Featured Publications of Lingnan Researchers

Competition, innovation and trade
Editor : Larry D. QIU
Type : Edited Book
Published Year : 2021
Publisher : World Scienfitic
ISBN : 9789811203985
Innovation and international trade are two important drivers of economic growth. These two activities perform differently under different types of market competition. This book — a collection of several important research publications by Larry D Qiu — discusses innovation and international trade, separately and jointly, under imperfect competition. Through exploring these topics, they offer different perspectives on these issues. The selected works also provide clear and strong implications on trade policies and intellectual property rights protection.

Prof. QIU Dongxiao Larry
Sydney S. W. Leong Chair Professor of Economics, Department of Economics
Director, China Economic Research Programme
About the editor

香港志 ‧ 總述 大事記
Editors : 丁新豹 ; 陳佳榮 ; 劉智鵬 ; 劉蜀永
Type : Edited Book
Published Year: 2021
Publisher : 中華書局(香港)有限公司
ISBN : 9789888676682
國有史,地有志。編修地方志是中華民族悠久而獨特文化傳統。《香港志》旨在全面系統地記述香港地區自然和社會各方面的歷史和現狀。《總述》與《大事記》將合為《香港志》的首卷,是本項大型文化工程啟動的標誌。
大事記是記載在某個行政區域內,一定歷史時期重大事件和重要人物活動的編年體史書。本卷《大事記》將以《香港志》整體篇目為綱,並以前人的研究成果為基礎,增補缺漏要項,全面、系統記述香港自遠古以來之歷史大事,突出香港特殊的地理、歷史、文化、經濟和國際地位,從而發揮資政、存史、教化的功能和使命。

Prof. LAU Chi Pang 劉智鵬
Associate Vice-President (Academic Affairs and External Relations), Office of the President
Professor, Department of History
Co-ordinator, Hong Kong and South China Historical Research Programme
Director, Jockey Club Hong Kong History Learning Programme
About the editor

Prof. LIU Shuyong 劉蜀永
Senior Research Fellow, Hong Kong and South China Historical Research Programme
About the editor

India’s social policy response to Covid-19 : temporary relief in a rigid welfare landscape
Authors : Stefan KÜHNER; Keerty NAKRAY; Daniel NEFF
Type : Report
Published Year : 2021
Publisher : Collaborative Research Centre 1342 : Global Dynamics of Social Policy
This essay summarises the broad contours and key characteristics of the Indian government’s social policy response to the global Covid-19 pandemic and the ensuing nationwide lockdown. The principal strategy of the Indian government was to implement a large and at times bewildering array of temporary relief measures by ordinances after adjournment of the Indian parliament in March 2020. Not a single new piece of legislation was implemented in direct response to the Covid-19 crisis, although recent federal labour law reforms are likely to shape the Indian social and economic recovery. Collectively, the Indian government’s relief measures have not been able to adequately alleviate the Covid-19-related social pressures and risks. While there is still a dearth of adequate statistical data to assess how well the relief measures were implemented, the initial picture suggests that the Indian government’s response to the global Covid-19 pandemic prioritised economic and fiscal measures, relied on the existing inadequate safety net, and was not timely enough to support millions of inter-state migrants. The public health crisis and ensuing nationwide lockdown have not resulted in a path-breaking trajectory away from the entrenched Indian welfare paradigm.

