No abstract

People from lower social classes experience significant difficulties in many life domains including work, yet their work lives continue to be understudied in psychology. This study examined the applicability of the Psychology of Working Theory (PWT), which emphasizes the role of socioeconomic constraints in shaping work and well-being outcomes, in a non-Western, collectivist cultural framework. Specifically, we tested the associations of social class with work volition and career adaptability in predicting decent work and job and life satisfaction with a sample of 401 low-income Turkish employees. Results of structural equation modeling analyses supported all hypothesized paths of the proposed model. Social class predicted decent work directly and indirectly through work volition and career adaptability, and decent work predicted job satisfaction and life satisfaction. In addition to extending the research on the international utility of the PWT, these results support the notion that social class has a crucial role in low-income working adults' access to decent and fulfilling work along with their attainment of well-being. The results of this study also underline the importance of promoting decent work among low-income individuals to improve their personal and work lives. Implications for practice with low-income Turkish employees and directions for future research are discussed. Public Significance StatementThe present study describes the ways in which social class influences low-income Turkish employee's access to decent and fulfilling work along with their general well-being. Our results emphasize the necessity of further scholarly attention to low-income individuals' work-related experiences and an inclusive psychological practice that integrates advocacy at multiple levels.

In recent years, many counseling psychology training programs in the United States have adopted social justice principles into training. Although previous studies have provided thought-provoking discussions on social justice advocacy, they mostly reflected the voices of psychologists in academia; therefore, the advocacy work of practitioners has been neglected. In order to explore the advocacy experiences of counseling psychologists in practice, we utilized qualitative content analysis to analyze semistructured interviews with 11 practitioners who were trained in social justice-oriented counseling psychology doctoral programs. The findings were clustered under three domains: (a) participants' development of a social justice orientation, (b) different ways of implementing advocacy in practice, and (c) positioning advocacy in psychology. The interviews depicted resources and challenges with regard to integrating advocacy into practice indicating that counseling psychologists continue to struggle with systemic barriers that limit their advocacy actions. We discuss implications for research, practice, and training in counseling psychology.

This study examined the psychometric properties of the Turkish version of the Decent Work Scale (DWS), a recently developed measure that assesses the psychological experience of the quality of one’s work life. The proposed five-factor structure was verified with a sample of 326 Turkish working adults. Consistent with previous research, a five-factor bifactor model showed best fit to the data. The results of multigroup confirmatory factor analysis showed that the structure of the instrument was invariant across gender, income, and social class groups. Convergent and discriminant validity were supported by positive correlations with person–organization fit, job satisfaction, life satisfaction, and work meaning and by negative correlations with withdrawal intentions. Evidence of predictive validity was obtained by regressing the five subscales on four outcome measures. These findings suggest that the Turkish version of the DWS can be used for assessing decent work among Turkish working adults and cross-cultural psychological research.

The implicit thread running through career intervention discourse in the past century has been about opportunity. The expanding array of opportunities that emerged in the later part of the 19th century and the early part of the 20th century created the need and context for career interventions, which were constructed to provide support and guidance for people grappling with choices about education, training, and work (Savickas & Baker, 2005). As opportunities increased dramatically, a growing proportion of people in Western nations faced expanding choices, which generated a need for career practitioners to help clients and students navigate a pathway to a dignified and satisfying work life. Access to opportunity, however, occurs along a continuum that varies based on a number of individual and contextual factors (American Psychological Association [