Yisrael Rich

Gender Differences in the Importance of Work and Family Roles: Implications for Work–Family Conflict

In this study we explored between- and within-gender differences in the importance of life roles and their implications for work–family conflict. In earlier research (Cinamon & Rich, 2002) we found 3 profiles of workers who differ in attributions of importance to work and family roles: persons who assigned high importance to both the work role and the family role (“Dual” profile); participants who ascribed high importance to the work role and low importance to the family role (“Work” profile); and participants who attributed high importance to the family role and low importance to the work role (“Family” profile). We used these profiles to clarify the relationship between gender and work–family conflict. Participants were 126 married men and 87 married women who were employed in computer or law firms. Significant between- and within-gender differences were found in the distribution of participants to profiles. Men were equally distributed throughout the profiles, whereas women were underrepresented in the Work category. More women than men fit the Family profile, and more men than women fit the Work profile. No gender differences were found for the Dual profile. Women reported higher parenting and work values than men did. Between-gender differences in work–family conflict were apparent, as were within-gender differences across profiles. Results demonstrate the value of examining both between- and within-gender variation in studies of gender and work–family conflict.

Profiles of attribution of importance to life roles and their implications for the work-family conflict

Cluster analysis identified 3 groups of individuals who differed systematically on attributions of relative importance to work and to family roles. Participants were 213 married computer workers and lawyers, 126 men and 87 women. Questionnaires gathered data on attributions of importance to life roles, work-family conflict, spousal and managerial support, and flexibility of working hours. In addition to variation between members of the 3 profiles for level of work-family conflict, differences were also found for age, hours working at job and home, and spousal support. Findings also indicated meaningful differences between the profiles for 2 types of conflict: work → family and family → work. Results suggest that simultaneous analysis of relative importance attributed to life roles enables more precise understanding of work-family conflict.

Extending the Concept and Assessment of Teacher Efficacy

This report describes an effort to develop an instrument to assess teacher efficacy for enhancing student social relations (TES). In addition, the psychometric properties of the teacher efficacy scale produced by Gibson and Dembo were examined after translation to Hebrew and administration to 218 Israeli teachers. Results indicated that the TES subscale is independent of the two original subscales and demonstrates good internal and test-retest reliability. Also, the factorial structure of the original teacher efficacy scale was replicated with the Israeli sample, and reliability levels were generally adequate. Some problems with one of the original subscales are noted.

Work Family Relations: Antecedents and Outcomes

This study investigated interrelations between conflict and facilitation in work and family domains, with spousal, managerial, and collegial social support serving as antecedents, and professional vigor and burnout as outcomes. Participants were 322 female, married teachers. Regression analyses revealed complex relations between conflict and facilitation, and different patterns of association in the work and family domains. Only managerial support predicted conflict and facilitation relations. Work-to-family (W→F) and family-to-work (F→W) conflict predicted burnout. Results suggest that conflict and facilitation are distinct constructs and they underscore the importance of working with managers to enhance their ability to promote employees’ health.

Identity Education: A Conceptual Framework for Educational Researchers and Practitioners.

This article presents the concept of identity education (IdEd) referring to the purposeful involvement of educators with students’ identity-related processes or contents. We discuss why educators may consider identity important to the realization of educational goals and choose to target aspects of students’ identity in their pedagogical practice. We offer a broad theoretical framework that organizes and focuses the extensive yet scattered discourse on identity and education. Because IdEd is a concept that accommodates diverse educational perspectives and concerns, we outline several parameters that can assist educators in making sense of this diversity and provide a conceptual basis for pedagogical and curricular decision making. These parameters also provide researchers from different scholarly traditions a common framework for constructive dialogue and can serve as a basis for generating focused and productive research directions.

Stability and change in teacher expertise

Abstract Teacher expertise research has focused on differences between experts and novices generally assuming that characteristics of both groups are stable across classroom situations. This assumption was examined in a study of the implementation of cooperative learning in nine heterogeneous classes by teachers who were inexperienced in the use of cooperative learning and who varied on instructional expertise and subject-matter proficiency. Results suggest that the behavior of many experts resembles that of novices when the former confront unfamiliar pedagogical situations. Finally, restoration of expertise is not always accomplished with ease. Finally, subject matter proficiency contributes to, but is not the sole determinant of, expert teacher performance in novel situations.

Conceptions of Spirituality among Israeli Arab and Jewish Late Adolescents

Considerable research has demonstrated that spirituality is generally a positive force in human functioning. Reasoning that ones perceptions of spirituality are based on particular cultural, religious, and social contexts and that adult and adolescent conceptions may differ meaningfully, the authors examine understandings of spirituality among Arab and Jewish Israeli late adolescents. Participants are 36 high school students or college freshmen, Arab and Jewish, male and female, and religious and secular. The authors use semistructured interviews to collect data and the consensual qualitative research method to analyze them. Results indicate broad agreement regarding transcendence as the essential component of spirituality and show that religious and humanistic modes of spirituality exist. Religious and cultural groups develop divergent conceptions of spirituality with overlapping and contrasting features. Gender yielded few differences. Finally, limited correspondence appears between components of spirituality in this study and those found among adults in earlier research.

Reducing Teachers’ Work-Family Conflict: From Theory to Practice

Work-family conflict is a vocational psychology variable whose antecedents and outcomes have been extensively investigated. In contrast, less effort has been invested in creating practical programs to prevent and reduce it. This article provides the rationale and describes the framework for a comprehensive organizational program designed to ease employees’ work-family conflict. Using an interdisciplinary approach, the program combines primary and secondary interventions aimed at school managers and teachers. The program is grounded in work-family conflict models, social cognitive career theory, and the literature on health promotion in organizations and includes process variables comprising critical career intervention components.

Perceptions of school life among physically disabled mainstreamed pupils

Summary Perceptions of school life were examined among physically disabled pupils, aged nine to 12, learning in regular classrooms in Israel. Three groups (N = 25 per group) of pupils–extremely short, diabetic and orthopaedically impaired children — corresponding to Goffmans (1963) categorization of stigmatized persons responded to the Israeli Quality of School Life scale. Significant differences between the groups were found on four of the seven subscales. Short children as compared to orthopaedically impaired pupils were more satisfied with social aspects of schooling, but reacted less positively to their teachers. Diabetic pupils were also less satisfied with teachers than were orthopaedically impaired children and they demonstrated relative dissatisfaction with affective components of schooling. Implications for designing more appropriate school environments for main‐streamed physically disabled pupils are discussed.

Enhancing intergroup relations among children : a field test of the Miller-Brewer model

Abstract Miller and Brewers theoretical model was tested in a field experiment intended to reduce intercultural conflict between religious and secular Jewish Israeli children. 74 religious and 69 secular children participated in a joint enrichment program for gifted youth. Contact between the two groups was arranged so as to manipulate decategorization, by teaching academic content with an Interpersonal or Task orientation. In addition, the small activity groups in the enrichment programs were established according to Cross-cutting (Gender × Religiousness) or Convergent boundaries. Social acceptance of outgroup children was measured at the first session and after 6 weeks. At the tenth session generalization was measured. Results comparing the sixth session to the first, showed an increase in social acceptance towards religious outgroup members among ingender persons only, and for task oriented classes only. Generalization results indicated that the religious ingroup bias, exhibited at the first session, was eliminated. These findings raise questions regarding the applicability of the Miller-Brewer model when the conflict is real and intense, and field study rather than laboratory analogue conditions prevail.