Abstract: In life event research relating to vulnerability and resilience factors, single moderator variables have typically been the focus of study. Little is known about the ways in which moderator variables may interact with one another to increase vulnerability or resilience. We propose a distinction between conjunctive moderation, in which multiple moderators must co-occur in a specific combination or pattern to maximize a relation between a predictor and an outcome variable, and disjunctive moderation, in which any one of a number of moderators maximizes the predictor-criterion relation. Our results indicate that social support and psychological coping skills are statistically independent psychosocial resources and that they operate in a conjunctive manner to influence the relation between life stress and subsequent athletic injury in adolescents. Only athletes low in both coping skills and social support exhibited a significant stress-injury relation, and in that vulnerable subgroup, negative major life events accounted for up to 30% of the injury variance. Methodological considerations in the assessment of conjunctive moderator effects are discussed.

Abstract: Schuler's process model of employee participation in decision-making and job satisfaction (Schuler, 1980; Lee and Schuler, 1982) was tested using a path analytic approach. Reanalysis of Schuler's data and replication on a new sample indicated that (a) participation in decision-making has both direct and indirect effects on job satisfaction; and (b) performance–outcome expectancy, role conflict, and role ambiguity all appear to mediate the relationship between participation and satisfaction. In an extension of the model, organizational level and job involvement were hypothesized to moderate the participation–satisfaction relationship (i.e. function interactively). Although neither variable functions as a moderator, job involvement operates in a fashion similar to participation in the model. In general, consistent results across four independent samples strongly support Schuler's basic process model.

Abstract: Examined the research studies cumulated in recent quantitative reviews of the relationship between goal difficulty and performance to determine how goal difficulty has been operationalized. 4 categories (assigned goal level, self-set goal level, performance improvement, and difficulty perceptions) of operationalization were discovered, and the operationalization of goal difficulty was tested as a moderator of the relationship between goal difficulty and performance

Abstract: An experiment was conducted to examine the effect of self-interest in a personal communication situation. Self-interest was investigated as a moderator of the effects of argument strength and exper...

Abstract: The personality typology of high versus low self-monitoring is presented as a possible moderator of leadership training. The behavior of high self-monitoring individuals is guided by situational fa...

Abstract: Reactions to an important college exam were used to test enhancement, consistency, and stability contingent theory. Before the exam, students completed a measure of level and stability of self-esteem. After the exam, cognitive, affective, and behavioral responses to the feedback were taken. Enhancement theory predicts that persons low in self-esteem have a strong need to think and feel better about themselves. Thus, they should indicate more acceptance of success and more rejection of failure than persons high in self-esteem. Consistency theory asserts that people avoid inconsistency because it is psychologically uncomfortable. This model predicts that high self-esteem persons should accept success more than lows, who in turn should be more accepting of failure than highs. Finally, the stability contingent theory highlights the importance of stability of self-esteem as a moderator of self-motives. This model predicts that enhancement effects should occur for persons with unstable self-esteem, whereas consistency effects should occur for those with stable self-esteem. Our data provide no support for the stability contingent theory. Support for the other two models depended upon the type of feedback that was assessed: Cognitive reactions to feedback supported consistency theory, whereas affective reactions supported enhancement theory.

Abstract: A brief description of the controversy surrounding moderation goals for individuals with alcohol problems is provided. Although the controversy is as yet unresolved, particularly for severely dependent individuals, evidence for the utility and appropriateness of offering goal choices (including moderation goals) to less dependent problem drinkers is discussed. In addition, secondary prevention of alcohol problems with high-risk drinkers often utilizes moderation goals; these individuals are unlikely to fit the traditional alcholic pattern, but are at risk for a variety of intoxication-related problems. Relapse prevention, an example of a tertiary prevention program to facilitate abstinence in the treatment of addiction, may also be applied to secondary prevention (moderation) goals. Following a description of the relapse prevention approach and its use with moderation goals, two studies applying this approach to secondary prevention are discussed, and summaries of the results are presented.

