Why donate and for what? The pseudoinefficacy bias in donating behavior

Charitable donations represent a possible indirect way to face the social challenge of poverty with people donating a certain amount of money independently of their social status and social roles. As such, scholarly authors devoted to the study of charity and donating behavior have proposed several models following different perspectives to explain the motivational factors and the individual conditions affecting donating behavior. In the present study, we aim at contributing to the selfish altruism model by suggesting the effect of pseudoinefficacy as possible cognitive bias which may be detrimental for deciding to donate. On the one hand, the selfish altruism model has gained notable attention as a possible explanation of the decision-making process underlying donating behavior. This model suggests that people offer aid to receive something in return or to gain a personal advantage. Such a personal benefit can be seen as the individual sense of being morally satisfied, namely, warm-glow. That is, those who donate may feel higher levels of social esteem, gratitude and respect from others which are aspects feeding their warm-glow. Individual would decide to donate by the possibility to gain moral satisfaction rather than acting for the common good. On the other hand, according to cognitive psychology, pseudoinefficacy may affect donating behaviors as an illusion of inefficacy that arises when individuals can only help some people but not others who yet are equally in need. In this sense, the phenomenon of pseudoinefficacy contributes to the selfish altruism model as an explanation of the individuals’ emotions that may reduce donors’ warm-glow. Ultimately, we propose a critical and interdisciplinary review of donating behaviors model and propose a research agenda for further investigations. Given the widespread of poverty as linked to the worldwide changes (i.e., novel pandemic of Sars-Cov-2), theoretical indications and reflections on donating behavior represent a pragmatic and moral concern whose relevance rests in the potential applied implications

Fostering employability at work through job crafting

In the current times of labor market transformations characterized by increasing globalization and digitalization processes, institutions and organizations are aiming at fostering employees’ levels of employability via training interventions at work. Higher levels of employability sustain employees’ competitiveness and job security as well as organizational productivity. Some scholarly authors define employability as a form of proactive adaptability specific to work that allows employees to identify and implement their career plans. It is also defined as the ability to transition effortlessly among the different occupations, allowing the individual to obtain employment. Given this, interventions aimed at fostering proactivity are deemed to be a possible way to foster employability. In recent years, researchers and practitioners have extensively examined employability, identifying different and separate antecedents, i.e., volition, support for career, skill development, job-related skills, willingness to change jobs, self-efficacy, and applicability of training on the job. In this study, we aim to give a contribution to such literature on training interventions to promote employability by proposing critical scrutiny around training interventions by which we will introduce job crafting intervention as a candidate to foster employability by supporting employees’ proactive behaviors. Indeed, job crafting intervention is a specific training aimed at promoting proactive behavior. In particular, it focuses on four main employees’ behavioral strategies, namely, (a) reducing job demands, (b) seeking challenges at work, (c) optimizing and (d) enhancing job resources. By promoting such behavioral strategies, employees can foster the applicability of learning by doing at work which directly affect the overall sense of employees’ employability. For instance, seeking challenges strategies can indirectly lead to learn novel practices at work affecting their sense of competence and organizational belonging. Likewise, reducing job demands and enhancing job resources can be seen as behavioral strategies which can directly foster practical knowledge (i.e., know-how) and its applicability which in turn may lead to higher levels of perceived employability among employees. Hence, in this study, we will firstly outline the benefit of training interventions at the workplace within which job crafting can be seen as a possible training pathway to foster employability. Secondly, we will present the specific training strategies setting a research agenda for further developments. Ultimately, we aim at lecturing about the pragmatic and moral concern of the notion of employability by proposing a theoretical discussion for practical implications

Responding to burnout with \u201cGRRR\u201d! A training programme for enhancing GRit, Resilience and Recovery in the workplace (Part 2 \u2013 practitioner\u2019 presentation

EAWOP 2019

GAME-BASED TRAINING: AN EFFECTIVE METHOD FOR REDUCING BEHAVIOURAL-FINANCE BIASES

Nowadays, being able to understand and infer reasonable conclusions based on great amounts of numerical information represents a key competence to succeed both in education and work. Numeracy is defined as the ability to understand, think, and reason using numbers and math concepts. Such a competence is key in the field of behavioral-finance where individuals manage numerical information to face important choices. Indeed, numeracy is fundamental to analyze data and to make predictions on the likelihood of future events. Moreover, research shows that individuals who score high on numeracy report higher ability in creating alternative options when it turns to make decisions. Building on the computer-supported collaborative learning and on the technology acceptance model, this study aimed to evaluate the efficacy of different interventions to reduce psychological biases related to numerical information processes in a group of university students (N = 800). Specifically, we devised two training interventions based on the two educational approaches, i.e., the computer-supported collaborative learning and on the technology acceptance model. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the two conditions, and -post measures were collected after the interventions to assess their numerical information processing ability. Moreover, post-training results were compared with the results of a control group. Results of a one-way ANOVA showed that in the control group reported the highest incidence of numeracy biases. Our preliminary findings support the main literature on the use of technological instruments and distant training as keys to develop cognitive and operational competences. Such results are limited since we were unable to collect -pre-measures of participants\u2019 numeracy biases. Overall, the present contribution provides initial insights into how different kind of technology-based trainings can be effective to reduce biases referred to numerical information processing

