, a visiting scholar at the LaMarsh Centre for Child & Youth Research, will deliver a LaMarsh talk Wednesday, June 15, from 1 to 2pm, in 163 Behavioural Science Building, Keele campus. His talk, “The Role and Meaning of Work in Individual Lives During Emerging Adulthood: Trajectories and Adaptation” will be based on data collected in a four-wave longitudinal design in which 175 Israeli emerging adults with the mean age of 22 years were followed over a period of seven years. The focus of the study was on the occupation and relationship decision-making process.

Right: Shmuel Shulman

“Taking a biographical approach, we focus on the processes of occupation and relationship decision-making among young people rather than on concrete outcomes,” says Shulman, whose research covers developmental processes and psychopathology during adolescence and young adulthood. “That is the subjective meaning that certain options and outcomes have for the young person and on his or her subsequent adaptation.”

In addition to the four assessments, at the fourth wave the participants were given an in-depth interview covering work and love domains. As part of a broader interview, young people were asked to talk about their work experiences, feelings and expectations about work and its meaning. They were also asked to reflect on changes and turning points in their work and career histories.

Qualitative analysis of the interviews yielded four main constructs of personal inner work meanings and their evolvement over time, reflecting adaptive and maladaptive trajectories. “Our findings show that the multiplicity of experiences can be traced to individual personality and relational attributes,” says Shulman. “For example, self-efficacy, self-criticism, intrinsic and extrinsic motivation explain the different trajectories that young people embark on.”

He will discuss the importance of examining subjective meanings in developmental processes as well as the role of personality constructs in coping with developmental tasks during emerging adulthood.

Shulman has more than 100 publications, including books and papers. His work has focused mainly on understanding the development and processes in adolescent romantic relationships. Recent research on young adults, however, has also examined the process associated with consolidation of occupational identity and its interplay with commitment in relationships.

For more information or to RSVP, e-mail lamarsh@yorku.ca.

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

The post Personality and ability to relate affect career choices, says visiting Professor Shmuel Shulman appeared first on Research & Innovation.

According to professor of organizational behaviour in the School of Administrative Studies and the School of Human Resource Management at 91��ɫ [Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies], telework, or telecommuting, is increasing dramatically in many countries as organizations seek to reduce costs and individuals look to be more flexible in their working arrangements.

However, while there are many benefits ranging from greater flexibility for employees and improved performance for employers, Richardson also pointed out several concerns associated with telework, including isolation, blurring of boundaries between home and work, and loss of control over employees.

While telework isn't a new phenomenon, thanks to the rapid rise of computer networking, it's one trend that's being watched closely, said , professor in the School of Human Resource Management at 91��ɫ. "And the trend is here to stay," she said, adding there's a drive to get more out of workers by not having them commute to work.

"If you look at the best places to work on the Fortune 100 list, most of them offer some kind of flexibility," Ezzedeen said. "It's a reflection of the changing nature of our social values and norms. It challenges our notion of what does it take to produce good work? Is this the end of the job as we know it?"

Best Buy may be lauded for its revolutionary "results-only work environment", which measures performance on output instead of hours spent at the office, but managing a virtual team comes with numerous implications and challenges, including dealing with conflict, managing performance and issues of measurement, Ezzedeen said.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer, with files courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin

The post Professors Richardson and Ezzedeen on rise of telework appeared first on Research & Innovation.

"I'm optimistic about the explosion that's happened in Wisconsin," says Leo Panitch, a political science professor at 91��ɫ [Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies]. "For the first time in a long time, the Canadian left is looking south, rather than the other way."

But he's loath to make too many claims for a new dawn rising: "The craziness and mindlessness of so much of what is going on in the American right may – and I'm very cautious about this – it may lead to the same kind of sensibilities that produced a radical new left in the sixties."

Says Panitch, "It's much more complicated now. It's not easy to organize these days when you don't have masses of workers brought together in a big factory and they aren't living in the same part of the city. A lot of people now who are exploited and poorly paid are working in funky areas like producing software or advertising."

