Environmental Science DB2 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Environmental Science DB2 - Essay Example This is what makes the U.S. capable of solving food security problems faced by developing regions. In order to reach global food security goals, regions need to increase their trade relations, and allow trade to flow without much of the restrictions in place. Countries can negotiate deals that allow the exportation and importation of food at cheaper prices, thus; increasing the chances of attaining global food security (Wilde, 2013). Seafood, nowadays, happens to be present in almost every home. The only problem is, these products may not be locally raised. The importation of seafood, for example; tilapia, catfish, shrimp, and even salmon from China into the U.S., is on a sharp rise. The approximate distance that the food may have travelled to reach its destination is 7,000 miles. The fact that there are drawbacks and benefits to both importing and growing food locally, it is my opinion that locally produced food is the best option. The processes involved in the production of these products can be monitored to ensure that everything is done according to state regulation. Moreover, there is little contamination involved when food is produced locally, unlike when food has to travel for miles before it is set on the table as a meal (DeWeerdt,

Evgeny Morozov Essay Example for Free

Evgeny Morozov Essay Evgeny Morozov’s article, ‘Technology’s Role in Revolution’, was very attention-grabbing. Evgeny argued that many revolutions throughout history do not transpire through internet and technology, but in effect, are shaped by cultural factors. His term, cyber-utopianism, suggests that online interaction between individuals is emancipatory, and that the internet favours the oppressed, rather than the oppressor. He makes evident, that this belief is nieve and stubborn because it refuses to recognize its consequences. Evgeny argues against the certain ideas of what he refers to as internet centrism, and cyber-utopianism, and indeed points out that there is a dark side to internet freedom. Within Evgeny’s article, there are many points he makes that definitely articulate cyber-utopianism, and its affect on many populations. Evgeny explains the role of internet in the middle- eastern revolutions. He suggests that, people in the middle-east often brag about documenting police brutality, but is not what they should be focusing on. He argues that they should focus on how new leaders will shape the new constitution, and how to deal with issues regarding previous regimes. Morozov believes that the middle-east can obtain successful democracy, but depending on how they can react, and work on existing problems. Evgeny implies that regimes would be a lot less hectic if it weren’t for the internet. He claims, if it the internet wasn’t around, they could have taken a different route in making decisions, could have been less violent, and decisions could have been made months earlier than they did. He explains how in Russia, kids were being so distracted by other websites that, for a short while, government had put up censorships so people would be less distracted. He believes that the most successful way of controlling the internet, â€Å"isn’t one that has the most sophisticated censorship, but one that doesn’t need a one at all.† In addition, Evgeny suggested that it is nieve to believe that something as complex and sophisticated as the internet, could create exactly the same outcomes. In conclusion, he creates an unpretentious approach of dealing with policy making; Cyber-realism. Cyber-realists are people that make the internet a method for achieving specific policy objectives, rather than,  people who only focus on the internet’s philosophical impact as a whole. Evgeny makes some remarkable points, and although I think he slightly dramatizes the negative impacts internet has on the utilitarian states, he still manages to convince me of his argument. For instance, I too, believe that internet is credited for some negative things such as: countries having lacked enlightenment in the topic of political decisions, being a distraction rather than a source of information, and finally, giving the government a disloyal reputation. 1 Evgeny suggests that certain countries do not have the ability to be notified of political suggestions online, because computers are not available to them. A relatable example he expresses is that, Fidel Castro has a twitter page, but people in Cuba, do not have computers, let alone twitter. In Italy, for example, only three hundred and sixty seven people have computers, out of one thousand people. That’s less than half of the population that would not be well informed. In addition, in places such as Russia, internet isn’t a system intended to gain information, but rather, a search engine utilized for personal enjoyment. Internet is often a way of keeping kids away from politics because they become far to distracted on other sites, such as RuTube, to focus on government issues. I agree this is a negative effect, because if kids are uninformed, their kids will be uninformed, and the pattern of using internet for personal use will take its toll on future generations. Other countries, such as North Korea and Belarus, lack the ability to be technologically caught up in society. Evgeny mentions, â€Å"I wouldn’t have much hope in the internet in North Korea. It’s a country with some of the fewest internet connections in the world, and average North Koreans have been brainwashed to such an extent that you have serious psychological challenges that you can’t overcome just by using blogs and twitter.† This expresses the internet as being an unfair advantage to certain countries that are not as technologically advanced. Additionally, internet is giving the government a bad reputati on for two different reasons. First off, Evgeny states that bloggers publishing about dishonesty in local governments, are easily co-opted by higher politicians, and are turned against what they were blogging about. In this case, bloggers are absolutely being shut down, in that the power of the government  is less on local authorities, but on the federal government. This demonstrates the government being disloyal to the people, and using a pessimistic way of controlling the local population, which in turn, can certainly lead to trust issues between the two. Secondly, the government will frequently reach out to citizens for their opinion, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that they are listening to what the citizens have to say. 2 Evgeny suggests that governments pretend to reach out to obtain citizens input, but in reality, it is only a way of making them seem legitimate. The problem with this is that it causes the government to lose power, in that, they can no longer be trusted by the people, therefore the people will slowly stop publicizing their input. Another topic he could have reached upon would be that, because internet is so traceable, some negative things that might have gone viral will always be traced back to you. When bloggers write anti-government information, they are giving out their location, and can easily be tracked by local policemen. Overall I think that Evgeny truly convinced me of his argument because he had some very valid ideas, and as he pointed out, there are plenty of reasons people blame internet for the negative effects it has on the revolution.