Abstract: Admission committees report that demographic variables, although accurate, reliable, and easily obtained from applicants to medical schools, are only moderately important in their decision making. This may be because the committees are concerned about the validity and legality of using such data as admissions criteria. This essay discusses the research on the validity of demographic variables and the recommendations for their legal use in selecting students for medical school. The relationships of age, gender, size of hometown, parental education, parental occupation, parental income, and marital status to medical school outcomes of preclinical performances, clinical performance, attrition, specialty choice, and practice location are summarized. [Race or ethnic group is discussed in a separate essay in this issue.] Although the authors focus on the predictive value of demographic variables, these variables play a more important role as the moderator variables for other predictors of medical school outcomes. The full value of using demographic variables derives from data obtained in local validity studies. To comply with the equal-protection and due-process requirements, admission officers must assure that the use of demographic information in the admission process is explicit in bulletins given to applicants and is uniformly applied in the evaluation of all applicants.

Abstract: Two classrooms of fourth grade suburban children (n=37) were trained using a 20-lesson revised Social Problem Solving (SPS) curriculum and compared to two no-training comparison classrooms (n=45). Results indicated a significant increase in the number of alternative solutions to interpersonal difficulties generated by E versus C children on a group social problem solving measure. Adjustive gains for E versus C children were reported by teachers and children on indices of school adjustment. These findings supported the efficacy of the shortened curriculum in increasing problem solving skills and facilitating positive adjustive change. The link between gain in SPS skills and adjustive change was examined in two ways. Delta scores compared changes in SPS skills and changes in teacher/child adjustive ratings yield no significant relationships. Hierarchical regression analyses, incorporating a moderator variable (empathy), indicated a significant relationship among pre level of empathy, gain in SPS skills and teacher rated adjustive change. These findings supported the hypothesis that key moderating variables may play a role in the training and employment of SPS skills and that strategies designed to examine these variables need to be employed.

Abstract: Harter's (1980) Intrinsic-Extrinsic Orientation scale was examined for evidence of empirical and construct validity. We hypothesized that subscales defining the motivational component of intrinsic motivation would be correlated with novelty, a collative motivational variable. Partial support for the hypothesis was obtained for boys; correlations between novelty and Harter's Curiosity subscale were .57, .64, and .58 for boys in the third, fifth, and combined grades, respectively, and correlations approached significance for Harter's Challenge subscale. Not predicted were the correlations of .40, .68, and .46 obtained for girls in the third, fifth, and combined grades, respectively, between the Independent Judgment subscale (a cognitive-informational scale) and novelty. Results indicated that gender operated as a moderator variable, with boys expressing collative motivation directly in an action-oriented form, and girls demonstrating it somewhat indirectly in a thought-oriented form.

Abstract: While important positive effects on the psychological and physical well-being of the elderly often result from increased perceived and actual personal control, the literature also reflects many inconsistent findings. The lack of consensus on aging and the psychology of control has been variously attributed to differences in methodology, measurement devices, theoretical assumptions and the impact of moderator variables. To help bring order to this area the present study evaluated the Latitude of Choice model to determine whether Latitude of Choice scores differ across living arrangements, gender or age. Analysis of covariance tests, controlling for measures of education, perceived health and economic satisfaction, yielded significant main effects but no significant interactions. Partial correlations between Latitude of Choice and measures of psychological well-being, for the total sample and each of the main effect samples, were all significant. These findings provide substantive support for the t...

Abstract: Data collected from 44 married female schoolteachers and 26 married female workers in a military organization indicated that perceptions of equity were stronger predictors of feelings of job satisfaction among those who were the family breadwinners than among those whose husbands worked (i.e., the nonbreadwinners).