Two years ago, he wrote a piece for Foreign Policy magazine titled “Thoroughly Modern Marx” about how the post-crash world might possibly (though by no means inevitably) see a rebirth in radical thinking. That, of course, has not happened – in fact, the political left has suffered setbacks and since 2008, centre-right parties have gained power in Europe.

Panitch is the Canada Research Chair in Comparative Political Economy and a Distinguished Research Professor of Political Science.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer, with files courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin

The post Professor and CRC Leo Panitch on renewed interest in Karl Marx appeared first on Research & Innovation.

It is by far the best method to ensure food security, especially when women are the producers, said Mukherjee-Reed, who was here recently as part of the research project on farming activity by women's groups. The advantage is access to food in the hands of those who need it (are food insecure), she said.

Mukherjee-Reed, whose works include and series, said there is a lesson in here that the world can take to fight food crisis.

About 2.5 lakh women in the state in about 30,000 groups are engaged in collective farming. Together they cultivate over 27,000 hectares, growing paddy, tapioca, pineapple, plantain, vegetables and other items that are used to ensure that the growers get enough to eat and the surplus is sold in the open market.

“Most of the groups of women, who started with small areas for cultivation, have increased their production by taking up more fallow land, rejuvenating it and cultivating it,” said Mukherjee-Reed.

Her study involved 100 groups spread across the state. Among her major findings, Mukherjee-Reed said that land is the major constraint of the women engaged in collective farming. Women are unsure about retaining the leasing rights of the vacant, fallow land that they rejuvenate and prepare for cultivation.

About 21 per cent of women groups expressed their wish to become landowners. In fact, it is a major aim of some groups, who have managed to buy land.

In spite of the constraints, women are happy, said Prof. Mukherjee. Most of the women who have been able to leave wage labour are very happy. Organic farming is the aim of at least 45 per cent of the 100 groups she has studied. Some groups among them make organic manure for their cultivation. There are women who have had no previous exposure to go out of the house for any activity, now fully engaged in collective farming and also inspiring other women to follow an activity of economic independence, she said.

In Kudumbasree, she found a strong support system that provides a platform for women. The Mission has an elaborate structure and allows functioning as an institute.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer, with files courtesy of YFile – 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

The post Professor Ananya Mukherjee-Reed's study lauds women's collective farming appeared first on Research & Innovation.

Nazilla Khanlou knows. An immigrant herself, she's been studying the mental health of new arrivals – mainly women and youth – for a decade. But her community-based research goes well beyond gathering information. Whatever she learns about the mental wellbeing of newcomers and the services they need to adjust and integrate she shares with community agencies, health and social service providers and policy makers.

Right: Nazilla Khanlou

In fact, check out her new website and see that since 2008, when she joined 91��ɫ’s Faculty of Health as the first Echo Ontario Women’s Health Council Chair in Women’s Mental Health Research, she has shared her research on immigration and mental health at dozens of conferences and with government ministries. The nursing professor never turns down invitations to speak to local community groups, has started a newsletter and has launched a speaker series at 91��ɫ – anything to help improve the transition of immigrant women, youth and their families into Canadian society.

In her office suite in 91��ɫ Lanes, one room serves as a meeting room, resource library and workspace for her community-based partners, visiting scholars, graduate students and her research team. “I like the connection between academia and community,” says Khanlou, who has put up pictures on the wall and tried to make the room a welcoming, comfortable space.

Khanlou practised as a psychiatric nurse and spent seven years as health domain leader of the Centre of Excellence for Research on Immigration and Settlement in Toronto.

She believes in caring for the individual as well as providing systemic support to promote the mental wellbeing of immigrant women.

“When we talk about women, we’re not talking about a homogeneous group,” says Khanlou. Immigrant women come from varying cultures, religions, regions and educational backgrounds. They juggle many of the same day-to-day responsibilities and face the same pressures and multiple-role expectations as their Canadian-born peers.

