the best in you: enhancing performance through feedforward...

The Best in You: Enhancing Performance through

Feedforward Intervention

Thesis submitted for the degree of

"Doctor of Philosophy"

By

Eyal Rechter

Submitted to the Senate of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem

December 2010

Feedforward Interview Eyal Rechter

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This work was carried out under the supervision of

Prof. Avraham N. Kluger


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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This dissertation could not have completed without the help and support of many:

Prof. Avraham N. Kluger was my advisor during my Masters and Doctoral studies. I have learnt from him more than from anyone else, and I am grateful for it.

Prof. Gervase Bushe kindly agreed to serve as a committee member for my PhD. His writings and his comments on my progress were both illuminating and inspiring.

I owe Prof. Lilach Sagiv more than can be expressed in words. As a committee member, a teacher and a mentor, I received endless guidance and support, professionally and personally. I could not have come this far without it.

I am grateful for the support, help, example, advice and belief of Tammar Zilber and Yanko Goldenberg from the Hebrew University's Business School.

I was fortunate to enjoy my fellow PhD students' support and friendship: Liad Uziel, Nir Halevy, Adi Amit, Sharon Ariely-Langer, Dina Nir, and especially Liat Levontin, Varda Wasserman, Edith Levintz-Gilai – partners, colleagues and friends for life.

I thank students of the MBA Research Methods course of 2006 and 2007, for their curiosity, creativity and motivation in their work at the initial phases of FFI experimental examination: Benny Guna, Shimon Biton, Benny Shlezinger, Lior Nissman, Osnat Vroom-Golan, Salem Hatib, Zipi Goodman, Tali Dahan-Rosenfelder, Sara Marjen, Osnat Nitzan, Efrat Sutzkever, Noa Shelach, Liat Kofman, Betti Bruchim, Natali Varbitzky-Katzav, Einat Arviv, Moran Ben-Aharon, Mariela Kantor, Noa Tirosh, Did Shamas (2006); Avivit Hagoel, Maya Goldstein, Shirley Bitansky, Shalom Veil, Ofra Elhasid, Yael Blitz, Yoni Snapiri, Racheli Kaplan (2007). To Itzhak Leibovitch and Yael Cohen from 2006 MBA Emotions in Business Seminar for important insights from the field; and Micha Shaham from 2009's seminar for his research involvement.

To the dedicated research assistants: Adi Kazav Adir Mor, Rita Levinson, Shirley Bitansky, Maya Oren, Efrat Peretz, Nurit Polancheck, Yaakov Ofir, Sivan Alfi, Dafna Fein, Ofer Waldman, Nirit Gordon, Merav Flum, Keren Dartal and to Andrey Elster who was always on call to lend a hand.

To Hana Or-Noy and Noga Sverdlick, for friendship, advice, belief and support.

The following friend and acquaintances shared their work experiences, promoting my research and developing my interviewing skills: Alon Marom, Lior Maayan, Amir Or, Adva Margolis, Idit Newman-Steiner, Orit Rubin, Daphie Ben-Ari, Hamutal Fishman, Anat Zecharia, Eli Elyahu, Merav Jeanou, Almog Behar, Dalia Alev, Liora Jonpur, Naomi Gafni, Mali Nevo, Pnina Fisher, Keren Haddad, Lior Granot, Reuven Sela, Ran Aisenberg and Dorit Zioni; to Nitzan Guy, Or Porat, Yael Zidky, Anat Zafran and Reli Brikner, for admitting me into their organizations.

My work was supported by scholarships for PhD students and the Recanati Fund of the Business Administration School, and an ARI grant to Prof. Avraham N. Kluger.

I thank my family members, who supported, understood, helped and provided enlightening ideas: and helped me remember that what is really important is life is placed outside my computer: Tzila and Danni Ben-Nachum, Gal and Etti Rechter, Netta and Koby Ben Barak, my parents, Dorit and Danny and my wonderful grandmother, Michal. And last, but surely not least, Efrat, who's been there along the way, supporting, sharing, absorbing, and paying a high-price to my preoccupation with my work. Thank you. And for sharing with me the most wonderful creation, my dear boy Rotem, who carries the sunshine in his smile. You're going to get your father back, now.


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This work is dedicated to my late Grandfather, Zvi Rechter,

who more than anyone else would have been thrilled to see this work completed.


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ABSTRACT

Feedforward Interview (FFI) is an organizational intervention designed as a

replacement of or an augmentation to various feedback interventions (Kluger & Nir, 2010).

FFI consists of a systematic analysis of a story regarding peak experience of top performance,

aiming at improving performance and strengthening relationships between participants. The

FFI reveals the crucial conditions that enabled past top performance. These conditions are

used as guidelines for future plans to recreate and expand their presence, thus promoting a

work environment that encourages people to perform at their best through expressing their

strengths and providing them with the necessary conditions for top performance.

FFI is based on the appreciative interview, the first stage of Appreciative Inquiry (AI)

method for organizational change (Cooperrider & Srivastva, 1987). AI is based upon the

assumptions that in every human system some things works well and that reality can be

changed through altering the way we perceive it (Gergen, 1994). Thus, AI strives at revealing

the positive aspects of the system, and use this 'positive core' to ignite the change. FFI is a

variation of AI's appreciative interview, constructed as a stand-alone intervention that can be

applied at the individual level as well as the group or organizational levels. It can potentially

overcome known shortcomings of current employee feedback and development interventions

(Coens & Jenkins, 2002; Ilgen, Fisher, & Taylor, 1979; Kluger & DeNisi, 1996; Smither,

London, & Reilly, 2005).

As a newly-developed organizational intervention, there is a need of empirical

research of FFI, to better understand and assess its effects. Considering the lack of empirical

research of AI (Grant & Humphries, 2006) – the foundation of FFI – such an empirical

assessment of FFI is necessary. Thus, the goal of this thesis is to expand the theoretical

foundation of the FFI and to subject it to empirical tests. I suggest four variables that mediate

FFI's effects on performance: affect, self-efficacy, learning and bonding; and suggests

attachment style as a moderator of the benefits people draw from FFI. The theoretical model


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was examined in three preliminary studies, two lab experiments and two small sample field

experiments.

Preliminary Study 1 (N=1,180) was a measurement study, aimed at establishing the

distinction between social emotions, that are specifically directed toward other people (e.g.,

empathy, jealousy), and general emotions (e.g., excitement, sadness). Participants filled out a

self-report emotions questionnaire comprised of the PANAS (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen,

1988) with added items representing social emotions. Both factor analysis and Smallest

Space Analysis (Guttman, 1968) indicated that social emotions (both positive and negative)

represent distinct (though related) constructs from general emotions (both positive and

negative).

Preliminary Study 2 (N=36) provided initial support for the positive effect of FFI on

affect. Using a within-subject design, participants reported an increase in general and social

positive affect and decrease in general and social negative affect, following FFI. Considering

social affect as a proxy for bonding (emotions toward another person), results provide some

support for the bonding hypothesis as well.

Toward Study 1, a pilot study was performed (N=116), that aimed at choosing a

performance task for Study 1. Out of four tasks that were tested, FFI led to improved

performance in one – brainstorming – that was subsequently used in study 1. Results further

provide some weak support for the affect and bonding hypotheses.

Study 1 (N=264), comparing FFI with control treatments, provided strong support for

FFI's positive influence on affect and learning, and some support for FFI's positive influence

on bonding. It provided partial support for the moderating role of participants' attachment

style. Results regarding performance were mixed, with some measures influenced in

accordance to hypotheses, while other measures affected in a direction opposite to the

hypotheses. The self-efficacy hypothesis was not supported.

Study 2 (N=236) compared FFI to control treatments using a different task – striving

to achieve personal goals of students. Participants were either at the end (N=132) or the


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beginning (N=104) of their first academic year. Unexpectedly, results significantly differed

between the two sub-samples. For the senior students, FFI had a clear positive effect on affect

and bonding, as expected. There was partial support for the self-efficacy, learning and

attachment hypotheses, and mixed support for FFI's influence on performance. For junior

participants, however, results regarding affect, bonding and performance were opposite to the

hypotheses. The self-efficacy, learning and attachment hypotheses again received partial

support. These results suggest that some contextual and participants' characteristics should be

considered while applying FFI.

Field Study 1 (N=22) was conducted in an army base, using a within-subject design.

Participants were senior officers about to participate in a career-planning process. Following

an FFI workshop, they felt their career objectives were clearer to them and reported higher

commitment to the process. Self-efficacy and perceived organizational commitment to the

process were also higher, but effect sizes were not significant, probably due to small sample

size.

Field Study 2 (N=28) was conducted in a high-technology firm. Participants were

managers about to perform an annual performance evaluation process with their subordinates,

and were divided to FFI and control groups. Results indicated better performance of the

evaluation process for managers in the FFI group, who also displayed a more positive tone in

their evaluations, while still providing critical information to their subordinates.

Taken together, the findings show FFI is potentially an effective intervention that can

promote performance in various contexts, positively influencing emotions and strengthening

bonding between people. While all theoretical hypotheses received some support, results

were not unequivocal. Being a relatively novel intervention, further research is needed to

determine specific variables that makes FFI effective and contexts for which it is especially

suited.


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Table of Contents

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................... iii ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................... v

INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................... 1

The Purpose of this Work ........................................................................................................... 1

Chapter Overview ....................................................................................................................... 2

What is Feedforward? ................................................................................................................. 2

Appreciative Inquiry – the Origin of Feedforward ..................................................................... 4

AI in Practice .......................................................................................................................... 6

Empirical Findings of AI ........................................................................................................ 7

Feedforward Interview (FFI) ...................................................................................................... 9

Description of Feedforward .................................................................................................. 10

Alternative Uses of FFI ......................................................................................................... 23

Theoretical Considerations of FFI ........................................................................................ 25

Theoretical Model and Research Hypotheses ....................................................................... 27

EXPERIMENTAL DATA ............................................................................................................ 38

Chapter Overview ..................................................................................................................... 38

Preliminary Studies ................................................................................................................... 40

Preliminary Study 1: Measurement Study ............................................................................ 40

Preliminary Study 2: Emotional Reaction to FFI ................................................................. 45

Study 1: Brainstorming ............................................................................................................. 50

Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 50

Method .................................................................................................................................. 51

Results ................................................................................................................................... 57

Discussion ............................................................................................................................. 67

Study 2: Students' Personal Goals in Academic Life ............................................................... 71

Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 71

Method .................................................................................................................................. 73

Results ................................................................................................................................... 82

Discussion ............................................................................................................................. 93

Field Studies.............................................................................................................................. 99

Introduction to Field Studies ................................................................................................. 99

Field Study 1: FFI at an Army Base ..................................................................................... 99

Field Study 2: Performance Evaluation at a High-Technology Firm ................................. 104

GENERAL DISCUSSION ......................................................................................................... 113

Chapter Overview ............................................................................................................... 113

Summary and Discussion of Findings ................................................................................ 113

Implications of Current Findings ........................................................................................ 120

Future research .................................................................................................................... 130

Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 135

REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................... 136

APPENDICES ............................................................................................................................ 152


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List of Tables

Table 1: FFI protocol (left column) and directions and considerations for the interviewer (right column) (from Kluger & Nir, 2010) ..................................................................... 18

Table 2: Measurement Study: Version 1's Emotions Scales' Intercorrelations and Cronbach Alphas ............................................................................................................................. 43

Table 3: Measurement Study: Version 2's Emotions Scales' Intercorrelations and Cronbach Alphas ............................................................................................................................. 43

Table 4: Preliminary Study 2: Means, Standard Deviations and Intercorrelations and Reliabilities of Emotions Scales ..................................................................................... 46

Table 5: Preliminary Study 2: Paired-Sample t-test Comparisons of T2-T1 Emotion Scales ...... 47

Table 6: Percentage of Participants' Emotional Reaction to FFI in light of Research Hypothesis ...................................................................................................................... 48

Table 7: Linear Regression of T2 Emotions Scales as Predicted by the Corresponding Scales of T1 .................................................................................................................... 48

Table 8: Means, Standard Deviations and Correlations between T2-T1 Emotions Deltas, Self-Efficacy, Learning and FFI Assessment ................................................................. 49

Table 9: Study 1: Individual Measures: Means, Standard Deviations, and Intercorrelations Individual Measures: Means, Standard Deviations, and Intercorrelations ..................... 58

Table 10: Study 1: Group Measures: Means, Standard Deviations, and Intercorrelations of Group Measures: Means, Standard Deviations, and Intercorrelations ........................... 59

Table 11: Study 1: One-Way ANOVAs Testing the Effects of the Experimental Manipulation (FFI vs. Control vs. No-treatment) on the Dependent Variables ............. 59

Table 12: Study 1: Individual Measures: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Dependent variables by experimental conditions, and mean comparisons with Cohen’s d values ............................................................................................................. 61

Table 13: Study 1: Group Measures: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Dependent variables by experimental conditions, and mean comparisons with Cohen’s d values .............................................................................................................................. 61

Table 14: Study 1: Chi-Square Comparisons of Likelihood to Reach a Decision........................ 62

Table 15: Study 1: Two-way ANOVAs testing the effects of the experimental manipulation (FFI, control interview, and no interview), four attachment styles, and their interaction on affect, learning, self efficacy and performance measures. ...................... 62

Table 16: Study 1: t-comparison of PA/NA between Experimental Conditions .......................... 64

Table 17: Study 1: t-comparison of SPE/SNE between Experimental Conditions ...................... 65

Table 18: Study 1: t-comparison of Learning between FFI and FB Conditions ........................... 66

Table 19: Study 1: One-way ANOVA of the Effect of Experimental Condition on Self-Efficacy by Attachment Style ......................................................................................... 66

Table 20: Correlations between Performance and Related Cognitions Measures ........................ 78

Table 21: Study 2: Dependent Variables and Attachment: Means, Standard Deviations and Correlations ..................................................................................................................... 83

Table 22: Study 2: One-Way ANOVAs Testing the Effects of the Experimental Manipulation (FFI Interviewees vs. FB Interviewees vs. Reflection) on the Dependent Variables ....................................................................................................... 85

Table 23: Study 2: MANOVA for the Effects of Experimental Condition (FFI vs. FB) x Role (Interviewee vs. Interviewer) on the Dependent Variables .................................... 86

Table 24: Study 2: One-Way ANOVAs Testing the Significant Effects of Condition (FB vs. FFI) x Role (Interviewee vs. Interviewer) on the Dependent Variables ................... 87

Table 25: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Dependent Variables and Attachment by Experimental Conditions, and Mean Comparisons with Cohen’s d Values ................... 88


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Table 26: Study 2: MANOVA for the Interaction between Experimental Manipulation (FFI interviewees vs. FB interviewees vs. Reflection) and Attachment Style on the Dependent Variables ....................................................................................................... 90

Table 27: Study 2: MANOVA for the Interaction of Experimental Condition (FFI vs. FB) x Role (Interviewee vs. Interviewer) and Attachment Style on the Dependent Variables ......................................................................................................................... 90

Table 28: Field Study 1: Means, Standard Deviations, Cronbach alphas and Intercorrelations of the Four Scales, Before and After the FFI .................................... 101

Table 29: Field Study 1: Paired-Comparisons of Before and After Scales ................................ 103

Table 30: Field Study 1: Percentage of Responses Consistent or Contradictory to Hypothesis .................................................................................................................... 103

Table 31: Field Study 2: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Part 1 Dependent Variables by Experimental Conditions, and Mean Comparisons with Cohen’s d Value ............................................................................................................................. 108

Table 32: Field Study 2: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Part 3 Dependent Variables by Experimental Conditions, and Mean Comparisons with Cohen’s d Value ............................................................................................................................. 109

Table 33: Field Study 2: HLM results of the experimental effect on the proportion variables .. 110

Table 34: Summary of experimental findings ............................................................................ 113

Table 35: Preliminary Study 3: Dependent Variables Comparisons of Individual and Groups Performance Measures Between FFI and Control Conditions – Survival Task ............................................................................................................................... 157

List of Figures

Figure 1: AI's 4-D cycle (Cooperrider & Whitney, 2005, p. 16) .................................................... 6 Figure 2: Theoretical Model of FFI .............................................................................................. 37 Figure 3: Measurement Study: SSA Results of PA, NA, SPE and SNE Scales ........................... 44 Figure 4: Study 1: Experimental Effects on PA/NA by Attachment Style ................................... 63 Figure 5: Study 1: Experimental Effects on SPE/SNE by Attachment Style ............................... 64 Figure 6: Study 1: Experimental Effects on NA by Attachment Style. ........................................ 65 Figure 7: Study 2: ANOVAs for the Significant Effects of Experimental Condition on

Dependent Variables – Between Subjects Comparison ............................................... 85 Figure 8: Study 2: MANOVA for the Significant Effects of Experimental Condition (3

conditions) on Dependent Variables – Between Subjects Comparison ....................... 87 Figure 9: Interaction between Experimental Condition and Role and Attachment Style on

Learning ........................................................................................................................ 92 Figure 10: Interaction between Experimental Condition and Attachment Style on Personal

Resources for Goal 1 .................................................................................................... 92 Figure 11: MANOVAs for the Effects of Experimental Manipulation (FFI Interviewees vs.

