Bringing Carl Rogers Back In: Exploring the Power of Positive Regard at Work

We draw on Carl Rogers’ client‐centred therapy theory and the theoretical lens of positive work relationships to explain why and how positive regard can be a powerful source for the development of employees’ sense of vitality, job performance and organizational citizenship behaviours (OCBs). We theorize that when employees experience relationships characterized by a high level of regard with their co‐workers they are likely to develop a sense of vitality, which in turn results in enhanced job performance and OCBs. These relationships are examined in both experimental and field studies. The results of these multiple studies provide general support for the power of positive regard in augmenting a sense of vitality and enhancing both job performance and citizenship behaviours.     

Comments on Sociology of Religion in America: A History of a Secular Fascination with Religion

Anthony J. Blasi’s book, Sociology of Religion in America: A History of a Secular Fascination with Religion, is a valuable contribution to the history of the sociology of religion. In this comment paper, I assert that this text is a fine addition to any graduate-level course on the sociology of religion, and I discuss three different threads of discussion that masters and doctoral students could explore in class. These discussion threads include: 1) Can sociologists maintain objectivity when studying faith-based phenomena? 2) How can sociologists best study religion today? 3) How does the current study of religion today compare to the subfield a century ago? Educators can use this text as a springboard for their students to think, discuss, and write critically.     

The effects of normal mixtures and autocorrelation on the fraction non-conforming

In this article, the effects of mixtures of two normal distributions on the fraction non-conforming are studied in the context of capability analysis. When the output from several processes is mixed, the quality characteristic variables of the resulting mix may result in a normal mixture distribution. This can happen in cases such as monitoring an output from several suppliers, several machines, or several workers. This study considered the independence case and autocorrelated processes for a mixture of two normal distributions, using an autoregressive model of order one, AR(1). It is shown that the true attained process fraction non-conforming (corresponding to specific values for some capability index) can be very different from what is expected when the data are independent normal random variables.     

Rejected by Family for Being Gay or Lesbian: Portrayals,Perceptions, and Resilience

A myriad of negative psychosocial outcomes face gay men and lesbians who experience rejection by their family for not being heterosexual. However, what constitutes rejection is not clear, and, more importantly, it is not known how resilience is fostered within such a context. This qualitative study sought to examine these issues by exploring the lived experiences of Australian gay men and lesbians who were previously or were currently experiencing family rejection because of their sexuality. A total of 21 in-depth, semistructured interviews were individually conducted and analyzed. Thematic analysis of the interviews revealed several themes that provided greater understanding of the portrayals and perceptions of family rejection; the impact of family rejection on mental health; and, importantly, how these individuals came to establish resilience in the face of experiencing family rejection. Limitations, directions for future research, and clinical implications of the findings are also discussed.     

Evaluating multi-regional population projections with Taylor’s law of mean–variance scaling and its generalisation

Organisations that develop demographic projections usually propose several variants with different demographic assumptions. Existing criteria for selecting a preferred projection are mostly based on retrospective comparisons with observations, and a prospective approach is needed. In this work, we use the mean–variance scaling (spatial variance function) of human population densities to select among alternative demographic projections. We test against observed and projected Norwegian county population density using two spatial variance functions, Taylor’s law (TL) and its quadratic generalisation, and compare each function’s parameters between the historical data and six demographic projections, at two different time scales (long term: 1978–2010 vs. 2011–2040; and short term: 2006–2010 vs. 2011–2015). We find that short-term projections selected by TL agree more accurately than the other projections with the recent county density data and reflect the current high rate of international migration to and from Norway. The variance function method implemented here provides an empirical test of an ex ante approach to evaluating short-term human population projections.     

Social model of emotional labour and client satisfaction: exploring inter- and intrapersonal characteristics of the client−provider encounter

As part of healthcare organisations’ efforts to improve client satisfaction, special attention is directed to care providers’ expression of authenticity through genuine emotional displays in care encounters. The study’s aim was to test a mediating–moderating model for predicting clients’ satisfaction. The model combined intrapersonal forces (the healthcare provider’s level of caring and emotional load) and interpersonal forces (meeting the client in a team of professionals or alone, and client?provider similarity), as predictors of emotional labour strategies, and subsequent client satisfaction. Clients’ evaluation of whether or not the emotional displays were authentic was intended to moderate the link between emotional labour and client satisfaction. The sample consisted of 103 healthcare providers’ encounters with clients’ family members, randomly selected from five nursing homes. Data were collected by validated questionnaires at three time points. Mixed linear model analyses generally supported the proposed model. Meeting a client’s family in teams, ethnic similarity, and providers’ caring and emotional load stimulated higher levels of deep acting. Meeting clients alone and less emotional load involved more surface acting. These findings offer empirical support for the social interaction explanation of emotional labour, pointing to the importance of social characteristics of the service encounter in shaping emotional labour strategies and maintaining client satisfaction.     

New perspective on the benefits of the gene–environment independence in case–control studies

We study the benefit of exploiting the gene–environment independence (GEI) assumption for inferring the joint effect of genotype and environmental exposure on disease risk in a case–control study. By transforming the problem into a constrained maximum likelihood estimation problem we derive the asymptotic distribution of the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) under the GEI assumption (MLE‐GEI) in a closed form. Our approach uncovers a transparent explanation of the efficiency gained by exploiting the GEI assumption in more general settings, thus bridging an important gap in the existing literature. Moreover, we propose an easy‐to‐implement numerical algorithm for estimating the model parameters in practice. Finally, we conduct simulation studies to compare the proposed method with the traditional prospective logistic regression method and the case‐only estimator. The Canadian Journal of Statistics 47: 473–486; 2019 © 2019 Statistical Society of Canada     

Economic Integration among Children of Israeli Immigrants in the United States

The paper analyses the economic assimilation of first, 1.5, and second generation Israeli Jewish immigrants in the United States. The empirical analyses are based on the 1990 public use sample (PUMS) that enables the identification of adult children of Jewish Israeli immigrants. The analyses show that all groups of Jewish Israeli immigrants in the United States are doing very well relative to a benchmark of native‐born Americans. The comparisons also indicate that children of immigrants — both men and women — are even more successful economically than the immigrants themselves. The economic success of Israeli immigrants and their offspring in the United States is due not only to their high level of education, but also to unmeasured traits that help them earn more than demographically comparable natives.     

The Public Policy of Motherhood

Parents seeking to balance their work lives with family responsibilities often find the challenge made more difficult by outdated images of the ideal worker, the good mother, and the good father. Social and legal constraints on mothers' choices exacerbate the problem. While other countries have implemented national work/family policies, the climate in the United States seems unreceptive to federal government mandates for meaningful changes in employees' work hours, schedules, and paid leave, or for sweeping new child care subsidies. As a viable interim measure, we propose a statute forbidding discrimination based on family responsibilities, which would tap deeply-felt values about the importance of family caregiving, serve as an important symbolic statement, and be useful to courts.