Newcomers also face barriers – linguistic, social, cultural and gender-based – and discrimination. Isolation, family pressures and fear of stigma can prevent many from seeking help. To flourish, immigrant women, like everybody else, need fulfilling relationships, self-confidence and a sense of security. They need support systems that provide access to employment and good housing, health and social services, and equitable treatment.

“Good mental health doesn’t happen on its own,” she says. “We need a way to focus on society and systemic issues but not to lose sight of each person's resilience and challenges because at the end of the day, you need to attend to the individual.”

Most recently, Khanlou has collaborated with community partners on a variety of studies. One looked at how newcomer teenagers from Afghan, Colombian, Sudanese and Tamil communities understand mental health and seek help. Another compared the perceptions of newcomer immigrant and Canadian-born residents of Toronto’s St. James Town of their neighbourhood, social relations and access to health and social services and the effect on their wellbeing. With faculty in 91��ɫ's School of Nursing, a third explores the connection between immigrant women’s participation in their community and their success at settling in a community, and a fourth aims to improve the measurement of child and youth resilience.

Khanlou has also reviewed policies on immigrant health and mental health for federal and provincial agencies.

All Khanlou’s studies come with recommendations on how to remove barriers and improve services to promote mental health.

“It’s an exciting time to be in the mental health field because more people are talking about the relevance of mental health to all of us,” says Khanlou. “Hopefully our efforts come together to take away the fear of stigma so when families experience mental illness they are able to access good services and are able to talk about it. We all need good mental health.”

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin

The post Professor Nazilla Khanlou's research advocates for immigrants and mental health appeared first on Research & Innovation.

Perfectionism is sometimes viewed as a positive personality trait to be rewarded or reinforced, but Dalhousie University psychology professor Simon Sherry believes it is mostly a self-defeating behaviour, wrote :

In professors, the effect can be particularly pernicious: in a new study, Sherry and colleagues found that perfectionism leads to lower research productivity. The findings suggest that professors who display a higher level of perfectionism are less likely to produce publications, garner citations or publish their research in high-impact journals.

“We found that perfectionism trips up professors on the way to research productivity. The more perfectionistic the professor, the less productive they are,” said Dr. Sherry. This could “seriously and adversely impact” their career development. The study was published in the .

. . .

To investigate the issue, he and colleagues of 91��ɫ’s and Paul Hewitt of the University of British Columbia studied the link between perfectionism and research productivity among psychology professors working at universities in the US and Canada. They limited it to their own profession to simplify the logistics and restricted it to universities with graduate programs in psychology.

They contacted 10,000 professors, of whom 1,258 responded using an online survey. The researchers found a “robust correlation” between increased perfectionism and decreased research productivity in the respondents. A higher level of perfectionism was associated with a lower number of total publications and a lower number of first-authored publications. It was also associated with a lower number of citations and a track record of publishing in journals with a lower impact rating.

. . .

If professors suspect they’re perfectionists, Dr. Sherry counsels that they seek professional help. The best treatment options appear to be interpersonal or cognitive behavioural therapy, he added.

Ironically, “perfectionists are often very reluctant to seek help because they see it as tantamount to being imperfect,” he said. As well, perfectionism itself can be a barrier to effective treatment; afflicted individuals might subconsciously sabotage their course of treatment because of unrealistic expectations.

Perfectionist profs have another reason to worry: research has linked perfectionism with depression, suicide and various forms of eating disorders such as bulimia, binge eating and anorexia.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer, with files courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

The post Perfectionist professors have lower research productivity, study shows appeared first on Research & Innovation.

That’s contrary to what most Canadians believe, says Raphael in his new book , which looks at who stays healthy, who gets sick and why. It’s written with the goal of educating the informed Canadian, as well as university students.

Most people think luck, treatment options and lifestyle choices shape whether they are healthy or not. After all, that is the current mantra – eating better and exercising will lead to a healthier existence – a mantra that Canadians have wholeheartedly internalized. But that’s only part of the equation, and not the biggest part, says Raphael, a professor in 91��ɫ's School of Health Policy & Management in the Faculty of Health.

