Satisfiers and dissatisfiers among white-collar and blue-collar employees.

Interviewed "accidental" samples of 36 white- and 31 blue-collar employees concerning satisfying and dissatisfying job incidents. These incidents were categorized using an event-agent classification system developed by J. Schneider and E. A. Locke in 1971 to overcome certain limitations in F. Herzberg's 1959 system. The same categories of events led to both satisfaction and dissatisfaction within each job level. However, different agents were seen as responsible for these events-the self for satisfying events and others for dissatisfying events. White-collar Ss mentioned task events significantly more often and reward and context events significantly less often than blue-collar Ss as sources of satisfaction and dissatisfaction. This finding was not replicated in the 2nd sample of 94 white-collar and 66 blue-collar employees. An explanation based on differences in the occupational makeup of the 2 samples is offered. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development and field evaluation of an interdisciplinary measure of job design.

Developed a taxonomy of job design approaches from the literature, including (1) a motivational approach from organizational psychology, (2) a mechanistic approach from classic industrial engineering, (3) a biological approach from work physiology and biomechanics, and (4) a perceptual/motor approach from experimental psychology. The Multimethod Job Design Questionnaire (MJDQ) was developed reflecting these approaches. A corresponding taxonomy of job outcomes was developed, and hypotheses were generated about relationships between job design approaches and outcomes. A field study of 121 jobs, 215 19–63 yr old job incumbents, and 23 27–58 yr old supervisors was conducted using this instrument. Results show that the MJDQ was reliable and that most hypotheses were supported. Jobs that scored high on the Motivational subscale had employees who were more satisfied and motivated, rated higher on job performance, and exhibited less absenteeism. Jobs high on the Mechanistic subscale had higher utilization levels and lower training requirements. Jobs high on the Biological scale required less physical effort, produced fewer aches and pains, and resulted in fewer medical incidents. Jobs high on the Perceptual/Motor scale were less likely to produce accidents, errors, stress, and work overload and required fewer mental demands. Sample items are appended. (113 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Psychosocial correlates of harassment, threats and fear of violence in the workplace

OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to investigate work climate factors and structural job aspects as predictors of workplace violence, with particular attention to the relative influence of both sets of factors. METHODS: Telephone survey data collected by a large midwestern insurance company were analyzed. Interviewers asked 598 full-time workers about their work climate, structural job aspects, and subject and workplace demographics, all of which were used as predictor variables in regression analyses. The participants were also asked about incidents of threats, harassment, physical attacks, and fear of becoming a victim of workplace violence, all of which were used as outcome measures. RESULTS: Separate logistic regressions were carried out for each of the outcome measures. The study identified a variety of factors which appear to place workers at risk of nonfatal occupational violence. Work climate variables, such as co-worker support and work group harmony, were predictive of threats, harassment, and fear of becoming a victim of violence. Structural aspects of the job, such as work schedule, were also significant in predicting threats and fear of becoming a victim of violence, but they were not predictive of harassment. CONCLUSIONS: This is the first study which suggests that both work climate and structural aspects of work may be important in promoting workplace violence. This finding suggests that intervention strategies should consider organizational and climate issues in addition to basic security measures.     

Impacts of Stressors and Stress on the Injury Incidents of Construction Workers in Hong Kong

Construction workers (CWs) are the key and indispensable contributors to every construction project. Their psychological feelings greatly influence their behaviors and safety performance. To improve CWs’ safety performance in dangerous working environment, the current research aims to identify the various stressors affecting two types of stress of CWs (i.e., job stress and emotional stress) and to explore the impacts of the two types of stress on CW injury incidents in Hong Kong. Eleven stressors were identified through factor analysis: work overload, role ambiguity, lack of autonomy, unfair reward and treatment, appropriate safety equipment, optimism, interrole conflict, poor workgroup relationship, lack of feedback, poor physical environment, and unsafe environment. The results of correlation and regression analyses reveal that (1) among the two types of stress identified, injury incident of CWs was found to be affected by emotional stress only, (2) emotional stress is predicted by work overload, interrole conflict, poor physical environment, unfair reward and treatment, and appropriate safety equipments, and (3) poor workgroup relationship, work overload, and interrole conflict predict job stress of CWs. Based on the result, various recommendations are suggested to employers on how to minimize CW injury incidents.     

