需求满足(能力需求、自主需求和关系需求),促进了主动性职业行为和创造力,其中能力需求满足中介了个性化工作协议对主动性职业行为和创造力的影响;此外,较高水平的工作负荷不仅增强了个性化工作协议对员工能力需求/自主需求满足的促进作用,也增强了个性化工作协议通过提升能力需求满足,进而提升员工主动性职业行为和创造力的中介效应。     

Multiple effects of performance-contingent pay for wait-persons

The owners of three restaurants requested help with the pay of waitpersons who were paid by the hour. The waitpersons asked for raises which the owners said they could not afford. This research changed the method of compensating waitpersons by making their pay contingent on dollars of food sold. Increased productivity and increased earnings per hour of work for all of the waitpersons followed the beginning of the performance-contingent pay. Most of the waitpersons also earned increased take-home pay when the performance-contingent pay began. There was little improvement in labor costs per dollar of food sold, a measure of benefit to the owners. The fact that benefits to workers occurred without benefits to owners is contrary to common views about the effects of performance-contingent pay.     

Visible minority applicant concerns and assessment of occupational role in the era of community‐based policing

Attempts to recruit minority officers are an integral component of community‐based policing initiatives in Western democracies. To better understand how to optimize these initiatives, 80 African‐Canadian police applicants were surveyed for perceptions of occupational role, career aspirations and obstacles to minority recruitment. Although service to the Black community was a high priority, applicants reported this goal as secondary to providing service regardless of ethnicity. Further, applicants reported they would be as effective policing the White community and more effective policing the Black community than their White counterparts. Racial prejudice on the part of police officers and society were viewed as the most significant obstacles to minority recruitment. Two tests of potential perceptual distortions indicated that applicants perceived African‐Canadian acquaintances to be more frequent targets of police discrimination than they were as individuals, and perceived themselves as relatively less alienated from the police than were the police from their group. Discussion focuses on obstacles to minority recruitment, the fit between applicants' attitudes and the demands of modern policing, and the potential impact of a more ethnically diverse force for police–minority relations. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The proportion heuristic: problem set size as a basis for performance judgments

How do people evaluate their degree of mastery over a task? A series of four studies demonstrated that a potentially irrelevant cue can have a strong influence on such evaluations. In these studies, the total amount of work given to participants (the problem set size) influenced both (a) the amount of work participants completed before feeling that they had performed well and were adequately prepared for a related future task, and (b) participants' assessments of their performance and their feelings of preparedness for a related future task. These effects occurred even when a randomization procedure was used to emphasize the arbitrary nature of the problem set size. The effects vanished, however, when participants were given extra time to evaluate their progress after completing each problem. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.