Abstract: This thesis is concerned with the role of individual differences in personality and social support in mitigating work-related stress. The model of work stress described by House (1981) served as a general theoretical framework for two questionnaire studies of white-collar workers carried out in the course of this research. The present work also draws upon the demand-discretion model developed by Karasek (1979). The first study was carried out with a sample (N=117) of employees and self-employed business men and women. The main aims were to investigate: (i) individual differences in perceived social support; (ii) the stress-buffering role of support resources in moderating work-related stress. The results showed significant differences in personality and work characteristics between the occupational groups. There was evidence of interactive relationships between nAch, extroversion and locus of control in predicting perceived social support. Work and non-work support showed different moderating effects on job stressors in relation to job satisfaction and GHQ. A negative buffering effect of social support on job demand was also found in the prediction of GHQ. The findings suggest the importance of investigating further the role of individual differences in the way people develop and access socially supportive networks. The main objectives of the second study were: (i) to extend, in longitudinal data, previous findings concerning the buffering role of social support and individual differences in mediating the stress-illness relationship; (ii) to test the Johnson demand-control-support model of work stress. Work-related demands, social support, personality traits, and psychological health were assessed among a group of new graduates (N=121) in their first year of employment. The results showed significant changes in the overall levels of perceived demand, work-related support and psychological well-being between Time 1 and Time 2, and replicated the stress-buffering effects of social support found in the first study. More importantly, the findings suggest that the efficacious moderating effects of supportive relationships is dependent on the timing and matching of "stressors" with specific support resources; work-related social support showed weaker stress-buffering effects at initial assessment but was significantly stronger in moderating job stressors at Time 2. Analyses of individual difference variables showed that neuroticism, locus of control, and individual preferences for particular types of work characteristics acted as moderator variables. Consistent with Karasek and Johnson's models, significant demand-discretion and demand-discretion-support interactions was also found. However, in some instances, the three-way demand-control-support interactions were not of the form predicted. Overall, the present studies provide further information concerning the stress-buffering role of social support and individual differences at work. Further research should also focus on the sequencing of the stress-support process in order to provide a clearer understanding of how supportive relationships moderate work-related demands.

Abstract: ["The research question explored in this experimental simulation was the nature of the relationship between poise and communication skills, leadership, interpersonal resonance, gender, and attributions of self-confidence. This set of potentially significant cues and clues were derived from an earlier unpublished exploratory research effort conducted by the author. Simulated interviews were designed to manipulate the poise and communication skills independent variable using a male and a female actor, each of whom enacted a high and low poise interviewee role on videotape. High and low leadership was manipulated by means of two different sets of documentary data in the form of a resume and letter of recommendation. Interpersonal resonance, another intervening variable, was a confounding factor and not intentionally manipulated. Gender as a moderating variable was manipulated by utilizing interviewees of different sex, as well as male and female questionnaire respondents. The respondents were 233 middle-level managers who were enrolled in a part-time MBA program. The results showed that while the intended poise/communication and leadership variable manipulations were successful, highly significant main effects resulted only for the poise/communication skills variable on attributions of self-confidence. Documentary evidence of leadership traits and experience, gender, and attractiveness effects had no significant impact on perceptions of self-confidence. These results would suggest that in a first-impression context like a job interview, attributions of self-confidence are largely contingent upon concrete, behaviorally-oriented data rather than more abstract, vicariously-known data. These attributions are independent of the gender of both the perceiver and the perceived. Implications of these findings included the suggestion that the term self-confidence might be most usefully reserved as a behavioral label, with another term, like self-esteem, being reserved for intrapsychic, cognitive states. It was also suggested that organizational members seeking to foster an impression of self-confidence in a first-impression context pay more explicit attention to poise and communication behaviors, in addition to the attention that traditionally gets paid to the preparation of documentary and other vicarious evidence of leadership experience. Implications for students going on job interviews, career counselors, teachers, and human resource professionals and trainers were explored."]