Systematic bias in job evaluation and market wages: Implications for the comparable worth debate.

Evaluated the consequences of systematic measurement errors in job evaluation and in wage distributions used as a criterion in the empirical validation of job evaluation. The way reverse regression combined with conventional regression could be used to identify systematic errors under a restrictive set of assumptions was also demonstrated. It was found that bias against female key or benchmark job wages had the generally hypothesized negative impact on predictions for female non-key job wages. However, systematic evaluation bias of female jobs does not necessarily serve to the wage disadvantage of all female jobs. (17 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Job analysis of psychology internships in counseling center settings.

A widely accepted method of job analysis, the critical incident technique, was applied in order to determine dimensions of performance among psychology interns. All training directors of Association of Psychology Internship Centers were contacted regarding participation, and 46 (90%) completed the critical incident interview. The 270 critical incidents were analyzed with a standard procedure for determining behaviorally defined job dimensions. Seven dimensions were identified: clinical skills, commitment to own professional development, crisis and emergency situations, interpersonal relationships, knowledge, professional and ethical behavior, and programming and consultation skills. The results are presented within the context of other definitions of intern performance and of entry-level psychological practice. In addition, suggestions for improving selection and evaluation of psychology interns are presented. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Adaptability in the workplace: Development of a taxonomy of adaptive performance.

The purpose of this research was to develop a taxonomy of adaptive job performance and examine the implications of this taxonomy for understanding, predicting, and training adaptive behavior in work settings. Two studies were conducted to address this issue. In Study 1, over 1,000 critical incidents from 21 different jobs were content analyzed to identify an 8-dimension taxonomy of adaptive performance. Study 2 reports the development and administration of an instrument, the Job Adaptability Inventory, that was used to empirically examine the proposed taxonomy in 24 different jobs. Exploratory factor analyses using data from 1,619 respondents supported the proposed 8-dimension taxonomy from Study 1. Subsequent confirmatory factor analyses on the remainder of the sample (n?=?1,715) indicated a good fit for the 8-factor model. Results and implications are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Use of both qualitative and quantitative approaches to study job stress in different gender and occupational groups.

Gender differences in job stress were investigated, collecting both qualitative (stressful incidents at work) and quantitative (rating scales of commonly experienced job stressors and strains) data from a sample of university employees. Content analyses of the qualitative data revealed 5 major job stressors, 5 major psychological strains, and 4 major physical strains experienced by both genders. When comparisons are made between men and women on their job stress experiences, a potential confounder is occupation, for which the authors controlled. While the authors controlled for occupation, women reported more overall psychological strains (as indicated by the qualitative data) and depression (as indicated by the quantitative data) than did men. Conversely, while the authors controlled for gender, faculty reported more anger and less frustration (as indicated by the qualitative data) and less turnover intentions (as indicated by the quantitative data) than did support staff. In this study, both qualitative and quantitative data indicated interaction effects between gender and occupation in predicting job stressors and strains. Finally, there was a stronger relation between interpersonal conflicts and negative emotions/job satisfaction were stronger for faculty than for staff. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Active immunization against cancer cells: impediments and advances

