Juanita Muller

Leaving High School: The Influence and Consequences for Psychological Well-Being and Career-Related Confidence.

This paper examines the well-being and career decision-making self-efficacy (CDMSE) of adolescents before and after leaving school, and tests for the changes in these variables as a result of leaving school. While at high school, 309 students were assessed on levels of school achievement, well-being (psychological distress, self-esteem, life satisfaction) and CDMSE. Nine months after leaving school, 168 of these students completed the above surveys and measures of their access to the latent (e.g. social contact, time structure) and manifest (i.e. financial) benefits of employment, and work commitment. At T2, 21% were full-time students, 35% were full-time students who were also working part-time, 22% were employed in full-time jobs, and 21% were in the labour market but not employed full-time. These groupings were differentiated at T2 on aspects of well-being, self-efficacy, and access to the latent and manifest benefits of work, and at T1 on aspects of well-being and confidence. Leaving school improved well-being and confidence for some. One group was disadvantaged by having poorer well-being while at school, which predisposed them to disadvantage in the labour market. Results are discussed in relation to models of well-being and drift/social causation.

The role of satisfaction with occupational status, neuroticism, financial strain and categories of experience in predicting mental health in the unemployed

This study tests the contributions of the latent functions of employment (latent deprivation model; Jahoda, 1981: Jahoda, M. (1981). Work, employment and unemployment: Values theories and approaches in social research. American Psychologist, 36, 184–191), the manifest functions of employment (agency restriction model; Fryer, 1986: Fryer, D. M. (1986). Employment deprivation and personal agency during unemployment: A critical discussion of Jahoda’s explanation of the psychological effects of unemployment. Social Behaviour, 1, 3–23) and personality (trait neuroticism) in accounting for psychological distress in the unemployed. Eighty-one unemployed individuals were assessed on measures of psychological distress (GHQ-12; Goldberg, 1972: Goldberg, D. P. (1972). The detection of psychiatric illness by questionnaire. London: Oxford University Press), the latent functions of employment (activity, time structure, social contact, status, collective purpose), financial strain, trait neuroticism, and a measure of labour market satisfaction. It was shown that the latent functions of employment and financial strain were each able to contribute significantly to the prediction of psychological distress over and above that predicted by Neuroticism, which alone also contributed significantly to the prediction of distress. Results are related to the latent deprivation and agency restriction models of well-being and it is argued that temperament needs to be considered in any explanation of the negative psychological effects of unemployment.

The Development and Preliminary Testing of a Scale to Measure the Latent and Manifest Benefits of Employment

Abstract. Theorists have argued the importance of the latent and manifest benefits of employment and their relationship with psychological well-being. However, no one scale has been devised that adequately and reliably measures all five latent and one manifest benefit together. The aims of this study were to develop such a scale that would satisfy standards for psychometric adequacy, and to present evidence for its validity. In the scale development phase, in-depth interviews with 33 unemployed adults and comments from labor market experts were used in the item generation process. In Study 1, 307 unemployed adults were surveyed, and item analysis, interitem and item-total correlations and factor analysis were used to reduce the item pool to a 36-item scale, with six homogeneous and reliable subscales. In Study 2, 250 unemployed adults were surveyed and the scale was subjected to confirmatory factor analysis and tested for associations with psychological distress, neuroticism, and various demographic varia...

Career Maturity and Well-Being as Determinants of Occupational Status of Recent School Leavers: A Brief Report of an Australian Study.

The present study tracked a group of Year 12 students 9 months after leaving high school and sought to identify whether age, gender, data on career maturity, psychological wellbeing, and school achievement reported while still at school could be identified as predictors of occupational status. Data on these variables were able to identify broad postschool occupational groupings of school leavers at Time 2 (T2), whether they were in full-time study, full-time employment, or unemployed/part-time employed. Findings support the assertion that career maturity is a predictor of a successful postschool transition. Discussion focuses on the need to explore movements between the occupational groupings and implications for school-based interventions.

The psychology of work and unemployment in Australia today: an Australian Psychological Society Discussion Paper

This paper reviews recent literature on psychological aspects of work, unemployment, and underemployment in Australia at the beginning of the 21st century. It examines different notions of “work”, including paid employment and unpaid work (e.g., emotional work, volunteer work). It draws attention to the fact that, in our society, most of the important emotional work is carried out by women (caring for children, disabled relatives, and elderly dependent parents). It discusses the well-documented negative effects of unemployment and underemployment and the corresponding benefits of having work, focusing on young people, middle-aged people, and retired people. Finally, it discusses the psychological and health costs of being employed, in the light of the changes in the workplace that have occurred in the last decade: increased work pressures, less job security, increasing needs for retraining, increased income inequality, and an inequitable distribution of paid work.

