Careers CAR

Dear Colleagues

(and sorry for cross posting),

as you may already know, the Journal of Organizational Behavior is planning a Special Issue on "Coping with Economic Stressors: Job-insecurity, Job-loss, Unemployment, and Underemployment" – please see the attached call for papers below.

In case that you are thinking of submitting your work to this Special Issue, please be advised that the deadline for initial submission has been moved to August 31^st, 2010, with publication still targeted to be in the first half of 2012.

We hope that this change in schedule causes more relief than disappointment and we are greatly looking forward to receiving your manuscripts.

With the best wishes,

Ute-Christine Klehe

(also on behalf of co-guest editors Annelies van Vianen and Jelena Zikic)

Journal of Organizational Behavior

special issue call for papers:
Coping with Economic Stressors:
Job-insecurity, Job-loss, Unemployment, and Underemployment

The editors of the Journal of Organizational Behavior intend to publish a special issue of the journal on the subject of 'Coping with Economic Stressors: Job-insecurity, Job-loss, Unemployment, and Underemployment.'

Guest Editors: Ute-Christine Klehe & Annelies van Vianen, University of Amsterdam, and Jelena Zikic, York University

Background and Rationale for the Special Issue

Throughout their working lives, many workers face some form of economic stress: their jobs may be threatened (job-insecurity) or lost (job-loss and unemployment), or workers may settle for employment that is below their abilities and aspirations (underemployment).

Being conceptual kin, one economic stressor oftentimes precedes the other or workers find themselves in the dire situation of having to choose between them. Different economic stressors also cause similar – usually negative – consequences on the psychological and physical well-being of workers. As well, these stressors affect workers' attitudes and actions, which lead to adverse consequences for their families, their current and future employers, and eventually for society overall.

Yet the literatures on job-insecurity and job-loss, unemployment and underemployment still await a common theoretical framing and overall integration. We need to fully understand the links between these stressful experiences and the self-regulated activities that the affected workers, their families, and diverse (employing, governmental, or voluntary) organizations undertake in order to cope.

The different literatures can be integrated with regard to their theoretical frameworks, sophistication of study-design and the level of specificity with which they address the self-regulatory nature of coping. Additionally, more attention should be paid to workers' resiliency and possible positive effects of economic stressors for people's life, family, and career, and for organizational outcomes as well.

Consequently, this special issue aims to strengthen these cross-links and to stimulate interaction between the related yet distinct research on job-insecurity and job-loss, unemployment and underemployment. Ideally, the issue will encourage researchers to share ideas with one another at both the conceptual and methodological levels and to foster a more positive outlook and a better integration of existing and emerging theoretical perspectives.

Potential Topics/Ideas for Contributors

This special issue invites theoretical and empirical papers that address the coping mechanisms and strategies used by individuals, families, employment agencies, voluntary or governmental organizations to address economic stressors such as job-insecurity, job-loss, unemployment and underemployment. The list below includes potential topics for contributions, but other topics may be suitable as well.

• the influence of family and social networks on workers' coping goals, strategies, and  success
• resiliency and the role of positive experiences related to economic stressors; addressing economic stressors from a positive psychological perspective
• the interplay of coping on an individual and a group level (e.g., among colleagues, within families)
• creative ways of coping; combining the coping-literature as applied to different economic stressors; the roles of leisure activities and volunteer work
• daily diary studies about the self-regulatory processes underlying coping strategies
• growth-curve and time-series studies addressing the changes in coping strategies and well-being over time as well as the perception and attractiveness of different jobs
• diverse long-term outcomes of different coping approaches (well-being, family, and working situations)
• effects of different re-employment interventions (e.g., on the KSAs, but also the motivation of the unemployed)
• worker's making decisions  between economic stressors (e.g., factors and processes that lead workers to prefer underemployment to unemployment or unemployment to job-insecurity)
• consequences of economic stressors on changes in work life balance, the effects of different economic stressors on different life facets, career adaptability, but also counter-theoretical consequences, consequences from a community perspective, ...

Contributors should note:

·         This call is open and competitive, and the submitted papers will be blind reviewed in the normal way.

• Submitted papers must be based on original material not under consideration by any other journal or outlet.
• For empirical papers based on data sets from which multiple papers have been generated, the editors must be provided with copies of all other papers based on the same data.
• The editors will select a number of papers to be included in the special issue, but other papers submitted in this process may be published in other issues of the journal.

The deadline for submissions is August 31, 2010. The special issue is intended for publication early to mid 2012.

Papers to be considered for this special issue should be submitted online via http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/job (selecting 'Special Issue Paper' as the Manuscript Type).  Please direct questions about the submission process, or any administrative matter, to Managing Editor, Kaylene Ascough, k.ascough@uq.edu.au

The editors of the special issue are very happy to discuss initial ideas for papers and can be contacted directly:

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"We all take different paths in life, but no matter where we go, we

take a little of each other everywhere."

-Tim McGraw

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Ute-Christine Klehe, Ph.D.

Arbeids- & Organisatiepsychologie

Universiteit van Amsterdam

Roetersstraat 15

1018 WB AMSTERDAM

The Netherlands

email: u.klehe@uva.nl

Phone: + 31 (0) 20 525 6745

Fax: + 31 (0) 20 639 0531