OBJECTIVE: This study was conducted to investigate the hypothesis that exposure to "job strain" is related to increased ambulatory blood pressure (ABP). METHOD: Participants were 195 men who wore an ABP monitor for 24 hours on two occasions 3 years apart. Job strain status, evaluated at each assessment, was used to identify four groups: those not having job strain at either assessment (N = 138), those having job strain at both times (N = 15), and two crossover groups. Regression analysis was used to examine the cross-sectional associations of ABP with job strain, controlling for other known risk factors. Repeated-measures analysis of variance was used to examine the association of ABP change with the category of job strain change. RESULTS: The cross-sectional analysis of the Time 2 data yielded almost identical, highly significant effects of job strain on ABP as was shown in our previously published Time 1 analysis. Those in high strain jobs at both times had systolic/diastolic ABPs at work and at home that were, on average, 11/7 mm Hg higher than those with no job strain at both times; the crossover groups had intermediate levels of ABP. The longitudinal analysis showed that those with a high strain job at Time 1, but not at Time 2, had a significant decrease in work and home ABP of approximately 5/3 mm Hg. CONCLUSIONS: The previously reported cross-sectional association between job strain and ABP was replicated at follow-up. The group repeatedly exposed to job strain had higher levels of ABP at Time 2 than either crossover group. Furthermore, change in job strain status partially predicted change in ABP. These results provide new evidence supporting the hypothesis that job strain is an occupational risk factor in the etiology of essential hypertension.     

Labeling sexual harassment in the military: An extension and replication.

Research conducted by V. Magley, C. Hulin, L. F. Fitzgerald, and M. DeNardo (1999) has suggested that women who experience sexual harassment report worse outcomes independent of the labeling process. This study replicates and extends that work. Discriminant analyses were conducted on a sample of approximately 28,000 men and women from the military. The authors included variables similar to those used by V. Magley et al., as well as a variety of antecedent variables. Two significant functions were obtained from the discriminant analysis. The 1st function ordered groups according to the frequency of harassment and accounted for substantially more variance than did the 2nd function, which ordered groups according to whether they labeled their experiences as sexual harassment. The overall results from these analyses demonstrate that labeling incidents as sexual harassment is of marginal meaningfulness in terms of job outcomes and antecedents of harassment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Job analysis results as influenced by sex of incumbent and sex of analyst.

22 male and 35 female undergraduate and 1st-yr graduate students were given preliminary training on the use of the Position Analysis Questionnaire (PAQ). Subsequently, they used this job analysis instrument to rate the job of administrative assistant presented through a verbal narrative and color slide stimulus format. While all other factors remained constant in the job stimulus conditions depicted, sex of the job incumbent was manipulated by using male and female figures matched on attractiveness and voice quality. ANOVA results indicate that although sex of the job incumbent did not influence the PAQ scores, sex of the analyst showed a marginal but consistent effect. Female analysts gave relatively lower PAQ scores to the job than male analysts across 22 PAQ job dimensions regardless of the sex of the job incumbent. Adjective Check List scores had no consistent effect on PAQ dimensions. The need for replication is stressed. (25 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Improvements in anaesthetic care resulting from a critical incident reporting programme

The r?le of an anaesthetic incident reporting programme in improving anaesthetic safety was studied. The programme had been running for 4 to 5 years in three large hospitals in Hong Kong and more than 1000 incidents have been reported. The number of reports being made and frequency of the various categories of incident reported, did not alter during the study period. Sixty nine percent of incidents were considered to be preventable. Human error contributed to 76% of incidents and violations of standard practice to 30% of incidents. The programme was effective in its ability to detect latent errors in the anaesthesia system and when these were corrected, incidents did not recur. The frequency with which various contributing factors were cited did not decrease with time. With the exception of problems dealt with by specific protocol development, the study found no evidence that an increasing awareness of the problem of human error was effective in reducing this kind of problem.     

Behaviorally based rating scales need not be job specific.

Used P. C. Smith and L. M. Kendall's (1963) procedure for designing behaviorally based rating scales to develop a set of 10 rating scales for all jobs (except nursing) of an entire hospital. Results show that 20 supervisors reached acceptable levels of agreement in allocating performance incidents to scales and assigning scale values to the incidents. This agreement was particularly encouraging since any given incident described job performance outside the work area of a majority of the supervisors. The practical implications of developing behaviorally based rating scales for various jobs, instead of just one, are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development of the Crisis Call Outcome Rating Scale.

