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The study focuses on the negative implications that an organizational crisis can have for individual employees. Specifically, it considers job-related uncertainty, negative emotions (anxiety and frustration) and job disengagement. Through the lens of the social exchange theory, it is argued that internal crisis communication needs to provide sufficient socioemotional resources to their employees in order to mitigate these negative outcomes. In particular, the study argues for internal crisis communication that fosters organizational transparency and organizational support to achieve these mitigating effects.

An online survey among employees in Austria was administered one year after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic – this specific crisis context particularly evoked job-related uncertainty and negative emotions which are considered relevant drivers of job disengagement. The hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling based on a sample of N = 410.

Results show that employees' perceptions of job-related uncertainty are strongly linked to job-related anxiety and frustration; job-related frustration, in turn, strongly influences job disengagement. Overall, employees' perceptions of organizational transparency and organizational support contribute both to prevent the risk of job disengagement; however, the processes how these effects evolve differ. Whereas organizational transparency works on the cognitive level via a reduction of employees' perceptions of uncertainty, organizational support shows its effect on the emotional level through a reduction of job frustration.

The study contributes to the scarce research on how internal crisis communication can address employees' uncertainty, negative emotions and job disengagement during a crisis. Moreover, despite the lack of organizational responsibility for creating the crisis, the study emphasizes organizational accountability to respond to the needs of its employees to mitigate negative effects.

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between job characteristics that foster learning (experience with and demand for continuous learning at work, skills variety and autonomy) as potential predictors of self-reported outcomes, such as future learning ability and employee disengagement at work for a cohort of employees with no or very limited job change experience. Further consideration was given to employees’ experiences at work (meaningfulness and recognition at work) as potential mediators in this relationship between job characteristics and employee outcomes.

A cross-sectional design was applied. Participants (N = 284) were recruited from Northern Germany and asked to complete a paper-and-pencil survey. The results were subsequently analyzed using path models to examine direct and indirect effects associated with mediation.

Path model analysis indicated that job characteristics promoting learning at work are positive predictors of self-reported future learning ability and negative predictors of disengagement. Both meaningfulness and recognition predict future learning ability as well. However, these variables only operated as significant mediators in the relationship between job characteristics and employee disengagement (but not self-reported future learning ability).

The study outlines the importance of job characteristics and employee experience to understand employees’ beliefs about their learning ability and engagement at work. The findings highlight the importance of meaningfulness and recognition for employees, as well as the role of learning-supportive job characteristics.

Firefighters are daily confronted with adverse, unpredictable and demanding situations. It is a dangerous profession that puts firefighters at risk of developing burnout. Although the literature has already identified personal and work-related factors of burnout, the examination of specific factors explaining burnout among volunteer and career firefighters is still needed. The purpose of this study is to investigate the explaining role of personal and work-related factors on volunteer and career firefighters’ burnout.

A nonrandom convenience sample of 250 firefighters (67% volunteer; M_age = 31.88) completed a sociodemographic questionnaire, the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory, the Proactive Coping Scale and a standard of living subscale item. Hierarchical multiple linear regression models were tested. Fisher’s criterion was considered, with p-values lower than 0.05 interpreted as statistically significant.

Personal and work-related factors accounted for 18% of volunteer and 31% of career firefighters’ variations in burnout. Personal factors offered a greater contribution explaining volunteer and career firefighters’ burnout. Still, variations in the role played by age, family responsibilities, proactive coping and satisfaction with standard of living on burnout were found among volunteer and career firefighters. Taking the work-related factors into account, working in rotative shifts constituted a risk factor for career firefighters’ burnout.

This study advances the understanding about the role of personal and work-related factors in volunteer and career firefighters’ burnout.

This study adds information about specific factors explaining burnout among voluntary and career firefighters. It deepens existing knowledge on variations in the role played by age, family responsibilities, work conditions, proactive coping and satisfaction with standard of living on the burnout of volunteer and career firefighters.