“Decades of research and hundreds of studies in Canada and elsewhere tell a different story: the primary factors that shape the health and well-being of Canadians – the factors that will give us longer, better lives – are to be found not in those much-discussed areas, but rather in the actual living conditions that Canadians experience on a daily basis,” says Raphael in About Canada: Health and Illness.

These factors include whether people are wealthy or poor, employed or not, working conditions, access to quality education, health and social services, and the basics of food and affordable housing. These social determinants “are crucial factors in the health and well-being of Canadians,” he says.

“Contrary to the assumption that we have personal control over these factors, in most cases these living conditions are – for better or worse – imposed upon us in the normal course of everyday life.”

Left: Dennis Raphael

That’s in large part because of the policies, regulations and laws enacted by governments at all levels, which influence employment income, family benefits and social assistance, as well as the quality and availability of affordable housing, health and social services, and recreational opportunities. That includes “what happens when Canadians lose their jobs during economic downturns such as the one that Canada began experiencing in 2008,” says Raphael.

“Governments also determine whether our children have access to affordable and high-quality child care and better-quality schools, the working conditions that we experience, and whether as seniors we receive levels of public pensions that allow us to live in dignity.”

Raphael wants to see changes in public policy that will affect Canadians’ health in a positive way. Through About Canada: Health and Illness, he wants the average Canadian to understand the role social determinants play in shaping health and what can be done to improve the situation through better public policies.

Raphael is the editor of , co-editor of and author of . He served as an adviser to the California Newsreel documentary series and the Deveaux Babin Productions Canadian documentary .

By Sandra McLean, YFile writer

Republished courtesy of YFile – 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

The post Professor Dennis Raphael: Getting sick is more about living conditions than lifestyle appeared first on Research & Innovation.

The annual award, presented last month, is named for Rosabeth Moss Kanter, who has influenced modern research literature on work and family, and is a partnership of the and the , and is sponsored by the Alliance of Work-Life Progress.

Ezzedeen’s article, “The Man Behind the Woman: A Qualitative Study of the Spousal Support Received and Valued by Executive Women”, appeared in the Journal of Family Issues and was based on a study she co-authored that found female executives were backed by emotionally supportive husbands more often than previous research would suggest (see YFile, Aug. 13, 2008).

A professor in the School of Human Resource Management in the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies, Ezzedeen interviewed 20 senior and executive-level women in the United States. The study, which began at the University of Penn State Harrisburg, looked at spousal behaviours that impacted the women’s ability to juggle the demands of career and family life.

Out of the 20 best articles of 2009, four were selected as finalists for the Rosabeth Moss Kanter Award, and from those, only one as the winner – a University of California, Irvine sociology professor’s article about career prioritizing and dual-earning couples.

Ezzedeen’s research interests focus on work-life balance and the advancement of women in organizations. She is a recipient of the George Washington University 2002-2003 Distinguished Teaching Assistant Award and the Harrisburg Chapter of Beta Gamma Sigma's 2006 Professor of the Year Award.

The purpose of the Rosabeth Moss Kanter Award is to raise awareness of excellent work-family research, foster debate about quality research standards and identify the best of the best for future research.

For more information about the award, visit the Web site.

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

The post Professor Souha Ezzedeen's study on men behind successful women recognized as one of 2009's 20 best on work-family research appeared first on Research & Innovation.

"There are better ways of doing many things regarding long-term residential care, more creative ways,” says Armstong. She is confident that the study will come up with ideas on how to improve conditions for workers and residents. “Long-term residences need to be a positive option, not the last resort as it now seems to be in Canada."

Armstrong says people feel shame when they have to admit a family member to a long-term care facility. “People see long-term care as a failure of themselves, their family and the health-care system. The main goal is always to keep them out of long-term care homes, rather than saying how can we make them attractive interesting places to be and work.” People are apologetic for not being able to care for their loved ones at home, but home care is not necessarily ideal either, Armstrong says. There can be issues with caregiver burnout and elder abuse, and it’s often just not a viable option as many women – still the main caregivers – work full time.