FB Interviewees vs. Reflection; Left or FFI vs. FB; right) Interaction with Seniority on the Dependent Variables .......................................................................... 97

Figure 12: Field Study 2: Part 1 Number of Words and Number of Items of FFI and Control Groups ........................................................................................................................ 109

Figure 13: Field Study 2: Part 3 Number of Words (left) and Number of Items (right) of FFI and Control Groups .................................................................................................... 110


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List of Appendices

Appendix 1: General and Social Emotions, Versions 1, 2, 3………………………….. 152 Appendix 2: Pilot Study………………………………………………………………… 153 Appendix 3: Attachment Questionnaire (used in Studies 1 and 2)……………………. 159 Appendix 4: Study1: HLM Results……………………………………………………... 160 Appendix 5: Study 2: Emotions Questionnaire………………………………………… 162 Appendix 6: Study 2: Interviewee questionnaire (FFI and Feedback conditions)……… 163 Appendix 7: Study 2: Interview Protocols that Were Projected During Experimental

Conditions…………………………………………………………………. 166

Appendix 8: Study 2: Main Effects and Interactions between Attachment Styles and Experimental Manipulation (condition x role, FFI vs. FB) on the Dependent Variables………………………………………………………

167

Appendix 9: Field Study 1: Self-Report Questionnaire………………………………… 168


1

INTRODUCTION

The Purpose of this Work

Feedforward Interview (FFI) is an organizational intervention that focuses on analyzing

work peak experiences of top performance through a constructed interview, aiming at improving

performance and strengthening relationships between participants. FFI was developed and

examined in the Hebrew University's Organizational Behavior department during the last years

(Kluger & Nir, 2010). It can potentially bridge the gap between the goals of existing

organizational interventions (e.g., performance improvement, employees development) and their

actual consequences, who often fail to achieve these goals (e.g., Kluger & DeNisi, 1996;

Smither, London, & Reilly, 2005) and are characterized by negative attitudes of both managers

and employees (e.g., Coens & Jenkins, 2002; Ilgen, Fisher, & Taylor, 1979; Rechter, 2006).

Being a new method, while enjoying increasing popularity (Bouskila-Yam & Kluger, in

press; Budworth & Latham, work in progress; Chinotti, 2008), devising a theoretical model of

FFI and empirically examining its outcomes is highly important at this stage, and is the precise

goal of this dissertation. Such theory and empirical data have potential importance for both

scholars and practitioners. For scholars, this dissertation can direct further theoretical

development and future lines of research of FFI specifically, and of organizational interventions

and people's behavior at the workplace at large. For practitioners, it can serve to provide

guidelines for optimal application, and specific contexts and situations that should be considered

while practicing FFI.

In this work I describe FFI, suggest a theoretical model of its consequences and

empirically examine the model's hypotheses.


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Chapter Overview

The current chapter has three main parts: In the first, after introducing FFI, I shortly

review Appreciative Inquiry approach to organizational change, from which FFI evolved. In the

second part I describe FFI in details, its practice and various uses and the rationale behind it. In

the third part I suggest a theoretical model of FFI and the processes through which it affects the

people who participate in it. The empirical research I have been conducting during the past years

is based on this model and is detailed in the following chapter.

What is Feedforward?

"You have 99 percent customer satisfaction and the first thing everybody says is let's look at that 1

percent and determine what the company is doing wrong."

Bob Stiller, CEO, Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (Kinni, 2003)

Liran Vaxberger will probably always remember the last days of 2005 as a down-point of

his professional career. One of Israel's leading soccer referees, young and promising at the time,

suffered from a sequence of bad matches, where controversial decisions have drawn harsh

criticism by the covering media, fans and soccer professionals. In an article published by Moshe

Boker (Boker)1, it was reported that "the referees union will conduct a special meeting tomorrow

regarding the problem named Liran Vaxberger." It was further said that there is unanimous

agreement in the union that Vaxberger is an excellent referee. Officials of the referees union and

former referees were interviewed, providing their views of how to solve Vaxberger's problem

and "the Vaxberger problem" of the union. They all agreed that he lost his confidence, could not

participate in higher-division matches for time being and that suspension was in place, with only

its lengths left to be determined. Personal meetings with a superior and the assignment of a

mentor were also advised. Everyone agreed Vaxberger is good and capable, and it was evident

1 All references regarding this case are taken from Boker's article. Translations to English are mine.


3

that all interviewees genuinely wanted the best for him. One of them was the head of the

committee that later decided about the actions to be taken, another one a member.

Reading the article, I wondered whether the proposed solutions, and the way they were

discussed publicly, were indeed the best way to get Vaxberger back on track. He was surely

familiar with the criticism against him and knew the mistakes he made. Is this public debate, a

suspension, a formal meeting and a mentor were really the best means to establish his lost

confidence? Or was this public discussion causing even more damage to his confidence and

professional self-esteem? Since he displayed high performance in the past, perhaps looking back

at those high times of his career could have been a more productive starting-point. Considering

great performances he displayed in the past could help realizing what enabled him to perform

well – was it the team he was leading (three supporting referees in each game)? The support and

confidence in his skills he received from his superiors? Confidence he had in himself?

Understanding these conditions that enabled him to perform highly in the past could then be used

as guidelines, directing his actions and plans for the future, to recreate these conditions. I further

asked myself, what would it feel like for him, to seat with his superior and discuss these peak

matches, instead of the worst ones he ever had? How would it affect his supervisor's view of

him, his own view of himself, their relationships and his performance in the future?

The practical thinking and ethical standpoint I take here is that underlying FFI, which

involves a systematic analysis of peak work experiences through a constructed interview, to

improve performance in the future. The interview aims at understanding the enabling conditions

for top performance, both at the individual and group levels, and make future plans accordingly

to recreate and expand these conditions that allow people to perform at their best. FFI is based on

the appreciative interview of Appreciative Inquiry (AI) approach to organizational change. In the


4

following section I briefly review AI, before detailing FFI. Following my description of FFI

practice, I suggest a theoretical model and empirical hypotheses of the variables through which

FFI affects performance – affect, self-efficacy, learning and bonding. Finally, I suggest

Attachment Style as a moderator of FFI's effects.

Appreciative Inquiry – the Origin of Feedforward

Appreciative Inquiry (Cooperrider & Srivastva, 1987) – AI – is an approach to

organizational transformation that – unlike traditional approaches – builds upon what works well

(Johnson, 2001), and upon people's ability to change and shape their realities (Cooperrider,

1990). Rooted in the action-research tradition (Lewin, 1947) – though criticizing it – AI was

termed "one of the more significant innovations in action research in the past decade" (Bushe &

Coetzer, 1995, p.13). Cooperrider and Srivastva (1987), in the first publication of AI, stress the

constructive role social scientists should have in changing the organizational systems they study:

"Instead of attempting to present oneself as an impartial… the social scientist conceives of himself

or herself as an active agent, an invested participant whose work might well become a powerful

source of change in the way people see and enact their worlds."

(Cooperrider & Srivastva, 1987, p. 344).

While most variants of action research adopt the logical positivist paradigm, viewing

social and psychological realities as stable and concrete (Bushe & Coetzer, 1995), Cooperrider

and Srivastva adopt Gergen's (1982; 1990) socio-rationalist view. Gergen suggests that social

order and social reality are open to continuous revision and reconstruction, and that the reality

we live in is shaped by our theories of it and by the meanings we assign to various stimuli around

us. Thus, change can be achieved through reshaping and transforming the meanings and

interpretations people assign to events and objects in the organization, and through developing

novel theories of the organization, its goals, capabilities and aspirations. A favorite quote by AI


5

scholars is that of Marcel Proust: "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new

landscapes, but in having new eyes." This 'having new eyes', or developing new theories, is

achieved through open, free and unconstrained dialogue between the members of the social

system under investigation (Cooperrider & Srivastva, 1987).

Following the socio-rationalist view, AI holds the view that social systems evolve in the

directions they inquire, which is the result of the questions they ask. Change in organizations

should not focus on eliminating problem, but rather on striving to new heights. This is achieved

through focusing on positive questions, and studying the systems at their best moments.

Placing AI in the context of other contemporary forms of action research (such as

participatory action research (Whyte, 1989), action science (Argyris, 1995), and action learning

(Marsick & O'Neil, 1999)), Newman and Fitzgerald (2001) suggest they all emphasize "(1) full

client-consultant partnership, (2) collaborative learning throughout the action research process,

(3) the importance of local tacit knowledge, (4) a willingness to examine assumptions in the

system, and (5) organizational transformation. These newer approaches might be viewed as

extending an action research “continuum” that ranges from more traditional, consultant-directed,

linear applications toward increasingly collaborative, systemic, transformational change

processes" (Newman & Fitzgerald, 2001, p.13).

Two specific 'outcome claims' distinguish AI from other organizational development

(OD) interventions (Bushe & Kassam, 2005): First, AI should result in new knowledge and

theories, thus changing not only how people do their work, but rather how they think. Second, AI

results in a generative theory regarding the organization, which provokes its members to action.


6

AI in Practice

AI intervention starts in defining the affirmative topic of inquiry – a central (positive)

topic of investigation of the system. For example, in Avon Mexico (Morris & Schiller, 2003;

Schiller, 2002), what started as a concern about sexual harassment and a wish to diminish

harassment incidents, became an inquiry about the affirmative topic of high-quality inter-gender

relationships in the workplace; At British Airways, concerns about lost luggage led to the

affirmative topic 'exceptional arrival experience'2.

Evolving around the affirmative topic, AI is a four-stage process – the 4-D Cycle:

Discovery, in which organizational members share peak work experiences regarding the

affirmative topic; Dream, in which people envision the future of the organization; Design, in

which the ideal organization is portrayed; and Destiny (called Delivery in earlier versions), in

which a momentum of positive change and top performance is built (Cooperrider & Whitney,

2001, 2005). It is a continuous, cyclical, ever-adapting process, as illustrated in figure 13.

2 Described in Cooperrider & Whitney (2005), pp. 18-23. 3 Reprinted with permission of the publisher. From Appreciative Inquiry: A Positive Revolution in Change,

copyright© 2005 by Cooperrider & Whitney, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., San Francisco, CA. All rights reserved. www.bkconnection.com.

Affirmative Topic Choice

Design What should be the ideal?

Co-Constructing

Discovering what gives life

(The best of what is) Appreciating

Dream What might be?

(What is the world calling for)

Envisioning Results

Destiny How to empower, learn,

and adjust/improvise Sustaining

Figure 1: AI's 4-D cycle (Cooperrider & Whitney, 2005, p. 16)


7

AI intervention "can take as little as a week or two to complete, or as long as several

months" (Johnson & Leavitt, 2001, p. 131). The process does not seek to create structured

processes, but rather to encourage actions by members of the system (Bushe & Kassam, 2005).

During the discovery phase, there is a strong emphasis on the power of 'unconditional

positive questions' (Cooperrider & Whitney, 2001; Ludema, Cooperrider, & Barrett, 2001),

carefully crafting the appreciative interview, and the importance of stories as powerful change

agents and meaning-providers (Ludema, 2002). Bushe & Kassam (2005) perceive the idea of

discovery, upon which FFI is based, as the main characteristic that defers AI from other

intervention. Explaining its rationale in the AI thought, they write (pp. 167-168):

"The importance of narrative to processes of organizing has been stressed by some AI

theorists who, after Gergen (1994), describe organizational life as a narra-

tive. Organizations make themselves understandable to their members and stake-

holders through stories they tell (Ludema, 2002) and members make sense of their

experience in organizations through the stories they tell each other (Bushe, 2001b). A

change in the stories that are told and used for sense-making can, therefore, lead to

change in the informal organization or “inner dialogue” of the organization (Bushe,

2001a). Just as importantly, organizational life tends to unfold like a narrative,

following “storylines” that exist in the social environment in which organizations

operate. Usually there is dominant storyline, or macronarrative, used to understand the

past, present and future of an organization and a change in that storyline can occur as

dozens of micronarratives are collected and told that allow a new dominant storyline to

emerge (Ludema, 2002)."

Empirical Findings of AI

AI theory coincides with the growing field of positive organizational behavior (e.g.,

Bakker & Schaufeli, 2008; Luthans, 2002; Wright, 2003), or positive organizational scholarship

(e.g., Dutton & Sonenshein, 2007), following increasing interest in positive psychology (e.g.,

Fredrickson, 2003a; Seligman, 1999). Examining its actual influence on systems is it applied to,

however, there is a void in quantitative evaluation of AI's influence (Grant & Humphries, 2006).


8

The existing literature of AI consists mainly of case studies, and Bush & Kassam (2005) claim

that despite AI's increasing popularity, "an almost complete lack of published research exists

examining it." (p. 161). Yaeger, Sorensen & Bengtsson (2005) point that "much of the work

reported continues to be anecdotal to a great extent" (p. 313) and Ven der Haar & Hosking

(2004) claim that "calls for evidence of its value are increasingly urgent." (p. 1017).

There are a few exceptions, however, and from those the most prominent is Bushe &

Kassam's (2005) meta-case analysis, reviewing 20 published cases4 using AI for changing social

systems, trying to assess both interventions' adherence to AI principles and their effectivity in

achieving transformational outcomes, such as the achievement of new knowledge, models or

theories, and a "generative metaphor that compels new action" (p. 163). They assessed 7 cases

(35%) as having transformational outcomes. Though all cases adhered to AI principles, it seems

that what distinguished cases that resulted in transformational outcomes from those that did not

was (a) creation of new knowledge; (b) creation of generative metaphor; (c) penetration of the

ground of the organization; and (d) using an improvisational approach to the destiny phase.

Cases that did not result in transformational change were still characterized as successful first-

order change processes (though they rightly note that unsuccessful interventions are rarely

published). They conclude that the transformational results occurred when AI was used in a more

radical, less controlled way, and that "when AI techniques are used in more conventional change

processes, more conventional change outcomes result" (p. 177).

