Negotiating demands of social change in young and middle-aged adults from Poland.

Abstract

Social and economic changes on the societal macro level, such as globalization, pluralization, and demographic shifts, create new demands that produce stress and require behavioral adaptation. In this largesample correlational study, which replicates a similar study previously conducted in Germany, we investigated how young and middle-aged adults from Poland (N ϭ 2,541) negotiated these demands. Dependent variables were engagement and disengagement strategies as defined by the motivational theory of life span development. By using planned contrasts between engagement (selective primary, selective secondary,

Preparing for uncertain careers: How youth deal with growing occupational uncertainties before the education-to-work transition

“…We investigate how youth who are still in education and at the brink of working life deal with perceived growing occupational uncertainties in terms of goal engagement (i.e., investing active effort in goal pursuit; surmounting obstacles) and goal disengagement (i.e., distancing from unattainable goals; protecting the self against failure experiences; Heckhausen, Wrosch, & Schulz, 2010). Our research builds on previous analyses among adults from Germany and Poland who had finished their education or vocational training and were already active on the labor market, henceforth "post-transition adults" (Tomasik, Silbereisen, Lechner, & Wasilewski, 2013;. Our research strategy is to replicate and extend these analyses, using essentially the same set of variables, in pre-transition youth from the same countries, a group this previous research has excluded.…”

Demands of Social Change Across Multiple Domains of Life and Across Time at the Advent of the Global Financial Crisis

“…Third, and maybe most importantly, individuals are not passive victims of demands of social change, but rather try to cope with them either in terms of engagement or disengagement. We Tomasik et al, 2013) found more engagement-type of coping in individuals from regions with a more precarious labor market, in women, in those who were living together with a partner, and in those who were employed as compared to the unemployed or those outside of the labor market. Disengagement type of coping (for details, see Tomasik, Silbereisen, & Heckhausen, 2010) was more prevalent in individuals from more affluent regions, in men, in those outside of the labor market, and in those not living together with a DEMANDS OF SOCIAL CHANGE 7 partner.…”

Control Strivings in the Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP)

“…Interestingly, our results suggest that self-protection is not only related to disengagement but also to goal engagement. The engagement in long-term goals includes hard times when opportunities for reaching the goal are temporarily blocked; strategies of self-protection might help to overcome these challenges and help to maintain goal engagement (see also Tomasik et al, 2013). Our results also suggest that it would be preferable to further distinguish between different kinds of selfprotection strategies, i.e., avoiding self-blame vs. focusing on positive things (as reflected in the low inter-item correlations).…”