Abstract: Steiner & Truxillo (1989) recently presented a study on the disaggregation hypothesis of the relationship between job and life satisfactions. The disaggregation hypothesis proposes that the relationship between job satisfaction and life satisfaction will be moderated by the importance of work to an individual's life. Previous research on the hypothesis (see Steiner & Truxillo, 1989) suffered from weaknesses in three areas which Steiner & Truxillo sought to correct: (1) a weak measure of life satisfaction, (2) an inadequate measure of the work value, and (3) a potentially weak statistical technique. The Steiner & Truxillo study remains an improvement on the first two areas; however, more recent evidence suggests that the statistical technique did not in fact require improving. In recent years, investigators of moderating effects have relied on ordinary least squares (OLS) regression approaches to test for the significance of such effects (see Cohen & Cohen, 1983; Zedeck, 1971). Disappointment both with the infrequency of detecting such effects and with the small size of effects detected (Cohen, 1969; Morris et al., 1986) prompted Morris et al. (1986) to propose an alternative strategy for conducting the analysis. The new procedure, referred to as principal components regression (PCR) is used to overcome multicollinearity problems encountered in regression analyses. Morris et al. proposed using the PCR procedure when multicollinearity was problematic in moderated regression analyses. In an effort to stay current with the latest developments in moderator regression analysis, it was the PCR approach that Steiner & Truxillo used as the statistical improvement in their study. Articles appearing subsequent to the Morris et al. piece and the preparation of the Steiner & Truxillo study have, however, convincingly argued that PCR provides an inaccurate analysis of moderator effects (Cronbach, 1987; Dunlap & Kemery, 1987). Therefore, Steiner & Truxillo's (1989) improved test was based on an incorrect analysis. The correct analysis, based on OLS moderated multiple regression analysis, was included in the article; however, those results indicated that the importance of work does not moderate the relationship between job and life satisfactions. This conclusion is contrary to the results based on the PCR procedure. Due to the strength of the correlation between job and life satisfaction in the Steiner & Truxillo data, the more straightforward spillover hypothesis, wherein job satisfaction and life satisfaction are positively related, appears to be better supported. This finding is consistent with a recent meta-analysis on this topic (Tait, Padgett & Baldwin, 1989). Other moderators, particularly coping, as proposed by Steiner & Truxillo (1989), might prove more successful in future research than the work value was. The OLS procedure (see Cohen & Cohen, 1983, for a complete discussion) remains the technique of choice to analyse for moderator effects. But, as Cronbach (1987) pointed out, power to detect moderator effects appears limited. He encouraged further investigation into research methods that would be more sensitive to detecting moderator effects. Without more powerful approaches, significant moderators are likely to go undetected, thus discouraging researchers from studying them.

Abstract: In a study of predictors of tuition expenditures on postsecondary education, the role of individual differences in religious affiliation was examined with a national sample of 3,615 individuals. Based on past findings, it was hypothesized that religious affiliation may serve as a moderator of the relationship of tuition expenditures with (a) parental income and (b) prior educational involvement (i.e., type of high school attended). Analysis indicated that religious affiliation may interact with prior educational involvement and so partially account for tuition expenditures.

Abstract: Although an essential part of the continuing medical education program, the moderator is seldom mentioned in the literature when program preparation and evaluation are discussed. One result of such neglect could be the perception of the moderator as one who merely introduces the speaker and monitors the time and questions. The purpose of this article is to provide some useful guidelines that should enable the Moderator to become more cognizant of the role and responsibilities. Such guidelines are especially essential for the moderator at a National Assembly where the program planner may not always be readily available.

Abstract: In this paper, we show a maximum likelihood estimation procedure in the Box–Cox model when a lagged dependent variable is included among explanatory variables and the first observation of the dependent variable is random. It is shown in a numerical example that a test of a coefficientof the lagged dependent variable is sensitive to whether the first observation of the dependentvariable is random or not.