Another quantitative examinations found AI to result in 30-32 percent increase in return

rate and decrease in employees' intentions to leave a large fast-food chain, compared with control

branches (Jones, 1998, 1999). In teams, AI was found to be an effective team-development

intervention in terms of both process and outcomes (Bushe & Coetzer, 1995), and lead to higher

4 Appearing in 5 separate publications, 10 of which are taken from Fry, Barrett, Seiling, & Whitney, (2002).


9

group potency and identification (Peelle, 2006). A second extensive empirical evaluation of AI

was conducted by Yaeger, Sorensen & Bengtsson (2005), who reviewed the literature and found

50 studies, of which (only) 5 included experimental design. In addition to Jones (1999) and

Bushe & Coetzer (1995), they site three other cases, in which AI led to superior group

performance (Head, 20005; in Yaeger et al., 2005), increased willingness to participate in

organizational citizenship behavior (OCB; White-Zappa, 20016; in Yaeger et al., 2005), and

better relationships, collaboration and understanding between groups in an international merging

setting (Miller, Fitzgerald, Murrell, & Preston, 20027; in Yaeger et al., 2005). Overall, Yaeger et

al. conclude that those cases that used experimental designs, "although limited in number, are

highly supportive of the effectiveness of AI, and [provide] general superior results when AI is

compared with alternative change methods and control groups." (Yaeger et al., 2005, p. 313).

Finally, using AI following a negative change to provide social account of the process led to

increased perception of justice, higher positive emotions and job satisfaction and lower negative

emotions, compared with several control treatments (Spatz, 2002).

Feedforward Interview (FFI)

"The goals of FFI are to (a) facilitate positive change by sparking a self-evaluation of

one's current behavior and plans in relation to one's strengths and proven practices, (b)

enrich the interviewer's knowledge of the interviewee's strengths and the conditions

that facilitate the expression of these strengths in the organization, and (c) build and

improve the relationship, existing or new, between interviewer and interviewee."

(Kluger & Nir, 2010, p. 236)

5 Head, R. L. (2000). Appreciative inquiry as a team-development intervention for newly formed heterogeneous groups. OD Practitioner, 32, 59–66. 6 White-Zappa, B. (2001). Hopeful corporate citizenship: A quantitative and qualitative examination of the relationship between organizational hope, appreciative inquiry, and organizational citizenship behaviors. Benedictine University unpublished doctoral dissertation. 7 Miller, M. G., Fitzgerald, S. P., Murrell, K. L., & Preston, J. (2002, August). The efficacy of appreciative inquiry in building relational capital in a transcultural strategic alliance. Academy of Management Meeting Best Paper Proceedings CD-ROM, Academy of Management Meeting, Denver, CO.


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Like AI, FFI belongs to the broader context of positive organizational behavior, focusing

on "how organizations and individuals within them function at their very best" (Fredrickson,

2003a, p. 164) and positive organizational scholarship (e.g., Dutton & Sonenshein, 2007)

focusing on the study of positive and flourishing organizations.

Description of Feedforward

Feedforward Interview (FFI) was developed by Kluger & Nir (2010). Acknowledging the

powerful potential of AI, FFI is based on the appreciative interview, though its development is

anchored in somewhat different, or additional, theoretical considerations:

"Our version of the Appreciative Interview that is incorporated into the FFI protocol

retains the original spirit of Appreciative Inquiry, and at the same time is guided by

four theoretical considerations: (1) utilizing the advantages of episodic memory in

eliciting success stories (e.g., Robinson & Clore, 2002), (2) incorporating a win-win

approach that focuses on maintaining employee-organization alignment (e.g., Pruitt &

Rubin, 1986), (3) formally adding the benefits of active listening to the process (e.g.,

Drollinger, Comer, & Warrington, 2006), and finally (4) using the motivating force of

cognitive discrepancies to facilitate change (e.g., Carver & Scheier, 1981). While the

first consideration is well established within the AI approach, the other considerations

add new perspectives to the process, which are unique to FFI."

(Kluger & Nir, 2010, p. 236)

FFI focuses on the developmental possibilities of the appreciative interview alone, and

does not go through the whole 4D cycle.

FFI begins by the interviewer acknowledging that he or she is certain that the

interviewee's career or current work-life must consist of both positive and negative experiences,

but wishes to concentrate at the moment on the positive aspects of the interviewee's work-life.

The interviewee is then asked to tell a story of a specific peak experience in his work. When the

story is concluded the interviewee is requested to describe the peak moment of the event and


11

describe his or her thoughts and emotions at that moment. Next, the interviewee is asked to

consider the conditions that enabled this event to happen, thus forming a list of necessary

conditions for top performance. Finally, the interview is concluded with the Feedforward

question, asking the interviewee to consider his or her plans for the future in light of these

conditions, and whether they will bring him or her closer to, or further away from, the enabling

conditions.

FFI can be done either individually or in groups. A detailed description of FFI and its

various uses can be found below, in the "FFI in Practice" section (pp. 11-25).

While AI is "often involving hundreds or sometimes thousands of people" (Cooperrider

& Whitney, 2001), FFI can be applied to small groups or teams, and even individuals, so

potentially needs the cooperation of no more than a single person. Another difference is that

while AI ranges from few days and up to months, FFI can be as short as a few hours' workshop,

and can still be advantageous to those who use it. The interview itself ranges from 15-20 minutes

(in experimental or organizational workshop settings) and up to 1-2 hours (when time is

available). Lastly, "FFI requires little training, is easy to implement and can be used for different

purposes by all levels of the organizational echelon" (Kluger & Nir, 2010). Thus, FFI is far less

demanding on the system, in terms of physical, financial and human resources. I will now give a

detailed description of how FFI is conducted.

FFI in Practice

Setting the Stage

FFI is a structured interview, ideally conducted in a quiet, no-interruptions surrounding.

It is important to make enough time to enable a meaningful interview, which is done sitting face

to face without barriers (such as a table). This way the interviewee receives full and undivided

attention, and is aware of it through the interviewer's gestures (like turning a mobile phone off or


12

moving a chair around the table to sit face-to-face). As in AI's appreciative interview, FFI begins

by the interviewer acknowledging that he or she is certain that the interviewee's career or current

worklife must consist of both positive and negative experiences. Experience shows that this

opening acknowledgement is highly important, as most people's professional lives involve many

hardships and frustrations. Speaking with people about their work, they are often more inclined

to talk about their problems and express their complaints and discomforts of their worklife than

to discuss their positive aspects. With this opening statement, that normally gets a reaction of

agreement, the interviewer implies the realization that (work) life is not always good and people

are not always happy. The interviewer does not ignore the problems and the negative aspects of

work (neither they are neglected as an intervention topic, as will be shown below), only today,

right now, he or she wishes to concentrate on the positive aspects of work8.

A Success Story

The interview begins with asking the interviewee to think about a specific incident in

which he or she felt at their best, were full of life, curious, energetic and engaged in what they

were doing – even before they knew the outcome of the process. There are two important aspects

to the story: it should describe a specific incident, and its 'life-giving' aspects should be grounded

in the process and not the outcome. Reliance on a specific incident, rather than broad

generalizations (such as 'I need managerial support to be at my best'), shifts the interviewee's

focus from semantic to episodic memory (e.g., Tulving, 1993; Tulving & Thomson, 1973). This

focus enables considering the past in new light and reach new conclusions and insights – 'using

new eyes' as it may be, thus extracting and creating new knowledge. The focus on a 'process-

based' (as opposed to 'outcome-based') peak experience leads the interviewee away from the

common theme (especially among managers) of 'victory' stories. Such stories are often

8 When time permits, usually in a one-on-one setting, it is sometimes helpful to let interviewees begin by expressing their complaints, and when they feel ventilated, to move on to discuss the positive aspects of their experiences.


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characterized by a painful and harmful struggle to everyone involved. The final 'victory' may

result in feelings of pride and accomplishment, but this success not only demanded a costly price

from the interviewee, but was also at the expense of others. It is suggested that process-based

stories have a stronger potential to lead to an integrative win-win outcome (Kluger & Nir, 2010).

This is especially important when considering not only the individual's best interests, but also

those of the organization that strives at maximizing the accomplishments of all its members.

Both as an interviewer and an observer in workshops I facilitate, I usually see that with

the advancement of the story, both sides become highly involved in and excited about the story

the interviewee describes. As the interview advances, body language becomes more open, facial

expressions soften, and smiles become frequent.

Ideally, the interviewer should use active listening (e.g., McNaughton, Hamlin,

McCarthy, Head-Reeves, & Schreiner, 2007), or active empathetic listening (Drollinger et al.,

2006): making empathetic comments, asking encouraging questions, attuning him or herself to

the speaker’s situation and mood and paraphrasing the story in his or her own words. Doing so

promotes a full comprehension of the story and its meaning to the speaker, and recognizing

important aspects of the situation that might not be fully clear to him or her. It further establishes

and communicates that the interviewer is interested in the speaker’s story, listening carefully and

genuinely doing his or her best to understand it from the interviewee's point of view. The

practice of active listening also ensures a clear, full and precise understanding of the story and

encourages the interviewee to speak and add more information that might be important, while

reviewing the story as it is being retold by the interviewer. Active listening was found to build

trust between people and create a sense of importance and respect for the interviewee (e.g.,

McNaughton et al., 2007). Naturally, the use of active listening is time-consuming and requires

practice, both of which are not always available.


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Experienced Emotions

When the story is concluded and the interviewee confirms he or she were fully

understood and have no more details to add, they are asked what the peak moment of the event

was, what did they think at that moment and how did they feel. This question aims to tap the

interviewee's emotional state during the event, both to intensify its vividness in his or her mind,

and as a signal, to both sides, that the experience was indeed process-based – thus characterized

nearly exclusively by positive emotions – and not outcome-based, which is normally

characterized by a mixed emotional tone. It begins with directing the interviewee's attention to

the peak moment of the event to make these emotions more vivid and accessible, and let him or

her describe their thoughts first. Experience shows that many people find it difficult to describe

their feelings, and tend to relate to cognitive content when asked about emotions (and to answer

'how did you feel?' with 'I thought that…'). This approach allows the interviewee to first express

relevant cognitions, which seems to make it easier to move on to describe emotions (or make it

harder to bypass them by talking about thoughts instead). If the event described was a true peak

process-based experience, the emotions that arise at this moment will normally be ones of elation

and excitement (joy, pride, happiness, enthusiasm and so forth). However, if it was a story of

victory, the emotions are usually more on the line of spite and revenge ('I showed them'),

exhaustion and relief (tired, worn out). If positive emotions were involved they are most likely to

have appeared at the end of the event, when its outcome became known (usually feelings of

pride, relief and satisfaction). If the latter is the case and the story was not characterized by

positive emotions throughout, the interviewer will stop and ask the interviewee to tell another

story, of an event he or she felt good during the event and not only when it was concluded9.

9 In practice, time constrain often prevent from asking for a second story (and sometimes more). This is usually the case in workshops when interview time is constrained. In such contexts, those who failed to choose a 'good' story


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Facilitating/Enabling Conditions

Next, the interviewee is asked to think "what were the conditions that enabled this event

to happen?" He or she is directed to recognize conditions both in themselves and external to

them (such as other people that were present or otherwise participated, the organization, the

physical conditions, the timing, etc.). Since some interviewees are naturally inclined to interpret

their successes as only depending on themselves, while others tend to recognize only conditions

outside of themselves, they are directed to come up with both types of conditions. This focus

helps forming a more balanced (and accurate) picture of the enabling conditions. For this reason,

in the latest adjustment of FFI (Kluger & Nir, 2010), enabling conditions are prompted using

three separate questions, regarding internal conditions, conditions supplied by others and those

supplied by the organization (see table 1 below). The interviewer repeats the list of conditions,

making sure both parties remember them. If the interviewer feels he or she recognizes additional

conditions to the ones the interviewee brought up, they suggest them ('it also seems like the fact

that you were doing something you really like helped as well'). The final decision regarding his

or her own enabling conditions is left to the interviewee. The enabling conditions that are raised

here are crucial to a successful intervention, and the goal is to provide (and equip for the future)

interviewees with a list of enabling conditions that are necessary for them personally to be at

their best, according to the story they told. If time enables it (normally in one-on-one session),

asking the interviewee to tell another story (and even more), can potentially enrich and broaden

this list, which is viewed as a personal code for top performance.

can still benefit from the small-groups work that follows. In experimental settings without group work, however, this is a crucial problem that prevents participants from fully enjoying FFI's potential on one hand, and to provide supporting empirical results for FFI's effectiveness on the other hand. This issue will be discussed further in the general discussion section of this dissertation.


16

The Feedforward Question

At this point, when the list of enabling conditions is finalized and clear to both

interviewer an interviewee, the Feedforward question is asked. The interviewee is asked to

review his or her plans for the near- and far-future, in light of these conditions as a personal code

for top performance and success. Interviewees are instructed to ask themselves whether their

plans will bring them closer to or away from these conditions, and to think how they can adjust

their plans to bring them closer. Depending on the context, the Feedforward question is

sometimes not elaborated on in a form of an interview, but rather left open for the interviewee to

consider privately. The main goal of the Feedforward question is to let (or help) the interviewee

think about ways to increase the presence of these personal enabling conditions in his or her

everyday work-life. The interviewee is instructed to consider each condition individually, actions

that can taken to recreate and enhance it, possible challenges or roadblocks that might interfere,

and how to overcome them.

The Feedforward question is the main part where FFI defers from AI's appreciative

interview. It is based upon the strong agreement between researchers from various areas and

theoretical thinking, that creating (or identifying) discrepancies between current state and a

desired goal or end-state creates motivation to act to decrease these discrepancies (Higgins,

1987; Kluger & DeNisi, 1996). Defining specific performance goals while providing feedback

regarding a current state is a central principle of goal-setting theory (Locke, 2001; Locke &

Latham, 2002, 2006), drawing attention to the discrepancy is necessary for performing goal-

directed actions (Carver & Scheier, 1981), and breaking an ultimate desired goal (i.e., top-

performance or reliving a peak experience) into sub-goals (achieving the enabling conditions)

and realizing ways to encounter them is a central concept in Gollwitzer and colleagues' model of

action phases (e.g., Gollwitzer, 1990, 1999; Gollwitzer & Brandstatter, 1997). Lastly, a person's

belief in his or her own ability to achieve personal goals, as the aim in relating interviewees to


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past relevant experience, is a central part in various motivational theories and concepts, such as

self-determination theory (Ryan & Deci, 2000), expectancy theory (Vroom, 1964), goal

orientation theory (Dweck, 2006), Bandura's work on self-efficacy (e.g., Bandura, 1997) and

Oettingen and colleagues' work on goal attainment (e.g., Oettingen & Stephens, 2009).

Naturally, for some conditions it might not be clear how one can ensure their

reoccurrence. In such cases, the creation of these specific conditions can be the subject of an

additional interview. For example, an interviewee might realize that receiving her teammates'

support was a crucial condition that enabled her to be at her best, but she feels that right now she

does not receive this support and is not sure how to get it. A follow-up interview can evolve

around an experience where she did not have others' support initially, but managed to create it

eventually. Exploring such a case through FFI, and understanding the conditions that enabled her

to establish others' support, can show her the path to achieve it again in the future.

FFI is geared towards revealing facilitating conditions (both individual and communal)

that allow employees to be full of life, and ultimately create a work-environment that enables

them to express their personal strengths. A successful interview extracts new knowledge and

insights about the necessary conditions for top performance, similar to AI's appreciative

interview. It further facilitates initial ideas, or concrete plans, to achieve them again in the future.