Psychological contract breach effects and violation on employees

Psychological contract breach effects and violation on employees Abstract The goal of this study is to examine the influence of personality on the relationship between psychological contract breach and violation and its respective impact on employees work-related outcomes such as turnover intentions and counterproductive work behaviors. In this paper, personality was assessed on the basis of the Five-Factor model of personality (Goldberg, 1990) that is comprised of the following dimensions: Extraversion, Conscientiousness, Agreeableness, Emotional Stability and Openness to Experience. Introduction In difficult times when companies must adapt to different changes in the global economic climate work behaviors are of great interest to organizations. In trying to retain the best employees, managers are interested in reducing turnover and preventing counterproductive behaviors. In order to understand employee responses and reactions to the work environment, contracts become vital as they create a behavioral guideline for both the employee and the organization. The psychological contract is a major element of any employee organization relationship, and consists of an employees beliefs concerning the terms and conditions of a reciprocal exchange agreement between that focal person and another party (Rousseau, 1989, p.123). Employees often feel that their organization has not fulfilled at least some of the promises it has made; and when they do their psychological contract is said to have been breached (Robinson and Rousseau, 1994). Numerous studies have analyzed the consequences of psychological contract breach on employees work-outcomes and generally conclude that there is a positive relationship between psychological contract breach and job dissatisfaction and turnover intentions (Zhao, Wayne, Glibkowski, Bravo, 2007; Bal, de Lange, Jansen and Van der Velde, 2008). Psychological contract violation has been defined as feelings of betrayal and deeper psychological distress à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ [whereby]à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ the victim experiences anger, resentment, a sense of injustice and wrongful harm (Rousseau, 1989, p129). While psychological contract breach may not always lead to undesirable work-related attitudes, it is expected that employees who experience intensely negative feelings might take different measures against the organization they work for (Suazo et al., 2005). This is why in this paper we focus on the role of psychological contract violation as the mediator between psychological contract breach and employees work-related outcomes. But do all people have the same reactions to contract breach or could it be that there are individual differences in personality that lead some employees to react more strongly to psychological contract breach than others? Many authors have investigated the relationship between personality traits and job related outcomes (Judge, Heller and Mount, 2000; Tallman and Bruning, 2008), but there is little research on the relationship between personality and psychological contract breach and violation. Raja, Johns and Ntalianis (2004) is one of the few articles that report on the impact of personality on psychological contracts. These authors found that people high in neuroticism and low in conscientiousness are the ones that are more likely to perceive psychological contract breach. Moreover, the paper revealed that some personality traits moderated the relationship between psychological contract breach and violation. People high in neuroticism tended to perceive a stronger relationship between breach and violation than people high in locus of control. The main focus of this paper is to gain a better understanding of the psychological contract breach and violation relationship by analyzing whether this relationship is moderated by the Five-Factor model of personality (Goldberg, 1990).The study tries to fill in a gap in the existent psychological contract literature by examining the extent to which personality can explain changes in employees attitudes. Compared to other studies in the field, this study focuses on all five personality traits of the Five-Factor model of personality (Goldberg, 1990). This study is structured as follows: the next section describes the current state of the art with respect to psychological contract breach and violation; section three includes the research method and data collection; results will be discussed in section four and the main findings and implications for study and practice along with limitations and suggestions for future research in section five. Literature review and hypotheses The psychological contract As explained in the introduction, the term psychological contract is used to explain the relationship between an employee and an employer and the promises they have made to one another. Many researchers have explained the psychological contract in terms of social exchange theory. This theory (Blau, 1964; Robinson and Morrison, 1995) suggests that individuals enter relationships which consist not only of economic exchanges but also of more diffuse social obligations. These obligations change over time, but research has shown that individuals feel most comfortable when they are in a balanced exchange environment (Gouldner, 1960; Wayne, Shore and Liden, 1997), an environment where they feel that there is a fair equilibrium between what they offer the organization and what they receive in return. When the organization fails to fulfill its promises, employees might feel that there is inequality in the employment relationship (Lester, Turnley, Bloodgood and Bolino, 2003) and might as a result be inclined to take actions to rebalance their work situation, by for example reducing their contribution to the organization (Rousseau, 1995). Psychological contract breach and violation The psychological contract is a subjective perception, so the employee and the organization can possess radically different views of what are the