Journal of Applied Psychology最新文献

The literature on resilience has focused predominantly on the consequences of resilience for the resilient individuals themselves. Yet, current theorizing on workplace events suggests that the critical and eye-catching nature of demonstrating resilience is likely to draw the attention of other employees. We explore these interpersonal dynamics surrounding resilience by developing and testing a model that delves into the consequences of employees observing their coworkers' resilience. Drawing from social comparison theory, we explain how observing resilience is related to both positive (inspiration) and negative (anxiety) social comparison emotions, based on perceptions of similarity with the resilient individual. We further theorize about the downstream consequences of these emotions for the observer's attitudes (positive mindset about stress) and behavior (adaptive performance). Across a combination of lab and field studies, we found that observing resilience is related to feelings of anxiety when the observer perceives themselves as being dissimilar to the resilient individual. However, the significant positive effect of observing resilience on inspiration was not conditional upon similarity perceptions. In turn, these feelings of inspiration and anxiety were associated with the observer having a more, or less, positive attitude toward stress, respectively, which was ultimately related to helping or hindering their adaptive performance in the workplace. We discuss how our research provides a rich avenue for future studies on the social dynamics surrounding employee resilience. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Humans possess an evolved followership psychology that enables them to identify and endorse different types of leaders depending on situational demands. But what fundamental needs guide these follower endorsements? Across a preliminary study and five validation studies (N = 3,514), we developed and validated the Fundamental Follower Needs Inventory (FFNI)-a psychometrically robust measure that identifies six core follower needs: protection, affiliation, status, guidance (including vision and expertise), and fairness. In Studies 1 and 2, we conducted content validation, tested reliability, and confirmed the factor structure of the FFNI across three domains (general, political, and workplace), three countries (the United States, the United Kingdom, and China), and multiple time points. Study 3 demonstrated FFNI's convergent and discriminant validity. Studies 4 and 5 explored the nomological network, examining its antecedents, consequences, and both predictive and incremental validity. The FFNI provides a novel tool for researchers to investigate how follower needs vary across contexts and cultures and how these needs shape leader endorsements and perceptions of leadership effectiveness. Practically, the FFNI offers leaders a framework to better understand and respond to the psychological needs of those they lead. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

We conducted a study of aviators who experienced a close brush with death at work, in an effort to better understand how such events influence thoughts about work. Importantly, our initial interviews suggested that participants used conversational storytelling about their close brush with death as a means of enhancing the meaningfulness of their work. That initial finding presented us with a puzzle, as the literatures connecting storytelling to the meaning of work view stories as useful for meaning as understanding-not meaning as fulfillment (i.e., meaningfulness). Additional interviews culminated in a theoretical model where the raw materials of the close brush with death (loss of life, errors by the crew) created stories with more versus less dramatic tension. Differences in dramatic tension then shaped how story work (humor, poetic license) was used to craft the tale, how the tellings were experienced (teller emotions, audience reactions), and how gains in meaning as fulfillment (significance, belonging, esteem) were realized. In the end, participants with more and less dramatic tension in their stories were both able to use tellings to cultivate meaning as fulfillment, albeit in distinct and varying ways. Our findings therefore illustrate that the literatures connecting storytelling to the meaning of work have given short shrift to the power of stories. We discuss the implications of our theorizing for the meaning of work and storytelling at work literatures. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).