When future plans are elaborated on, the interviewer helps the interviewee to consider these

plans, relating to gaps between conditions' importance and their actual existence at present.

Above the emphases described, interviewer-interviewee chemistry and an honest

willingness to help the interviewee are also crucial to FFI's success.

If done in a one-on-one context, this is where FFI generally ends. Table 1 describes FFI's

protocol, alongside directions and consideration for the interviewer. Next, I describe an actual

one-on-one intervention I conducted.


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Table 1: FFI protocol (left column) and directions and considerations for the interviewer (right column) (from Kluger & Nir, 2010)10

FFI Protocol Directions and Considerations Step 1 – Eliciting a success story

Address your interviewee with the following statement: “I am sure that you have had both negative and positive experiences at work. Today, I would like to focus only on the positive aspects of your experiences."

Sit face to face, preferably without a barrier between you, and without any papers, pens or pencils in your hands, so that you will be able to concentrate entirely on the interview process.

Ask your interviewee the following questions: 1. “Could you please tell me a story about an experience at work during which you felt at your best, full of life and in flow, and you were content even before the results of your actions became known?”

The story elicited at this point is the basis of the intervention. Therefore, it is important to make sure you hear a specific story (i.e., specific details such as time, space, and action), rather than a summary of an event or a generalization (i.e., “I usually enjoy…”). Active listening: Reflect the story back to the interviewee by summarizing the story in your own words. Then ask: “Did I miss anything in the story?”, and “Do you want to add anything else?” (If there are corrections or additions reflect them as well).

2. “Would you be happy to experience a similar process again?”

If the interviewee answers YES, continue to the next question, as the story most likely holds information that is worthwhile inquiring into and learning from. However, if the interviewee answers NO, ask for another story that the interviewee would be happy to experience once again.

3. “What was the peak moment of this story? What did you think at that moment?”

Make sure you hear the details of a single peak or two at most. The question about thoughts is designed to help some interviewees relate to the next questions.

4. “How did you feel at that moment (including your emotional and physiological reaction)?”

If the interviewee describes positive emotions, reflect the emotions back and proceed. However, if the interviewee describes negative emotions, or mixed feelings, ask for another story, and start over with question 1. When people are asked to describe how they felt in a certain situation, they sometimes report a thought they had rather than an emotion. If this is the case with your interviewee, simply acknowledge their thought and ask again about the emotions they experienced. Some interviewees describe the emotions in general terms (e.g., “I felt good”), if so ask for the details of the feeling including how the interviewee felt these emotions in the body. Active listening: Reflect the emotions back to the interviewee.

Step 2 – Discovering your personal success code Ask your interviewee the following questions:

1. “What were the conditions in you, such as things you did, your capabilities and your strengths that made this story possible? “

To elicit the underlying conditions that facilitated the interviewee's best performance – his or her personal code of success– it is important to reveal as many diverse conditions as possible.

2. “What did others do that enabled this story?” Therefore, make sure the interviewee recognizes and describes facilitating conditions in him or her, in others and in the organization.

3. “What were the conditions facilitated by the organization (even physical or temporal) that enabled this story”?

Active Listening: Reflect the conditions back to the interviewee. For a full and rich description of facilitating conditions, encourage your interviewee to reveal more conditions by asking “…and what else?” - until you have confirmed that all the conditions in the mind of the interviewee are accounted for.

Step 3 – The feedforward question State the following to your interviewee:

“The conditions you have just described seem to be your personal code for reaching [insert the key achievement in the story, e.g., happiness at work, optimal performance, or outstanding leadership].

Add the question: “If this is so, think of your current actions, priorities and plans for the near future (e.g., next quarter), and consider to what extent they incorporate all of these conditions.”

Depending on the situation the answer to this question may either be elaborated and discussed in detail or left as a question for the interviewee to ponder privately.

10 Used with permission by the owner (License no. 2490180632975).


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An Example of FFI Practice

During the summer of 2006, a mid-level manager in the public sector came to me for

counseling. With ten year tenure and being highly successful and esteemed, she felt dissatisfied

with her job, and wanted a change. I asked her to tell me a story about a time when she did feel

good at her work, enjoyed what she was doing and was excited about it. She told me about a time

when she represented her organization in an international conference, giving a talk about projects

she managed. Since this event did not belong to her usual role, and time was available, I asked

her for an additional story. She told me about a time she designed, implemented and supervised a

training program for new recruits for a project she was managing. In a third story she told me

about a time she was training employees for yet another project she led. I pointed out to a

common theme in all three stories, one of presenting, instructing and guiding others about what

needed to be done. When I said that, her eyes practically lit and she said: "you know what? Now

I'm sure this is it! This is what I need to do."

The accumulating enabling conditions also evolved around this theme: analyzing a

project, planning and training others, creating something new and following the process

throughout, and in a more abstract level, being given a responsibility that is solely 'her own',

using her outstanding interpersonal skills to help and guide others, combining analytical thinking

in private with being under the spotlight in public, being independent and feeling competent and

challenged. Since the events she described were not a central part of her job-description or

everyday worklife, in a traditional inquiry (done either by her supervisor or an internal

counselor) that seeks to understand what aspects in her job she was dissatisfied with and why,

there was a good change to miss these high points that were so meaningful to her. When she

came to me she could not clearly phrase the reasons for her dissatisfaction. When I asked her to


20

review her plans and consider whether they bring her closer to or away from the enabling

conditions, her demeanor marked sadness and despair. And when I asked what can she do get

closer to them, she looked me in the eyes and said with determination, "I have to leave my job."

Three months later she quitted her job and started to work as a free-lance organizational

training professional. She works much harder now than she ever did at her former job, and earns

significantly less. But she is glowing with excitement and enthusiasm whenever she talks about

her new career. Had her supervisors known what she have learnt about herself, they could have

searched together for ways to let her express and develop this newly-recognized desire, without

losing a young and competent manager. But considering the prevalent discourse at her previous

workplace (and many other organizations), it seems highly unlikely this new passion would have

been revealed.

This case exemplifies FFI's potential to create new self-knowledge and awareness for the

interviewee that would otherwise might remain hidden or obscured.

FFI is often conducted in groups, rather than individual counseling. In such cases, the

interview is only the first part of an FFI workshop.

FFI Workshops: Small Groups and Plenum

If FFI is done in a workshop context, participants interview each other in pairs, and at this

point switch roles, so that former interviewees now interview their partners. Interviews are

normally limited to 20-25 minutes each. When the second interview is concluded, pairs are

broken and participants form small groups, without their original partner. Depending on the

organization and the workshop's context, groups can be organized around a common theme,

usually work teams or units. In these groups, tipically consisted of 4-6 participants, members

share an overview of the stories they told, so each group forms a mass of peak experience stories


21

and their enabling conditions. They are instructed to look for common conditions, thus forming a

list of shared conditions that are crucial for top performance and are perceived by group

members as necessary conditions at the group or unit level. The groups then move to assess each

condition's importance for top performance, and the extent to which it is currently present in

their work. Following, while considering the gaps between importance and presence of each

condition, they plan specific actions to enhance it, forecast possible obstacles to this objective,

and consider ways to overcome them.

Following the group work, which takes approximately 45-60 minutes, each group

presents its working process and outcome to the plenum, focusing on issues of practical interest

and relevance to others. Such issues can be insights regarding the FFI process and its possible

uses, issues regarding condition-implementation, or the list of common conditions, whose

implementations can be now the ground for further inquiry. For example, in a workshop I

facilitated for managers in a high-technology firm, the topic of inquiry was providing effective

feedback to their subordinates during employee evaluation meetings11. After analyzing past

events of effective feedback-giving, participants wrote down on a flipchart a list of common

conditions for best feedback practices. Among them was affording enough time both before the

evaluation meeting to prepare it, and during the meeting so a thorough discussion was possible.

From the top management's side it became clear that if they wish the evaluation process to be

effective, they need to allow managers the time to prepare their meetings, and take it into account

while planning managers' tasks. From the managers' side it was understood that not only setting a

timely meeting (60-90 minutes) was required, but also to schedule it early in the morning, before

the daily events take priority and make it harder to clear both time and mind for the meeting.

11 This workshop was conducted prior to and towards an upcoming performance evaluation process (see Field Study 2 in the methodological chapter of this dissertation for further details).


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This exemplifies the use of FFI workshop to provide participants with practical actions or

guidelines to achieve the enabling conditions and exchange ideas with colleagues who face

similar challenges, concerns and needs. The process also provides top management with an

overview of necessary conditions for those under their supervisions to achieve top performance.

The session was concluded in a discussion of the potential integration of FFI in the evaluation

meetings, and some managers did ask their subordinates later to tell them about their high-

moments during the evaluation period.

An alternative way to move on from the interview phase was done by me in a different

context, when I gave a workshop to senior officers in an army base, geared towards a career-

planning process they were about to conduct with their subordinates12. In this workshop my

intention was not to use FFI to understand the path to top performance, but rather to advise them

to use FFI as a working tool with their subordinates to perform an effective career planning.

Since FFI is highly foreign to the strict and hierarchical army culture, following the interviews I

instructed the groups to choose one personal story and consider how the story and the enabling

conditions can be used as guidelines for future career planning. My goals were to make

participants realize the potential of FFI and the novel learning their subordinates can extract from

it to help them plan their professional future, to show them how they can personally use it to

review and plan their own careers, and to make them as comfortable as possible in using FFI.

This design also enabled participants to control their level of participation and realize, through

either helping their colleagues or getting help from them, how the enabling conditions can serve

as guidelines for future planning even in the rigid military culture.

To sum, FFI aims at showing the path (both to employees and their supervisors) to top

performance, and to make top performance concrete in the employees' mind, as well as provide

12 See Field Study 1 in the methodological chapter of this dissertation.


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them with direction and means to achieve it. In the organizational context, in addition, it aims at

establishing an organizational understanding of these conditions, and the path to recreate them in

the future. FFI also emphasizes the responsibility of managers and the organization's leadership

to provide these conditions, if they are to expect top performance from their subordinates. Thus,

FFI emphasizes mutual responsibility for the future of both supervisors and subordinates, and the

organization as a whole. This emphasis is often absent from traditional interventions such as

performance evaluations, where employees are given behavioral instructions and the

responsibility to perform them is considered their own.

An additional characteristic of FFI is that supervisors and subordinates participate as

equals. Formal authority and hierarchy is momentarily ignored, encouraging parties to engage in

an open dialogue promoting mutual knowledge, understanding each other's needs, and bringing

people closer together.

Alternative Uses of FFI

FFI is a generic and modular intervention that can be used as a personal counseling tool,

group intervention and up to involving the whole system. It can be general (inquiring about

professional peak experiences in their broad context) or focused on a specific context or desired

behavior (such as feedback-giving or team-work). FFI can also be used in an iterative manner

where, after the initial interview, specific enabling conditions can be the subject for further

inquiries. For example, in an intervention Kluger and I conducted in a municipal education

system, mutual trust was recognized as a crucial condition for success. However, the means to

establish this trust between seemingly opposing parties – municipality, school managers and

parent's representatives – were not clear. We then facilitated an additional inquiry on situations


24

in which participants managed to build trust where it was not initially present, and the conditions

that enabled them to build this trust.

Despite its positive inclination, FFI can be used to solve problems – through approaching

them from a positive (and constructive) viewpoint. When aims to solve problems, interviewees

are instructed first to picture the ideal opposite situation, and look for a past experience when this

opposite occurred. For example, in a personal counseling process I conducted my counselee

complained about the deteriorating relationships between her and one of her subordinates. After

she pictured the ideal opposite – relationships that involved mutual respect, accepting

organizational hierarchy and authority and commitment to the job and the team – I interviewed

her on past events where she created such an attitude within a subordinate.

It happens at times, when facing novel situations, that pervious experience is scarce or

absent (such as in selection processes), so there are no past experiences to draw upon. In such

cases the interview can be directed to important aspects or characteristics of the job that are less

task-specific, such as team-work, openness to learning and the like. An example of such a case is

depicted in Kluger & Nir's (2010) description of FFI's use in selection interviews. In a technical-

support department of the Hebrew University, the interviewer asked applicants to tell him about

a time where they helped others and felt great. This new approach led some applicants, which

possessed the relevant technical knowledge, to understand that giving support to others will not

make them happy. In such cases it became clear to both the interviewer and the applicant that

this was not the right job for them, and enabled them to part ways with mutual understanding,

without feelings of rejection and failure. When using FFI in a selection process, the Feedforward

question (regarding future plans) is omitted (Kluger & Nir, 2010).


25

Theoretical Considerations of FFI

My theoretical model of FFI (described in the next section) focuses on four variables that

mediate FFI's influence on performance: Affect, self-efficacy, learning and bonding; and one

moderator – attachment style. Before arguing my hypotheses, I briefly relate FFI to two

organizational processes that place FFI in a broader theoretical and practical context:

performance evaluation processes, which, like FFI, aim at enlightening employees regarding

their behaviors to improve performance; and reflected best self, that is suggested to help bring

out the best in people (Roberts, Dutton, Spreitzer, Heaphy, & Quinn, 2005) – again, like FFI.

Organizational Feedback (FB) and Performance Evaluation

FFI is suggested as a complement, and even a replacement, to traditional performance

evaluation processes (Kluger & Nir, 2010). Recently, Kluger & Bouskila-Yam (Bouskila-Yam &

Kluger, in press; Kluger & Bouskila-Yam, 2010) incorporated FFI in a ‘strengths-based

performance evaluation’ in an Israeli private company, and reported high satisfaction of the

firm’s employees and management. Research suggests that traditional FB have only marginal

(and often negative) effect on performance (Kluger & DeNisi, 1996; Smither et al., 2005). FFI

corresponds to the growing evidence of employee evaluation processes’ shortcomings, and calls

for a shift from performance appraisal to performance management (Bach, 2000) and even

dropping performance evaluation altogether (Coens & Jenkins, 2002).

While traditional intervention process is a communication in which a sender (the source)

conveys a message to a recipient (Ilgen et al., 1979), in FFI information is revealed and assessed

in a mutual way, in which the employee is the central source – in accordance to people’s natural

preference to the self as a source of information (Greller & Herold, 1975). Combined with the


26

fact that FFI establishes a self-set performance standard (as opposed to external standards), this

should lower the risk of rejecting the FB (Kluger & DeNisi, 1996).

Examining the human interactionist aspects of FB interventions, Rechter (2006) have

found that among the necessary conditions for effective FB are good relationship and bonding,

unthreatening situation, belief in the source's good intentions, mutual trust and appreciation,

revealing of new information and understanding what needs to be changed and the means to

achieve this change. FFI, if done correctly, can surely produce and support these conditions,

perhaps better than traditional FB encounters that are often perceived as threatening, judgmental

and confrontational (Coens & Jenkins, 2002; Rechter, 2006).

Finally, FFI also corresponds to Ilgen et al.'s (1979) claim that "there is a need to modify

the nature of feedback to fit the individuals for whom it is intended" (p. 386), since FFI affords

high flexibility and places control of the process' content and nature largely (though not

exclusively) in the hands of the employee.

Reflected Best Self (RBS)

A reflected best self (RBS) is "a person's cognitive representation of the qualities and

characteristics that a person displays when one is at his or her best" (Roberts, Dutton et al., 2005,

p. 713). Roberts, Dutton et al. suggest that revealing and enhancing employees' RBS is a fine

method of employee development, helping organizations to bring the best out of employees,

when they are at their best. Instead of using performance evaluations to recognize who is the best

employee, they suggest building the human capital in a way that brings out the best in each and

every employee. They further suggest this practice eliminates employees' weaknesses.