obligations or promises that they have made to one another (Robinson and Rousseau, 1994). This is why often employees feel that their psychological contract has been breached and that the organization has failed in keeping its promises (Robinson and Rousseau, 1994). Although both the employee and the employer can feel that the contract has been breached by the other party, in this paper, as in many investigations on the psychological contract (cf. Zhao et al., 2007) the focus is on the perspective of the employee. In the early phases of research into the psychological contract there was not a very clear distinction between psychological contract breach and psychological contract violation and researchers used these terms interchangeably (Suazo, Turnley, Mai, 2005). In 1997, Robinson and Morrison made a clear distinction between the two. These authors defined psychological contract breach as a cognitive perception, while psychological contract violation was defined as the emotional or affective reaction that can sometimes arise from the perception of a breach of the psychological contract (Morrison and Robinson, 1997). Research has shown that not all breaches lead to emotional reactions on the part of employees (Morrison and Robinson, 1997; Turnley and Feldman, 1999a) because these emotional reactions can be influenced by different individual differences such as personality (Raja et al., 2004) or fairness perceptions (Morrison and Robbinson, 2000), but in those cases where emotional reaction do es occur the employee may have feelings of anger, injustice, resentment and distrust toward the organization that has not honored its promises (Raja, Johns and Ntalianis, 2004). Several studies have linked psychological contract breach to violation. Zhao, Wayne, Glibkowski, Bravo (2007) have summarized these studies and report a meta-analytic correlation of 0.52 (p In line with research findings and with social exchange theory, it is proposed here that psychological contract breach is positively related to psychological contract violation. Hypothesis 1: Psychological contract breach is positively related to psychological contract violation. Psychological contract breach and employees responses Previous studies have linked psychological contract breach to negative work outcomes (Robinson and Rousseau, 1994; Robinson and Morrison, 1995). When psychological contract breach occurs, employees start reducing their contribution to the organization as they feel that the organization has failed them (Robinson, 1996). Turnover intentions and counterproductive behaviors are employee possibilities of reducing their efforts and contributions towards the organization they work for. Zhao et al. (2007, p.651) define turnover intentions as the subjective probability that an individual will leave his or her organization within a certain period of time. The meta-analytic study shows that there is a positive correlation between psychological contract breach and turnover intentions (r=.42, p Hypothesis 2a: Psychological contract breach will be positively related to turnover intentions. Counterproductive behavior can be seen as destructive reactions toward an organization (Kickul, Neuman, Parker, Finkl, 2002). When employees feel that there psychological contract has been breached their level of commitment and trust in their organization decreases (Ball, Trevino, Sims, 1994) and they might react destructively toward the organization (Kickul et al., 2002). This reaction may be characterized by a set of different deliberate acts that harm the organization or even the organizations stakeholders such as clients, owners or supervisors (Spector and Fox, 2005). Counterproductive behavior is a very broad construct which contains behaviors ranging from theft or sabotage to violence against others (Gruys and Sackett, 2003). Each one of these actions create great problems to the organization and are also economic threats as organizations need to spend money to protect themselves against such actions (Bennett and Robinson, 2000). The employees counterproductive actions may even escalate until the level where they interfere with co-workers jobs or where they give a disrespectful treatment to their supervisors (KicKul et al., 2002). Bordia et al. (2008) found that the psychological contract breach was positively related to both minor offenses (ÃŽÂ ²=0.44,pË‚.001) and major offenses (ÃŽÂ ²=0.49, pË‚.001) of the employees at the work place. Following on their results, we propose that psychological contract breach will be positively related to the employees counterproductive behavior. Hypothesis 2b: Psychological contract breach will be positively related to counterproductive behavior. Psychological contract violation Prior to 1977, the terms psychological contract breach and psychological contract violation were used as synonyms, so much of the existent literature focused on the relationship between psychological contract breach and employees responses. Only after the paper of Robinson and Morrison (1997) the two became the separate concepts as we know them now. In this part of the paper we introduce psychological contract violation as a mediator of the relationship between psychological contract breach and employees reactions. As not all contract breaches results in feelings of violation and not all employees respond negatively to their psychological contract being breached (Morrison and Robinson, 1997; Rousseau 1995, Turnley et al., 2003) we believe that it would be interesting to test whether psychological contract violation could have a mediating effect on the psychological breach employees reactions relationship. One paper that focuses on the mediating role of psychological contract violation is the meta-analysis of Zhao et al. (2007). The authors use affective events theory to explain the relationship between psychological contract breach, affect (violation and mistrust), job attitudes and individual effectiveness. Following this theory, a negative event at the workplace causes negative emotional reactions, which in turn are taught to cause negative work attitudes (Bal et al., 2008). In their study, the authors find psychological contract breach to be a negative event leading to emotional reactions and job attitudes. The authors found that psychological contract violation fully mediated the relationship between psychological contract breach and job satisfaction, organizational commitment and intentions to quit. While psychological contract breach may not always lead to undesirable work-related attitudes, it is expected that employees who experience intensely negative feelings (psychological contract violation) will take some measures (such as leaving the organization or working less) against their organization (Suazo et al., 2005). Based on the affective events theory we expect that psychological contract violation will mediate the relationship between psychological contract breach and employee responses toward the organization they work for. Hypothesis 3a: Psychological contract violation will mediate the relationship between psychological contract breach and employees turnover intention. Hypothesis 3b: Psychological contract violation will mediate the relationship between psychological contract breach and employees counterproductive behavior. 2.5 The moderating role of personality Robinson and Morisson (2000) showed that attributions and fairness perceptions moderate the relationship between psychological contract breach and violation. The authors explain that when employees felt that they were treated unfair there was a stronger relationship between the breach of the psychological contract and an emotional reaction to it, so lower levels of fairness were predicting violation. Other papers suggested that organizational influences and also employees personal dispositions may be predictors of psychological contracts (Rousseau, 1995; 2001). But only little research has been conducted on the relationship between personality and psychological contract breach (Raja et al., 2004; Tallman and Bruning, 2008) even though there are a lot of papers that emphasize the importance of personality on work attitudes such as job performance or job satisfaction (Barrick and Mount, 19921; Judge and Bono, 2001). The focus of this study is to analyze whether personality might moderate the relationship between psychological contract breach and violation. We consider that personality could significantly influence this relationship because personality can explain how people differ in their social interactions, reaction to perceived injustice and attachment of importance to various extrinsic and intrinsic outcomes (Raja et al., 2004, p354). Zhao et al. (2007) also state that future research should focus on personality as a moderator when studying psychological contract breach and outcomes. The personality dimensions used in the paper are derived from the Five-Factor model of personality (Goldberg, 1990) and consists of 5 personality types: Extraversion, Neuroticism (Emotional Stability), Agreeableness, Conscientiousness and Openness to Experience. We chose this model of personality because it has been used in a variety of studies (Barrick and Mount, 1991; Judge, Heller and Mount 2002, Raja et al. , 2004) and have been related to numerous work attitudes and behaviors (Costa and McCrae, 1992). Raja et al. (2004) article is one of the very few studies that established a connection between personality and psychological contract breach. These authors studied only the effect of Neuroticism, Extraversion and Conscientiousness, because they were unable to establish a reliable level of measurement for the Agreeableness dimension and considered Openness to Experience to be a too controversial structure. Still, in a more recent study of Tallman and Bruning (2008) the authors were able to measure all of these personality dimensions with the help of the NEO Five-Factor Inventory questionnaire, so we decided to also focus on all five personality aspects and their relation to the psychological contract breach and violation. The authors (Raja et al., 2004) found that employees personalities are related to their contract choice, as people high in neuroticism will tend to choose transactional contracts, while people high in conscientiousness or extraversion prefer relational ones. Transactional contracts are characterized by short-term economically focused attitudes and relational ones by a set of long-term attitudes that include features like loyalty or security (Raja et al., 2004). The authors also found that people who were more sensitive to equity issues (equity sensitivity dimension) were more likely to feel negative emotional reaction when there psychological contract was breached, than people who were more internal (external locus of control dimension). Tallman and Bruning (2008) extended the study of Raja et al. (2004) and the research on the relationship between psychological contracts and personality, by studying the link between employees personality and their beliefs regarding the employees obligations and organizational behavior. The authors linked personality to nine employee psychological contract obligation dimensions: commitment to the organization, commitment to the job, stewardship behaviors, showing initiative, serving the needs of the organization, support in the job, growth, support as a person and existence and their results showed that employees personality explained the variance for 4 out of 9 dimensions. Even more, they found that each of the Five-Model Personality dimensions was related to at least one of the dimensions, indicating that using all the 5 personality types was important for the study. As research has showed personality is an important factor in employees beliefs regarding their psychological contract; this is why we believe that personality might moderate the relationship between psychological contract breach and violation, influencing the extent to which employees perceive there psychological contract being violated and not only breach. The next part of this chapter will be divided according to the Five-Factor Model: Extraversion (1), Neuroticism (Emotional Stability) (2), Conscientiousness (3), Agreeableness (4) and Openness to Experience (5). Extraversion (1) Extroverts are highly sociable, talkative, energetic, ambitious and assertive (Costa, McCrae, 1992). The assertiveness of extroverts is associated with a desire for increased status and salary (Cattell, 1981). Extraversion is associated with high job performance, job satisfaction and team performance (Judge and Ilies, 2002; Judge and Bono, 2000; Kickul and Wiesner, 1997). Previous studies have shown that there is a positive relationship between extraversion on the one hand and job satisfaction (Judge et al., 2002) and organizational commitment (Erdheim et al., 2006) on the other. Even though extroverts are seeking for monetary rewards they tend to form long-term relationships, because in these ones they can develop themselves and have better opportunities to gain a better status and a better income (Tallman and Bruning, 2008). Tallman and Bruning (2008) found that there was a positive correlation between the extroversion personality dimensions and the perceived obligation extrovert people felt organization towards them in fulfilling their growth needs (ÃŽÂ ² = .25, p Extroverts are high performers and they are committed to their organization (Tallman and Bruning, 2008), in addition they are assertive, so they will tend to stand up for their rights. Breaching the psychological contract of extroverted people will probably lead to stronger negative emotional feelings toward the organization they work for than when comparing to introverted people. This is why it is proposed here that extroverts will be more likely to react emotionally to their psychological contract being breached than non-extroverts. Hypothesis 4b: Extraversion moderates the relationship between psychological contract breach and psychological contract violation, so that the relationship between psychological contract breach and psychological contract violation is stronger for extroverts than for introverts. Neuroticism (2) People high in neuroticism are anxious and lack trust in people, and it is said that they are more prone to perceive failures in life (Judge, Higgins, Thoresen, Barick, 1999). They have a greater tendency to pay attention to the negative side of a situation than other people who have a more balanced view of things (Ho, Weingart, Rousseau, 2003). They are usually poor team performers and they fear change (Kichuk and Wiesner, 1997). Previous research has shown a negative relationship between neuroticism and job satisfaction (Judge et al., 2002). Other authors have linked neuroticism to a preference for transactional psychological contracts (Raja et al., 2004) because these contracts do not require much initiative or confidence (Raja et al., 2004). Tallman and Bruning (2008) showed that neuroticism is positively related to the organizations obligations to provide support for the employees and to stewardship behavior. Because people high in neuroticism are more worried and anxious we believe that their reaction to a psychological contract breach would be stronger than that of people emotionally stable. This is why we propose that people high in neuroticism will have stronger emotional reaction and will tend to perceive their psychological contract as being violated. Hypothesis 4a: Neuroticism moderates the relationship between psychological contract breach and psychological contract violation, so that this relationship is stronger for people high in neuroticism than for those low in neuroticism. Conscientiousness (3) Conscientiousness is related to an individuals degree of self-control, need for achievement, order and also persistence (Costa, McRae Dye, 1991). Conscientious people tend to be more concerned with tasks accomplishment than with the task rewards (Stewart, 1996) and are interested in forming long-term employment exchange relationships (Zhao and Chen, 2008). Research has shown that there is a positive relationship between conscientiousness and work-related outcomes such as job satisfaction (Judge et al., 2002) or commitment (Erdheim, 2006). Orvis et al. (2008) tested the hypothesis that conscientiousness moderates the relationship between psychological contract breach and work outcomes. In their study, the authors showed that lower levels of conscientiousness led to a higher level of perceived psychological contract breach and lower levels of job satisfaction, organization loyalty and higher levels of intentions to quit. Raja et al. (2004) also found that there is a strong relation between conscientiousness and psychological contract breach: people with higher levels of conscientiousness perceived lower levels of psychological contract breach. Thus, it is expected here that it is unlikely that conscientious people will feel that their psychological contract has been violated upon perceiving a breach of their psychological contracts. Hypothesis 4c: Conscientiousness moderates the relationship between psychological contract breach and violation, so that the relationship between psychological contract breach and psychological contract violation is stronger for people low in conscientiousness than for those high in conscientiousness. Agreeableness (4) The agreeableness personality dimension refers to a persons preferences for interpersonal interactions that can range from compassion to antagonism (Costa McCrae, 1992). One of the few papers that investigated the relationship between agreeableness and psychological contract breach and work-related outcomes is the paper by Tallman and Bruning (2008). In their research, the authors show that there is a positive correlation between the agreeableness personality dimension and that perceived obligation agreeable people feel their organization has in supporting its employees (ÃŽÂ ²=.20, p Agreeable people value their interpersonal relationships and are characterized as being very interested in maintaining positive relations with the people that surround them (Ho, Weingart, Rousseau, 2003). The fact that agreeable people are more prone to maintaining long-term and pleasant relationship with others might have an effect