We constructed a rating scale of caller behavior to be used as an outcome measure at a telephone hotline facility. Hotline volunteers supplied an initial pool of critical incidents, which described caller behavior that suggested whether or not a successful outcome had occurred. Psychology students used an initial version of the Crisis Call Outcome Rating Scale ({ccors}) to rate caller behavior on role-played audiotapes. Items that demonstrated respectable item–total correlations were retained for the final 26-item version of the {ccors}, which had an alpha coefficient of .95 and detected meaningful differences among audiotapes as indicated by analyses of variance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Critical incidents and chronic stressors at work: Their impact on forensic doctors.

Workers in medium- or high-risk professions are often confronted with critical incidents at the workplace. The impact of these acute stressors may be serious and enduring. Many workers also experience chronic job stressors, such as work overload or role conflicts. This study examined the frequently neglected relationship of acute and chronic stressors with self-reported health symptoms, such as posttraumatic responses, fatigue, and burnout. This association was investigated in a sample of forensic doctors in the Netherlands (N = 84). It was found that the more traumatic events the respondents experienced, the more problems they reported in coping with the traumatic events. Chronic job stressors were associated with posttraumatic responses (intrusions and avoidances) and with burnout and fatigue. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Further investigation of common knowledge effects on job analysis ratings.

Previous research (Smith & Hakel, 1979) raised the possibility that the Position Analysis Questionnaire (PAQ) only captures common knowledge, or stereotypes, about jobs. Cornelius, DeNisi, and Blencoe (1984) presented data to refute this, but found that the number of PAQ items rated does not apply (DNA) was related to the agreement between naive raters and expert raters. The present study used data from 87 analysts and 24 jobs. Naive ratings were those obtained from analysts who had not studied the job, whereas expert ratings were those obtained from raters who had observed the job, interviewed incumbents, and written task statements describing the job. These ratings were then compared to target-score profiles obtained from PAQ services. Results confirmed earlier hypotheses that large numbers of DNA items artifactually inflate correlational estimates of agreement between expert and naive raters. In addition to this artifact, results also supported the view that the PAQ is less appropriate as a job analysis tool for some types of jobs. Implications for research and practice are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Professional Burnout in the Mirror: A Qualitative Study From a Lacanian Perspective.

This article reports on a qualitative interview study that examined the job experiences of a group of burned-out professionals (n = 15). The authors studied the meanings these professionals associate with incidents in their intersubjective relations, as well as how they relate these incidents to their identity. The interpretation of the data starts from Lacanian psychoanalytic theory on identity (Lacan's "schema of the 2 mirrors"). The authors show how the concepts under discussion enable one to trace burnout dynamics in the relation between subject and other. A tripartite conceptual model that accounts for dynamic processes is presented. Each process is formulated conceptually on the basis of Lacan's schema of the 2 mirrors and is discussed with narrative data drawn from interview research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effect of camel urine on the cytological and biochemical changes induced by cyclophosphamide in mice

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether mandatory universal precautions changed nurses' body fluid exposure and reporting rates, hepatitis B vaccination rates, and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) testing rates. Random cross-sectional surveys of nurses in Tennessee were conducted in 1991 and 1993 (n = 145 in 1991; n = 143 in 1993). The questionnaire in both surveys included frequency of body fluid exposures and reporting in the past year, and whether or not the respondent had received the hepatitis B vaccine or had been HIV tested. Findings indicated that self reported needlestick injuries decreased by 69%, and other sharps injuries decreased by 81%. Only 4.1% of all exposure incidents reported on this anonymous survey were reported to employee health officials, as required. Body fluid exposure incidents were the most common form of exposure (81%) and the most underreported. Hepatitis B vaccinations significantly increased (61.4% to 82.5%), with a nonsignificant increased in HIV testing (47.2% to 55.6%) from 1991 to 1993. Findings of this study suggest that the universal precautions regulatory mandate has been effective in increasing nurses' compliance to universal precautions. Body fluid contacts were significantly underreported and showed no decrease between 1991 and 1993.