Roberts, Dutton et al. (2005) stress the important role organizations have in finding their

employees' RBS through formal and informal 'appreciation jolts' – events in which employees


27

have an opportunity to receive expressions of appreciation. Such events cause individuals to

integrate new information into their RBS portrait and reveal hidden aspects of their RBS through

enhancing their knowledge base of personal strengths and capabilities. FFI can serve as such an

appreciation jolt, since "engaging in experience that draws upon one's strengths and compe-

tencies may make the RBS portrait more vivid" (p. 720). In the spirit of AI, they too suggest that

organizations gain the most in human development when they focus on what people do best.

Theoretical Model and Research Hypotheses

The theoretical model I present here suggests four variables that mediate FFI's effects on

performance and are known to have important consequences for performance: Affect, self-

efficacy, learning and bonding; and suggests individuals' attachment style as a moderator of the

benefit people might draw from FFI. For each variable, I first discuss its importance, mainly in

the work-life context, and then suggest why I believe it is influenced by FFI.

At its current stage of development and research, it is not yet possible to provide a

complete and comprehensive theory of FFI (Kluger & Nir, 2010). Hence, there is no claim that

the suggested variables are exhaustive. These considered here seems to be: a) important to

performance; b) influenced by FFI; c) relevant for an experimental testing; and d) measurable.

Affect

Emotions play an organizing part in our behavior and perception of the world around us

(Isen, 2003). Our emotional reactions signal us who to trust and who to avoid, when to mate,

fight, engage or run for our lives. Emotions are claimed to be “at the core of the human

experience” (Muchinsky, 2000, p. 801), to influence attention and information processing

(Salovey & Mayer, 1990) and to be tightly linked to motivation and behavior (Carver & Scheier,

1981; Carver, Sutton, & Scheier, 2000). Specifically, there is growing evidence of various


28

positive effects of positive emotions and affect (as well as negative effects of negative emotions)

for individuals and organizations (e.g., Fredrickson, 2003; Hareli & Rafaeli, 2008; Isen, 2003).

Positive affect “encourages and supports flexible, open-minded cognitive processing that

enables people to do what needs to be done and make the most of the situations they are in”

(Isen, 2003, p. 180) and “has important facilitating effects on thinking and on people’s ability to

function" (Isen, 2003, p. 182). It promotes helping (Isen, Clark, & Schwartz, 1976), generosity,

social responsibility and interpersonal understanding (Isen, 2001); encourages approach behavior

(Carver et al., 2000; Watson, Wiese, Vaidya, & Tellegen, 1999) and engagement in adaptive

activities (Fredrickson & Branigan, 2005). Fredrickson's Broaden-and-Build theory (Fredrickson,

1998; 2001; 2005; 2002) suggests that positive emotions build intellectual and social resources

and broaden people's thought-action repertoires and scope of attention. Other findings show

positive affect to be related to thought-processes that are unusual and diverse (Isen, Johnson,

Mertz, & Robinson, 1985), flexible (Isen & Daubman, 1984), creative (Isen, Daubman, &

Nowicki, 1987), integrative and open to information (Estrada, Isen, & Young, 1997) innovative

and efficient (Isen, 2001). Furthermore, Fredrickson & Losada (2005) suggest that a positive-to-

negative-affect ratio of 2.9 and above characterizes flourishing individuals (connoting goodness,

generativity, growth and resilience) – suggesting the importance of positive affect experiences in

people's life and work.

Raghunathan and Trope's (2002) mood-as-a-resource hypothesis regards positive mood

as a resource people rely on while processing self-relevant information (such as about them-

selves or their performance), that might have an emotional immediate cost, but holds long-term

benefits (see also Trope & Netter, 1994). This effect of mood-as-a-resource is especially relevant

when individuals have control over future outcomes. FFI, like AI, although positive in nature,


29

can still bring forth problems and weaknesses (Newman & Fitzgerald, 2001). The mood-as-a-

resource hypothesis suggests that the overall positive context of FFI will be advantageous in

dealing with such problems, as employees will approach them in a positive mood.

More specific to organizational context, Anat Rafaeli nicely expresses the importance of

the study of emotions to organizations:

“People cannot park their emotions along with their cars when they come to work in

the morning. Business and management scholars must come to understand emotion in

order to understand work and organization.”

(Rafaeli, 2004, p. 1344)

In organizational-relevant contexts, positive affect was shown to facilitate creativity,

problem-solving and decision-making (Estrada, Isen, & Young, 1994; Estrada et al., 1997; Isen,

2001; Isen et al., 1987; Madjar, Oldham, & Pratt, 2002), integrative bargaining (Carnevale &

Isen, 1986), openness to information and more regard to information that do not fit prior

hypotheses (Estrada et al., 1997), and to lead to customer satisfaction (Pugh, 2001). It was found

to increase helping behaviors and innovation, and reduce risk-taking and negative perceptions of

and behaviors toward out-group members (see Isen et al., 1987 for a review). Positive affect was

further found to increase expectancy motivation (Erez & Isen, 2002), intrinsic motivation and

responsible work-behavior (Isen, 2001, 2002; Isen & Reeve, 2005), to guide feedback-seeking

(Gervey, Igou, & Trope, 2005; Trope & Pomerantz, 1998), influence outcomes of feedback

interventions (Atwater & Brett, 2005; Brett & Atwater, 2001; Smither et al., 2005) and to be

positively related to performance (Erez & Isen, 2002; Isen, 2001). Job satisfaction, stress and

organizational justice – all central work psychology concepts – are related to emotions and are

partly defined as affective responses (Muchinsky, 2000).

Finally, leadership research has recently focused on emotional characteristics of leaders-

followers interactions. Charismatic and transformational leadership are characterized by


30

emotional attachment to the leader (Bono, Foldes, Vinson, & Muros, 2007; Shamir, 1991;

Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993). Positive mood of the leader was found to facilitate coordination

among followers (Sy, Coˆte´, & Saavedra, 2005), prosocial behavior and decreased turnover,

both at the individual (George, 1991) and group (George & Bettenhausen, 1990) levels.

Hypothesis 1a – FFI's influence on general emotions

Roberts, Dutton et al. (2005) suggest that appreciation induces positive emotions and

Seligman, Steen, Park & Peterson (2005) have found that reflecting on situations where

participants were at their best and the strengths they displayed raised self-reported happiness and

lowered self-reported depression (though this effect was only short-termed). Trope & Netter

(1994) have found that recalling past positive experiences improved subjects' mood. Hareli &

Weiner (2002) suggest that experiences of success elicit pride, while experiences of failure (quite

often present in formal FB interventions) elicit guilt or shame. On the contrary, negative

feedback can lead to feelings of anger and discouragement (Brett & Atwater, 2001).

Since FFI in its essence is about recalling and reliving past (positive) experiences of

success, while avoiding criticism, discussing failures and negative feedback, it is hypothesized to

have a positive effect on people's affect.

Hypothesis 1a: Participation in FFI will increase positive emotions, and reduce negative

emotions, relative to control treatment.

Social emotions. Kemper (1991) suggests that our social environment is a central

generator of emotions. Indeed, Wallbott & Scherer (1986) have found that people were most

likely to specify social relations and encounters when asked about emotional incidents. Despite

this recognized importance of emotions in the social context, most research on, and specifically

available measures of emotions focus on general emotions (such as joy or distress), while


31

disregarding the fact that a large scope of emotions occur in the interpersonal realm (e.g.

sympathy, jealousy). We have suggested elsewhere (Levontin & Rechter, 2008; Rechter,

Levontin, & Kluger, Work in progress) that social emotions can be considered as a separate

(though related) construct distinguished from general emotions.

Hypothesis 1b – FFI's influence on social emotions

AI literature stresses the major importance of interpersonal reality and positive affect, a

claim that provides an additional reason to examine whether emotions between people are

distinct from positive emotions generally. As FFI is a (positive) interaction between people, it is

hypothesized to have positive effect also on social affect.

Hypothesis 1b: Participation in FFI will increase positive social emotions and decrease

negative social emotions, above and beyond its effect on positive and negative general emotions,

relative to control treatment.

Self-Efficacy

"Perceived self-efficacy is defined as people's beliefs about their capabilities to

produce designated levels of performance that exercise influence over events that

affect their lives. Self-efficacy beliefs determine how people feel, think, motivate

themselves and behave. Such beliefs produce these diverse effects through four major

processes. They include cognitive, motivational, affective and selection processes."

(Bandura, 1994, p. 71)

"Those who regard themselves as highly efficacious act, think, and feel differently

from those who perceive themselves as inefficacious. They produce their own future,

rather than simply foretell it."

(Bandura, 1997, p. 395)

Self-efficacy is a component of an overall self-concept regarding a person's perceived

capacity to perform a particular task (Bandura, 1982, 1997). It is related to performance (Wood

& Bandura, 1989b), predicts performance improvement (Smither et al., 2005) and is "both


32

antecedent and a consequence of performance" (Bandura, 1997). Self-efficacy is specifically

related to people's persistence and resilience facing challenges, difficulties and failures (Wood &

Bandura, 1989b), willingness to try new things (Roberts, Dutton et al., 2005), motivation (Wood

& Bandura, 1989b), greater improvement following feedback (Heslin & Latham, 2004), and the

tendency to participate in development activities (Atwater & Brett, 2005). Low self-efficacy, on

the other hand, might lead to learned helplessness (Mikulincer, 1988).

Research on goal orientation theory (Dweck & Leggett, 1988; Dweek, 1986) have shown

self-efficacy to be related to learning orientation and overall performance (Dweek, 1986;

Vandewalle, 2001). Self-efficacy is also an essential component of expectancy motivation

(Vroom, 1964), intrinsic motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2000) and goal-setting theory (Locke, 2001;

Locke & Latham, 2002). Self-efficacy, or the belief in one's ability to accomplish goals, in also

related to successful intelligence (Sternberg, 1997). When a person views a desired outcome in

his future, the most advantageous strategy to achieve this outcome is by developing positive

expectations regarding its occurrence through envisioning relevant behaviors (Oettingen &

Stephens, 2009). Developing these positive expectations about the future is done through

reliance on past experience (Oettingen & Stephens, 2009), as is done in FFI.

Hypothesis 2 – FFI's influence on self-efficacy

Wood & Bandura (1989b) report that self-efficacy can be situationally induced, and

stress that organizations should take steps to heighten employees' levels of self-efficacy through

experiences of success. Future expectation to succeed relies on memories of past experience, and

favorable memories raise expectations and effort (Carver & Scheier, 1990). Considering the fact

the FFI is based upon recollections of one's own past successful experiences, and specifically his

personal contribution to the event, I hypothesize that


33

Hypothesis 2: Participation in FFI will increase state self-efficacy, relative to control

treatment.

Positive emotions were found (Saavedra & Earley, 1991) or suggested (Raghunathan &

Trope, 2002) to be positively related to self-efficacy, or perception of personal control over

outcomes. Carver & Scheier (1990) suggest reciprocal relationships between positive

expectations and positive emotions, such that they tend to heighten each other. This suggests a

possibility that positive affect and self-efficacy mutually enhance each other.

Learning

Learning is at the core of our everyday experiences, and is often a goal in itself, as in

educational contexts or organizational training and development programs. Learning, particularly

from past experiences, is suggested to be related to various outcomes, such as professional and

personal performance and success (e.g., Sternberg, 1997) and performance improvement

following organizational feedback (Heslin & Latham, 2004). It is related to change (hopefully to

the better) in behavior in most psychology and OB text books (e.g., Baumeister & Bushman,

2010; Greenberg & Baron, 2008; Plotnik & Kouyoumdjian, 2008; Robbins & Judge, 2009).

Learning is also related to the development and expansion of one's abilities (Dweck, 2002), and

to intelligence, via the ability to acquire and create new knowledge (H. Gardner, 1983).

FFI aims to improve performance (though not only), and is assumed to do so also through

learning, via guided systematic consideration of past events. I suggest that participation in FFI

contributes to the individual's learning, in the sense that it helps people know themselves better

(professionally) and what they need, and can do, to perform at their best. Aiming to show that, I

will try to assess learning by measuring the perception of participants that they gained new


34

knowledge and insights from the intervention, and hypothesize that as one of the main goals of

FFI is the uncovering of new knowledge,

Hypothesis 3: Participation in FFI will increase learning and revealing of new

information, relative to control treatment.

Bonding

Bonding is a central construct in many psychological theories, ranging from personality

theories such as Attachment theory (Bowlby, 1987), through counseling theories such as Rogers’

Client-Centered therapy (Rogers, 1946). Central motivation theories like Maslow’s Theory of

Human Motivation (Maslow, 1943) and Self-Determination theory (Ryan & Deci, 2000)

specifically posit the importance of human bonding and relatedness as a central component in

their conception of motivation and its detriments. Recently, Levontin (2008) has extended Goal-

orientation theory (Dweck, 1986) by introducing amity as a central achievement motivation.

These theories, as well as many others, share the common view that safe and accepting close

relationships with others are a crucial factor in people’s well-being and adjustive functioning in

their environment. Baumeister & Leary (1995), in their extensive review of belonging, see it as a

“powerful, fundamental and extremely pervasive motivation.” (p. 497).

Dutton & Heaphy (2003) suggest that high-quality connections create feelings of vitality

and aliveness. Such connections have the capacity to influence people’s ability to examine

alternative, valued identities and feelings of worthiness and positive meaning. Ultimately, high-

quality connections have strong effects on organizational functioning, building organizational

strengths, health, flourishing and virtues. They can help people develop, enhance their

commitment and effort at work and facilitate learning through knowledge exchange and creation.


35

Carmeli & Gittell (2009) founded that psychological safety enables people to speak more

freely about their mistakes, thus learning from them. Their findings point to another advantage of

high-quality relationships, between managers and subordinates in particular.

Finally, Rechter (2006) suggests that bonding, mutual trust, good relationships and good

intentions are among the necessary conditions for effective organizational feedback.

Hypothesis 4 – FFI's influence on bonding

Bonding can be related to Hallowell’s (1999) ‘human moment’: an authentic

psychological encounter that involves physical presence and cognitive and emotional attention. It

requires the full attention of one person to another, and is suggested to bring people together and

have long-lasting effects on their well-being and performance at work. FFI strongly corresponds

to Hallowell's notion of a human moment, and combined with Carmeli & Gitell's (2009)

suggestion that sharing stories of peak experiences creates bonding between people, I argue that

Hypothesis 4: FFI will increase bonding between interviewer and interviewee, relative to

control treatment.

Attachment Style as a Moderator

Probably not all people can benefit to the same extent from FFI. The individual's

attachment style (Bowlby, 1987; Mikulincer & Shaver, 2008) might be a possible moderator of

the benefit people can draw from FFI.

Research on adult attachment show that people with secure attachment style are happier,

friendlier, more trusting and understanding, develop closeness with others easily (Hazan &

Shaver, 1987), tend to self-disclose more (Mikulincer & Nachshon, 1991), and can more easily

seek and accept from, and offer to others support in time of need (Simpson, Rholes, & Nelligan,

1992; Simpson, Rholes, Orina, & Grich, 2002). At work, secure individuals report higher


36

satisfaction from their work and co-workers (Hazan & Shaver, 1990) and have productive

relationships with subordinates (Johnston, 2000; Popper, Mayseless, & Castelnovo, 2000).