Impacts of social and environmental perceptions on preparedness and knowledge of air pollution risk : a study of adolescent males in an urbanized, high-density city
Authors : Hung Chak HO; Paulina P. Y. WONG; Chunlan GUO
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Mar 2021
Source : Sustainable Cities and Society
DOI : 10.1016/j.scs.2020.102678
Background: Adolescent males are often considered as less medically vulnerable, resulting in less community healthcare but stronger influences of environmental awareness (preparedness and knowledge) on self-preventive strategies of air pollution risk. However, socio-environmental experiences can alter subjective understandings of the environment, thereby modifying their environmental awareness.
Method: A two-stage analysis was applied to evaluate the impacts of socio-environmental perceptions on the preparedness and knowledge of air pollution risk among 551 adolescent males. In the first stage, we evaluated the impacts on the overall preparedness and knowledge with Gaussian regressions, and in the second stage, we evaluated specific preparedness and knowledge with binomial regressions.
Results: First-stage analyses showed that socio-environmental perceptions impacted overall preparedness but not overall knowledge. Particularly, perceivably low environmental knowledge of oneself negatively influenced overall preparedness, and a perceivably large household positively influenced overall preparedness. The second-stage analyses further implied a complex mechanism between perception, preparedness, and knowledge. Specifically, poor outdoor air quality surrounding the home and perceivably low environmental knowledge of oneself negatively influenced specific preparedness for caring for family members. Perceivably low environmental knowledge of oneself also negatively influenced preparedness for outdoor air pollution and knowledge of visibility, wearing masks, cardiovascular diseases, and mortality risk. Poor indoor environment negatively influenced preparedness of wearing a mask. However, participating in few sports activities negatively influenced preparedness for wearing mask, and knowledge of wearing masks, greenhouse gases, and tropospheric ozone, but positively influenced preparedness for outdoor activities during hazy days. Perceivably low school grade positively influenced knowledge of tropospheric ozone. Perceivably low environmental knowledge of the parents and a large household also positively influenced specific preparedness. Poor indoor air quality at home positively influenced knowledge of mortality risk.
Conclusions: Due to the complexity of adolescent males’ preparedness and knowledge, further environmental and health actions (e.g., community services, environmental education, and health workshops) with appropriate preventive strategies should be targeted and specified.

Psychological transformation of youth after engaging in non-radical and radical political activities
Authors : Yuefeng Alex ZHU; Alex Lih Shing CHAN; Kee Lee CHOU
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Jan 2021
Source : Current Psychology
DOI : 10.1007/s12144-020-01239-5
Although the links between political attitudes and political participation have been extensively studied, there is limited understanding of attitudinal transformation following different types of political engagement. This study differentiates between non-radical and radical political participation and explores their respective impact on political interest, external political efficacy, and internal political efficacy. A three-wave dataset collected from a sample of Hong Kong youth was adopted to assess three cross-lagged models. Regarding the link between attitudes and participation, we only found that internal political efficacy played a positive role in predicting radical political participation. Regarding the link between participation and attitudes, the results showed that radical political engagement positively predicted political interest and negatively predicted external political efficacy; non-radical political engagement promoted internal political efficacy. Our findings offer valuable implications for Hong Kong policy makers, educators, and social workers who care about the positive development of local youth following their engagement in political activities and hope to promote effective political communication.

Test-retest reliability and validity of the Service-Learning Outcomes Measurement Scale
Authors : Ka Hing LAU; Robin S. SNELL
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Dec 2020
Source : International Journal of Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement
DOI : 10.37333/001c.18782
The current study evaluated the test-retest reliability and validity of the 56-item Service-Learning Outcomes Measurement Scale (S-LOMS) by inviting 122 university students to respond to items on the scale twice within a two-week period. Results indicated test-retest reliability that was moderate for eight out of 11 domains and good for the three other domains. There were intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs) of 0.6 or above at the domain, category, and overall levels of the scale. Notably, respondents with prior service-learning experience tended to score higher on developmental outcome domains than those without prior service-learning experience. Comparisons between S-LOMS scores according to gender, age, year of study, and academic background were also made and discussed. The results indicated that S-LOMS is stable over time and that it has robust validity vis-à-vis undergraduate students in Hong Kong as the target population.

Images of Chinese women in the hands of translators : a case study of the English translations of Pu Songling’s Liaozhai zhi yi
Author : Wen-chun LIANG
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Dec 2020
Source : Translation Horizons
This paper discusses the images of traditional Chinese women in the English translations of Pu Songling’s Liaozhai zhi yi. This is a fictional work famous for its vivid and lively love stories between young male scholars and beautiful female spirits, immortals, and demons. Pu Songling often described the female super natural beings in his fictional work as beautiful, kind, obedient, loyal, and passive. These are characteristics that reflect the values and images of traditional Chinese women from the Confucian perspective. According to Beller and Leerseen (2007), imagology examines “the origin and characteristics of other countries and peoples”, which are often depicted in works of literature at the textual level. Previous studies of Liaozhai zhi yi’s English translations also touched upon the translation of imagology (e.g., Dong & Hu, 2013; Chen, 2014). However, none of them considered the sociological aspects that influence how translators reconstruct original images in their translations. Nevertheless, when reformulating original text images, translators, whose behaviours are constructed by sociocultural determinants in a given social space and time, should not be immune from the imagological approach in the study of translations. This paper studies two English translations of Liaozhai zhi yi, namely, Herbert Giles’s Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio (Pu, 1880/2010) and John Minford’s Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio (Pu, 2006). This paper examines how these two translators reaccentuated the image narratives of traditional Chinese women portrayed in Liaozhai zhi yi. It discusses how these images transformed in the West by investigating the social contextualization of the two translators. It is hoped that this paper’s emphasis on the sociological aspects of image-making through translation will constitute a significant contribution to the study of imagology.

