Zooming in on Life Events: Is Hedonic Adaptation Sensitive to the Temporal Distance from the Event?

This paper analyzed the effect of major positive and negative life events (marriage, divorce, birth of child, widowhood, and unemployment) on life satisfaction. For the first time, this study estimated the effects of life events not with a precision of 12 months but of 3 months. Specifically, two questions were addressed: (1) Does the precision of the temporal localization of the event (i.e., 12 or 3 months) affect the observed trajectories of life satisfaction, and (2) is the precision of the temporal localization more important for negative life events? As expected, results showed that the precision of temporal localization allows a clearer view on hedonic adaptation, in particular following negative life events.     

The Influence of Family Expressiveness,Individuals’ Own Emotionality,and Self-Expressiveness on Perceptions of Others’ Facial Expressions

To examine individual differences in decoding facial expressions, college students judged type and emotional intensity of emotional faces at five intensity levels and completed questionnaires on family expressiveness, emotionality, and self-expressiveness. For decoding accuracy, family expressiveness was negatively related, with strongest effects for more prototypical faces, and self-expressiveness was positively related. For perceptions of emotional intensity, family expressiveness was positively related, emotionality tended to be positively related, and self-expressiveness tended to be negatively related; these findings were all qualified by level of ambiguity/clarity of the facial expressions. Decoding accuracy and perceived emotional intensity also related positively with each other. Results suggest that even simple facial judgments are made through an interpretive lens partially created by family expressiveness, individuals’ own emotionality, and self-expressiveness.     

Nativity Status and Depressive Symptoms among Hispanic Young Adults: The Role of Stress Exposure

OBJECTIVE: This article documents nativity differentials in depressive symptoms among Hispanics during their initial years of adulthood and explores how ethnicity, socio-demographic characteristics, and exposure to stressful life events and changes in social roles help to explain those differentials. METHODS: Data is drawn from a large-scale two-wave community study of stress, psychiatric well-being, and substance use disorders among young adults. Our analytic sample includes 553 Hispanic respondents and we employ multivariate regression techniques. RESULTS: Regardless of age at immigration, foreign-born women experience greater declines in depressive symptoms than native-born women during early adulthood. This advantage is explained by differences in perceptions of discrimination, family-based stress, and social role changes. The association between nativity and depressive symptoms is not conditioned by ethnicity, but ethnicity does condition the association between stressful events and depressive symptoms. CONCLUSIONS: The findings suggest that mental health treatment and prevention efforts should focus more heavily on stress exposure.     

Where I Belong: Identification Processes of Young Volunteers in Super-Diverse Cities

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - In the context of super-diverse cities, scholars and policy makers are increasingly interested in the potential of...     

Performance management theory: A look from the performer's perspective with implications for HRD

Performance management methods are receiving increased attention as organizations seek performance gains from their workforces during challenging economic times. In this paper, the construct of performance management is challenged along two lines: how applied models do not take full advantage of existing theories of work motivation; and how the impact of performance management will continue to be constrained as long it remains a predominantly top-down process. Several relevant theories of motivation are examined to illustrate gaps between theory and practice and to provide a basis for looking at performance management from the performer's perspective. Resulting implications for the human resource development (HRD) field are discussed.     

Book Review: The Charitable Impulse: NGOs and Development in East and North-East Africa,by Ondine Barrow and Michael Jennings (eds.). James Currey,Oxford, 2001

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations -     

The Present and future role of ILO standards in realizing the right to social security

The right to social security is accepted in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Nonetheless, international human rights instruments and supervisory mechanisms have remained mostly silent about its definition. Within the UN family, it has been left to the ILO to give substance to this right through international labour Convention No. 102. Despite international recognition of the Convention's positive influence as a mechanism to help steer the progressive development of social security, it falls short of obliging minimum requirements for a basic social floor. In examining whether existing ILO standards can help States realize the universal right to at least a basic social security package, the article suggests the need for the ILO to develop new complementary mechanisms, which would also contribute to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals and global poverty reduction.