Anxious/ambivalent individuals tend to be obsessive, emotionally unstable and preoccupied with

personal relations and intimacy (Hazan & Shaver, 1987). At work, they worry about their

performance and others' appreciation of them (Hazan & Shaver, 1990) and suffer from negative

interactions with subordinates (Johnston, 2000). Avoidant individuals are characterized by fear of

intimacy, and are uncomfortable being close to others and trust them (Hazan & Shaver, 1987),

dismiss the importance of relationships, maintain distance from others, inhibit emotional display,

experience more negative emotions interacting with self-disclosing partners and their own self-

disclosure does not correspond to their partner's (Mikulincer & Nachshon, 1991). At work, they

prefer to work alone (Hazan & Shaver, 1990) and suffer from conflictual interactions with their

subordinates (Johnston, 2000).

The interpersonal dynamics of FFI is crucial to its successful outcome. The ability to self-

disclose, share a special moment and the feelings it brought, and to discuss one's virtues and

interactions with his or her surrounding, are all necessary components of the insights one can

draw from FFI. As people with avoidant attachment style tend to avoid and dislike self-

disclosure and feel uncomfortable with it, it is hypothesize that

Hypothesis 5a: Following FFI, avoidant individuals will show less increase (possibly a

decrease) in positive emotions and less decrease (possibly an increase) in negative emotions,

both general and social, relative to secure and anxious/ambivalent individuals.

As anxious individuals tend to be preoccupied with relationships, FFI might appeal to

them, but this preoccupation, combined with their concern about their performance (Hazan &

Shaver, 1987), might impair their learning on the one hand, and not be enough to boost their self-

efficacy on the other, therefore


37

Hypothesis 5b: Anxious individuals will show a lesser raise in self-efficacy and amount of

learning following FFI, relative to secure individuals.

Following the above hypothesis, it is implicated that secure individuals will be most

positively affected by FFI (higher affect, self-efficacy and learning) and hence I argue that

Hypothesis 5c: Securely attached individuals will show a greater increase in

performance following FFI, relative to avoidant and anxious individuals.

FFI's Effect on Performance

Finally, I argue of course that FFI will contribute to performance, hence

Hypothesis 6: FFI will lead to improved performance, relative to control treatment13

.

Figure 2 summarizes the theoretical model presented here.

13 As FFI aims at deciphering the individual's personal code of top performance, it might be that the task in question moderates FFI's effectiveness. It is likely that FFI will be more effective for tasks for which individual characteristics are stronger determinants of performance (e.g., teaching vs. technical tasks). However, examining task as a boundary condition is beyond the scope of this dissertation.

PA

Learning

FFI

NA

SP

SN

Self- Efficacy

+ +

+ +

+

+

+ -

-

+

Attachment Style

Performance

H5a

H5b

H5b

H1a

H1b

H2

H3

H6

Bonding

H4

H5c

Figure 2: Theoretical Model of FFI


38

EXPERIMENTAL DATA

Chapter Overview

In this part of the dissertation I discuss the experiments examining various aspects of the

theoretical model proposed in the introduction. This chapter consists of three parts: in the first

part, I discuss two preliminary studies designed to develop the tasks and measurements and

perform initial examinations of some of the hypotheses. Next, I discuss in details the two major

lab experiments testing the theoretical model, while using control groups to compare FFI's

influence on the mediating variables and on performance variables, and their interactions with

attachment style. In the third part, I briefly discuss two small-scale field studies, in which FFI

produced some positive results that can direct future, larger-scale field studies.

Preliminary Study 1 explored affect – a central variable in my proposed theory – and

shows that positive and negative social emotions – emotions that are directed to other persons

(e.g., empathy, jealousy) – can be viewed as distinct constructs from the more commonly used

positive and negative general emotions (e.g., anxiousness, happiness). Preliminary Study 2

examined FFI's effect on participants' emotions. Participants reported higher positive emotions

and lower negative emotions following FFI, compared with their reports prior to it. It was further

found that the changes in the new social emotions scales developed in Preliminary Study 1

maintain their significance while controlling for the general emotions scales. Thus, results further

establish the unique contribution of social emotions to the understanding of people's emotional

reactions. Lastly, results provide initial examination of the relationships between affect, self-

efficacy and learning, two other mediators in my proposed theory. Viewing social emotions as a


39

proxy of interpersonal bonding is also discussed, as well as the validity of interviewer's

assessment of the FFI they conducted.

In the second part, in Study 1, 256 participants were divided to FFI, control or no-

treatment groups, and performed a brainstorming task in groups of 3-5. The task was chosen

based on a pilot study in which four task were examined, and which showed FFI to have some

benefit to positive emotions and brainstorming performance, compared with control groups.

Participants in the experimental conditions were interviewed by trained research

assistants. Results show that FFI was advantageous to participants' affect, bonding (assessed

through social emotions) and learning, but not to self-efficacy and performance. Participants'

attachment style interacted with experimental condition in its effect on emotions, in a pattern

consistent with the hypotheses, but did not significantly interact with condition in its effect on

any other dependent variable.

In Study 2, 236 students participated and worked on their own personal goals during their

studies period. They were divided to FFI or Feedback conditions, where they worked in pairs and

interviewed each other, or reflection condition, where they worked individually. Results show

that the different experimental treatments affected the dependent variables, but these effects were

not always in the hypothesized direction: FFI's positive influence on emotions, self-efficacy,

learning, and bonding was found for one sub-sample (more senior students), but not the other

(junior students). Effects on performance were mixed, some of them consistent with the

hypotheses. Surprisingly, participants were better off in the interviewer role. Lastly, attachment

style did not interact with experimental condition, but did interact with experimental role.

In the third part I examined FFI in the field with small sample sizes, thus results should

be interpreted with caution. The first study (N=22), carried out with senior army officers as a


40

start-off of a career-development process, showed that participants felt their career objectives

were clearer to them, and they were more committed to the process following FFI workshop,

compared with their reports immediately prior to the workshop. In the second study (N=28),

carried out with high-technology company managers prior to the company's annual performance-

evaluation process, participants were divided into experimental and control group (who received

the FFI workshop after the process were concluded). Managers in the FFI group used more text

and more content-items compared with control participants, and included more positive items in

their evaluations, with no decrease in the number of negative items. These findings might

indicate that managers in the FFI group have put more thought and consideration to the

evaluation process, and were more serious about it.

Preliminary Studies

Preliminary Study 1: Measurement Study

Introduction

In the last few decades there has been a growing interest in emotions as a research topic

and with it, a growing need, and many attempts, to measure and assess emotions of research

participants. Since emotions are defined as subjective reactions, it is common to use self-reported

measures in studies of emotions (though see Davidson (2003) for a counter-argument), and there

are some available measures, such as the popular PANAS (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988).

The PANAS distinguishes between the two broad (perhaps the broadest) constructs of emotions,

positive affectivity and negative affectivity. However, I suggest that adding the parallel

constructs of social positive and negative affectivity can be of theoretical consequences. By

social emotions I refer to emotions that are specifically directed to other people (e.g., sympathy,

jealousy), unlike most of those consisting the PANA and other measures, that can be


41

conceptualized as general, or not necessarily target-directed (e.g. elation, sadness). Indeed, many

scholars posit that a significant part of people's emotional experiences are inter-personal in

nature (C. B. Gardner & Gronfein, 2005; Scheff & Retzinger, 2003). Kemper (1991) suggests

our social environment is a powerful generator of emotions, and Wallbott & Scherer (1986) have

found that people were most likely to specify social relations and encounters when asked about

incidents when they felt anger, fear, joy or sadness.

There is no known available measurement of social emotions, which are perceived as a

central variable in FFI’s influence on participants. It was therefore needed to develop such

measure that could be integrated with available measurements of general emotions. The goal of

Preliminary Study 1 was to develop such a measure and test the hypothesis that social emotions

represent a separate construct, distinct from (though related to) general emotions. Thus, items

representing social emotions were added to the self-reported PANAS scale, and two versions

were run (analyzing the data and refining the questionnaire for each version)14.

Hypotheses

H1: Adding social emotions to the PA<AS questionnaire will result in additional, distinct

constructs, representing social positive emotions (SPE) and social negative emotions (S<E).

Since the PANAS was developed without considering the suggested distinction, two of

its negative items (hostility and shame) are hypothesized to belong to the new SNE scale.

H2: The PA<AS' <A items 'hostility' and 'shame', which represent social emotions, will

be closer to the new S<E items than the PA<AS' <A.

14 This research project is done with collaboration with Liat Levontin.


42

Method

Participants

A total of 1,180 participants filled out one of the first two versions of the questionnaire:

363 filled out the version 1 and 817 filled out version 2.

Measurements

The questionnaires consisted of 51 (version 1, see appendix 1 for items' list) or 44

(version 2, see appendix 1) emotions. The first 20 were the original PANAS (Hebrew version

translated and tested by Uziel, 2006), followed by various positive and negative social emotions.

Participants were asked to indicate, using a 1-5 Likert-type scale, to what extent they feel each

emotion now.

Procedure

Participants filled out the questionnaire in various ways, such as a part of class

requirement, internet survey or a larger experiment, or being approached by friends or relatives.

Results

Version 1: Factor Analysis with Varimax rotation yielded 7 factors, of which the first

four roughly correspond with the four emotional constructs hypothesized, accounting for a total

of 49% of the variance, thus supporting H1. Hostility and shame were not clearly loaded on

either NA or SNE factors. However, while dropping them from the NA scale had a meager effect

on its Cronbach alpha (a decrease from .87 to .8615), adding them to the SNE scale significantly

improved its Cronbach alpha (from .60 to .70), thus supporting H2 as well. Considering the

factor analysis results and items' effect on scales' Cronbach alphas, PA16, NA17, SPE18 and SNE19

scales were computed. Table 2 shows scales' intercorrelations and Cronbach alphas.

15 Calculated without the item Jittery, that negatively affected the scale's Cronbach alpha, dropping it from .87 to .57. 16 Without the item Strength, who had a strong negative effect on the scale's Cronbach alpha, dropping it from .84 to .59.


43

Table 2: Measurement Study: Version 1's Emotions Scales' Intercorrelations and Cronbach Alphas

PA NA SPE SNE PA (.84) NA .16 ** (.86) SPE .58 ** -.04 (.87) SNE .03 .67 ** -.11 * (.70)

<otes: N=363; ** p<.01, * p<.05; Cronbach alphas are displayed in the diagonal.

While the factor analysis results support the hypothesis that positive and negative social

emotions are distinct from, though related to general positive and negative emotions, the

intercorrelations are in the magnitude of the cross product of the respective reliabilities, raising a

question of whether or not these constructs are indeed distinct.

Version 2: Based on version 1's results, and considering translation issues (since this

version was translated to English), some of the social emotions items were replaced in version 2.

Factor analysis with Varimax rotation again yielded 7 factors, of which the first four roughly

correspond with the four emotional constructs hypothesized, accounting for a total of 54% of the

variance, again supporting H1. NA items hostility and shame had higher loadings on the SNE

than on the NA scale, supporting H220. Based on these results, PA21, NA22, SPE23 and SNE24

scales were computed. Table 3 shows the scales intercorrelations and Cronbach alphas.

Table 3: Measurement Study: Version 2's Emotions Scales' Intercorrelations and Cronbach Alphas

PA NA SPE SNE PA (.87) NA .13 (.92) SPE .72 ** -.04 (.91) SNE .01 .70 ** -.05 * (.90)

<otes: N=817; ** p<.01, * p<.05; Cronbach alphas are displayed in the diagonal.

17 Consisting of seven items as explained before. 18 9 items: sympathy liking closeness, honesty, understanding, empathy, openness, appreciation, intimacy. 19 6 items: embarrassment, detachment, insult, humiliation, hostility, shame. 20 These two items were the only ones with higher than .4 loading on both scales. 21 With all 10 items. 22 8 items, excluding hostility and shame. 23 10 items: sympathy, liking, partnership, understanding, empathy, appreciation, intimacy, brotherhood, love, fondness. 24 10 items: hostility, shame, insult, humiliation, jealousy, hate, pity, contempt, loath, averse.


44

Analysis of version 2 of the questionnaire showed similar results to version 1's, although

versions differed with respect to the individual items representing the social emotions facets.

An additional analysis of the data was done using Smallest Space Analysis (SSA) maps

(Guttman, 1968), with items representing the four scales. SSA results produced a two-

dimensional space, with COA=.074 and CI for angular separation was .98 (see figure 3). While

the positive items of both scales are widely spread and general and social items clearly distinct,

the negative items are more closely grouped, with general and social items somewhat mixed.

SSA map of PA & NA and Social EmotionsSocial Emotions

(N= 820, C0A = .07)

SSA map of PA & NA and Social EmotionsSocial Emotions

(N= 820, C0A = .07)

Figure 3: Measurement Study: SSA Results of PA, NA, SPE and SNE Scales

Discussion

Data analysis shows that, corresponding to the theoretical suggestion, social emotions,

ones that are directed to other people, are distinct from general emotions. These distinct (though

related) constructs have both theoretical and practical implications, both to the understanding of

people's emotions and to measure and asses reactions to various stimuli. The four separate scales

will be used throughout this dissertation in testing FFI's effects on emotions.


45

Preliminary Study 2: Emotional Reaction to FFI

Introduction

Preliminary Study 2 was conducted in preparation for Study 1. It was done as a part of

research assistants' training in conducting FFI, interviewing participants regarding peak

teamwork experiences, as was to be done in Study 1. Its main goal was to examine the first

theoretical hypothesis, regarding FFI's positive influence on emotions, in a within-subject design.

A second goal was to examine whether FFI's quality can be assessed by the interviewer, and if

this assessment can serve as a valid predictor of FFI's outcomes. The last goal was to provide a

preliminary examination of possible relationships between FFI's quality and the mediating

variables: effect, self-efficacy and learning (bonding was not measured directly).

Hypotheses

H1: Participants will report higher levels of positive emotions (both general and social)

and lower levels of negative emotions (both general and social) following FFI.

H2: Interviewer's assessment of the interview will be positively related to the change in

positive emotions (both general and social) and negatively related to the change in negative

emotions (both general and social) following FFI.

H3: Interviewer's assessment of the interview will be positively related to perceived level

of self-efficacy and learning of the interviewee, following FFI.

Method

Participants

A total of 36 subjects participated voluntarily or in exchange for course credit (26 of

which were personal acquaintances of the interviewer).


46

Measurements

Emotions. Participants filled out a new version of the emotions questionnaire described in

Preliminary Study 1 (version 3; see appendix 1), with the PANAS items followed by 23 items

representing social emotions. The questionnaire was filled out twice, before and after the FFI.

Table 4 displays means, standard deviations, intercorrelations and reliabilities of the scales.

Table 4: Preliminary Study 2: Means, Standard Deviations and Intercorrelations and Reliabilities of Emotions Scales

T1 T2

M SD PA NA25 SPE SNE PA NA1 SPE SNE

T1

PA 2.98 .80 (.86)

NA 1.85 .67 .32 * (.86)

SPE 3.45 .78 .66 ** .12 (.89)

SNE 1.41 .53 .40 ** .73 ** .20 (.83)

T2

PA 3.30 .84 .83 ** .18 .55 ** .25 (.89)

NA 1.59 .60 .31 * .81 ** .06 .68 ** .19 (.89)

SPE 3.64 .79 .65 ** .08 .88 ** .11 .62 ** -.01 (.90)

SNE 1.27 .44 .43 ** .63 ** .13 .90 ** .28 † .63 ** .09 (.84) N=36; ** p<.01, * p<.05, † p<.1.

Emotions deltas. The change in each scale following the interview was measured by

calculating the difference between T2 and T1 (e.g., D_PA = PA-T2 – PA-T1 = .32). Positive

values of the deltas indicate an increase in the relevant scales and negative values indicate a

decrease, following FFI.

