Transfer of training: Written self‐guidance to increase self‐efficacy and interviewing performance of job seekers

Subsequent to training IT professionals ( n = 35) in skills for performing effectively in a selection interview, 16 were randomly assigned to a transfer of training intervention, written self‐guidance (WSG). This methodology is based on social cognitive and self‐persuasion theories. The results showed that WSG resulted in significantly higher ratings from an interviewer than did those in the control group. Self‐efficacy for interviewing skill mediated the relationship between WSG and performance. A content analysis of the WSG letters showed that the use of self‐affirming and self‐relevant statements was positively related to performance in the selection interview. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The effect of primed goals on employee performance: Implications for human resource management

Overwhelming evidence in the behavioral sciences shows that consciously set goals can increase an employee's performance. Thus, HR professionals have had little, if any, reason to be interested in subconscious processes. In the past decade, however, laboratory experiments by social psychologists have shown that goals can be primed. That is, people's behavior is affected by goals of which they are unaware. Because a conscious goal consumes cognitive resources, this finding has important implications for employee efficiency in the workplace. This paper discusses the results of priming a performance goal in two organizational settings. Call center employees who were primed using a photograph of a woman winning a race raised significantly more money from donors than those who were randomly assigned to a control group. A meta‐analysis revealed that a photograph can prime the subconscious to increase job performance. The results of the present study demonstrate that subconscious motivation is a concept worthy of exploration for both human resource scholars and practitioners. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The role of hospital heterogeneity in measuring marginal returns to medical care: a reply to Barreca, Guldi, Lindo, and Waddell

In Almond et al. (2010), we describe how marginal returns to medical care can be estimated by comparing patients on either side of diagnostic thresholds. Our application examines at-risk newborns near the very low birth weight threshold at 1500 g. We estimate large discontinuities in medical care and mortality at this threshold, with effects concentrated at “low-quality” hospitals. Although our preferred estimates retain newborns near the threshold, when they are excluded the estimated marginal returns decline, although they remain large. In low-quality hospitals, our estimates are similar in magnitude regardless of whether these newborns are included or excluded.     

Do Credit Cards Really Reduce Aggregate Money Holdings?

This paper discusses whether the use of credit cards reduces aggregate money holdings in an economy. Applying and modifying the Baumol-Tobin model (Baumol Quarterly Journal of Economics 66:545–556, 1952 and Tobin Review of Economics and Statistics 38(3):241–247, 1956), it studies how much money a credit card bank would normally maintain to support retail trade, and shows that whether or not the use of credit cards actually reduces the aggregate demand for money depends on how often consumers visit the bank and how long it takes to clear a check. With innovations in the banking industry such as ATMs, online banking, and other electric funds transfer services, the cost of visiting banks (i.e., switching funds between a checkable account and an interest-earning account) is now very low. For the whole economy, as a result, the use of credit cards may not necessarily reduce aggregate money holdings.     

Are Congressional Black Caucus Members More Reliable? Loyalty Screening and Committee Assignments of Newly Elected Legislators

A bstract .   As previous research has suggested, the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) demonstrates the characteristics of a well-functioning vote-producing cartel in both the degree and uniformity to which it supports the leadership of the Democratic Party in the U.S. House of Representatives. As previous work has pointed out, this cartel is, therefore, rewarded by House Democrats through selection for service on "important" committees at the beginning of each Congress. However, Democratic leaders have very little, if any, information to guide them in their choices regarding committee placement for newly elected Democratic representatives. As such, they are likely to use past CBC uniformity and loyalty as a low-cost screening device for predicting future reliability. Examination of the committee placement of newly elected Democrats to the U.S. House from the 103^rd Congress through the 106^th Congress reveals such a pattern by House Democratic leaders. In other words, newly elected CBC Democrats face much higher probabilities of receiving "important" committee assignments than their newly elected non-CBC counterparts, ceteris paribus .     

Connecting Optimal Capital Investment and Equity Returns

Economic theory predicts a contemporaneous correlation between equity returns and investment growth that is only weakly present in the data. By modifying the firm's production function to include a lag between investment decisions and expenditures, and after correcting for the temporal aggregation of investment, I find the predicted correlation to be present in the data. I estimate the model for 31 industries and find that investment returns are highly correlated with the industry portfolio equity returns. Further, the portion of investment returns orthogonal to equity returns is associated positively with changes in profitability and negatively with lagged differences between equity and investment returns.     

The Changing Distribution of Male Wages in the U.K.

This paper uses microeconomic data from the U.K. Family Expenditure Surveys (FES) and the General Household Surveys (GHS) to describe and explain changes in the distribution of male wages. Since the late 1970s wage inequality has risen very fast in the U.K., and this rise is characterized both by increasing education and age differentials. We show that a large part of the changes in the U.K. can be summarized quite simply as increases in eduction differentials and a decline of growth of entry level wages which persist subsequently. This fact we interpret as cohort effects. We also show that, like in the U.S., an important aspect of rising wage inequality is increased within-group wage dispersion. Finally we use the GHS to evaluate the role of alternative education measures.     

Best Value and the Control of Local Government: Challenges and Contradictions

This article offers some understanding of the early experience of implementing Best Value in the local authority sector. Implementation is dependent on how local government understands the concept; what local government is able to deliver; and what central government is prepared to accept. For the case study authority described in this article, Best Value is understood to depend on three deliverable 'cornerstones', embedded in a context that emphasises accountability, seeks to develop 'learning' and pursues change in organizational culture, emphasising the tenets of 'business excellence'. The authors conclude that Best Value represents an unusual cocktail of top-down concept and bottom-up realization, providing a new twist in the control of the local government sector.     

Improving product instruction compliance: “If you tell me why,I might comply”

Although prior research into product instructions has been limited to investigating the effect of warnings such that people might avoid possible product dangers by heeding warnings, this research considers methods of improving consumer product instruction compliance when noncompliance with a product instruction does not necessarily lead to a hazardous situation. In particular, this research investigates the impact of providing instructions that specify the process by which compliance with the instructions will lead to the desired end state (e.g., product outcome), called process‐cause information. The results of a first field experiment indicate that intention to comply with product instructions is enhanced when people are told how compliance with the instructions will lead to the desired outcome (i.e., when process‐cause information is included in a product instruction). This finding is substantiated by results of a follow‐up laboratory experiment where subject compliance with an instruction‐based behavior was observed. The importance of the present research is discussed in terms of the potential impacts on customer satisfaction, service recovery, product returns, product liability, and warranties. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals.