Refine
Document Type
- Article (16)
Language
- English (16)
Has Fulltext
- yes (16)
Is part of the Bibliography
- no (16)
Keywords
- COVID-19 (2)
- leadership (2)
- Academic publishing (1)
- Common humanity (1)
- Compassionate writing exercises (1)
- Industrial psychology (1)
- Mindfulness (1)
- Open science (1)
- Organisational psychology (1)
- Replication (1)
Institute
Problematisation: The credibility and transparency of industrial and organisational psychological (IOP) research within South Africa was recently challenged by Efendic and Van Zyl (2019). The authors briefly showed inconsistencies in statistical results reported by authors of the South African Journal of Industrial Psychology (SAJIP), that various studies were insufficiently powered, that best-practice guidelines for the reporting of results were mostly only partially followed and that no transparency exists with regard to the research process. They demonstrated that authors of the SAJIP may knowingly or unknowingly be engaging in questionable research practices, which directly affects the credibility of both the discipline and the journal. Furthermore, they suggested practical guidelines for both authors and the SAJIP on how this could be managed.
Implications: Based on these suggestions, the authors invited prominent members of the IOP scientific community to provide scholarly commentary on their paper in order to aid in the development of ‘a clear strategy on how [the confidence crisis in IOP] could be managed, what the role of SAJIP is in this process and how SAJIP and its contributors could proactively engage to address these issues’. Seven members of the editorial board and two international scholars provided commentaries in an attempt to further the debate about the nature, causes, consequences and management of the credibility crisis within the South African context.
Purpose: The purpose of this final rebuttal article was to summarise and critically reflect on the commentaries of the nine articles to advance the debate on the confidence crisis within the South African IOP discipline.
Recommendations: All SAJIP’s stakeholders (authors, editors, reviewers, the publication house, universities and the journal) can play an active role in enhancing the credibility of the discipline. It is suggested that SAJIP should develop a clear and structured strategy to promote credible, transparent and ethical research practices within South Africa.
The relationship between exhaustion and work engagement has received considerable attention during the past decades. Although the theoretical proposition exists that work engagement may increase exhaustion over time, previous research has been mixed. Drawing on the transactional stress model and applying latent growth modeling, we aim to provide a more comprehensive picture of the work engagement–exhaustion relationship over time. In two longitudinal studies, with four measurement points each, we found consistent evidence that a higher initial work engagement related to increased exhaustion over time. Consistent with our hypotheses, a higher initial work engagement also related to less initial exhaustion, and increases in work engagement related to decreases in exhaustion over time. However, contrary to our expectations, a higher initial exhaustion related to elevated work engagement over time. In conclusion, our findings suggest that engaged employees are less exhausted but face a higher risk of exhaustion over time. At the same time, exhausted employees are less engaged, but they have the potential to become more so over time. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings will be discussed in this paper.
Defensive decision making occurs when the decision-maker does not choose the option that is in the best interest of an organization or client but instead chooses a less effective but lower risk alternative that protects him or her in case something goes wrong. Such decisions are widespread across occupations and sectors and cause substantive damage to organizations. In a first step, we developed a scale to measure defensive decision making and test its validity. The scale covers two distinct but related dimensions: avoidance and approach. In a subsequent, two-wave study, we examined the antecedents of defensive decision making using conservation of resources theory as a theoretical lens. An environment characterized by higher psychological safety can reduce resource depletion and diminishes defensive decision making. In contrast, job insecurity can result in a threat to personal resources, which increases the likelihood that employees choose defensive decisions.
Practitioners points:
People engage in defensive decision making as a means to protect their own resources from exhaustion.
Organizations can reduce the number of defensive decisions by enhancing situational resources such as psychological safety.
The short and preliminarily validated scale we developed can be used to make defensive decisions visible in organizations.
