Flexible Work Arrangements Availability and their Relationship with Work‐to‐Family Conflict,Job Satisfaction,and Turnover Intentions: A Comparison of Three Country Clusters

The present study explored the availability of flexible work arrangements (FWA) and their relationship with manager outcomes of job satisfaction, turnover intentions, and work‐to‐family conflict (WFC) across country clusters. We used individualism and collectivism to explain differences in FWA availability across Latin American, Anglo, and Asian clusters. Managers from the Anglo cluster were more likely to report working in organisations that offer FWA compared to managers from other clusters. For Anglo managers, flextime was the only FWA that had significant favorable relationships with the outcome variables. For Latin Americans, part‐time work negatively related with turnover intentions and strain‐based WFC. For Asians, flextime was unrelated to time‐based WFC, and telecommuting was positively associated with strain‐based WFC. The clusters did not moderate the compressed work week and outcome relationships. Implications for practitioners adopting FWA practices across cultures are discussed.     

Ambivalent Attitudes in a Communication Process: An Integrated Model

In a communication process that involves a target subject (what is being communicated about) and a source, existing attitudes (positive or negative) toward the target or the source influence communication effects. People also may hold ambivalent attitudes (positive and negative) toward the target or the source, but the implications of such ambivalent attitudes on communication effects remain unclear in communication research. This study tries to fill that void by exploring ambivalent attitudes toward the target and source on communication effects and proposing an integrated model to demonstrate that ambivalent attitudes encourage systematic processing (Experiments 1 and 2) and that identification with the target or the source further encourages motivated processing among ambivalent people (Experiments 3 and 4).     

Measurement of activity in small animals using a microcomputer-controlled system

A computer-controlled system that detects spontaneous activity (locomotion and rearing) and diurnal activity rhythms in small animals is described. Automatic recording of subtotals during test periods provides data about habituation (nonassociative learning). The system is relatively inexpensive to construct. Fabricated from highly reliable circuit components, it provides replicable measures that enable comparisons between different experimental treatments to be made using parametric statistics.     

Constructing the exact significance level for a person fit statistic

This paper uses an extension of the network algorithm originally introduced by Mehta and Patel to construct exact tail probabilities for testing the general hypothesis that item responses are distributed according to the Rasch model. By assuming that item difficulties are known, the algorithm is applicable to the statistical tests either given the maximum likelihood ability estimate or conditioned on the total score. A simulation study indicates that the network algorithm is an efficient tool for computing the significance level of a person fit statistic based on test lengths of 30 items or less.     

Sex differences in household labor time a comparison of rural and urban couples

A sample of 440 full-time employed couples from 11 states was examined to determine the differences between time spent on housework by husbands and wives in rural and urban areas. More time is spent in housework in rural families than in urban families because time spent in housework is greater for rural women than for urban women, while rural and urban husbands' times do not differ. Education of spouses, job status differentials, and age of the younger child do not significantly interact with rural-urban residence and sex of the spouse. However, family income does significantly influence the relationship between time spent on housework for rural and urban husbands and wives.     

New perspectives on child and adolescent depression

The Children's Depression Index (CDI) was administered to a group of 304 regular school students in Grades 3–12. It was found that 21% of the students reported mild to moderate levels and 7% reported severe levels of depression. Females reported more overall depression than did males. Specific CDI items selected more frequently by females than by males supports previous work suggesting that females tend to internalize difficulties whereas males are more likely to externalize problems. There were no age differences associated with overall depression; however, there were some developmental differences in specific items cited. Finally, “red flags” were identified that may be helpful in spotting children suffering from severe levels of depression.     

Another look at the effects of the system of multicultural pluralistic assessment

The purpose of this study was (a) to determine if a declassification occurs when estimated learning potential (ELP) is used in reevaluation of special education students and (b) to assess the effects of the use of ELP by multidisciplinary teams. Subjects included 107 black and 13 white students (83 males and 37 females) referred for reevaluation from classes for the mentally retarded. Data analysis consisted of determining the percentage of students who would be classified as mentally retarded according to the main criterion of (a) Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised (WISC-R) scores, or (b) ELP scores, or (c) multidisciplinary teams' placement. A chi-square test of independence indicated a significant difference between WISC-R and ELP scores; and between multidisciplinary teams' placement and ELP scores (p<.05). Students already in special education classes for the mentally retarded were not determined to be ineligible for services by multidisciplinary teams, even though 15% of the students would be ineligible for services according to ELP scores.