on their perception of their psychological contract being breached. Because the psychological contract is an agreement made between two parties and involves an interpersonal element, agreeable people might be more tolerant and forgiving so it might make agreeable people feel fewer negative emotional reactions to breach than other personality types. Hypothesis 4b: Agreeableness moderates the relationship between psychological contract breach and violation, so that this relationship is stronger for people low in agreeableness than for those high in agreeableness. Openness to Experience (5) Openness to Experience represents open-minded individuals, who are imaginative, inventive, creative, curious and unconventional (Costa and McCrae, 1992). Open people have a high need for autonomy and tend to be creative and adaptive to change (Costa and Mcrae, 1992). Furthermore, open employees are less likely to feel that they must serve the organization or their managers and will look for organizations that will allow them enough freedom to try new ideas and approaches in their activities (Tallman and Bruning, 2008). Because open employees will look for interesting and challenging jobs, we would consider that they will also seek an organization that supports their decisions and that allows them to grow and satisfy their needs (Tallman and Bruning, 2008). This is why we expect that they might feel strong negative emotions when their freedom is limited or when they dont feel their organizations support. Hypothesis 4e: Openness to experience moderates the relationship between psychological contract breach and violation, so that this relationship is stronger for people high in openness than for those low in openness. Research model In the previous sections four sets of hypothesis were established. As shown in the figure, the principal relation in the paper is the one between psychological contract breach, violation and employees responses (turnover intentions, counterproductive behavior), while personality traits are hypothesized to moderate the relationship between breach and violation. Figure 1. Research model 3. Method 3.1 Sample The study was conducted in the Netherlands and used 3 data sources: full-time or part-time employees in the Netherlands, their supervisors and one of their friends. The questions related to psychological contract breach, psychological contract violation and turnover intentions were answered by the respondent, the questions regarding counterproductive behavior were answered by the respondents supervisor and personality was assessed by obtaining ratings from the respondents friend. We consider that the employee is the best source of information when considering psychological contract breach or violation as he is the only person who knows exactly what were his expectations and beliefs regarding his psychological contract. For the turnover intentions we use the employee as a respondent for similar reasons: he is the only one who can tell about his thoughts on leaving the company he works for. In what concerns the measurement of counterproductive behavior we expect that employees will be more reluctant to state the situations were they were acting accordingly, so we consider that their direct supervisor will give more objective responses. Supervisors ratings were previously used to assess counterproductive behaviors in Bordia et al. (2008) or anticitizenship behaviors in Kickul et al. (2001). We also ask one of the respondents friends to fill in the personality survey because employees might distort their personality scores (Rosse, Stecher, Miller and Levin, 1998) and answer the questions the way they think that they should be answered (Mahar, Cologne and Duck, 1995). The respondents were approached through a press release and invitation which were available to them through different websites like: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ The total number of questionnaires spread among the employees was à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ from these, only a number à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ participants responded. à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦. In the beginning the employees were sent an email with the link for completing the survey and after 1 week they also received a reminder. The supervisors and friends were approached through the employee, who received a separate link to forward to its supervisor and friend so that they could participate at the survey. X% of employees were male, X% were female, Y% completed their university education, Y% their secondary education programThe average age of respondents was from à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ to à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦, X% of them were working X hours a week, Y% of them were working Y hours a weekà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ X% of employees reported an organizational tenure of X%, Y% of employees reported an organizational tenure of Y yearsà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ Y% of the supervisors were male and Y% were female, Y% completed their university education, Y% their secondary education program The age of ranged from supervisors was from à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ to à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦, X% of them were working X hours a week, Y% of them were working Y hours a weekà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ The average organizational tenure of supervisors was T%. The frequency of contact between the supervisor and employee was for X% daily, for Y% weeklyà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦ Z% of the friends were male, Z% were female. Their age range was from X to Y years, X completed their university education, Y% their secondary education program. 3.2 Measurement of variables Control variables The results of this study were controlled for the effects of: gender, age and organizational tenure. Gender was controlled for because employees might be evaluated differently according to gender (Turnley, Bolino, Lester and Bloodgood, 2003). Age was controlled for because age could affect work behavior or could also influence the kind of job people choose and finally, organizational tenure was necessary as a control variable because the length of employment might be related to the number of psychological contracts breaches an employee might experience (Turnley at al., 2003). Psychological contract breach The scale of Robinson and Morrison (2000) was used to assess psychological contract breach (Cronbachs ÃŽÂ ± = .92). The scale consisted of five items that assessed the employees perception of psychological contract breach. An example item is: I feel that my employer has come through in fulfilling the promises made to me when I was hired. Thr