Despite the increasing interest in leaders’ health-promoting behavior, the employees’ role in the effectiveness of such behavior and the mechanisms underlying how such leadership behavior affects their well-being have largely been ignored. Drawing on implicit leadership theories, we advance the health-oriented leadership literature by examining employees’ ideals, that is, their expectations regarding such leader behavior, as a moderating factor. We propose that higher expectations increase the association between actual health-oriented leader behavior and employee-rated leader-member relationships (LMX) and health-oriented behaviors by employees, which, in turn, positively relate to their well-being (here: exhaustion and work engagement). We tested our theoretical model in three studies, using a cross-sectional design (Study 1, N = 307), a two-wave time-lagged design (Study 2, N = 144) and an experimental design (Study 3, N = 173). We found that the effect of actual health-oriented leader behavior on LMX is contingent on employees’ ideal health-oriented leader behavior. Yet, for employees’ self-care behavior, the proposed moderation was only significant in Study 1. High expectations strengthened the relationship between actual health-oriented leader behavior with LMX and self-care behavior, which, in turn, were associated with less exhaustion and more work engagement (only LMX), supporting most of our mediation hypotheses. Our results highlight the pivotal role of employees’ expectations regarding leaders’ health support and help in building practical interventions with regard to leaders’ health promotion.
The COVID-19 pandemic has triggered health-related anxiety in ways that undermine peoples’ mental and physical health. Contextual factors such as living in a high-risk area might further increase the risk of health deterioration. Based on the Social Identity Approach, we argue that social identities can not only be local that are characterized by social interactions, but also be global that are characterized by a symbolic sense of togetherness and that both of these can be a basis for health. In line with these ideas, we tested how identification with one’s family and with humankind relates to stress and physical symptoms while experiencing health-related anxiety and being exposed to contextual risk factors. We tested our assumptions in a representative sample (N = 974) two-wave survey study with a 4-week time lag. The results show that anxiety at Time 1 was positively related to stress and physical symptoms at Time 2. Feeling exposed to risk factors related to lower physical health, but was unrelated to stress. Family identification and identification with humankind were both negatively associated with subsequent stress and family identification was negatively associated with subsequent physical symptoms. These findings suggest that for social identities to be beneficial for mental health, they can be embodied as well as symbolic.
Workaholism and overcommitment are often used as interchangeable constructs describing an individual’s over-involvement toward their own job. Employees with high levels in both constructs are characterized by an excessive effort and attachment to their job, with the incapability to detach from it and negative consequences in terms of poor health and job burnout. However, few studies have simultaneously measured both constructs, and their relationships are still not clear. In this study, we try to disentangle workaholism and overcommitment by comparing them with theoretically related contextual and personal antecedents, as well as their health consequences. We conducted a nonprobability mixed mode research design on 133 employees from different organizations in Italy using both self- and other-reported measures. To test our hypothesis that workaholism and overcommitment are related yet different constructs, we used partial correlations and regression analyses. The results confirm that these two constructs are related to each other, but also outline that overcommitment (and not workaholism) is uniquely related to job burnout, so that overcommitment rather than workaholism could represent the true negative aspect of work drive. Additionally, workaholism is more related to conscientiousness than overcommitment, while overcommitment shows a stronger relationship with neuroticism than workaholism. The theoretical implications are discussed.
The social identity approach to stress proposes that the beneficial effects of social identification develop through individual and group processes, but few studies have addressed both levels simultaneously. Using a multilevel person–environment fit framework, we investigate the group-level relationship between team identification (TI) and exhaustion, the individual-level relationship for people within a group, and the cross-level moderation effect to test whether individual-level exhaustion depends on the level of (in)congruence in TI between individuals and their group as a whole. We test our hypotheses in a sample of 525 employees from 82 teams. Multilevel polynomial regression analysis revealed a negative linear relationship between individual-level identification and exhaustion. Surprisingly, the relation between group-level identification and exhaustion was curvilinear, indicating that group-level identification was more beneficial at low and high levels compared with medium levels. As predicted, the cross-level moderation of the individual-level relationship by group-level identification was also significant, showing that as individuals became more incongruent in a positive direction (i.e., they identified more strongly than the average team member), they reported less exhaustion, but only if the group-level identification was average or high. These results emphasize the benefits of analyzing TI in a multilevel framework, with both theoretical and practical implications.
