Kulturelle Variablen, organisatorische Netzwerke und demokratische Staatsstrukturen als Determinanten der wirtschaftlichen Entwicklung im internationalen Vergleich

The article focuses on the determinants of economic growth in modern democratic industrial societies. The investigation is led by the idea that the traditional theory of growth must be extended in two directions: towards the micro-level, i.e. towards the field of microeconomic attitudes and values, and towards the macro-level, i.e. towards the field of institutional and political conditions. The study makes an attempt to develop such an integrative perspective and to explain the growth rate in the 1980s and 1990s with cultural, political-institutional and economic factors. Empirical analyses show that economic expansion is limited by three factors: the distribution of post-materialist values, the size of economic interest organizations and consensus forms of democracy. Furthermore, the results confirm the assumption of conditional convergence of economic growth.     

Das soziale Netz der Nachbarschaft als System informeller Hilfe

In view of limited public budgets and as a consequence of the decrease of national security systems and services, primary helping networks like the neighbourhood received scientific and political atten-tion. Neighbours as members of the personal social network are ideal sources of support in situations, that require need-suitable and unbureaucratic support within a short time, because of their physical proximity and quick accessibility.The following article shows the impact of neighbourhood as part of the personal social network in the modern society. On the one hand the article focuses on the causes for neighbourly solidarity and the different exchanged assistances. On the other hand the difficulties in help-seeking and help-activating in neighbourhoods are regarded. Partly based on specific problem constellations and, in addition, they also can be led back up on processes of social change and changed individual requirements on neighbourhood relations.     

Achtsamkeit im Team: Entwicklung eines Fragebogens und Hinweise zur Anwendung in der Praxis

Whereas the important role of individual mindfulness in organizations is more and more empirically supported, collective mindfulness—especially on the team level—is neglected. To foster research on mindfulness in teams, scientific sound questionnaires are important. Based on previous literature on collective mindfulness and semi-structured interviews this article in the journal Gruppe. Interaktion. Organisation (GIO) aims at identifying relevant factors of mindfulness in teams and at developing a questionnaire based on these factors. The examination of 239 employees supports the factor structure which was assumed based on the interview results (deference to expertise; aspiration for flexibility; sensitivity to operations; reluctance to simplify interpretations; preoccupation with failure) and further hints at convergent and divergent validity. The application of the developed questionnaire to practice promoting mindfulness in teams is discussed.     

Der Einfluss der Arbeitslosigkeit und der sozialökologischen Kontexte auf die Bildungschancen von Kindern in Ostdeutschland

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the extent to which the family’s socioecologic contextual factors and parental unemployment influence children’s opportunities for participation in higher education. It is of primary interest how factors of socioecological environment such as living conditions, residential environment, and neighbourhoods in combination with unemployment influence the successful intergenerative transmission of human-capital. For the empirical investigation, data from a postal survey of households conducted in Dresden in autumn 1999 are used. The results show that the influence of socioecologic contextual factors should not be overestimated. The socioecologic contextual factors lose their influence for the educational opportunities of the children as soon as unemployment occurs in the family. Furthermore, the impact of parental professional status on children’s educational achievement is stronger in explaining educational opportunities than socioecologic contextual factors and unemployment.     

Der Einfluss der sozialpolitischen Kontexte auf die Frauenerwerbstätigkeit in der Schweiz

This article investigates the influence of political measures and instruments on women’s employment behaviour. Unlike former studies in this field individual factors as well as the policy-context are analyzed simultaneously in a multilevel analysis in order to explain women’s employment decisions. Additionally, group-specific policy-effects are analyzed. Since, public policies are often directed to particular groups in society, or at least, they do not affect everyone in the same way. The results show that policies facilitating the reconciliation of family and work particularly promote the work intensity of mothers in the middle class, who can chose whether to participate in the labour market or not. However, a substantial child care supply also increases the scope for women that have to work for economic reasons, and therefore improves equal opportunities in the labour market.     

Bericht über die Tagung „Bildung, Arbeit und Identität im Jugendalter“

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Entwicklung von Gruppenstruktur, Zusammenhalt und Selbstvertrauen im Verlauf erlebnispädagogischer Segelmaßnahmen

Two groups of 11–13 year old students were participants in a one-week experimental program with sailing as the medium. Their estimations of group coherence, self-confidence, the value of nature experience and highlights during the program were assessed with questionnaires and sociometry. These assessments were attached prior, immediately after and at 4 weeks after the program. The results show favorable changes in respect to group coherence and self-confidence which were also stable over time. The structure of the relationships between group members also showed a clear change during the program. The coping of common tasks in the sailing boat, new social insights and the chance to free activity and self efficiency in a unfamiliar surrounding were of great influence on the reported changes.     

Aktuelle Herausforderungen im internen Change Management der Commerzbank und der Deutschen Bahn

Gruppe. Interaktion. Organisation. Zeitschrift für Angewandte Organisationspsychologie (GIO) - Dieser Artikel der Zeitschrift ?Gruppe. Interaktion. Organisation. (GIO)“...     

Sozioökonomische Entwicklung und Wertvorstellungen in elf Regionen der Türkei

Being an official EU candidate country since 2005 Turkey has also become an interesting object of investigation for empirical social science, especially in the field of value research. In this article we examine value orientations in different regions of Turkey. Contrary to previous country-comparing studies our regional approach accounts for the immense developmental gaps which exist within Turkey. In line with central assumptions of modernization theory we expect values of tolerance and individual autonomy in high developed regions and, on the other side, dogmatic beliefs, intolerance and authoritarian attitudes being predominant in weaker developed regions. First, regional stages of modernization are specified using macro indicators like GDP, education, urbanity, the occupational structure, and fertility rate from the official statistics of Turkey. The regional spectrum varies from extremely poor developed rural-agrarian regions in the east to industrialized regions with high degrees of urbanization up to the rich regions in the west with well developed infastructure and service sector. Second, Multiple Correspondence Analyses carried out with data from the European Values Study 2000 show that value differences concerning democratic culture, religiosity, secularity and sexual tolerance occur as expected according to socio-economic disparities between regions. Additionally, we find evidence that independent from socio-economic factors value orientations of people are also shaped by other influences like the minority situation or political stability in a region.     

Die soziale Diffrenzierung der Übergangsmuster in den Beruf

Growing risks in working lives and in the transition to the first job are supposed to be a core characteristic of labor market changes in the last two decades. However, they cover heterogeneous phenomena that have to be treated separately. Regarding the job entry process among in-firm training diploma holders, firm shifts, occupational shifts and unemployment represent distinct indicators of non-standard transitions to the first job. The empirical analyses, using data from the German IAB-employment-subsample 1975–1995, show that transition patterns have changed differently in the respective cohorts. The probability of experiencing specific transition patterns strongly depends on social structural as well as occupation-specific characteristics. The strongest risks at labor market entry are associated with combined firm and occupational shifts. There is no coherent evidence of a dominant trend towards less structured job entry patterns.