Contradictory asymmetries in body and weapon size,and assessment in fighting male prawns,Macrobrachium rosenbergii

Asymmetries in weapon size and body size, both contributing to an animal's fighting ability, may be contradictory in two fighting Macrobrachium rosenbergii males: One male may be larger in body size but smaller in cheliped size than its rival. The aim of the study was to determine the relevance of these two asymmetries in the assessment of relative fighting ability, and to reveal the effect of the asymmetry level on the structure of contests. Thirty contests were staged between male prawns from the ‘blue-clawed’ morphotype and the ‘orange-clawed’ morphotype. The blue-clawed males were 0%, 10%, or 20% larger in cheliped length but 93%, 45%, or 25% smaller in weight, respectively (n = 10), as compared to their orange-clawed opponents. The blue-clawed males with 10% and 20% advantage in cheliped length almost invariably won the contests. When similar in cheliped length, the 93% smaller blue-clawed males still won half of the contests. This indicated that the prawns ignored large asymmetries in body size even when no asymmetry in cheliped size existed. The results suggest that only cheliped size is used by M. rosenbergii males in the assessment of fighting ability. The effect of asymmetry level on contest structure was apparent only with the increase from 10% to 20% difference in cheliped size: Both the frequency and the intensity of fighting were lower in contests between prawns with 20% difference, as compared to 0% and 10% difference in cheliped length. Aggr. Behav. 23:81–91, 1997.© 1997 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Asymmetry of cognitive functioning as a possible predictor for vocational counseling and personnel classification

Neuropsychological research indicates the asymmetrical functioning of the cerebral hemispheres. The right hemisphere appears to specialize in global, synthetic, spatial, time-independent processing, whereas the left hemisphere is dominant in analytic, verbal, sequential, time-dependent processing. It is proposed here that in tasks, jobs, and occupations entailing hemisphere-specific abilities, personnel with superior functioning of the relevant hemisphere would perform more proficiently. A test battery designed to assess hemispheric dominance was administered to two groups, Economics and Arts students. Significant differences in mean performance were found between groups, as predicted. The findings suggest that the identification of individual patterns of hemispheric specialization may be useful for matching people's abilities with job demands.     

Retracted: The Indirect Relationship Between Learning Climate and Employees’ Creativity and Adaptivity: The Role of Employee Engagement

This study examines the indirect relationship between learning climate and employees’ creativity and adaptivity. Utilizing multi‐level modeling analysis techniques and data from a sample of 625 employees from 12 different organizations in Israel, we tested the proposed relationship as mediated by employee engagement and moderated by sector of employment (business versus public). Results were generally consistent with the hypothesized conceptual model in that we found the indirect relationship between learning climate and employees’ creativity and adaptivity to be mediated by employee engagement. In addition, we found that this mediation through engagement is moderated by sector of employment. We conclude that the relationship between learning climate and employee performance behaviors is more complex than previously argued in the learning climate literature. Implications for theory and practice are discussed. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved     

To work or not to work: nonfinancial employment commitment and the social desirability bias

The so-called "lottery question," which asks whether individuals would stop or continue working if there were no economic reasons to do so, was used to evaluate non-financial employment commitment. Data were collected through a survey conducted among a representative sample of the adult population in Israel. The sample included 501 respondents, who were interviewed via telephone in their homes by professional interviewers from a national survey agency. The additional contribution of social desirability to the prediction of nonfinancial employment commitment, beyond the contribution of age, is significant. There is a higher likelihood of indicating a desire to continue working under conditions of high social desirability rather than under those of low social desirability. It is suggested that, in order to examine the actual scope of nonfinancial employment commitment, some measures of detecting or reducing the social desirability bias should be taken.     

Test-retest reliability of the relative work centrality measure

The Meaning of Work International Research Team in 1987 developed the Relative Work Centrality measure, on which individuals divide 100 points among five major domains (work, leisure, community, religion, and family) in their lives, based on their relative centrality. The present study examined the test-retest reliability of this measure in a convenience sample of 96 Israeli full-time workers over a 4-wk. period. The sample consisted of 41.7% men and 58.3% women, of whom 48.9% were married. The participants had a mean age of 36.0 yr. (SD = 11.5) and a mean education of 14.9 yr. (SD = 2.5). The Spearman rank correlation coefficients for work, leisure, community, religion, and family at Time 1 and Time 2 were, respectively, .66, .76, .64, .76, and .82. These values indicate a fairly high test-retest reliability of the Relative Work Centrality measure and support the notion that this measure can also be applied to assess the relative centrality of each of the other four major life domains, in addition to work.     

Leisure patterns among retired workers: Spillover or compensatory trends?

Leisure behavior patterns after retirement were compared retrospectively with those of the preretirement period. The data, which related to former industrial and service workers in Israel, were examined within the context of the spillover and compensatory hypotheses, with retirement representing a non work sphere. Findings revealed a spillover effect, characterized by a high degree of passive, solitary leisure behavior both before and after retirement.     

Work centrality and post-award work behavior of lottery winners

Individuals who had won the lottery responded to a survey concerning whether they had continued to work after winning. They were also asked to indicate how important work was in their life using items and scales commonly used to measure work centrality. The authors predicted that whether lottery winners would continue to work would be related to their level of work centrality as well as to the amount of their winnings. Individuals who won large amounts in the lottery would be less likely to quit work if they had relatively greater degrees of work centrality. After controlling for a number of variables (i.e., age, gender, education, occupation, and job satisfaction), results indicated that work centrality and the amount won were significantly related to whether individuals continued to work and, as predicted, the interaction between the two was also significantly related to work continuance.     

Variables Affecting Non-financial Employment Commitment

Pour étudier la motivation non financière au travail, on a utilisé la question dite de la loterie: "Continueriez-vous à travailler si vous n'aviez plus besoin de gagner de l'argent?" 89.9% d'un échantillon représentatif d'actifs masculins israéliens ont affirmé qu'ils continueraient à travailler. Des résultats analogues avaient été obtenus en Israël il y a 10 ans. Mais la comparaison des enquetês fait apparaître des différences entre les réponses des plus jeunes et des plus âgés. On a fait appel à l'analyse discriminante pour classer les caractéristiques des travailleurs de l'échantillon qui choisissaient soit de continuer, soit d'arrêter de travailler. A partir d'une liste de variables liées au travail, quatre discriminants significatifs sont apparus: l'origine ethnique, la satisfaction professionnelle, la localisation de la résidence et le niveau culturel.
To evaluate non-financial commitment to work, the so-called "lottery question" was employed—i.e. "Would you continue working if there were no financial reason to carry on?" In a representative sample of men in the Israeli labour force, 89.9% indicated that they would continue working. Similar findings were reported in Israel a decade ago. However, a comparison of the surveys reveals variations between the responses of younger and older respondents. A stepwise discriminant analysis was utilised to classify the characteristics of workers in the present sample who expressed their preference either to continue or stop working. From a list of work-related variables, four significant discriminators emerged: ethnic origin, occupational satisfaction, place of residence, and educational level.