Self-efficacy. Following the interview, participants noted, on a 1-5 likert-type scale, to

what extent they feel they are able successfully participate in teamwork.

Learning. Following the interview, participants noted, on a 1-5 likert-type scale, to what

extent did the feel they have learnt from the interview.

FFI assessment. Following the interview, interviewers filled out a short report, briefly

summarizing the interview's content and assessing it by replying on a 1-7 likert-type scale the

25 Without the items hostility and shame who were moved to the SNE scale.


47

following items: 1. general assessment of the interview; 2. the interviewee self-disclosed; 3. the

interviewee was open; 4. the interviewee was cooperative; 5. the story was detailed; 6. I felt the

interviewee would have liked to experience again the situation he described. Cronbach alpha of

the six items was .89, and an interview assessment scale was computed.

Procedure

Participants were interviewed in their own time by research assistants in training, about

peak teamwork experiences. Interviews took approximately 30 minutes. Participants filled out

the emotions questionnaire twice, once immediately before the interview (T1) and once

immediately after (T2). The second questionnaire included the self-efficacy and learning items,

following the emotions. Following the FFI, experimenters filled out an interview report, in which

they assessed the interview.

Results

Each emotion scale was compared before and after the interview, using paired-sample t-

test (see table 5). All four comparisons were significant and in the hypothesized direction, such

that participants reported increase in positive emotions, both general and social, and decrease in

negative emotions, both general and social.

Table 5: Preliminary Study 2: Paired-Sample t-test Comparisons of T2-T1 Emotion Scales

t (35)

PA 4.01 **

NA -3.88 **

SPE 2.86 **

SNE -3.78 **

** p<.01

These results support hypothesis 1, regarding FFI's positive effect on emotions26.

26 Though the deltas of the general scales are higher than those of the social scales, these differences (D_PA vs. D_SPE and D_NA vs. D_SNE) were not significant.


48

Examining the emotional data at the individual level, an average of 62% of the

participants reacted in the hypothesized direction (i.e., increase in the positive emotions scales

and decrease in the negative emotions scales), while 17% reacted in a contradictory manner

(22% did not report a change; see table 6).

Table 6: Percentage of Participants' Emotional Reaction to FFI in light of Research Hypothesis

Consistent No Change Contradictory

PA 72% 0% 28%

NA 56% 39% 6%

SPE 67% 8% 25%

SNE 53% 39% 8%

Average 62% 22% 17%

An additional analysis was performed to test the unique variability of the general and

social emotions scales, which is not explained by the social and general emotions scales,

respectively. For each T2 social emotions scale (SPE and SPN), the corresponding T1 general

scale (PA for SPE and NA for SPN) was entered as a first predictor in a linear regression, and the

social T1 scale was entered as the second. For each T2 general emotions scale, the corresponding

T1 social scale was entered as a first predictor, and the general scale was entered as the second.

As can be seen in table 7, despite the significant correlations between the general and social

scales, both T1 general scales lose their significance as predictors of T2 social scales, while both

T1 social scales maintain their significance. A corresponding pattern is seen for the general T2

scales. These results can be interpreted as further supporting the validity of viewing social

emotions as separate constructs from general emotions.

Table 7: Linear Regression of T2 Emotions Scales as Predicted by the Corresponding Scales of T1

Predictors Beta Predictors Beta

SPE - T2 PA - T1 .13 PA - T2 SPE - T1 -.15

SPE - T1 .79 ** PA - T1 .85 **

SNE - T2 NA - T1 -.05 NA - T2 SNE - T1 .20

SNE - T1 .94 ** NA - T1 .67 ** ** p<.001; df=2.


49

Exploring the correlations between the DVs (see table 8) suggests that interviewers'

assessment of the FFI was related to interviewees' increase in PA following the interview but not

to changes in the other emotional scales, thus providing only partial support for hypothesis H2.

FFI's assessment was also correlated to interviewees' self-efficacy, but not to their perception of

learning from FFI, providing partial support to H3 as well. The amount of learning interviewees

felt they extracted from the interview was related to their increase in general positive emotions

and decrease in general negative emotions, and also to their level of self-efficacy, which suggest

overall relationships between the various FFI outcomes. None of T1's emotions scales correlated

significantly with self-efficacy, learning or FFI's assessment, suggesting these results can be

ascribed to the FFI and not reflect preliminary relationships between these DVs (such that

participants who felt better prior to FFI felt higher self-efficacy, for example).

Table 8: Means, Standard Deviations and Correlations between T2-T1 Emotions Deltas, Self-Efficacy, Learning and FFI Assessment

M SD D_PA D_NA D_SPE D_SNE SE Learning

D_PA .32 .48

D_NA -.26 .40 .09

D_SPE .18 .38 .27 -.09

D_SNE -.14 .23 .10 .23 .28

SE 3.81 .98 .23 -.14 .16 .04

Learning 3.43 .95 .33 * -.31 † .09 .03 .33 *

Assessment 5.46 1.00 .54 ** .03 .12 -.02 .51 ** .09

N=36; ** p<.01, * p<.05, † p<.1

Discussion

Results clearly show that following FFI participants report significantly higher positive

emotions, both general and social, and significantly lower negative emotions, both general and

social. This provides some support for hypothesis 1, regarding the positive influence of FFI on

emotions. However, these finding should be treated cautiously, since the current design was not

experimental which compared FFI to control treatments.


50

Results also suggest that trained interviewers – here, already in the first 5-6 interviews –

can assess FFI in a way that reflects important aspects of its quality, and hence, its outcomes.

Lastly, results suggest some systematic relationships between the various outcomes of

FFI, specifically, between learning and the other two (emotions and self-efficacy). The

correlations do not allow causal explanations, but can raise some theoretical questions. For

example, if higher positive emotions (and/or lower negative emotions) would be found to lead to

more learning, a stronger emphasis on creating a pleasant and comfortable atmosphere can be

given during training; if learning would be found to lead to higher self-efficacy, FFI can be more

explicitly directed to the discovery of new knowledge, with an emphasis on more content in the

stories, or more stories. Such explorations, that are outside the scope of the current dissertation,

can provide deeper understanding of the way FFI acts, and the role its specific aspects (like

atmosphere, interpersonal relationships, amount of past experience, etc.) play in its outcomes.

Study 1: Brainstorming

Introduction

Following the results of the preliminary studies, Study 1 aimed at examining the overall

theoretical model presented in the introduction to this dissertation27. As a first stage, a pilot study

was conducted in order to choose the performance task to be used in Study 1. Since FFI is based

on positive interpersonal interaction, it was desired to find a task that involves teamwork and

interpersonal dynamics. Four tasks were tested (N=116), and based on the results, brainstorming

was chosen as the task to be used in Study 1 (for a detailed description of the pilot study see

appendix 2).

27 Hypothesis H4 of the original model, regarding bonding, was tested indirectly through the social emotions scales. Since this hypothesis originated in later theoretical development, Study 1 did not use a direct measure to test it. This will be done in Study 2, reported in the next section of this chapter.


51

Hypotheses

Hypothesis 1a: Participation in FFI will increase positive emotions, and decrease

negative emotions, relative to control treatment.

Hypothesis 1b: Participation in FFI will increase positive social emotions and decrease

negative social emotions, above and beyond its effect on positive and negative general emotions,


Hypothesis 2: Participation in FFI will increase state self-efficacy, relative to control

treatment.

Hypothesis 3: Participation in FFI will increase learning and revealing new information,


Hypothesis 4: FFI will lead to improved performance, relative to control treatment.

Hypothesis 5a: Following the FFI, avoidant individuals will show less increase (possibly

a decrease) in positive emotions and less decrease (possibly an increase) in negative emotions,

both general and social, relative to secure and anxious/ambivalent individuals.

Hypothesis 5b: Anxious individuals will show a lesser raise in self-efficacy and amount of

learning following FFI, relative to secure individuals.

Hypothesis 5c: Securely attached individuals will show a greater increase in

performance following FFI, relative to avoidant and anxious individuals.

Method

Participants

264 undergraduate students from the Hebrew University (mean age=22.6) participated in

the experiment in groups of 3-5. Eight participants were dropped from the experiment (incidents

where too few participants arrived to the lab). The remaining 256 participants were randomly


52

assigned to experimental (FFI, 23 groups, 84 subjects), control (25 groups, 85 subjects) and no

treatment (22 groups, 83 subjects) conditions. Participation was in exchange for course credits.

Task and Measures

Emotions. Emotions were measured using the emotions questionnaire described above

(version 3, see appendix 1), Cronbach alphas for PA28, NA29, SPE and SNE scales were .83, .85,

.86 and .82, respectively.

Emotions Ratios. Two proportion measures were calculated by dividing the positive with

the negative general and social scales (PA/NA and SPE/SNE), such that the higher the ratio is,

the higher the proportion of positive over negative emotions.

Residualized emotions. Since SPE and SNE measures are new, it was important to

demonstrate that any experimental effect, if found, on these measures is not merely reflecting

effects on either PA or NA. Therefore, for each emotion measure (PA, NA, SPE, and SNE) I

calculated a residual score based on a regression with the other three measures. For example,

PA’ is the residual score in a regression predicting PA from NA, SPE, and SNE. The benefit of

these scores is that if any effect on these measures is found, it is a unique effect that cannot be

explained by co-linearity with the other emotion measure. The drawback of these scores is that

they run the risk of “throwing out the baby with the bath water” in that effects common to some

or all of the measures cannot be observed. Finally, I calculated residualized ratio scores. For

example, SPE/SNE’ is the residual score of SPE/SNE controlling for PA/NA. These residuals

have the benefit of controlling social emotions for general emotions, and vice versa.

28 Excluding the item attention, due to technical problem. 29 Excluding the items hostile and ashamed that were integrated in the SNE scale, following previous results.


53

Self-efficacy. Participants were asked to rate on a 1-5 likert-type scale how well they

expected to perform in teamwork (a single-item measure was chosen for its simplicity; this

measure was previously used by Levontin & Kluger (2004)).

Learning. Subjects were asked to indicate on a 1-5 likert-type scale how much they felt

they have learnt from the interview (previously used by Nir (work in progress)).

Interview quality. Following FFI or control interview, each interviewer filled out a short

report, describing the story told and the interview's progress, and rated on a 1-7 likert-type scale

his or her general assessment of the interview and the participant’s disclosure, openness,

cooperation, how detailed the story was and whether it seemed the interviewee would like to

experience the described event again. Factor analysis of the six items yielded a single factor,

explaining 70% of the variance. An interview quality scale was calculated, with a Cronbach

alpha of .90. Scores of interview quality were significantly higher in the FFI condition than in the

control conditions (t(167)=3.4, p<.01). This provides evidence for the success of the manipulation.

Interview quality furthermore was positively correlated with PA (r=.20, p<.01), PA' (r=.20,

p<.01), and PA/NA (r=.20, p<.01), learning (r=.15, p<.05), and performance ratings of both

judges (r=.21, p<.01), though not with actual performance. However, interview quality did not

moderate FFI effects and thus this variable is not further discussed.

Attachment. Participants' attachment style was assessed using Brennan, Clark & Shaver's

(1998) Experiences in Close Relationships (ECR) 36-items attachment style questionnaire

(Hebrew version by Mikulincer & Florian, 2000, see appendix 3). Cronbach alphas for anxious

and avoidance scales were .88 and .87, respectively. Participants were divided into high and low

anxious and avoidance using median split. Participants scoring high on anxious and low on

avoidance were classified as having anxious attachment style (51 subjects); participants scoring


54

high on avoidance and low on anxious were classified as having avoidant style (50 subjects);

participants scoring low on both anxious and avoidance were classified as having secure

attachment style (76 subjects); finally, participants scoring high on both anxious and avoidance

were classified as having fearful attachment style (74 subjects). Anxiousness and avoidance

scores were also used as separate independent variables, using the continuous scores, thus

avoiding the loss of statistical power.

Brainstorming Task. Participants performed 20-minutes brainstorming, on the subject

"How to enhance awareness and treatment of environmental issues at campus?". When 15

minutes were concluded, participants were asked to choose and rate the best five ideas, in terms

of originality, applicability and return-of-investment. They were given five minutes to make their

choice. Subjects did not know before that they will be asked to choose the best ideas. The

brainstorming was facilitated by one experimenter and observed by a second – both blind to the

experimental condition of the group.

Individual Performance. Two measures were used to gauge individual performance.

First, quantity was measured by the number of ideas each participant came up with. Second, the

facilitator and observer rated all participants after each brainstorming session. They rated

between three to five participants they have just observed for 20 minutes (15 minutes of group

discussion and five minutes of group decision making). Raters reviewed coding forms before

using it for the first time, and when necessary, questions were answered and terms were clarified

for them. They rated the brainstorming participants on the following 1-7 Likert-type scales:

cooperation with other group members (ICC(2)=.65), openness to others' ideas (ICC(2)=.44),

creativity (ICC(2)=.73), interest and involvement in the task (ICC(2)=.66) and friendliness

toward other group members (ICC(2)=.67). Each of these five items were averaged across raters


55

and subjected to a factor analysis which yielded one factor. I Therefore created a single measure

of rated performance (Cronbach’s alpha = .90). Inter-judges reliability for this 5-item scale was

ICC(2)=.8930.

Group Performance was measured by: (1) the average number of ideas generated by the

group members (since groups diverged in size, total number of ideas was divided by number of

group members), (2) whether or not the group reached a decision within the allotted five

minutes, (3) the time it took the group to choose the best ideas (groups failing to reach a decision

were given a value of 5 minutes)31, and (4) by the judges' ratings of two items, on a 7-point

scales: group cooperation (ICC(2)=.57) and communication (ICC(2)=.40). The average of these

two items across raters was reliable (alpha = .75) as was the inter-rater agreement across the two

averaged items (ICC(2)=.72)32.

Procedure

Upon arrival, participants were given general introduction to the experiment, and learnt

that they were going to participate in a brainstorming task where cooperation, openness and

creativity are required.

Participants in the FFI and control interview conditions were interviewed by a trained

experimenter, while participants in the no-treatment condition moved directly to the next part,

without being interviewed. Participants in the experimental groups sat face-to-face with their

interviewer in a private room or at a quiet corner of a class, with no barriers between them. FFI

30 At a later stage (after the experiment was concluded), a third measure was calculated: all ideas were divided into categories, and each idea was given a score based on the rarity of its category within the total sample, thus providing a creativity measure following Goncalo & Staw (2006). However, experimental manipulation did not have any effect on this measure, thus it is not reported here. 31 The time needed to reach a decision can imply the level of cooperation between group members, with shorter time indicating higher cooperation. 32 Group creativity was also measured using the average creativity scores of the group members (Goncalo & Staw, 2006). Another measure was ratings the chosen ideas' creativity (for groups who reached a decision). Again, these two measures were not affected by the experimental manipulation and are not reported.


56

interviewers started by stating "I am sure that in situations of teamwork, you had both negative

and positive experiences. Now, I wish to focus on a good experience." The interview was

conducted using the following protocol:

1. Would you please tell me about and experience in which you were part of a group, and felt full of life and at your best, felt creative, open and cooperative – even before you knew what the result of the experience will be?

2. What were the conditions that enabled this to happen? What was it in yourself, in the

surrounding, in the people with you, the organization and the timing?

3. What was the peak moment? What did you think at that moment? How did you feel at that moment (including physical sensation)? Would you like to experience these feelings again? The FF question: Now, think about the conditions that enable you to be at your best. To what degree your plans concerning teamwork bring you toward or away from the conditions that came up here? This question is for you, and there is no need to answer it right now.

