Suchergebnisse

While people have an influence on current political decisions, and as ordinary citizens represent the basis for political participation, depicting such political engagement in an empirical/practical way creates a concerning amount of methodological questions. Data obtained via the European Social Survey Round 1–7 offers the opportunity to outline and broaden the picture in terms of the personal (demographic and psychological) features of individuals who participate in politics to a greater or lesser degree. Participants from the seven rounds of the European Social Survey (ESS) were divided into three groups: higher, medium, and lower political participation (α = 0.642). A Scale of Political Participation was created based on 'yes' answers. It was found that those individuals who were female or had a lower level of education participated less, while older people were more politically participative than younger people. The psychological profile of these groups differs in terms of preferred values: attitudes, satisfaction, trust in people, and institutions.

Limited number of studies have explored role of locus of control (LoC) in job search. In this study, involving over fourteen thousand participants enrolled in retraining courses, we examined the role of LoC in individuals' responses to a hypothetical job offer located 100 km away from their current place of residence. Results indicated that internal locus of control predicted a positive response to the job offer and the tendency to seek additional information about the job offer. In addition, the internal locus of control predicted worries and the automatic rejection of job offers negatively. Conversely, the external locus of control predicted worries and a tendency to reject job offer positively and engagement in further seeking of information and positive reactions to job offer negatively. However, the size of the effects was small, indicating a need to continue the search for predictors of the reaction to the job offer. Neither type of locus of control was found to be associated with seeking advice from friends or family.