Self-compassion has been theorized to have three components, each with a positive pole and a negative pole: self-kindness versus self-judgment, common humanity versus isolation, and mindfulness versus over-identification. Neff (Self Identity 2:85–101, 2003a) proposes that they mutually influence each other, however, this proposition has not been tested yet. We conducted a pilot study to see if improvements from training one component spilled over to the other two—and whether these trainings had an impact on well-being. 80 participants completed 8 weeks of self-compassionate writing exercises to enhance either self-kindness, common humanity, or mindfulness. Trait self-compassion was assessed using the six-factor model of the self-compassion scale. To address issues of alpha-error-inflation, the false discovery rate was fixed at 5%, and critical p values were adjusted accordingly. Participants in the mindfulness condition reported increased total self-compassion (p = .009), which was accompanied by increased self-kindness (p = .027) and lower isolation (p = .045). Participants in the common humanity condition reported improved total self-compassion (p = .018), lower over-identification (p = .045), and higher life-satisfaction (p = .049). The training in self-kindness failed to improve self-kindness or any other factor. These findings provide initial evidence that the components of self-compassion mutually enhance each other. They also emphasize the importance of mindfulness within the conceptualization of self-compassion.
The relationship between exhaustion and work engagement has received considerable attention during the past decades. Although the theoretical proposition exists that work engagement may increase exhaustion over time, previous research has been mixed. Drawing on the transactional stress model and applying latent growth modeling, we aim to provide a more comprehensive picture of the work engagement–exhaustion relationship over time. In two longitudinal studies, with four measurement points each, we found consistent evidence that a higher initial work engagement related to increased exhaustion over time. Consistent with our hypotheses, a higher initial work engagement also related to less initial exhaustion, and increases in work engagement related to decreases in exhaustion over time. However, contrary to our expectations, a higher initial exhaustion related to elevated work engagement over time. In conclusion, our findings suggest that engaged employees are less exhausted but face a higher risk of exhaustion over time. At the same time, exhausted employees are less engaged, but they have the potential to become more so over time. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings will be discussed in this paper.
We extended the job demand–control model by including a social comparison perspective and hypothesised that an employee's work-related well-being is to some degree relative to the perceived work environment of coworkers rather than absolute (in terms of isolated effects of individual work characteristics). Hence, we account for the social context when examining the effects of individual job characteristics. Using a lagged study design with two measurement times eight weeks apart, we examined the effects of the (in)congruence between one´s own job demands and job control with the perceived job demands and job control of coworkers on job satisfaction, emotional exhaustion, cynicism, and professional efficiency. Findings from polynomial regression analyses and response surface methodology revealed that perceiving coworkers as having either higher or lower demands than oneself is associated with lower job satisfaction and higher levels of emotional exhaustion. This provides partial support for our hypotheses. We found first-time evidence that social comparison processes regarding job demands can influence employees´ well-being.
The purpose of this study was to investigate which social groups are perceived as a threat target and which are perceived as a threat source during the COVID-19 outbreak. In a German sample (N = 1454) we examined perceptions of social groups ranging from those that are psychologically close and smaller (family, friends, neighbors) to those that are more distal and larger (people living in Germany, humankind). We hypothesized that psychologically closer groups would be perceived as less affected by COVID-19 as well as less threatening than more psychologically distal groups. Based on social identity theorizing, we also hypothesized that stronger identification with humankind would change these patterns. Furthermore, we explored how these threat perceptions relate to adherence to COVID-19 health guidelines. In line with our hypotheses, latent random-slope modelling revealed that psychologically distal and larger groups were perceived as more affected by COVID-19 and as more threatening than psychologically closer and smaller groups. Including identification with humankind as a predictor into the threat target model resulted in a steeper increase in threat target perception patterns, whereas identification with humankind did not predict differences in threat source perceptions. Additionally, an increase in threat source perceptions across social groups was associated with more adherence to health guidelines, whereas an increase in threat target perceptions was not. We fully replicated these findings in a subgroup from the original sample (N = 989) four weeks later. We argue that societal recovery from this and other crises will be supported by an inclusive approach informed by a sense of our common identity as human beings.
Objectives: To investigate whether citizens’ adherence to health-protective non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) during the COVID-19 pandemic is predicted by identity leadership, wherein leaders are perceived to create a sense of shared national identity.
Design: Observational two-wave study. Hypotheses testing was conducted with structural equation modelling.
Setting: Data collection during the COVID-19 pandemic in China, Germany, Israel and the USA in April/May 2020 and four weeks later.