Metaphysical egoism and personal identity
Author : Andrea SAUCHELLI
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Jan 2021
Source : Journal of Value Inquiry
DOI : 10.1007/s10790-020-09792-9
Metaphysical egoism pursues what Gregory Kavka called ‘the reconciliation project’ (roughly, the project of reconciling the demands of morality with our rational self-interest) by appealing to one version of the psychological approach to personal identity. I argue that, for reasons related to its commitment to an implausible understanding of the notion of a psychological connection, this form of egoism is not plausible. I also explore one way in which metaphysical egoism may be amended, but I ultimately reject it.

Prof. Andrea SAUCHELLI
Head and Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy
Associate Dean (Research and Postgraduate Studies), Faculty of Arts
About the author

《悲剧心理学》的成就与启示
Author : 丁尔苏
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Nov 2020
Source : 文艺理论研究
《悲剧心理学》是我国悲剧理论史上的一座重要里程碑,朱光潜在书中自如穿梭于西方各大理论流派之间,以一个中国学者特有的眼光,提出不少至今仍然很有价值的见解。朱光潜对悲剧理论的最大贡献在于修正亚里士多德的“过失论”和“净化说”,不仅肯定好人受难的悲剧情节,而且引入“爱”“惋惜”等其他描述悲剧情感的重要概念。也许因为过于青睐康德的崇高理论,朱光潜对描写卑微人物被动受难的作品稍有疏忽。就德国古典理论而言,朱光潜一方面批评黑格尔的“永恒正义”论过于乐观,另一方面认为叔本华的“退让说”过于悲观。无论在人生哲学还是美学观念上,他都更倾向于介于这两者之间的尼采。可惜尼采的悲剧死亡论与史实相去甚远,导致朱光潜在同一问题上出现偏差。尽管如此,尼采和朱光潜将悲剧与文化价值进行连接的尝试,依旧对后人的研究很有启发。

Towards purchase prediction : a transaction-based setting and a graph-based method leveraging price information
Authors : Zongxi LI; Haoran XIE; Guandong XU; Qing LI; Mingming LENG; Chi ZHOU
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : May 2021
Source : Pattern Recognition
DOI : 10.1016/j.patcog.2021.107824
Targeting at boosting business revenue, purchase prediction based on user behavior is crucial to e-commerce. However, it is not a well-explored topic due to a lack of relevant datasets. Specifically, no public dataset provides both price and discount information varying on time, which play an essential role in the user’s decision making. Besides, existing learn-to-rank methods cannot explicitly predict the purchase possibility for a specific user-item pair. In this paper, we propose a two-step graph-based model, where the graph model is applied in the first step to learn representations of both users and items over click-through data, and the second step is a classifier incorporating the price information of each transaction record. To evaluate the model performance, we propose a transaction-based framework focusing on the purchased items and their context clicks, which contain items that a user is interested in but fails to choose after comparison. Our experiments show that exploiting the price and discount information can significantly enhance prediction accuracy.

Prof. XIE Haoran
Associate Professor, Department of Computing and Decision Sciences
About the author

Prof. LENG Mingming
Dean, Faculty of Business
Professor, Department of Computing and Decision Sciences
About the author

Intranasal oxytocin in the treatment of autism spectrum disorders : a multilevel meta-analysis
Authors : Yi HUANG; Xin HUANG; Richard P. EBSTEIN; Rongjun YU
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Mar 2021
Source : Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews
DOI : 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2020.12.028
Intranasal oxytocin has been shown to promote social functioning and has recently been applied as a treatment for autism spectrum disorders (ASD). The current meta-analysis aims to assess the crucial question of oxytocin's efficacy in the treatment of ASD. We performed a systematic literature search, including randomized, single- or double-blind/open-label and placebo-controlled clinical trials as well as single-arm, non-randomized and uncontrolled studies investigating exogenous oxytocin effect on ASD. A total of 28 studies (N = 726 ASD patients) met our predefined inclusion criteria. We used a multilevel meta-analytic model and found that oxytocin had beneficial effects on social functioning, but did not find strong evidence for symptoms improvement in the non-social domain. Our findings suggest that oxytocin administration can be regarded as an effective treatment for some core aspects of ASD, especially in the domain of social functioning, highlighting the promise of using oxytocin as a new-generation therapeutic to address core social impairments in ASD.

