The Impact of Cognitive, Physical, and Psychological Stressors on Subsequent Cognitive Performance

Objective To quantify the impact of performing challenging cognitive, physical and psychological tasks on subsequent cognitive performance, and whether differences in performance are predicted by psychological variables. Background Successful performance in many occupations depends on resilient cognition: the degree to which cognitive functions can withstand, or are resilient to, the effects of stress. Several studies have examined the effect of individual stressors on cognition; however, the capacity to compare different types of stress across studies is limited. Method Fifty-eight participants completed cognitive, physical, psychological and control interventions, immediately preceded, and followed, by a battery of cognitive tasks. Self-efficacy and cognitive appraisal were reported at baseline. Perceived stress was recorded post-intervention. Subjective workload was recorded for each cognitive battery and intervention. Results Cognitive performance was impaired by the cognitive, physical and psychological interventions, with the greatest effect following the cognitive intervention. The subjective workload reported for the post-intervention cognitive battery was higher following the cognitive and physical interventions. Neither self-efficacy, cognitive appraisal, perceived stress nor subjective workload of the intervention strongly predicted post-intervention performance. Conclusion Given the differences among interventions and cognitive domains, it appears that challenges to resilient cognition are broad and varied, and the mechanism(s) by which impairment occurs is complex. Application Considering the increase in subjective workload for the post-intervention cognitive battery, a combination of subjective and objective measures of cognitive performance monitoring should be considered.

Study of Nigerian employees shows effect of change leadership on attitudinal support for changes

Purpose The purpose of the research was to examine how change leadership activities could help bring about employee support for planned organizational change. Design/methodology/approach The authors tested their theories on employees at Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Education (FME), which was undergoing major reforms. The “Ministerial Strategic Plan” was to be implemented over four years from 2018 to 2022. Data came from employees at FME headquarters. Of the 212 respondents to a questionnaire, 58% were females, 85% were principal staff, while 15% were support staff. Findings Analysis showed that of the three hypothesized direct effects from change leadership, only the path from change leadership behaviors to cognitive appraisal (H1a) was statistically significant. The paths from change leadership to emotional response (H1b) and change leadership to intentions to support change (H1c) were not statistically significant. Meanwhile, hypothesis 2, which stated "employee cognition and emotion toward a change serially mediates the relationship between change leadership and employee behavioral intentions toward a planned change" was fully supported. Originality/value Previous studies had suggested an effect from change leadership behaviors, but there was a lack of the types of empirical evidence gathered in Nigeria. The results could also help managers to plan for changes by revealing the critical role of employees’ cognitive appraisal of the proposals. Change agents should focus on employee attitudes to changes as precursors to desired positive behavior.

Difference in stress-related indicators between employees experiencing partial and complete lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan

Objectives: The present study aimed to compare the stress experience of employees facing to differentiated types of lockdown situations: total vs. partial. It also aimed to identify the cognitive appraisal, coping, stress, and fear of contracting COVID-19 associated with lock down situations among employees. Method: A cross-sectional research design was employed. The sample comprises two groups (n = 490 in each group), complete lockdown (people working from home) and partial lockdown (people going to workplace), and was drawn from Pakistan using purposive sampling technique. Stress Appraisal Measure, Brief COPE Inventory, Perceived Stress Scale, and Fear of Contracting COVID-19 Questionnaire were used to measure cognitive appraisal, coping, stress, and fear, respectively.Results: Independent sample t-test showed that the threat and uncontrollable appraisal was high in people going to workplace as compared to people working from home. Results of binary logistic regression showed that people going to workplace were more likely to cope with COVID-19 situation through seeking instrumental support, behavior disengagement, acceptance, and religion as compared to people working from home. Moreover, people working from home were 0.84 times more likely to cope through emotional support than people going to workplace. Fear was found to be 1.1 times more likely associated with people going to workplace than people working from home.Conclusion: This study would help administrative authorities and government institutions in designing mental health services for working population. It would help the emergency departments in devising first aid management plan to deal with the psychological needs of the workers under pandemic/lockdown situations.

Cognitive and Emotional Appraisal of Motivational Interviewing Statements: An Event-Related Potential Study

The counseling process involves attention, emotional perception, cognitive appraisal, and decision-making. This study aimed to investigate cognitive appraisal and the associated emotional processes when reading short therapists' statements of motivational interviewing (MI). Thirty participants with work injuries were classified into the pre-contemplation (PC, n = 15) or readiness stage of the change group (RD, n = 15). The participants viewed MI congruent (MI-C), MI incongruent (MI-INC), or control phrases during which their electroencephalograms were captured. The results indicated significant Group × Condition effects in the frontally oriented late positive complex (P600/LPC). The P600/LPC's amplitudes were more positive-going in the PC than in the RD group for the MI congruent statements. Within the PC group, the amplitudes of the N400 were significantly correlated (r = 0.607–0.649) with the participants' level of negative affect. Our findings suggest that the brief contents of MI statements alone can elicit late cognitive and emotional appraisal processes beyond semantic processing.

Suffering Job Insecurity: Will the Employees Take the Proactive Behavior or Not?

Job insecurity is considered an important antecedent of an employee’s creativity. Though, the relationship between job insecurity and proactive behavior has been neglected in previous human resources management studies. The aim of this study is to explore the influence of job insecurity on employees’ proactive behavior and its mechanism. Based on the social cognitive theory and cognitive appraisal theory, two types of cognitive appraisal of employee’s job insecurity (hindrance vs. challenge) as mediator variables of job insecurity and proactive behavior association. In addition, the moderator roles of self-efficacy are examined. This study is carried out with 257 employees from Chinese firms to examine the hypothesized moderated mediation model by using the hierarchical regression analysis and the bootstrap. The results showed a different effect of job insecurity depending on its conceptualization. The results show that job insecurity has a negative effect on employees’ proactive behavior. At the same time, cognitive appraisal of employees’ job insecurity mediated the association between job insecurity and employee’s proactive behavior. Self-efficacy not only moderates the relationship between job insecurity and cognitive appraisal but also moderate the cognitive appraisal’s mediation effect between job insecurity and proactive behavior. The study’s theoretical and practical contributions and future research are discussed.