A Temporal Comparison of the Effects of Unemployment and Job Insecurity on Wellbeing

Analyses of individuals\' working lives make a variety of assumptions about the relationship between time, wellbeing and economic stress. Some assume that stress will accumulate in adverse environments, leading to chronic effects of, for instance, long-term unemployment or job insecurity. Other studies emphasize the acute effects of changes per se, and assume adaptation. This paper examines how employees respond both to acute and chronic job insecurity This paper will use two datasets. The first is from a survey of over 300 UK employees employed in 26 companies; this dataset included both qualitative and quantitative data, at both employer and employee levels. The second dataset consisted of longitudinal data from the British Household Panel Survey. It was found that the unexpected announcement of job insecurity can cause a sudden and marked spike in psychological symptoms. Looking at longer-term effect for prolonged periods of job insecurity, wellbeing (i.e. symptoms of anxiety and depression) continues to deteriorate for at least a year, with no sign of leveling off or recovery. This is in contrast to the findings on long-term unemployment, where there is evidence of adaptation and slight improvements in psychological wellbeing after six months. The reasons for these opposing patterns between job insecurity and unemployment are discussed in terms of the challenge for individuals attempting to cope with perceived future uncertainty during the prolonged recovery from the current recession.Job Insecurity, Recession, Wellbeing, Unemployment, Chronic Stress

The stigma of failure: An international comparison of failure tolerance and second chancing

It is commonly asserted that high rates of entrepreneurship and superior economic performance in the United States is linked to a higher cultural tolerance of business failure. After reviewing cross country patterns of entrepreneurship we develop in this paper a measure of cultural attitudes towards failure which has two components. We term these failure tolerance which captures attitudes towards the risk of a business failing and second chancing which measures the degree of agreement with the proposition that those who have failed should be given a second chance. Using a unique dataset on attitudes to failure for a sample of 9,500 individuals drawn from 19 economies for the year 2002 we show that respondents in the USA appear to have relatively high levels of failure tolerance. However, they are less willing to grant a second chance to those who have tried and failed. We find that having relatively high levels of failure tolerance is not positively correlated with GDP growth. Having a relatively positive attitude towards second chancing across countries is positively related to GDP growth. Taken together these results suggest there is a link between attitudes to failure and economic growth, but it is not the one conventionally assumed in current policy rhetoric which argues that relatively favourable attitudes towards second chancing in the USA explains its more entrepreneurial activity.Attitudes to failure, Entrepreneurship, Cross-country comparisons

Communication in an "Officeless firm"

New technologies permit new types of organisations. This article describes and analyses one such organisation, an "officeless firm", where all employees work from their own homes and there is no central office. Drawing upon observations and interviews, the modes of communication and the nature of the interpersonal relationships that have permitted this organisation to succeed are described, along with the challenges that face this organisation in the future as it attempts to grow

Confirmation bias and the testing of hypotheses about other people

Critical reviews of the literatures on self-fulfilling prophecies and self-confirming hypotheses uncovered several weaknesses in key works on those topics. In particular two important flaws were revealed. Hypotheses and expectations were confused and confounded and the most important aspect of these effects in person perception, changes in the perceiver's representation of the target, were ignored. Instead these works either made inferences about the perceivers' judgments from other individuals with different perspectives, or claimed to have demonstrated the effect of manipulating the hypothesis whereas their results were probably attributable to manipulating expectancies instead. It was argued that both of these types of inferences are invalid, and reanalyses of data from empirical works showed that the claims were not justified. A series of experiments was conducted in an attempt to find unequivocal evidence of self-confirming hypotheses. Numerous reasons were found as to why the phenomenon was highly unlikely to occur in social interaction. For instance, the asking of biased questions was found not to occur when perceivers generated their own questions to ask instead of selecting from a list given to them. In addition, subjects modified the questions they asked during the course of social interactions in such a way as to eliminate any possible bias in information search. Even when questions searching for confirmatory evidence were asked there was little evidence that interviewers' judgements were biased in favour of confirming their hypotheses. By contrast strong evidence was found for self-confirming hypotheses when subjects used information from their own memories to test hypotheses about aquaintances. These findings were discussed in the light of other paradigms within social psychology. Reasons why social cognition has, at times, so underestimated human rationality were considered and several conclusions were made including the need for greater caution in attempting to emulate and understand social processes in a laboratory setting

Do active labour market policies reduce the harmful effects of job insecurity? Evidence for flexicurity from the EWCS and ESS

Conclusions: The relationship between job insecurity and psychological wellbeing seems to be remarkably unpredictable between countries, independent from their level of claimed or actual flexicurity policies. This calls into doubt one of the important claimed benefits of flexicurity – ameliorating the threat associated with job loss. Why? – Lack of knowledge about active labour market policies, etc? – Psychological attachment is with current job, not "employability"

The Social Consequences of Job Insecurity in the European Union

The relationship between job insecurity and psychological wellbeing seems to be unpredictable between countries, independent from their level of claimed or actual flexicurity policies. This calls into doubt one of the important claimed benefits of flexicurity – ameliorating the threat associated with job loss. Why? – Lack of knowledge about active labour market policies, etc? – Psychological attachment is with current job, not "employability"

Job quality in Europe

Promoting job quality and gender equality are objectives of the European Employment Strategy (EES) in spite of a downgrading of the attention given to both in the revised employment guidelines and the re-launch of the Lisbon Process. However, advances on both of these objectives may be important complements to the employment rate targets of the EES, as access to good quality jobs for both sexes is likely to help sustain higher employment rates. While the European Commission has a broad view of the concept of job quality in practice, it relies on a selection of labour market type indicators that say little about the quality of the actual jobs people do. Using data from the 2005 European Working Conditions survey, we analyse job quality along three dimensions: job content, autonomy and working conditions. We conclude that gender and occupational status, along with other job characteristics such as working time and sector, have more influence on an individual’s job quality than the country or ‘national model’ they are situated in. Our results also demonstrate the value of developing indicators of job quality that are both gender sensitive and derived at the level of the job rather than the labour market in order to advance EU policy and academic debate on this topic

NHS Reforms and the Working Lives of Midwives and Physiotherapists

From 2000 the NHS was subjected to a series of far reaching reforms, the purposes of which were to increase the role of the primary care sector in commissioning and providing services, promote healthier life styles, reduce health inequality, and improve service standards. These were seen as requiring a greater leadership role from health professionals, closer and more cooperative working between health professionals, and between health professionals, social services, and community and other service providers. The project surveyed a random sample of midwives and physiotherapists to investigate their perceptions of the effectiveness of the reforms, and their effects on working lives. The predominant perception was that NHS reforms had negatively affected the funding of their services; and had done little to improve service quality, delivery or organisation. Although the potential existed for the reforms to improve services, the necessary resources and required staffing were not made available and the objectives of the reforms were only partially secured by intensifying of work. The downside of this was a deterioration of the socio-psychological wellbeing of midwives and physiotherapists, especially the former, exacerbating the shortage of skilled and experienced. Shortage of staff and the associated increased work burdens were demoralising and demotivating; morale and job satisfaction declined, and job insecurity and labour turnover increased.Professional work, midwives, physiotherapists, Britain, public sector reforms, job satisfaction and morale