Abstract: This research focused on the role of dyadic duration, the amount of time a subordinate has worked for the same supervisor, in leadership dynamics. Specifically, a field study of engineering personnel examined dyadic duration as a moderator of the relationships between supervisory leadership behavior and subordinates' attitudes and behavior. Moderated regression analysis revealed that the length of time a subordinate had served under the same supervisor influenced the relationship between supportive and directive leader behaviors and follower performance. Implications of these findings were discussed, focusing on the exchange process between individual leaders and followers.

Abstract: Personality moderating variables act to qualify the relationship between a personality trait measure and a relevant behavioral criterion. Two data analytic techniques that can be used to test for significant moderating effects are the “median split” (MS) approach and the “moderated multiple regression” (MMR) approach. The goals of the present research were (a) to apply the MS approach to computer-simulated data in which the moderator and trait extremity are confounded, to determine the extent of artifact, and (b) to compare the performance (Type I and Type II error rates) of the two approaches when applied to confounded and nonconfounded data. It was found that when the MS approach was applied to confounded data in which no real moderating effect existed, this approach produced an alarming rate of apparent, but spurious, moderating effects. When the MMR approach was applied to the same data, the rate of spurious effects was reduced to that expected by chance. When both approaches were applied to simulated data which contained genuine moderating effects, the MMR approach consistently resulted in more correct detections of these effects than the MS approach. We conclude that researchers should always employ the MMR rather than the MS approach when testing for personality moderator variable effects.

Abstract: Abstract The production of UCN should more appropriately be termed the extraction of UCN since in the main they are only extracted from the total thermal flow of neutrons coming from the surface of the moderator of the reactor. However, even if there are UCN present in this flow, they cannot enter the neutron guide since the channel for the UCN is separated from the moderator by a wall that cannot be penetrated by UCN. This is done for technological reasons, in particular for creating a vacuum in the channel. For regeneration of UCN an additional moderator is placed inside the neutron guide; henceforth this moderator will be termed a converter. In this chapter, we shall deal with the slowing down of neutrons in the converter and also discuss the properties of the converter from the standpoint of UCN production. In some cases the regeneration of UCN is performed by directly slowing down the neutrons from higher energies mechanically or with the aid of external fields. These methods will be dealt with at the end of this chapter.

Abstract: Whenever nonexperimental methods are used to test a hypothesis and 1 or more predictor (independent) variables that may affect the criterion (dependent) variable are omitted from the analyses, it is possible that the estimates of the effects of the predictors are biased or that the omitted variable could account entirely for the effects attributed to one or more of the predictors. In this article, a technique is developed for determining when a variable omitted from a linear model can account for the effects attributed to a predictor included in that model. Social scientists are rarely able to obtain information on all of the factors that may affect their criterion (outcome, dependent) variables. Whenever researchers use nonexperimental methods and fail to account for all of the variables that affect a criterion, their inferences about the effects of the predictors (independent variables) on that criterion may be biased. 1 Whenever a relevant variable is neither held constant nor entered into an analysis, that variable could account entirely for the effects attributed to one or more of the predictor variables included in the analysis. In this article, a technique is developed for determining when a variable omitted from a linear model can account for the effects attributed to a predictor included in that model. This technique is designed to provide a general indication of the potential effects of an omitted variable. There is no associated statistical distribution theory. For an omitted variable to account for the effect of a specific predictor, the omitted variable must (a) have a substantial effect on the criterion variable, (b) be substantially correlated with the predictor in question, and (c) not be substantially correlated with the other predictors in the model. For example, a clinical psychologist might theorize that a disorder is the result of a genetic aberration, whereas another researcher theorizes that this disorder is the result of sociocultural factors and a high level of life stress. The first investigator might then conduct a study in which the family histories of patients are examined and conclude that controlling for age, sex, and socioeconomic status, family history (reflecting the genetic component) of the disorder is a significant predictor of the disorder. The second researcher could criticize this research for not including measures of other potentially important variables, such as life stress, and hypothesize that had a measure of