Profit‐tax relationship, business group affiliation, and external monitoring in China
Authors : Kenny Z. LIN; Shanshan SHI; Feng TANG
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Jan 2021
Source : Journal of International Financial Management and Accounting
DOI : 10.1111/jifm.12128
This study examines whether business group affiliation weakens the sensitivity of income tax expense to pretax income, while external monitoring mechanisms mitigate the effect of group affiliation. We find that this sensitivity is weaker for Chinese listed firms affiliated with a top 500 business group than for unaffiliated firms. Economically, our coefficient estimate implies that group affiliation weakens tax sensitivity to income by 5.2% in relative terms. However, we find that tax sensitivity improved in the post‐2008 period and with the presence of strong monitoring mechanisms by means of tax enforcement, analyst scrutiny, and long‐term institutional shareholding. To the extent that unexplained variation in current tax expense at a given income level is indicative of aggressive tax behavior, our results suggest that effective external monitoring can mitigate this behavior in group‐affiliated firms.

Smart responsive nanoformulation for targeted delivery of active compounds from traditional Chinese medicine
Authors : Xuejun JIANG; Mei LIN; Jianwen HUANG; Mulan MO; Houhe LIU; Yuan JIANG; Xiaowen CAI; Wingnang LEUNG; Chuanshan XU
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Dec 2020
Source : Frontiers in Chemistry
DOI : 10.3389/fchem.2020.559159
Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) has been used to treat disorders in China for ~1,000 years. Growing evidence has shown that the active ingredients from TCM have antibacterial, antiproliferative, antioxidant, and apoptosis-inducing features. However, poor solubility and low bioavailability limit clinical application of active compounds from TCM. “Nanoformulations” (NFs) are novel and advanced drug-delivery systems. They show promise for improving the solubility and bioavailability of drugs. In particular, “smart responsive NFs” can respond to the special external and internal stimuli in targeted sites to release loaded drugs, which enables them to control the release of drug within target tissues. Recent studies have demonstrated that smart responsive NFs can achieve targeted release of active compounds from TCM at disease sites to increase their concentrations in diseased tissues and reduce the number of adverse effects. Here, we review “internal stimulus–responsive NFs” (based on pH and redox status) and “external stimulus–responsive NFs” (based on light and magnetic fields) and focus on their application for active compounds from TCM against tumors and infectious diseases, to further boost the development of TCM in modern medicine.

Prof. LEUNG Wing Nang Albert
Professor of Clinical Practice, School of Graduate Studies
About the author

Social movements and politics of violence in cohabiting non-marital families
Authors : Anna W. M. CHOI; Alhassan ABDULLAH; Pik Ying CHAN; Peter Y. L. TO; Chuen Yee LO
Type : Book Chapter
Published Year : 2020
Source : The Sage handbook of domestic violence
ISBN : 9781526494863
Violence in cohabiting non-marital families seldom draws public attention, and protections for these families are limited. Even with the growing number of cohabiting non-marital families of heterosexual and same-sex relationships around the world, concern about and understanding of cohabiting non-marital families in crises are general weak, and this seems to be true both for policymakers and for helping professionals. Recognition of cohabiting non-marital families of heterosexual and same-sex couples has gradually emerged during the social movements that promote diversity and inclusive community. Some members of the general public find it difficult to accept these family forms as 'proper' family forms under the influence of traditional culture and the social policy made primarily for supporting and protecting married couples. Domestic violence in cohabiting non-marital families may face even more challenges in seeking a way out. Their needs are different from the needs of those in marries families, and thus they may not get immediate and practical support provided by typical social services. Legal protection for victims from cohabiting non-marital families is also limited as most social and legal preventive and protective measures were established based on the situation of nuclear marital families. Therefore, this chapter aims to discuss the social movements and politics in combating violence in cohabiting non-marital families by literature on reviewing cohabiting non-marital families, especially in cohabiting heterosexual relationships and in same-sex couples.