This paper aims to investigate the influence of moral disengagement, perceived penalty, negative experiences and turnover intention on the intention to violate the established security rules.

The method used involves two stages of analysis, using techniques of structural equation modeling and artificial intelligence with neural networks, based on information collected from 318 workers of organizational information systems.

The model provides a reasonable prediction regarding the intention to violate information security policies (ISP). The results revealed that the relationships of moral disengagement and perceived penalty significantly influence such an intention.

This research presents a multi-analytical approach that expands the robustness of the results by the complementarity of each analysis technique. In addition, it offers scientific evidence of the factors that reinforce the cognitive processes that involve workers’ decision-making in security breaches.

The practical recommendation is to improve organizational communication to mitigate information security vulnerabilities in several ways, namely, training actions that simulate daily work routines; exposing the consequences of policy violations; disseminating internal newsletters with examples of inappropriate behavior.

Results indicate that information security does not depend on the employees’ commitment to the organization; system vulnerabilities can be explored even by employees committed to the companies.

The study expands the knowledge about the individual factors that make information security in companies vulnerable, one of the few in the literature which aims to offer an in-depth perspective on which individual antecedent factors affect the violation of ISP.

Health apps offer a potential approach to support healthier food behaviours but a lack of sufficient engagement may limit effectiveness. This study aims to use a user engagement theoretical lens to examine the factors that influence app engagement over time and may prompt disengagement.

A phenomenological exploration of the lived experience was used. Women from a lower socioeconomic background (based on the occupation and employment status of the household’s primary income earner) were randomly assigned to use one of two apps for a minimum of eight weeks. Multiple data collection methods, including accompanied shops, researcher observations, interviews, participant reflective accounts and questionnaires, were used at different time-points to examine engagement. Theoretical thematic analysis was conducted to explore the engagement experience and relevant social, personal and environmental influences.

Healthy food involvement appears to drive app engagement. Changes in situational involvement may contribute to fluctuation in engagement intensity over time as the saliency of personal goals change. Negatively valenced engagement dimensions may contribute to the overall expression of engagement. A lack of congruency with personal goals or an imbalance between perceived personal investment and value was expressed as the primary reasons for disengagement.

Situational involvement may act as a trigger of different engagement phases. There is a need to better distinguish between enduring and situational involvement in engagement research.

Individual characteristics may shape engagement and propensity for disengagement, which highlights the practical importance of incorporating tailored features into app design.

Findings broaden the current conceptualisation of engagement within the digital space and prompt a reconsideration of the role of situational involvement and negatively valenced dimensions throughout the engagement process.

Social media has become an inescapable part of our lives. However, recent research suggests that excessive use of social media may lead to fatigue and users’ disengagement. This study aims to examine which brand-related factors contribute to social media fatigue (SMF) and its subsequent role on driving lurking behaviors, particularly among young consumers.

Based on survey data from 282 young users of social media, a holistic model of brand-related drivers and outcomes of SMF was tested, emphasizing the contribution of brands’ social media presence to users’ disengagement.

Research shows that branded content overload and irrelevance, as well as branded ads intrusiveness significantly impact SMF, which in turn plays a mediating role between brand-related drivers and lurking behaviors. The authors further conclude that the impact of SMF on lurking is stronger for users who follow a larger set of brands.

The study contributes to social media research by addressing its “dark side” and empirically validating the role of brands’ social media presence in developing young users’ fatigue and disengagement. The study further adds to the scant literature on SMF, which was mostly developed outside the branding field. Research also provides valuable insights to brands on how to improve their social media performance.

The author offers two challenges and four principles to teaching in the tertiary sector during this pandemic. While others may focus on the challenge of technical delivery, the author notes the challenges of systemic student disengagement. The author attempts to correct for this in four ways. She argues that the challenges she identifies and the principles that can be deployed in response are applicable across a range of teaching contexts and can be adapted for a post-COVID-19 era.

This paper draws on the author's phenomenological experience teaching in the context of COVID-19 and draws as well on the sociological literature of higher education teaching.