Free College Admissions Essays: Comment on an Experience :: College Admissions Essays

Comment on an experience in your life that had an effect on your life. I was a little worried writing about my mother because I thought it would seem like I was looking for sympathy, but I figured it was a good topic to write about because it had the largest effect on me. My goal became to write an essay that didn't focus on the death or loss but on the change and growth that took place. Being active is something that has always been important to me, and I learned this from growing up with and observing an expert. My mother was more active and involved than anyone I have ever known. She had an endless energy for life, and love for my two brothers and me, and I have tried to be the kind of person that she was. The phrase on her headstone reads: "A joyous and boundless energy." My mother was a highly respected kindergarten teacher for twenty years. In addition to working with children as a professional, she was always involved in my elementary school years, as a class mother or President of the PTO. In the summers there were more children, as we would go to sleepaway camp in Maine and she would be in charge of the youngest group of campers. She was always running, playing, consoling, planning, and caring for children. At home, she was just as active. I remember doing homework with her every night and she got so involved with it that she would practically do it for me, which I thought, at the time, was a pretty good thing. We were always going places, visiting friends, just learning, and there was never a dull moment. Though I didn't know it consciously at the time, she was setting an example which I was bound to follow. Over seven years ago, my mother died after a long battle with melanoma. I was ten at the time, in fifth grade, and I suppose I didn't really understand it all that well, or as well as my older brothers did. This essay is not about that loss or death, but on the change that took place. After she was gone, things were so drastically different, because there was so much dull time with nothing to fill it but thoughts. I think I learned from my mom about how to be active and I must have decided, subconsciously, to continue in her path.

City Of Manila.Background of a Smart Designed City Essay

The City of Manila has a population of 1.7 million people and is considered as one of the most polluted cities in the world with notorious traffic congestions. The city of Adelaide is on the other hand one of the most liveable cities in the world, with a population of 1.2 million and practically no traffic jams at all. This paper compares these two cities in order to establish what manila can learn from Adelaide. The City of Manila is a relatively small city with a population of about 1.7 million people and an area of around 40 square kilometres. The city can thus be categorized amongst the overpopulated cities of the world (Townsend, 2013). Consequently, Manila has a very high level of pollution and other challenges including traffic and poor drainage system that makes the sanitation very problematic. Background of a Smart Designed City Adelaide is a south Australian city with a population that is close to that of Manila at 1.3 million people. Initially, this city suffered from high levels of pollution owing to its large population and the energy sources being used across the city. First, the transport means today are highly effective reducing the traffic jams by 100% and the city is now considered as a ‘twenty minute city’ owing to the ability to move from one place to another easily (Fajardo, 2011). The reduced traffic jams translate to reduced gas emissions, as do the number of trees planted around schools, churches, parks, reserves, coastlines and transport corridors. These trees have managed to reduce the carbon emissions getting into the atmosphere thus making the city even cleaner. The city is planned very effectively in such a way that the transport systems are effective and diverse comprising of a South Eastern Freeway, Southern Express Way, the Port River Expressway and the Northern Expressway . This arrangement allows for effective transport across the metropolitan area thus making the city accessible without unnecessary congestions. The roads are also mostly very wide with multiple lanes to accommodate the growing number of vehicles in the city. The city has also cut down its use of fossil fuels in favour of renewable energy with a great inclination on solar energy. They have undertaken numerous campaigns to encourage the citizens to install solar panels on their rooftops, with over 200 schools having to depend on this clean energy for their power needs. As such, the city is slowly turning to solar energy to sustain its energy needs (Henderson, 2002). From its initial planning in the days of the first settlers, the city was designed to have two green rings around the city square thus implementing the green city initiative right from its birth. As a result, they have over 3 million trees within the city and a few parks and squares with a lot of trees as well. The green belt here is so extensive that it is rumoured that one can actually feel the fresh air in the city especially if they are from another part of the country or the world. These trees play a big role in keeping