Prof. LO Chuen Yee Barbara
Head & Associate Professor, Department of Applied Psychology
Associate Director, Wofoo Joseph Lee Consulting and Counselling Psychology Research Centre
About the author

單周堯教授七秩華誕國際學術研討會論文集
Editors : 李雄溪 ; 招祥麒 ; 郭鵬飛 ; 許子濱 ; 蕭敬偉 ; 潘漢芳
Type : Edited Book
Published Year: 2020
Publisher : 中華書局(香港)有限公司
ISBN : 9879888675500
單周堯教授,字文農,號勉齋,五十以後又號澹齋。自1975年起,即任職於香港大學中文系(現稱中文學院),講授《左傳》、文字學、音韻學等課程,研究範圍包括文字學、音韻學、訓詁學、出土文獻、粵方言、《尚書》、《左傳》等,俱有突出的學術成就,被譽為香港經學第一人。發表論文二百餘篇,專著有《中國語文論稿》、《文字訓詁叢稿》、《左傳學論集》、《勉齋小學論叢》、《漢字漢語解碼──咬文嚼字集》等,飲譽學界。學問以外,單周堯教授的人品和道德亦廣受稱頌,並在栽桃樹李、造育人才方面有傑出貢獻,單門弟子遍佈海內外學術界。2017年是單周堯教授七秩華誕,在多個合辦單位的努力下,「單周堯教授七秩華誕國際學術研討會」得以於2017年12月9日在香港饒宗頤文化館舉行。與會學者提交近百篇論文,涵蓋了單周堯教授專研的範疇,為相關領域提出了新發現,掀開了新局面。會上會下進行了熱烈而卓有成效的討論和交流,成為本地學界的佳話。為保存研討會的豐碩成果,籌委會把研討會上的論文以及開幕辭和閉幕辭加以結集出版,以見證單周堯教授和好朋友聚首論學的珍貴時光。

Everyday erotics in urban density : an ethnography of older lesbian and bisexual women in Hong Kong
Author : Tse Shang Denise TANG
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Dec 2020
Source : Gender, Place, and Culture
DOI : 10.1080/0966369X.2020.1859464
Lesbian spaces, in terms of their social, cultural, sexual or political purposes, have been dwindling in recent years within global North lesbian geographies. For this article, I would like to put forward a historical analysis of social spaces in Hong Kong through a qualitative ethnographic study of 12 older lesbians and bisexual women aged 60 years and above. Expanding upon Yue and Leung’s theoretical assertion of disjunctive modernity and urban neoliberalism, I proceed to develop my argument that lived experiences in an urban environment diffuses and decenters the assertion of one’s lesbian identity and sexual subjectivity across time and space. Under the British colonial era, the assertion of one’s Chinese womanhood as independent and modern intersects with rapid industrialization and social transformations which lead to culturally-specific spatial practices in locating lesbian desires. I call this mode of spatial practice as everyday erotics in density to describe the way of navigating sexual desires in relation to urban development, where becoming a woman with lesbian desires mean not only carving out one’s alternative erotic space but also disengaging with traditional gender roles in one’s life course and redefining gender and sexuality for an older generation of women.

Prof. TANG Tse Shang Denise
Assistant Professor, Department of Cultural Studies
Associate Director, Centre for Cultural Research and Development
About the author

Information policy
Author : Diana Lucy LEMBERG
Type : Book Chapter
Published Year : 2020
Source : Information : a historical companion
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN : 9780691179544
The phrase “information policy” is not entirely commonplace in contemporary English. It does not possess the same self-evident significance as “foreign policy” or “public policy,” which point to a government’s respective interactions with international actors and with its domestic inhabitants. By contrast, a certain ambiguity sets in when we speak of information policy. Does it refer to a state’s efforts to gather information within its borders? The control of what information is available to its residents? The use of information for diplomatic purposes? International standard-setting? The public’s protections against governmental abuses of power, in the form of transparency or privacy laws? At times its constituent parts even seem to pull in opposite directions: “information,” as the word is deployed in the digital age, often seems to be characterized by a tendency to transgress national borders and contravene government planning—in other words, to subvert precisely the kinds of strategic designs for which policy is the instrument.

