The job demands-resources model: A meta-analytic review of longitudinal studies

The job demands-resources (JD-R) model is an influential framework to understand how job characteristics foster employee well-being. Differing from the cross-sectional focus of most JD-R model reviews, this meta-analytic review uses longitudinal evidence to validate the essential assumptions within the JD-R model. We highlight two aspects: (1) The assessment of the methodological quality of the available longitudinal studies, and (2) the examination of the essential assumptions – the impact of job characteristics on well-being, and vice-versa – with meta-analytic structural equation modelling (metaSEM). We included 74 studies and evaluated their quality. Eighteen studies suffered from serious methodological shortcomings, whereas 29 studies (39%) were considered high-quality studies. Our meta-analytic structural equation models confirmed the essential assumptions simultaneously. The quality of the studies also had an influence on the goodness-of-fit indices. The models with reciprocal assumptions between job characteristics and well-being fitted the data best. The findings of this meta-analytic review suggest that the JD-R model is an excellent theoretical basis to assess employee well-being for a broad range of organisations. However, more research is needed to clarify the reciprocal relationships between job characteristics and employee well-being, as well as the different influences of challenging and hindering job demands on work engagement.     

A Bootstrap Mechanism for Response Masking in Remote Analysis Systems

National Statistical Agencies and other data custodian agencies hold a wealth of data regarding individuals and organizations, collected from censuses, surveys and administrative sources. In many cases, these data are made available to external researchers, for the investigation of questions of social and economic importance. To enhance access to this information, several national statistical agencies are developing remote analysis systems (RAS) designed to accept queries from a researcher, run them on data held in a secure environment, and then return the results. RAS prevent a researcher from accessing the underlying data, and most rely on manual checking to ensure the responses have acceptably low disclosure risk. However, the need for scalability and consistency will increasingly require automated methods. We propose a RAS output confidentialization procedure based on statistical bootstrapping that automates disclosure control while achieving a provably good balance between disclosure risk and usefulness of the responses. The bootstrap masking mechanism is easy to implement for most statistical queries, yet the characteristics of the bootstrap distribution assure us that it is also effective in providing both useful responses and low disclosure risk. Interestingly, our proposed bootstrap masking mechanism represents an ideal application of Efron's bootstrap—one that takes advantage of all the theoretical properties of the bootstrap, without ever having to construct the bootstrap distribution.     

Share,like, twitter,and connect: Ecological momentary assessment to examine the relationship between non-work social media use at work and work engagement

Non-work social media use at work has seen a dramatic increase in the last decade and is commonly deemed counterproductive work behaviour. However, we examined whether it may also serve as a micro-break and improve work engagement. We used ecological momentary assessment across 1 working day with up to 10 hourly measurements in 334 white-collar workers to measure non-work social media use and work engagement, resulting in 2235 hourly measurements. Multilevel modelling demonstrated that non-work social media use was associated with lower levels of work engagement between persons. Within persons, non-work social media use was also associated with lower concurrent work engagement. However, non-work social media use was related to higher levels of work engagement 1 hour later. While more extensive non-work social media use at work was generally associated with lower work engagement, our advanced study design revealed that the longer employees used social media for non-work purposes during 1 working hour, the more work engaged they were in the subsequent working hour, suggesting that employees turn to social media when energy levels are low and/or when they (temporarily) lose interest in their work. This behaviour may serve as a break, which in turn increases work engagement later during the day.     

Robustly assigning unstable items

Journal of Combinatorial Optimization - We study the robust assignment problem where the goal is to assign items of various types to containers without exceeding container capacity. We seek an...     

Service quality in the legal profession: a review

Research into the management of professional service quality, other than in health care, has been very limited, despite being particularly problematical. This paper focuses on the interactive, highly customized and labour-intensive service offered by solicitors to their commercial and corporate clients. The intangible nature of legal services, the natures of the professionals themselves and the firms within which they operate, and the perceptions of risk brought to the service by the client create additional difficulties in managing the service and measuring client perceptions of it. Yet solicitors must understand the requirements of the group of clients they seek to serve in order to design their service to match those needs. Clients have to assume the technical competence of their solicitor. Moreover, they seek confidence when buying legal services. Our research, therefore, sought to gain an understanding of the process used by commercial and corporate clients when evaluating legal service, and of the factors that are key drivers in the creation of confidence.     

Drivers of internationalization success: a conjoint choice experiment on German SME managers

Internationalization is a common growth strategy for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). However, SMEs face several challenges within the internationalization process. As SMEs are characterized by limited resources, managers are constantly involved in a decision-making process concerning the allocation of the SMEs’ resources. Therefore, internationalization can be understood as a complex, multidimensional decision process. Based on a set of 2244 internationalization decisions made by German SME managers, the present study examines how eight strategic and structural factors drive the perceived international success of SMEs. When applying conjoint choice analysis, the results suggest that especially equity financing in the internationalization process, an appropriate market selection as well as proactive motives, and a long-term scope can drive SMEs’ international success. Moreover, it becomes evident that strategic factors are more relevant for successful internationalization than structural factors.     

The Role of Affect in Attitude Formation toward New Technologies: The Case of Stratospheric Aerosol Injection

This article analyzes determinants of technology acceptance and their interdependence. It highlights the role of affect in attitude formation toward new technologies and examines how it mediates the influence of stable psychological variables on the technology's acceptability. Based on theory and previous empirical evidence, we develop an analytical framework of attitude formation. We test this framework using survey data on attitudes toward stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI), a technology that could be used to counteract global warming. We show that affect is more important than risk and benefit perception in forming judgment about SAI. Negative and positive affect directly alter the perception of risks and benefits of SAI and its acceptability. Furthermore, affect is an important mediator between stable psychological variables—such as trust in governmental institutions, values, and attitudes—and acceptability. A person's affective response is thus guided by her general attitudes and values.