Personal-organizational values fit and organizational commitment in Australian domestic and international students

This study examines the relationship between affective organizational commitment and the personal and perceived organizational values of international and domestic students in an Australian university. Results provide support for the values factors found by Abbott, White & Charles, 2005), and consistency with Schwartz's (1992) pan-cultural values hierarchy. Both groups of students rated their personal values as consistent with the rankings of the major pan-cultural values and perceived organizational values were drivers of affective commitment. This study highlights the need for higher education institutions as well as global organizations to address profit for values such as benevolence, self-direction, and universalism to encourage higher levels of student and employee commitment to their organizations and increase effectiveness.

An investigation into the cross-cultural equivalence of the personal wellbeing index

The Personal Wellbeing Index (PWI) is being developed for the cross-cultural measurement of subjective wellbeing (SWB). This paper reports the findings of its utility with the Hong Kong Chinese and Australian populations. An item on affect, ‘satisfaction with own happiness’ was also investigated to determine whether it should be added to the index. Three-hundred and sixty participants (180 per country), with equal representation from groups aged 18–35, 35–64 and 65 years and above, were recruited from each country. The PWI demonstrated good psychometric performance in terms of its reliability, validity and sensitivity, which are comparable in both countries. The item ‘satisfaction with own happiness’ was found to contribute significantly to the scale’s psychometric performance in Australia but not in Hong Kong. Cultural differences in the perception of the concepts ‘satisfaction’ and ‘happiness’ were suggested as an explanation for this finding. The PWI data are also consistent with homeostasis theory, which proposes that each person’s SWB level is maintained within a limited positive range. For the Australian population, their mean SWB level fell within the established Western range of 70–80, on a scale from 0 to 100. The Hong Kong population, however, fell below this range. Cultural response bias was identified as a plausible explanation for the differences between the Hong Kong and Australian samples.

The effects of accounting students` ethical reasoning and personal factors on their ethical sensitivity

Purpose – Rest posited that to behave morally, an individual must have performed at least four basic psychological processes: moral sensitivity; moral judgment; moral motivation; and moral character. Though much ethics research in accounting has been focused on component two, ethical judgment, less research has been undertaken on the other three components. The purpose of this study is to focus on component one, ethical sensitivity, of Rest's four-component model.
Design/methodology/approach – A sample of 156 accounting undergraduates was employed to investigate the ethical sensitivity of accounting students and the effects of their ethical reasoning and personal factors on their ethical sensitivity.
Findings – Results of this study show that accounting students vary in their ability to detect the presence of ethical issues in a professional scenario. There is no significant relationship between accounting students' ethical sensitivity and their ethical reasoning (P-score). Accounting students characterized as “internals” are more likely to show an ability to recognize ethical issues than those characterized as “externals.” The results also indicate that an accounting ethics intervention may have positive effect on accounting students' ethical sensitivity development. Hence, an individual who possesses the ability to determine what is ethically right or wrong (high ethical reasoning) may fail to behave ethically due to a deficiency in identifying ethical issues (low ethical sensitivity) in a situation.
Originality/value – Whilst much research has concentrated on ethical reasoning and ethics education to enhance the ethical conduct of accountants, it is important that the profession and researchers also direct their attention and efforts to cultivating the ethical sensitivity of accountants. The findings of this study provide additional evidence to support Rest's theory of a more comprehensive cognitive model of ethical decision-making and suggest a more balanced research effort in evaluating the ethical development of individuals.

`Out on the borderlands`: Time, generation and personal agency in women`s lives

What tools can we use in attempting to understand the recurring patterns of some girls’ early school leaving and consequent exclusion from well-paid employment? From which disciplinary fields can we take them? Using Bourdieu’s concept of the ‘scholastic point of view’ - the inherent intellectual bias of a discipline, in his case sociology - as a springboard, we suggest that if one turns to different ‘fields’, approaches might be found which point towards differing perspectives. This article brings Bourdieu into dialogue with the work of feminist historians and their conceptual tools. Carolyn Steedman’s notion of the politics of envy and Sally Alexander’s appropriation from psychoanalysis of the idea of repetition offer generative ways of exploring the ‘unthought categories of thought which delimit the thinkable and predetermine the thought’ (Bourdieu and Wacquant, 1992: 40). In their focus on gender, they have much in common with feminist sociologists’ responses to Bourdieu’s work, suggesting that a gendered ‘perspective’ offers a way of avoiding the ‘singular viewpoint’ inherent in any one discipline.

Using the personal wellbeing index in Lao PDR : issues of equivalence

Lao PDR is one of the 50 countries included in the International Wellbeing Group study which uses Cummin's (2001) Personal Wellbeing Index (PWI) to draw cross-national comparisons of subjective wellbeing. Lau, Cummins & McPherson (2005) found a statistically significant difference in PWI scores between Australian & Hong Kong. They ask whether this is a real reflection of lower quality of life in Hong Kong or whether there exists a cultural response bias which predisposes the Hong Kong population to be less willing to admit to high levels of satisfaction in the seven domains of the index. If the difference reflects cultural response bias, what factors contribute to that bias & how common is this phenomenon in the countries of South-east Asia & IndoChina? The paper addresses these questions with particular attention to Lao PDR where responses to the PWI from both urban & rural populations suggest a similar reticence about expressing high levels of satisfaction. The paper explores the sources of resistance to reporting positive subjective wellbeing & what adaptations may be needed to the Index to allow for such bias.

SME owners at personal financial risk

Phillip Kemp's article ("Increase will stifle ambition", Opinion, March 3) highlighted two main issues related to the small business sector, namely financial risk and its collective role in the employment of the Australian workforce.