“古四声不同今韵”与上古汉语韵尾构拟问题
Authors : 劉鴻雁 ; 馬毛朋
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Nov 2020
Source : 南通大学学报(社会科学版)
除调型丶调值外,上古与中古汉语声调的差异体现在两个方面:一是调类,比如上古汉语的声调就有三调丶五调之说;一是每个字的具体归类,比如有些字中古是去声,上古属于平声。这两类差异,段玉裁称之为"古四声不同今韵"。各家构拟在反映古今调类总体差异方面,均言之成理。在古今异调字问题上,高本汉等学者的构拟体系缺乏解释力,但可以容纳对异调字的不同处理;而持声调源于韵尾假说诸家的构拟,则陷入逻辑困境,如何解释异调字从上古到中古的演变过程,是该假说面对的一个难题。

Dr. MA Maopeng 馬毛朋
Senior Lecturer, Chinese Language Education and Assessment Centre
About the author

The effects of message tone and formats of CSR messages on engagement in social media
Author : Myoung Jin CHAE
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Oct 2020
Source : Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
DOI : 10.13106/jafeb.2020.vol7.no10.501
As more consumers are interested in sustainability issues and evaluate brands based on their social responsibility issues involved, firms are using social media platforms in order to communicate with consumers about Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities. However, the current literature focuses mostly on factors drive engagement of promotional messages, while little evidence was found in the literature on how to design effective CSR messages on social media to engage consumers. Using over 3,000 branded posts on Facebook and Twitter, this research explores factors that help CSR messages become more engaging in social media. The results show that, on average, CSR messages had a negative significant effect on consumer engagement. However, CSR messages became more engaging when designed with emotional appeals, longer texts, and a hashtag. While marginal, CSR messages with informational appeals and humor undermined the effect of CSR messages on engagement. Finally, we explore different types of CSR messages by their beneficiary scope and the role of brands in the message and discuss what message contents drive more engagement in social media. This research contributes to the academic literature and managers by providing new insights on how to design CSR messages for effective communications in social media.

Prof. CHAE Myoung Jin
Assistant Professor, Department of Marketing and International Business
About the author

Managing the COVID-19 pandemic crisis and changing welfare regimes
Authors : Ka Ho MOK; Yeun-wen KU; Tauchid Komara YUDA
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Dec 2020
Source : Journal of Asian Public Policy
DOI : 10.1080/17516234.2020.1861722
This article aims at setting out a broader context for the debates and discussions on welfare transformations driven by rapid global challenges and restructuring. Confronted with challenges resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, governments and societies across the globe must rethink and reimagine their social welfare approaches to make them appropriate and effective to manage the risks and crises. The papers in this special issue address three major themes: 1) democratisation and changing welfare regimes / social policy provision; 2) reflections of social service delivery; 3) rethinking state-market-society relationships when managing welfare needs.

Prof. MOK Ka Ho Joshua
Vice-President, Office of the President
Dean, School of Graduate Studies
Co-Director, Institute of Policy Studies
Lam Man Tsan Chair Professor of Comparative Policy, Department of Sociology and Social Policy
About the author

How critical activities within COVID-19 intensive care units increase nurses’ daily occupational calling
Authors : Yue ZHU; Tingting CHEN; Jie WANG; Mo WANG; Russell E. JOHNSON; Yanghua JIN
Type : Journal Article
Published Date : Nov 2020
Source : Journal of Applied Psychology
DOI : 10.1037/apl0000853
During normal and predictable circumstances, employees’ occupational calling (i.e., a transcendent passion to use their talent and competencies toward positive societal impact and a sense of meaningfulness derived from working in a chosen occupational domain) is observed to be relatively stable. However, with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, circumstances have become anything but normal and predictable, thus putting employees’ sense of occupational calling to the test. In this study, we investigate the possibility that occupational calling fluctuates across days during situations of crisis, and we identify antecedents and consequence of such fluctuations. To test our model, we conducted a daily diary study of 66 nurses working in intensive care units over 5 consecutive work days in a specialized Wuhan hospital that only admitted confirmed COVID-19 patients during the peak of the pandemic in China. We found that the daily number of code blue events (i.e., cardiopulmonary resuscitation efforts with the primary goal of patient revival) was positively related to daily occupational calling for nurses. Moreover, individual differences in prosocial motivation predicted the average level and variability of occupational calling over the 5 days, which subsequently related to the nurses’ job performance. Our study sheds light on how occupational calling enables people with the needed occupational knowledge and skills to function effectively in crisis situations.