Alcohol as social lubricant.

This study examines how consuming alcohol differentially affects the communicative behavior and perceptions of high and low social self‐esteem (SSE) women as they engage in a brief interaction with a flirtatious male. Alcohol myopia theory proposes that alcohol affects behavior when it blocks a person's normal inhibitions about enacting a behavior. It was predicted that low SSE women would be more inhibited when talking to a flirtatious male than would high SSE women and, therefore administration of a social self‐esteem measure and random assignment to an alcoholic or nonalcoholic beverage condition, participants (N=50) talked with an attractive, flirtatious male confederate. Low SSE women were less anxious and self‐disclosed more when drinking than when sober, whereas high SSE women were not significantly affected by alcohol consumption. The discussion highlights the complex and often contradictory effects of alcohol consumption on social interaction.     

The effects of violent video games on aggression.

Violent content video games such as Mortal Kombat and Doom have become very popular among children and adolescents, causing great concern for parents, teachers, and policy makers. This study cumulates findings across existing empirical research on the effects of violent video games to estimate overall effect size and discern important trends and moderating variables. Results suggest there is a smaller effect of violent video games on aggression than has been found with television violence on aggression. This effect is positively associated with type of game violence and negatively related to time spent playing the games. Directions for future programmatic research on video games are outlined.     

"Not another meeting!" Are meeting time demands related to employee well-being?

Using an interruptions framework, this article proposes and tests a set of hypotheses concerning the relationship of meeting time demands with job attitudes and well-being (JAWB). Two Internet surveys were administered to employees who worked 35 hr or more per week. Study 1 examined prescheduled meetings attended in a typical week (N=676), whereas Study 2 investigated prescheduled meetings attended during the current day (N=304). As proposed, the relationship between meeting time demands and JAWB was moderated by task interdependence, meeting experience quality, and accomplishment striving. However, results were somewhat dependent on the time frame of a study and the operational definition used for meeting time demands. Furthermore, perceived meeting effectiveness was found to have a strong, direct relationship with JAWB.     

Development of a global measure of job embeddedness and integration into a traditional model of voluntary turnover

Recent research on job embeddedness has found that both on- and off-the-job forces can act to bind people to their jobs. The present study extended this line of research by examining how job embeddedness may be integrated into a traditional model of voluntary turnover. This study also developed and tested a global, reflective measure of job embeddedness that overcomes important limitations and serves as a companion to the original composite measure. Results of this longitudinal study found that job embeddedness predicted voluntary turnover beyond job attitudes and core variables from traditional models of turnover. Results also found that job embeddedness interacted with job satisfaction to predict voluntary turnover, suggesting that the job embeddedness construct extends beyond the unfolding model of turnover (T. R. Mitchell & T. W. Lee, 2001) it originated from.     

The Variability of Criterion‐Related Validity Estimates Among Interviewers and Interview Panels

The authors examined differences in criterion‐related validity estimates among ratings from individual interviewers and interview panels within a structured interview. Senior non‐commissioned officers (NCOs) in the U.S. Army (N=64) conducted panel interviews with 944 junior NCOs during a concurrent validation project. Analysis of the data revealed considerable variation in interviewer validity coefficients in relation to multiple performance criteria. Results also indicated the importance of adopting a multivariate perspective when evaluating interviewer validity differences in that the amount of variation in validity coefficients differed both by interview dimension and criterion. A similar pattern of findings emerged when analyses were performed on ratings averaged within interview panel. Nonetheless, when meta‐analysis was used to estimate the amount of true variance in interviewer‐ and panel‐level validity coefficients, most or all of the variance for some interview‐criterion combinations appeared to be due to statistical artifacts.     

Perceived Meeting Effectiveness: The Role of Design Characteristics

Purpose  The aim of this investigation was to test hypotheses about meeting design characteristics (punctuality, chairperson, etc.) in relation to attendees’ perceptions of meeting effectiveness. Design/Methodology/Approach  Two studies were conducted: Study 1 investigated meetings attended in a typical week (N = 958), whereas Study 2 examined the last meeting attended on a particular day (N = 292). Findings   A number of design characteristics (in particular agenda use and quality of facilities) were found to be important in predicting perceived effectiveness. Attendee involvement served as a key mediator variable in the observed relationships. Neither meeting type nor size was found to affect the relationships of the design characteristics and involvement with effectiveness. Meeting size, however, was negatively related to attendee involvement. Implications  The findings help us to better understand relationships between design characteristics and attendees’ perceptions of meeting effectiveness. Meeting organizers can use the findings to guide administration of meetings, with potential to enhance the quality of meetings. Originality/Value   Meetings are a common organizational activity but are rarely the focus of empirical research. The use of two complementary studies, to our knowledge, provides a unique account of the contribution of design characteristics to perceptions of meeting effectiveness. Received and reviewed by former editor, George Neuman.