The law and job design: comments on recent Norwegian legislation

A primary concern of those interested in the quality of working life has been with the design of jobs. In this article the authors review the reasons why job design reform has not generally attracted the interest of lawmakers. One notable exception is Norway, and this article reports the findings of a survey into the effects of the most recent law—the Work Environment Act of 1977.     

Consumer profiles section: Consumer profiles for conventional bed and waterbed owners in Canada

This study examines consumer profile data on waterbed and conventional bed consumers. Five hundred conventional and waterbed consumers in Canada were randomly selected from two national lists of waterbed/mattress purchasers from 1981 to the present. A 73-item questionnaire was sent by mail to all of the selected respondents. The cover letter stated the purpose of the project; to study why people bought the bed that they are presently using. One hundred and sixty-two completed, useable questionnaires were returned, yielding a response rate of 37%. Following a series of multivariate analyses, a consumer profile for the two bed users was developed. Both groups tended to be married. The conventional bed consumers had: (a) either no children or one child at home; (b) a mean age of 44; and, (c) an average income in the $30,000-$40,000 range. Waterbed consumers had: (a) a mean age of 36, (b) one child living at home; and, (c) an average income in the $20,000-$30,000 range. On the Adorno F scale, the conventional bed user was found to be more conservative and authoritarian as compared to the waterbed user. The results did not support the notion that waterbed users are abnormally sexually-oriented or “kinky”. For both groups, the price paid for the purchased bed fell in the $600 to $650 range. Implications for retailers were discussed.