the city free of pollution as they mitigate from the effects of the unavoidable carbon emissions. Suggestions for Future Development and Lose Cost Estimates In order to reach up to Adelaide’s standards, the city of Milan has to undergo a number of transformations within its layout. First, the city’s roads must be reconstructed to accommodate the traffic and reduce the traffic jams. This may cost as much as $100 billion seeing as there is a need for a complete overhaul in the city’s transport system. For efficiency, subways may also be found necessary especially seeing as Manila is in a developing country and thus the urban population is likely to keep growing. The green technology in terms of shifting to solar power as a main source of energy must also be considered seeing as the country currently depends on fossil fuels for their energy. This shift should cost the government about $20 million in equipment and education programs about how to use them as well as their maintenance (Townsend, 2013). In doing this, the city will have cut down on pollution seeing as the dependence on fossil fuels is by far the most hazardous human tendency. As for planting trees and creating a green city, it should be noted that the best trees in Manila can be sourced locally and should thus be relatively cheap. The challenge however would be the sensitization of the masses in order to gain their support and cooperation for maintenance of the trees. It can thus be estimated that the local government will need about $5 million for this project and with the cooperation of the citizens and the private sector the city should qualify for a smart city categorization within approximately 30 years from the implementation date (Townsend, 2013). For this to happen however, the city’s administration will have to obtain the support and cooperation of the general public and the private sector. References Fajardo, B.K. (2011). Filipino crosscurrents. University of Minnesota Press: Minneapolis, MN. Henderson, V. (2002). Urbanization in developing countries. The World Bank Research Observer, 17(1), 89-112. Townsend, M.A. (2013). Smart cities: big data, civic hackers, and the quest for a new utopia. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company. Source document

Free Essays on What Do Hobbes And Locke Have To Say About How Society Was Formed

What do Hobbes and Locke have to say about how society is formed? How does this relate to their ideas about what reason is? What would civilisation be like if ‘society’, as we know it, was not formed? Hobbes and Locke tried to answer this by coming up with state of nature theories. The state of nature was a way of rationalizing how people would act in their most basic state. Hobbes believed that in a state of nature all men are at war, no one had any individual rights and life was a constant struggle for power ending in death. The search for power is the natural state of humans. Hobbes went on to say that nature has made men equal, even though some are more intelligent and/or stronger than others; they are still equally capable of killing each other. The ‘desire’ to escape this equality, has led to laws of nature discovered by reason. Locke believed god was the prime factor in politics. In a state of nature he believed individuals born with certain natural rights given by god, not the society or the government. Everyone had the right to property as long as they kept too two rule s. The first being that there is enough property for everyone and secondly nothing should be allowed to spoil. Locke also sees reason as a law of nature, which he sees is what makes people act civilised to one another. Thomas Hobbes was raised in the English Civil War, which probably influenced his idea that living in the state of nature would off been one of total chaos. ‘Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man, the same is consequent to the time wherein men live without other security than what their own strength and their own invention shall furnish them withal. In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the Earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no in... Free Essays on What Do Hobbes And Locke Have To Say About How Society Was Formed Free Essays on What Do Hobbes And Locke Have To Say About How Society Was Formed What do Hobbes and Locke have to say about how society is formed? How does this relate to their ideas about what reason is? What would civilisation be like if ‘society’, as we know it, was not formed? Hobbes and Locke tried to answer this by coming up with state of nature theories. The state of nature was a way of rationalizing how people would act in their most basic state. Hobbes believed that in a state of nature all men are at war, no one had any individual rights and life was a constant struggle for power ending in death. The search for power is the natural state of humans. Hobbes went on to say that nature has made men equal, even though some are more intelligent and/or stronger than others; they are still equally capable of killing each other. The ‘desire’ to escape this equality, has led to laws of nature discovered by reason. Locke believed god was the prime factor in politics. In a state of nature he believed individuals born with certain natural rights given by god, not the society or the government. Everyone had the right to property as long as they kept too two rule s. The first being that there is enough property for everyone and secondly nothing should be allowed to spoil. Locke also sees reason as a law of nature, which he sees is what makes people act civilised to one another. Thomas Hobbes was raised in the English Civil War, which probably influenced his idea that living in the state of nature would off been one of total chaos. ‘Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man, the same is consequent to the time wherein men live without other security than what their own strength and their own invention shall furnish them withal. In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the Earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no in...