The Role of Job Seekers' Individual Characteristics on Job Seeking Behavior and Psychological Well‐being

The job search process is considered a complex and intensive procedure requiring investment in time and effort on behalf of job seekers. Our study attempts to explore further the effects of a number of individual characteristics on job search behavior, effort, job search outcomes, as well as, on psychological well‐being. We examined these relationships using a daily diary methodology with the participation of 79 recent university graduates–job seekers in Greece at the beginning of the recent financial crisis. Our results did not support the importance of these individual characteristics on job search behavior, effort, and job search outcomes, but it supported their role of daily psychological well‐being, especially their self‐esteem. We discuss implications for job seekers to cultivate these skills that are related to these individual characteristics helpful in maintaining a positive psychological state during the job search period.     

The Role of Anticipated Regret in Advice Taking

Across five studies, we demonstrate that anticipated future regret influences receptiveness to advice. While making a revision to one's own judgment based on advice, people can anticipate two kinds of future regret: (a) the regret of following non‐beneficial advice and (b) the regret of ignoring beneficial advice. In studies 1a (scenario task) and 1b (judgment task), we find that anticipated regret from erring after following advice is greater than anticipated regret from erring after ignoring advice. Furthermore, receptiveness decreases as the difference between anticipated regret from following and from ignoring advice increases. In study 2, we demonstrate that perceived justifiability of one's own initial decision is greater than that of advice. This difference in perceived justifiability influences anticipated regret and that, in turn, influences receptiveness. In study 3, we investigate the effect of advisor's expertise on perceived justifiability, anticipated regret, and receptiveness. In study 4, we propose and test an intervention to improve receptiveness based on self‐generation of advice justifications. Participants who were asked to self‐generate justifications for the advice were more receptive to it. This effect was mediated by perceived justifiability and anticipated regret. These findings shed further light on what prevents people from being receptive to advice and how this can be improved. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Gamification in employee selection: The development of a gamified assessment

Gamification has attracted increased attention among organizations and human resource professionals recently, as a novel and promising concept for attracting and selecting prospective employees. In the current study, we explore the construct validity of a new gamified assessment method in employee selection that we developed following the situational judgement test (SJT) methodology. Our findings support the applicability of game elements into a traditional form of assessment built to assess candidates' soft skills. Specifically, our study contributes to research on gamification and employee selection exploring the construct validity of a gamified assessment method indicating that the psychometric properties of SJTs and their transformation into a gamified assessment are a suitable avenue for future research and practice in this field.     

‘Un-certainty’: working therapeutically with a transgender young person and learning to bear the unknown

Abstract

The rate of referrals to mental health services for children and young people for whom gender dysphoria is the identified clinical issue has increased significantly over the last ten years. Debates around the classifications of gender identity disorder, gender dysphoria or gender incongruence, as well as the involvement of child and adolescent mental health services with this group of children and young people seem to be re-enacting the societal gender binary world view where we see acceptance versus rejection, open-mindedness versus conservative, trans-phobic thinking. In this paper the author will attempt to shed some light on the work with these young people in a clinical setting by reflecting on a year of therapeutic work with a female to male young person. Through the therapist’s reflections upon these binary preconceptions, along with the use of developmental and object relations theory, an in-depth account of the work is given. It is suggested that in some cases the therapist’s capacity to bear the unknown, while gradually observing and mirroring the un-integrated inner self of the patient, can gradually bring the fragments together, even if not in a perfect fit, and that this in turn provides a sense of relief.     

Exploiting Listener Gaze to Improve Situated Communication in Dynamic Virtual Environments

Beyond the observation that both speakers and listeners rapidly inspect the visual targets of referring expressions, it has been argued that such gaze may constitute part of the communicative signal. In this study, we investigate whether a speaker may, in principle, exploit listener gaze to improve communicative success. In the context of a virtual environment where listeners follow computer‐generated instructions, we provide two kinds of support for this claim. First, we show that listener gaze provides a reliable real‐time index of understanding even in dynamic and complex environments, and on a per‐utterance basis. Second, we show that a language generation system that uses listener gaze to provide rapid feedback improves overall task performance in comparison with two systems that do not use gaze. Aside from demonstrating the utility of listener gaze in situated communication, our findings open the door to new methods for developing and evaluating multi‐modal models of situated interaction.