Right: Pat Armstrong

“How we treat this vulnerable population and those who provide their care is a critical indicator of our approach to equity and social justice, as well as to care,” says Armstrong. “Long-term residential care is a barometer of values and practices.” It raises questions regarding fundamental human and social rights, the role of the state, as well as the responsibilities of individuals, families and governments.

"Reimagining Long-Term Residential Care: An International Study of Promising Practices" is a seven-year project with $2.5 million in funding from the ’s program. Armstrong will lead an international team of researchers seeking to identify the most promising practices for long-term residential care, ones that treat both providers and residents with dignity and respect. The team is less interested in pointing out what’s broken in the system, than in coming up with promising practices to improve it.

Up until now, there has been little research on residential care in Canada or elsewhere that has taken this kind of approach, says Armstrong. What has been done tends to focus on issues such as patient abuse and under-staffing rather than on issues related to gender and diversity, the relationship between the conditions of work and conditions of care or on policies that will lead to quality care. Meanwhile, the need for long-term residential care in Canada is expected to grow in the face of psychiatric, chronic care and rehabilitation hospital closures, the shift in hospital focus to short-term acute care and outpatient services, and with an aging population, she says.

The research team, which includes physicians, architects, sociologists, philosophers, social workers, historians, political scientists and economists, along with representatives of competing interests, such as employers and unions, will compare practices in Canada, the United Kingdom, the United States, Norway, Sweden and Germany. They will look at four different themes – work organization, accountability, approaches to care, and financing and ownership.

Left: An elderly woman sits by a window. Photo by Chalmers Butterfield.

In the area of work organization, researchers hope to find care models that better meet the needs and balance the rights of residents, providers, managers, families and communities. Under accountability, they are looking for structures which nurture care and inspire quality workplace relations. They will also investigate financing and ownership models to identify the contexts, regulations, funding and conditions that allow residents and providers to flourish and that ensure equitable access to quality long-term residential care.

“We’re hoping to get the pieces of a kind of mosaic to guide us to a better place for all the countries…to producing an integrated picture of long-term residential care and how to do things differently,” says Armstrong. “In many ways, the approaches to care are the most important.” In this country, the emphasis seems to be more on finances, but it is imperative that approaches to care provide a viable, desirable and equitable option for individuals, families and those who provide care. Both providers and residents need to be treated with dignity and respect in the approaches to care, she adds.

The plan is to have researchers work in all four thematic areas, not just their area of expertise, to help generate new ideas and novel ways of approaching problems. “I emphasize the ideas because we're not just thinking about the residents, but the families, the workers and the governments,” Armstrong says.

Long-term care raises many complex issues dealing with gender, diversity, aging, sexuality and providing medical care once the domain of hospitals. Typically, long-term care residents have been mostly women, currently about 80 per cent, but the number of men in care has increased. So has the number of younger people needing constant care and not served by a hospital. Most care workers are also women, many of whom are from racialized communities. Trying to find the most promising practices is not an easy task and one size will definitely not fit all, but at the same time there is much room for improvement, Armstrong says.

Armstrong, who holds a Canadian Health Services Research Foundation/Canadian Institutes of Health Research Chair in Health Services & Nursing Research, expects the project to create readily usable research.

“We hope the research will make a difference long before the project is done.”

Armstrong is a professor of sociology in the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies and an executive member of both the 91��ɫ Institute for Health Research and the Graduate Program in Health Policy & Equity.

The post Professor Pat Armstrong's long-term residential healthcare study looks to improve national and international conditions appeared first on Research & Innovation.

Burke says the 9-to-5 workday was introduced to protect workers from long hours, but workplaces should now consider more flexible hours provided it's appropriate for the job. If employers allow workers to "work to results" and go home, they must be accountable to someone, show that results have been achieved, and possibly consider whether their whole team has achieved their results.

You can find the segment on CBC's Web site under beneath the heading "Leave When Done". Burke's interview begins at the 4:15 mark.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, with files from 91��ɫ's Daily Media Report.

The post Listen: 91��ɫ prof speaks to Metro Morning on restructuring the 9-to-5 workday appeared first on Research & Innovation.