The antecedents and consequences of anticipatory identification

The aim of this thesis was to investigate anticipatory identification: newcomers’ identification with an organisation prior to entry; in particular by exploring the antecedents and consequences of the construct. Although organisational identification has been frequently investigated over the past 25 years, surprisingly little is known about what causes an individual to identify with a new organisation before entry and whether this has an impact on their relationship with the organisation after formally taking up membership. Drawing on a Social Identity approach to organisational identification, it was hypothesised that newcomers would more closely identify with an organisation prior to entry when the organisation was seen as a source of positive social identity and was situationally relevant and meaningful to the newcomer, i.e. salient, during the pre-entry period. It was also hypothesised that anticipatory identification would have post-entry consequences and would predict newcomers’ post-entry identification, turnover intentions and job satisfaction. An indirect relationship between anticipatory identification and post-entry identification through post-entry social identity judgements (termed a “feedback loop” mechanism) was additionally proposed. Finally anticipatory identification was also predicted to moderate the relationship between post-entry social identity judgements and post-entry identification (termed a “buffering” mechanism). Four studies were conducted to test these hypotheses. Study One served as a pilot study, using a retrospective self-report design with s sample of 124 university students to initially test the proposed conceptual model. Studies Two and Three adopted experimental designs. Each used a unique sample of 72 staff and students from Aston University to respectively test the hypothesised positive social identity motive and salience antecedents of anticipatory identification. Study Four explored the relationship between anticipatory identification, its antecedents and consequences longitudinally, using an organisational sample of 45 employees. Overall, these studies found support for a social identity motive antecedent of anticipatory identification, as well as more limited evidence that anticipatory identification was associated with the salience of an organisation prior to entry. Support was inconsistent for a direct relationship between anticipatory identification and post-entry identification and there was no evidence that anticipatory identification was a significant direct predictor of turnover intention and job satisfaction. Anticipatory identification was however found to act as a buffer in the relationship between post-entry social identity judgements and post-entry identification in all but one of the four samples measured. A feedback loop mechanism was observed within the experimental designs of Studies Two and Three, but not within the organisational samples of Studies One and Four. Overall the findings of these four studies highlight key ways through which anticipatory identification can develop prior to entry into an organisation. Moreover, the research observed several important post-entry consequences of anticipatory identification, indicating that an understanding of post-entry identification may be enriched by attending more closely to the extent to which newcomers identify with an organisation prior to entry

Single crewing in English and Welsh policing: frequency and associations with violence towards and injuries in officers

There is limited contemporary evidence concerning whether single crewing – the deployment of unaccompanied police officers – presents a risk to officer safety. This exploratory self-report study examined the frequency of single crewing in England and Wales and associations with violence-related variables. Officers represented by the Police Federation of England and Wales contributed survey data on four forms of violent victimisation and injuries requiring medical attention arising from workrelated violence experienced over the 12 months to February 2016. Respondents for whom crewing was applicable to their role indicated the frequency with which they had been single crewed during the same period. Pearson’s χ 2 tests were used to characterise socio- and occupational-demographic factors associated with single crewing, violence, and injuries. Associations between single crewing frequency and the target variables were assessed using adjusted binary logistic regression to generate odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals. Among the 11,397 respondents who indicated that crewing was applicable to their role, 53% were often and 21% always single crewed. Relative to those who were never single crewed, the odds of being subjected to verbal insults and verbal threats were significantly elevated in officers who were often or always single crewed. The odds of physical attacks and injuries requiring medical attention were significantly elevated in officers who were always single crewed. There was no association between single crewing frequency and physical attacks with a weapon. These initial cross-sectional findings suggest that tailored crewing options might represent a means by which to reduce violence towards police officers. Keywords: crewing, injury, police, violence

Engaging on the ‘front-line’: Exploring how family support teams construct meaning in their work with young mothers.

This paper explores the provision of family support services for young mothers within a Sure Start Children’s Centre, drawing on data collected within a larger study. It identifies how the family support team attempted to build supportive relationships with young mothers between the ages of 16-19 years. The findings presented here draw on narrative interviews (n=10) and focus group interviews (n=2) with the family support team that included early years workers, family support workers and their managers. The findings captured how the participants actively resisted the stigma (Goffman 1963) of teenage motherhood in order to support young mothers in gaining the necessary skills and knowledge to care for their child. Drawing on the findings, this paper argues that the building of a supportive relationship enables a young mother to construct positive counter-narratives about her parenting experience. This suggests that the family support team are in a unique position to offer informal early support to young mothers who are at risk of more formal intervention. However, the complexity of this task should not be underestimated because in doing this, the family support team must at all times ensure the well-being and safety of the child. Keywords: Mothering, Family Support, Child Care, Safeguardin

A commerce of the old and new: how classroom teacher mentors work in multiple activities

A study of the literature relating to Initial Teacher Education (ITE) suggested that, while mentors had been studied as instruments of their partnership Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), there was little work which investigated the mentor as acting subject in ITE. Through an analysis of spoken and written data, this empirical study offers insights into how two teachers in a secondary school in England appeared to develop subjectivities to assist them in their work in ITE, in the context of the HEI partnership and government policy for ITE. A post-Vygotskyan Activity Theory (Engeström, 1987) and Critical Discourse Analysis (Fairclough, 1995) were used to explore the rules and conceptual and language tools that those teachers seemed to be drawing on when they worked as mentors. The study concludes that, even though the school or partnership appeared to offer few spaces for the development of robust identities, where a mentor had a pre-existing strong pedagogic orientation to mentoring, s/he was better able to construct a subject identity to help her work with students. Where a mentor lacked such a pedagogic orientation and drew on more managerial approaches, s/he experienced more tension in mentoring work and struggled to find an identity which might resolve those tensions

Direct Entry: Fairness, resilience and the impact on regular cops

The discourse emerging from the professionalisation agenda focuses on a drive for new knowledge. The introduction of the Direct Entry (DE) scheme in England and Wales is one practice that attempts to facilitate this. Controversial debates about credible operational experience and an over reliance on classroom-based learning, have become routine. By drawing on qualitative data from the Police Federation Pay and Morale Survey which explored perceptions of College of Policing initiatives, this paper reviews officer views on the DE scheme. The paper discusses the negativity surrounding the scheme and the consequences on both the scheme itself and the professional identity of frontline officers. The authors conclude that without further engagement with frontline staff and a shift in what is viewed as credible knowledge, negative perceptions will prevail. Moreover, evidence suggests that officers’ distance the new skills bought in through the DES and reaffirm their own competence through processes of ‘othering’