Four principles emerged from a year of successful teaching during COVID-19. First, the author embraces a pedagogy of care, which reflects a genuine concern for student well-being. Second, the author utilizes a variety of technological approaches to keep students engaged. Third, she retains a flexible approach to teaching. Fourth, she considers carefully the extent to which COVID-19 is included, and excluded, from topical discussions. On this point she argues that COVID-19 should neither be the center point of any material, nor should it be ignored completely.

Shocks to the tertiary education system will continue to recur, as will instances of systemic student disengagement. Effective correctives to such disengagement, drawn from both education theory and empirical experience, will continue to be of value.

This work sheds new light on the roles of gender, age and expatriation type—self-initiated expatriate (SIE) vs. assigned expatriate (AE)—by applying the transactional theory of stress and coping (and a validated measurement tool) to the expatriation experience.

Based on quantitative data from 448 expatriates, the authors examined the coping mechanisms (cognitions and actions) employed by senior and younger expatriates, females and males and SIE and AEs when they face hardships while working abroad.

Younger expatriates display less active problem-solving coping, planning, and restraint and consume more alcohol and drugs. Female expatriates express their emotions and use social support more than their male counterparts. SIEs rely on emotional social support more than AEs.

Recognizing that individual repertoires of responses to expatriate challenges are bounded by personal characteristics—such as age, gender, and expatriation type—should improve efforts to support expatriates. This research suggests that expatriate support should be tailored. It offers indications on who needs what.

This work provides a fresh perspective and new insights into classic topics (age, gender, and expatriation type). Individuals react differently abroad. They have different resources and face different demands (to a certain extent) that lead to different coping reactions. Older people manage their emotions better, and female expatriates and SIEs gather and use support; these abilities are assets abroad.

The purpose of this paper is to describe risk and protective factors for symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) experienced over a 1.5-year period among both frontline and “non-traditional” responders to the 2010 and 2011 earthquakes in Christchurch, New Zealand.

A longitudinal survey administered to Christchurch workers with referents from the city of Hamilton at 6, 12 and 18 months after the 2011 earthquake. Potential risk and protective determinants were assessed by questionnaire items at baseline and over time, the outcome being PTSD as assessed by the PTSD Checklist-Civilian version. A longitudinal latent class analysis identified groups with similar trajectories of PTSD.

A total of 226 individuals, 140 (26 per cent) from Christchurch and 86 (16 per cent) from Hamilton, participated at baseline, 180 at 12 and 123 at 18 months, non-traditional responders forming the largest single group. Two latent classes emerged, with PTSD (21 per cent) and without PTSD (79 per cent), with little change over the 18-month period. Class membership was predicted by high scores in the Social Support and Impact of Events scale items, Health-related Quality of Life scores being protective. PTSD scores indicative of distress were found in females, and predicted by burnout risk, behavioural disengagement and venting.

Non-traditional responders should be screened for PTSD. Social support should be considered with the promotion of adaptive coping mechanisms.

The strength was longitudinal follow-up over an 18-month period, with demonstration of how the potential determinants influenced the course of PTSD over time.

The alienation of megaproject environmental responsibility (MER) behavior is destructive, but its mechanism has not been clearly depicted. Based on fraud triangle theory and the fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) method, this study explored the combined effect of antecedent factors on alienation of MER behavior.

Based on the fraud triangle theory and literature review, eight influencing factors associated with the alienation of MER behavior were first identified. Subsequently, the fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis was used in this study to reveal configurations influencing alienation of MER behavior.

The study found nine configurations of MER behavioral alienation antecedent factors, integrated into three types of driving modes, i.e. “economic pressure + learning effect,” “institutional defect + moral rejection,” and “information asymmetry + economic pressure + expectation pressure.”

By analyzing the configuration effects of various induced conditions, this study puts forward a comprehensive analysis framework to solve the alienation of MER behavior in the megaprojects and a practical strategy to control alienation of MER behavior.