Commentary on Harrison: "Social Mechanisms of Stylistic Change"

This is a review of Harrison's (2021) paper "Social Mechanisms of Stylistic Change: A Case Study from Early 20th-Century France." In this study, Harrison found that the Apaches, a group of composers known for pushing stylistic boundaries in 20th-century France, employed slightly more instances of notated meter change in their music than a control group of their peers, but that the use of notated meter change also depended on other factors such as composers' generational membership. This commentary primarily explores Harrison's methodologies: while the stringent definitions Harrison defines for each variable in her studies allow for specificity in the statistical analyses, they leave out a large portion of perceptually relevant data that would lend greater musicological generalizability to the results presented.

Semiparametric APC analysis of destination choice patterns: Using generalized additive models to quantify the impact of age, period, and cohort on travel distances

This study investigates how age, period, and birth cohorts are related to altering travel distances. We analyze a repeated cross-sectional survey of German pleasure travels for the period 1971–2018 using a holistic age–period–cohort (APC) analysis framework. Changes in travel distances are attributed to the life cycle (age effect), macro-level developments (period effect), and generational membership (cohort effect). We introduce ridgeline matrices and partial APC plots as innovative visualization techniques facilitating the intuitive interpretation of complex temporal structures. Generalized additive models are used to circumvent the identification problem by fitting a bivariate tensor product spline between age and period. The results indicate that participation in short-haul trips is mainly associated with age, while participation in long-distance travel predominantly changed over the period. Generational membership shows less association with destination choice concerning travel distance. The presented APC approach is promising to address further questions of interest in tourism research.

Inequality in Pay Ranks Among Factors Impacting Job Satisfaction Among Female Physicians

Job satisfaction has fallen among doctors, and beyond lack of pay parity that averages 25%, female physician job satisfiers differ from male colleagues. Health systems can build upon female physicians' confidence in their abilities to communicate with patients, show empathy, build trust, and elicit patient compliance with treatment plans. Systems must attend to work conditions for young and female cohorts, thereby retaining half of the workforce offering critical care to 7.8 billion people. Ordinal logistic regression was used to analyze data gathered in the U.S. by the Center for Studying Health System Change. Data were used to build a predictive statistical model in concert with independent variables linked to generational and job satisfaction literature. This study revealed statistically significant correlations between factors not only by gender, but also by generational membership. Statistically significant factors affecting job satisfaction among female physicians include provision of quality care to all patients, adequate time spent with patients and income.

Implications of Generational and Age Metastereotypes for Older Adults at Work: The Role of Agency, Stereotype Threat, and Job Search Self-efficacy

This study explored how age compared with generational metastereotypes (i.e., what people think other people believe about their age group/generation) affect older adults’ sense of agency and stereotype threat and, consequently, their job search self-efficacy. We conducted an experiment including N = 183 participants between 50 and 79 years of age, asking respondents to think about either age or generational metastereotypes. We then explored the extent to which these metastereotypes influenced participants’ job search self-efficacy through perceptions of agency and age-based stereotype threat. First, results demonstrate that the impact of age compared with generational metastereotypes on perceived agency and age-based stereotype threat was moderated by respondent age, such that effects were only significant for older adults (60–79 years) but not middle-aged adults (50–59 years). Second, among older adults, perceptions of agency and stereotype threat mediated the effect of metastereotypes on job search self-efficacy. Our results suggest that encouraging older adults to identify with their generational membership in contrast to their age may positively influence perceptions of their ability to find a job and ultimately their actual job search behaviors.

Generational Membership as Determinant of Attitudes Towards Work. Stereotypes and Reality

Attitudes toward work are shaped by a number of variables and one of them is the generational membership. Due to the fact that in the modern labor market there are at least three generations (Baby Boomers, X and Y), more and more empirical researches on attitudes to work are focused on the diagnosis of the differences between representatives of the generations. However, a lot of conducted researches do not fulfill the condition of representativeness. Nevertheless, the results of these research are published and discussed, which may cause the stereotyping attitude relative to the work. That is why the purpose of this article is to show the arguments that may serve the stereotypical perception of prevention representatives of different generations and their attitudes towards work.

An Alternative Approach to Understanding Generational Differences

According to Costanza and Finkelstein (2015), the definition and measurement of generational membership could be two major problems inherent in the literature on generational differences. So far, researchers have defined generation in terms of groups of people belonging to the same cohorts, age groups, and experience of certain common events (Joshi, Dencker, & Franz, 2011). In this vein, generational difference is operationalized mostly as a categorical variable, and most researchers assign participants into generational categories based on date of birth. For instance, people born in 1958–1959 and 1973–1974 are typically divided into Boomers and Gen X, respectively (Twenge, Campbell, Hoffman, & Lance, 2010).

Fire All the Boomers: How Generational Labeling Legitimizes Age Discrimination

Costanza and Finkelstein (2015) make a number of important observations in their exploration of how generation-based differences are understood by academics and practitioners. The absence of a unifying theory, the lack of a clear pattern of findings, and the conceptual ambiguity about generational membership have all limited the utility of generational membership to researchers, while the practice of describing large groups of individuals in generational terms has become enormously popular outside of academia. Certainly, there are several topics that are popular among the public and widely used by businesses despite being viewed negatively by academics; however, there is some danger in the widespread perception that group differences between individuals of different ages can be explained by generational membership. Although it might be tempting to consider these generational stereotypes as simply innocuous misperceptions supervisors may hold, they may, in fact, be quite harmful. The purpose of this article is to further expand on the potential for these stereotypes to be harmful for older and younger employees.

Cross-Generational Valuing Among Peer Academic Librarians

This study investigated the skills, knowledge, abilities or dispositions that are most valued and respected by academic librarians, and determined how these qualities might, or might not, be associated with generational membership. Other variables included institutional classification, career length, years since first professional degree, and broad library job function. The article explains survey design, proportional random sampling method, statistical analyses and tests, and resulting findings that may have implications for recruitment, mentoring, succession planning, and for assisting in the transmission of knowledge among academic librarians, especially from career mature librarians to their younger colleagues.

A potential generation gap: perspectives on female leadership

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine the potential relationship between generational membership and perspectives on female leadership. Design/methodology/approach – Participants from Generation X (birth years from 1961 to 1980) and Generation Y (birth years from 1981 to 2000) rated 10 descriptor words, which came from Kouzes and Posner’s ten most admired leadership characteristics. Participants were put into three gender conditions: rating a male leader, female leader or gender-neutral leader. Findings – Differences did not emerge for the gender conditions, probably due to the methodology implemented. However, findings indicated that Generation X members admired competency and honesty more than Generation Y members, while Generation Y members admired ambitiousness and determination more than Generation X members. Social implications – By examining the perceptions of different generations, we can begin to track potential changes in this country’s perspective on female leadership. Originality/value – This study addresses how generation may be specifically linked to attitudes toward leadership; however, few empirical research projects have been done on the subject. Because this area of research has not been explored thoroughly, the present study has the potential to yield new and illuminating results. The present study may be one of the first steps in determining if our views on female leadership are changing.