Quality of Life in boarding houses and hostels: A Residents' perspective

In the last forty years deinstitutionalization has transferred the care of people with a serious mental illness from the psychiatric hospitals to community based facilities. More recently it has been questioned whether these new facilities offer the anticipated benefits of quality of life. This study examines the Quality of Life (QOL) of people diagnosed with schizophrenia living in two different accommodation facilities, hostels and boarding houses. QOL is examined from the residents perspective. Lehmans (1988b) QOL Interview was used to measure objective, subjective, and global QOL of 60 participants in three hostels and two boarding house clusters. Hostel and boarding house data were compared and results showed that residents preferred boarding house accommodation. Overall, residents of both accommodation facilities reported satisfaction with QOL, and indicated that they regard them as asylum or sanctuary from the outside world.

Money or time? Comparing the effects of time structure and financial deprivation on the psychological distress of unemployed adults

This study compared the direct effects of time structure and financial deprivation on psychological distress to determine which had the greater impact. The indirect effect of financial deprivation on psychological distress, through its effect on time structure, was also examined. Time structure, financial deprivation, and psychological distress (consisting of scores of self-esteem, anxiety, and depression) were examined in 201 short-term unemployed adults (49% female) from Victoria and 113 long-term unemployed adults (54% female) from Queensland. These samples formed part of two separate longitudinal surveys which assessed variables at baseline, 6-month and 12-month follow-up. Data were analysed using correlation analysis and structural equation modelling. Results showed that psychological distress was directly affected by financial deprivation and time structure. Furthermore, financial deprivation had an indirect effect upon psychological distress through its impact on time structure but only at baseline in the short-term unemployed sample. Study implications and limitations are discussed.

A review of career interventions from an educational perspective: Have investigations shed any light?

Despite widespread acknowledgement of the importance of career development programs to assist students in their complex transition from school to work, very few specific career education interventions have been objectively evaluated. The aim of this paper is to highlight what the authors consider to be a conspicuous shortfall in the career development literature to date, that is, reports of methodologically sound career intervention studies carried out in actual high school settings. International trends in the world of work are briefly discussed in association with the repercussions these changes are producing for todays youth. The major portion of this article is devoted to a comprehensive review of career intervention studies with particular attention paid to the methodological and theoretical issues that resonate from this review process. Recommendations for future research are proposed.

Psychological distress in the labour market: Shame or deprivation?

Abstract This study examined the efficacy of two environmental/job characteristic models (financial hardship/shaming and deprivation) that have been proposed to account for the negative wellbeing effects for people in the labour market. Scales tapping wellbeing, financial distress, shame and the latent benefits of employment (social support, collective purpose, activity, time structure, status) were administered to 125 unemployed and 133 full-time employed individuals. As predicted, the unemployed sample had poorer wellbeing, more shame and financial distress, and less access to all latent benefits, except social support. Shame accounted for a modest amount of variance in wellbeing, and only one latent variable (status) was a significant predictor. Social support and activity did not mediate the effects of shame and financial distress, and shame did not interact with financial distress to predict wellbeing. Financial distress was the best predictor of wellbeing. Implications for labour market participants...

DOES SPIRITUALITY MEDIATE THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ENVIRONMENTAL STRESSORS AND PSYCHOLOGICAL WELLBEING IN DISTRESSED UNEMPLOYED PEOPLE

A sample of 231 unemployed adults was surveyed using scales tapping psychological distress, the latent and manifest benefits of employment, and spirituality (connectedness, universality, prayer fulfillment, attendance at worship). It was hypothesised that the latent and manifest benefits would be associated with wellbeing; spirituality would be associated with wellbeing; spirituality would be associated with the latent and manifest benefits; and spirituality would mediate the relationship between the latent and manifest benefits and psychological distress. The latent and manifest benefits were associated with psychological wellbeing in the expected direction, with the strongest associations existing between wellbeing and financial deprivation; and social support and time structure. One spirituality dimension—prayer fulfilment—was positively associated with wellbeing, and adults reporting higher spirituality also reported greater access to the latent, but not manifest, benefits. Finally, spirituality mediated the relationship between the latent benefits of employment (social support and collective purpose) and wellbeing. Results are discussed in the context of the latent deprivation and agency restriction theories of wellbeing and unemployment. Practical implications are highlighted.