Participants: Adults in China (n=548, 66.6% women), Germany (n=182, 78% women), Israel (n=198, 51.0% women) and the USA (n=108, 58.3% women).
Measures: Identity leadership (assessed by the four-item Identity Leadership Inventory Short-Form) at Time 1, perceived shared national identification (PSNI; assessed with four items) and adherence to health-protective NPIs (assessed with 10 items that describe different health-protective interventions; for example, wearing face masks) at Time 2.
Results: Identity leadership was positively associated with PSNI (95% CI0.11 to 0.30, p<0.001) in all countries. This, in turn, was related to more adherence to health-protective NPIs in all countries (95% CI 0.03 to 0.36, 0.001≤p≤0.017) except Israel (95% CI−0.03 to 0.27, p=0.119). In Germany, the more people saw Chancellor Merkel as engaging in identity leadership, the more they adhered to health-protective NPIs (95% CI 0.04 to 0.18, p=0.002). In the USA, in contrast, the more people perceived President Trump as engaging in identity leadership, the less they adhered to health-protective NPIs (95% CI−0.17 to −0.04, p=0.002).
Conclusions: National leaders can make a difference by promoting a sense of shared identity among their citizens because people are more inclined to follow health-protective NPIs to the extent that they feel part of a united ‘us’. However, the content of identity leadership (perceptions of what it means to be a nation’s citizen) is essential, because this can also encourage people to disregard such recommendations.
The ability to respond appropriately to employees' work-related well-being requires leaders to pay attention to their employees' well-being in the first place. We propose that leaders' stress mindset, that is, the belief that stress is enhancing versus debilitating, may bias their perception of employees' well-being. We further propose that this judgment then influences leaders' intention to engage in or refrain from health-oriented leadership behavior, to express higher performance expectations, or to promote their employees. We expect this process to be stronger if leaders strongly identify with their team, increasing their perceived similarity with their employees. In three experiments (N1 = 198, N2 = 292, N3 = 250), we tested the effect of participants' stress mindset on their intention to show certain leadership behaviors, mediated by their perception of employee well-being (emotional exhaustion, somatic symptoms, work engagement) and moderated by their team identification. Our findings largely support the association between stress mindset and the perception of well-being. The results for the proposed mediation and the moderating function of identification were mixed. Overall, the results emphasize the critical role of leaders' stress mindset and may, thus, improve health promotion in organizations by helping leaders to adequately recognize employees' well-being and respond appropriately.
The papers in this Special Issue Part I “Revisioning, Rethinking, Restructuring Gender at Work: Quo Vadis Gender Stereotypes?” focus on the current state of gender inequality, particularly stereotypes. We present studies showing that differences in gender stereotypes still exist, confirm disadvantages for women in male-dominated roles and sectors and when the employment sector is not specified, but also disadvantages for men in female-dominated roles and sectors. In contrast to this general trend, one paper in Part II of this Special Issue found a preference for women over men as job candidates in their study. Incongruence emerged as a striking common theme to explain these gender differences, whereby some studies focused on the perceived incongruence from the actor's perspective and how external factors contribute to these perceptions, whereas others looked at the perceived incongruence from the observer's perspective. We summarize the papers and briefly discuss the key points of Part I at the end of this editorial.
Social identification is health-beneficial as social groups provide social support (i.e., the social cure effect). We study this social cure effect in diabetes patients by focusing on two relevant sources of social support, namely medical practitioners (MP) and fellow patients. As both groups have diabetes-specific knowledge, we predict that sharing an identity with them provides access to specific support, which, in turn, optimizes individuals’ diabetes management and reduces diabetes-related stress. We further predict that identifying with their MP or fellow patients will be more strongly related to perceived social support among individuals with lower diabetes-specific resilience because they pay more attention to supportive cues. We tested this moderated mediation model in a two-wave study with n = 200 diabetes patients. Identification with the MP related to more support, which, in turn, was related to better diabetes management and less diabetes-specific stress. Identification with fellow patients related to more support; however, social support was unrelated to diabetes management and stress. Resilience only moderated the relationship between MP identification and support, as people with lower resilience levels reported more support from their MP. This study shows the importance of social identification with the MP and other diabetes patients, especially for people with lower resilience levels.