Enhancing critical thinking and media literacy in the context of IVET: a systematic scoping review

Purpose \u2013 The alignment between the labour market and initial vocational education and training (IVET) is placing always more importance on technical knowledge and skills, whilst metacognitive competences such as critical thinking and media literacy are increasingly neglected. In the context of IVET, this results in authors and practitioners paying always more attention to how to devise possible training interventions, with the double aim of implementing their educational pathways and enhancing students\u2019 critical thinking and media literacy. This paper aims to report the state of the art concerning such processes of enhancement in IVET students. Design/methodology/approach \u2013 The study adopted the method of systematic scoping review to address the research questions on how to enhance critical thinking and media literacy in the context of IVET. Findings \u2013 The paper presents the analyses of the n = 19 contributions collected. Then, it proposes an initial conceptualization of the dimensions of critical thinking and media literacy. Moreover, by combining evidence from various contributions, the review proposes implications for educational practices and strategies. Around these pieces of knowledge, further avenues of research and practice are proposed. Research limitations/implications \u2013 This study contributes to the literature on critical thinking and media literacy in the context of IVET by advancing initial comprehensive conceptualizations of the two dimensions. Moreover, the study advances initial practical implications for teachers and trainers for the development of training interventions. Originality/value \u2013 The originality of the present review rests in its proposal of definitions of critical thinking and media literacy; moreover, it widens the discussion of practices on how to enhance such metacognitive competences. Indeed, the study identifies the teaching and training practices meant to enhance critical thinking and media literacy and proposes applied implications in the context of IVET

How Meaningful work and sources of meaning changed during the pandemic: an exploratory study

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected many aspects of our life leading to a completely new world, increasingly complex and uncertain. This is also evident in the workplace, especially on how employees experience and perceive their work. Indeed, it is not surprising that current critical reflections in the study of work and organizations give attention on the challenges on individuals’ wish for meaningful experiences at work. The current debate focuses on how employees can get lost in terms of their sense of work in the face of job demands, responsibilities and working hours. From here, it is central that in the face of new working methods and conditions, organizations behave to guarantee the quality of work and the degree to which work can be a source of meaning. This study has exploratory purposes and intends to investigate the relationship between the dimensions of quality of work and the dimension of meaningful work in the context of the post-pandemic. The data were obtained with a pre-test–post-test design, i.e., before and after restrictions due to the pandemic, through a survey administered online to about 145 workers. We investigated (a) the level of quality at work considering the dimensions of training, safety and communication at work, and (b) the Meaning in Work construct and the related sources of coherence, significance, purpose and belonging. We analysed data via the Structural Equation Modelling to explore the predictive role of job quality for meaning in work dimensions. The results indicate that the latent variable of job quality, described by the observed dimensions of organizational safety and training resources, at time 1 affect meaning in work dimensions respectively at time 1 and time 2. The results of the present study are relevant both for directing further studies on the topic of meaningful work and for organisations wishing to foster meaningful work and link sources. In the context of top-down work redesign process, our results offer initial implications about the role of job quality for sustaining employees’ wish for meaning in their work. The present study represents one of the limited studies on the sources of meaningful work and posit initial insights on how to foster meaningful work. Moreover, this happens in the context of the post-pandemic, supporting initial comprehension about whether organizations can support individuals’ quest for meaning in this uncertain time

Living Together in the Company: Operational Efficiency as a Function of Social and Relational Dynamics in Organizations

As Gozzoli (2016) points out, living together in the company has always been a complex challenge, since in organizations people find themselves interacting, developing relationships, producing, and share spaces and time, with little chance to choose each other, a phenomenon known as organizational coexistence. And yet people in the company are asked to cooperate to achieve the organizational goals, that is to say, goals set by the company, not by workers and employees. The article is a critical review that deals with the concepts of operational efficiency (good job performance) and interactive efficiency (good organizational climate) in the perspective of organizational coexistence, and reaffirms the concept expressed by Bass (1960) that without interactive efficiency, operational efficiency is less likely to be achieved