Control interviewers started by stating "I am sure that you have experienced many

situations of teamwork." They then asked the interviewee describe two experiences of teamwork.

Interviews lasted approximately 20 minutes. Participants in the no-treatment condition

did not participate in any interview. Next, all participants filled out the emotions questionnaire,

and answered the self-efficacy and learning items. Finally, participants performed the

experimental brainstorming task that lasted about 20 minutes.

When task was completed, participants filled out the attachment questionnaire, were

thanked, debriefed and released. Participation in the experiment took roughly 60 minutes for FFI

and control conditions and 40 minutes for the no-treatment condition.

Analysis

To test the hypotheses, I compared the means of the participants in the FFI condition to

the control interview, the FFI condition to the no-treatment, and the means of both FFI and the


57

control interview to the no treatment. The first comparison is a stringent test of the benefit of FFI

over a general interview. The second comparison is a lenient test of the benefit of FFI relative to

no intervention. Finally, the last comparison shows the benefits of an interview (including FFI,

but not limited to FFI). I also built a contrast variable where FFI (+1) is expected to yield the best

results, followed by control interview (0) and by no treatment effect (-1). To test the hypotheses

regarding interaction with attachment style, I first performed ANOVAs with the experimental

conditions and attachment style as predictors. Interactions between these factors indicate possible

support for my hypotheses.

Results

Table 9 and Table 10 present the means, standard deviation, intercorrelations and

reliabilities (where relevant) for all individual level measures, and group measures, respectively.

Examining table 9, it can be seen that the experimental contrast is correlated with the emotions

scales and learning in a pattern consistent with the research hypotheses, but contrary to

hypothesis, is negatively correlated with self-efficacy. There is also evidence that emotions were

related to learning and self-efficacy, and that negative emotions were negatively related to

observers' ratings of participants, though there is no clear relations to actual performance.


58

Table 9: Study 1: Individual Measures: Means, Standard Deviations, and Intercorrelations Individual Measures: Means, Standard Deviations, and Intercorrelations

Note : * r’s > |.12| are typed in bold and are significant at .05 level; r’s > |.16| are significant at .01 level; all N’s = 246 except for leaning N=167; numbers in the diagonal are reliabilities (where relevant). Experimental contrast: FFI = 1; Control treatment = 0; no treatment = -1.

Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

1. Experimental contrast

2. Anxious 3.19 0.95 -.11 (.88)

3. Avoidance 3.07 0.82 -.06 .22 (.86)

4. PA 2.78 0.70 .20 .06 -.04 (.83)

5. NA 1.66 0.62 -.20 .39 .23 .02 (.85)

6. SPE 2.76 0.73 .16 .13 -.14 .67 .03 (.86)

7. SNE 1.26 0.38 -.24 .43 .20 .19 .57 .22 (.83)

8. PA/NA 1.87 0.78 .28 -.31 -.18 .62 -.70 .41 -.28

9. SPE/SNE 2.31 0.73 .33 -.24 -.26 .41 -.38 .69 -.52 .56

10. PA’ -.00 0.52 .14 -.05 .06 .74 .00 -.01 .01 .47 -.03

11. NA’ .00 0.50 -.05 .19 .12 .00 .82 .00 .00 -.58 .00 .04

12. SPE’ .00 0.54 .07 .08 -.18 .01 .00 .74 -.01 .01 .64 -.65 .06

13. SNE’ -.00 0.30 -.21 .23 .12 .01 .00 .00 .79 .01 -.56 -.06 -.58 -.15

14. PA/NA' -.00 0.65 .11 -.21 -.04 .47 -.58 .03 .01 .83 -.01 .58 -.70 -.42 .39

15. SPE/SNE' .00 0.61 .21 -.08 -.20 .08 .01 .55 -.44 .00 .83 -.35 .39 .76 -.68 -.56

16. Learning 2.43 1.04 .24 .23 -.04 .39 .01 .33 .17 .19 .17 .23 -.05 .06 .09 .13 .06

17. Self-efficacy 3.63 1.00 -.14 -.22 -.27 .20 -.20 .23 -.04 .28 .21 .06 -.18 .13 .02 .19 .07 .10

18. No. of Ideas 9.35 5.27 -.09 -.09 -.07 -.05 -.10 -.13 -.14 .04 -.02 .06 -.03 -.12 -.08 .06 -.05 -.07 .02

19. Rated performance 5.28 1.06 .08 -.08 -.11 .02 -.19 -.08 -.14 .11 .03 .11 -.13 -.12 -.03 .10 -.03 -.09 .00 .51


59

Table 10: Study 1: Group Measures: Means, Standard Deviations, and Intercorrelations of Group Measures: Means, Standard Deviations, and Intercorrelations

Because this study had multiple dependent variables (DVs), as a first step an omnibus test

(MANOVA) was ran to examine whether the experimental manipulation had a general effect on

all the DVs33. Following, a series of ANOVAs were run, examining the effect on each DV

individually. The MANOVA indicates systematic differences in the outcome of the experimental

conditions, F16,394=3.84, p<.001, η2=.14. Examining the individual variables (see table 11) shows

that the mediating variables yielded significant differences, while there were no significant

differences in the performance measures.

Table 11: Study 1: One-Way ANOVAs Testing the Effects of the Experimental Manipulation (FFI vs. Control vs. No-treatment) on the Dependent Variables

Experimental condition; df = 2, 203

Dependent Variable F Eta2 PA 4.44 * .04 NA 5.02 ** .05 SPE 3.19 * .03 SNE 10.09 *** .09 Self-efficacy 3.48 * .03 Number of Ideas 1.77 .01 Observer rating 1.60 .16

Facilitator rating 1.86 .16

<otes: * p < .05; ** p < .01, *** p < .001.

Table 12 shows the means, standard deviations and three contrasts: between FFI and

control conditions; FFI and no-treatment conditions; and between both experimental conditions

33 PA, NA, SPE, SNE, Self-efficacy, Number of Ideas, Observer rating, Facilitator rating (excluding Learning, that was not measured in the No-treatment condition).

Mean SD 1 2 3

1. Number of Ideas 9.27 2.15

2. Time to decide 4.55 .74 -.15

3. Decision reached .72 .45 -.08 -.38 **

4. Judges’ rating 5.39 1.06 .02 .07 .13

**p<.01


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and no-treatment condition (measuring the effect of an interview), on the dependent measures of

emotions, learning, self-efficacy, number of ideas and judges ratings of the participants, as well

as on the anxiety and avoidance measures34. Table 12 shows that the level of attachment anxiety

was significantly higher in the no-treatment group relative to the other groups, and that it was

higher in the control interview group than in the FFI group despite the random experimental

assignment. Since attachment anxiety is correlated with the dependent variables (see Table 9),

this may slightly deflate the other effects found here, because anxiety produce the opposite

effects on mood predicted for FFI. Yet, given that the attachment measure was collected at the

end of the experiment, it could be that FFI, and to some extent the control interview, produced a

change in reporting attachment anxiety, perhaps as a result of the interaction with the

experimenter reducing attachment anxiety the participants (Mikulincer & Shaver, 2008).

The comparison of FFI to the control interview shows that FFI yielded higher PA/NA

(supporting H1), higher SPE/SNE (supporting H1b, and to some extent the bonding hypothesis),

and higher perception of learning (supporting H3). There were no difference in self-efficacy and

in individual performance measures (failing to support H2 and H5).

Also, comparing both interviews to the no treatment condition suggests that people who

were engaged in an interview feel better, both in terms of general affect (PA/NA) and social

affect (SPE/SNE) and that the effects on SPE/SNE is unique (on SPE/SNE’) in that it is not

merely reflecting the benefit on PA/NA. Surprisingly, the no-treatment group reported the

highest level of self-efficacy, a finding that may be an artifact of self-presentation considerations.

Table 13 shows that, at the group level, FFI decreased the number of ideas participants

provided relative to the control interview (opposite to H4) and interview conditions increased

rated performance relative to the no-treatment (providing a weak form of support to H4).

34 Effects on performance measures were also tested using HLM. Since HLM analysis did not provide additional information regarding the research hypothesis, they are not reported here, and can be found in Appendix 4.


61

Table 12: Study 1: Individual Measures: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Dependent variables by experimental conditions, and mean comparisons with Cohen’s d values

FFI (& = 82) Control (&=85)

&o Treatment (&=79)

FFI vs. Control

FFI vs. &o-treatment

Interviews vs. &o-treatment

Variable M SD M SD M SD d d d

Anxious 3.12 1.00 3.08 0.92 3.38 0.91 .05 -.27 * -.28 * Avoidance 3.01 0.82 3.06 0.88 3.14 0.78 -.07 -.17 -.12 PA 2.96 0.67 2.74 0.72 2.62 0.66 .32 * .52 ** .31 * NA 1.49 0.50 1.70 0.64 1.79 0.67 -.36 * -.52 ** -.30 * SPE 2.88 0.70 2.81 0.67 2.59 0.79 .10 .39 * .33 * SNE 1.17 0.33 1.23 0.32 1.39 0.45 -.21 -.57 ** -.48 ** PA/NA 2.16 0.78 1.84 0.85 1.62 0.60 .39 ** .77 ** .46 ** SPE/SNE 2.57 0.75 2.36 0.64 1.97 0.68 .31 * .85 ** .67 ** PA’ 0.11 0.56 -0.06 0.50 -0.06 0.46 .33 * .34 * .15 NA’ -0.06 0.44 0.07 0.59 0.00 0.46 -.25 -.13 .02

SPE’ 0.01 0.58 0.08 0.46 -0.09 0.56 -.15 .17 .24 †

SNE’ -0.05 0.28 -0.04 0.30 0.10 0.30 -.03 -.53 ** -.48 ** PA/NA' 0.12 0.66 -0.07 0.74 -0.06 0.52 .27 * .30 * .12 SPE/SNE' 0.12 0.64 0.07 0.57 -0.20 0.57 .08 .53 ** .47 ** Learning 2.66 1.06 2.18 0.94 - - .49 ** Self-efficacy 3.52 1.01 3.52 1.03 3.87 0.91 .01 -.36 * -.34 * No. of Ideas 8.55 4.35 9.80 5.38 9.71 5.94 -.26 -.23 -.09

Rated Performance 5.34 1.02 5.38 0.99 5.12 1.16 -.05 .20 † .22 †

*p<.05, **p<.01; one-tail. † p < .1

Table 13: Study 1: Group Measures: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Dependent variables by experimental conditions, and mean comparisons with Cohen’s d values

FF (& = 20) Control (&=23)

&o Treatment (&=20)

FFI vs. Control

FFI vs. &o-treatment

Interviews vs. &o-treatment

Variable M SD M SD M SD d d d

Number of Ideas 8.53 1.60 9.65 1.99 9.57 2.66 -.63 * -.49 -.20 Time to decide 4.63 .74 4.48 .74 4.55 .83 .21 .10 -.01 Decision reached .85 .37 .70 .47 .60 .50 .37 .58 * .35 Judges’ rating 5.47 1.06 5.68 .93 4.87 1.09 -.22 .57 * .66 * *p <. 05 one-tail.


62

FFI groups were more likely to reach a decision within five minutes than

control and no-treatment groups. Table 14 shows the proportion of groups that

reached a decision in the allotted time, and Pearson Chi-Square comparisons between

the experimental conditions.

Table 14: Study 1: Chi-Square Comparisons of Likelihood to Reach a Decision

No. of groups (likelihood to reach a decision)

FFI Control NT FFI vs. NT FFI vs. Ctrl+NT FFI+Ctrl vs. NT

20 (85%) 24 (71%) 21 (62%) 2.78 * 2.32 † 1.68 †

<otes: NT=no treatment; df=1; * p<.05, † p<.1, one-tailed;

As can be seen from table 14, FFI was beneficial to groups' ability to complete

the task of choosing the best five ideas, compared with no-treatment condition,

providing some further support to H4.

Table 15 presents ANOVAs testing the moderating effects of attachment style

on FFI effectiveness. Of interest here are the interactions. Two interactions with affect

scales were significant: with NA and with SPE/SNE. Since I had a prediction

regarding PA/NA I also explored this statistically marginal interaction (p<.06).

Table 15: Study 1: Two-way ANOVAs testing the effects of the experimental manipulation (FFI, control interview, and no interview), four attachment styles, and their interaction on affect, learning, self efficacy and performance measures.

Condition (A); df = 2, 250

Attachment style (B); df = 3, 250

A*B; df = 6, 250

Dependent Variable

F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2

PA 5.01 ** .04 .72 .01 .80 .02 NA 4.19 * .03 16.68 ** .17 2.24 * .05 PA/NA 7.48 ** .06 6.75 ** .08 2.09 .05 SPE 3.75 * .03 2.60 .03 .65 .02 SNE 4.55 * .04 18.8 ** .19 1.49 .04 SPE/SNE 11.57 ** .09 7.52 ** .09 2.29 * .05 PA’ 3.1 * .03 .82 .01 .33 .01 NA’ 2.46 † .02 3.55 * .04 1.48 .04 SPE’ 2.61 † .02 2.24 † .03 .40 .01 SNE’ 4.97 ** .04 4.22 ** .05 1.24 .03 PA/NA' 2.21 .02 3.01 * .04 1.12 .03 SP/SN' 5.6 ** .04 3.56 * .04 1.27 .03 Learning 11.10 ** .06 4.54 ** .08 .46 .01 Self-Efficacy 6.28 ** .05 8.32 ** .10 .54 .01 Number of Ideas 2.22 .02 .10 .01 .61 .02 Judges’ rating .62 .01 2.44 .03 .76 .02

<otes: * p < .05; ** p < .01; † p < .1; df’s for learning 1,168, 3, 168, and 3,168, respectively (excluding no-treatment participants, who were not interviewed).


63

Figure 4 presents the means of PA/NA by experimental manipulation and

attachment style35. It shows that except for participants with avoidant attachment

style, FFI produced the highest PA/NA followed by the control interview, and then by

the no-treatment control. Those with avoidant attachment style reported the highest

PA/NA when they experienced no interview. However, all groups showed higher

PA/NA after FFI then after control interview.

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

Fearful Secure Anxious Avoidant

Attachement Style

PA

/NA

FFI

Control

No Treatment

Figure 4: Study 1: Experimental Effects on PA/NA by Attachment Style

Table 16 shows means-comparisons, where the FFI vs. control or no-treatment

differences are significant for secure and anxious, but not for avoidant participants.

35 Using the median split to determine participants' attachment style forces the use of the fourth, fearful-avoidant category, that was suggested in later development of attachment theory (Bartholomew & Horowitz, 1991). Data for fearful participants are thus exhibited, though there were no hypotheses regarding fearful individuals.


64

Table 16: Study 1: t-comparison of PA/NA between Experimental Conditions

FFI vs. control FFI vs. no-treat.

Attachment Style df t df t

Secure 52 1.67 * 48 3.77 **

Anxious 36 2.10 * 29 3.13 **

Avoidant 36 .82 28 -1.00

Fearful 37 1.00 53 2.51 **

** p<.01, * p<.05.

Similar to Figure 4, Figure 5 suggests that except for participants with

avoidant attachment style, FFI produced the highest SPE/SNE followed by the control

interview and by the no-treatment conditions. Those with avoidant attachment style

appear relatively unaffected by the experimental manipulations.

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5


Attachement Style

SP

E/S

NE FFI

Control

No Treatment

Figure 5: Study 1: Experimental Effects on SPE/SNE by Attachment Style

Table 17 shows that the differences between FFI and control or no-treatment

conditions in SPE/SNE are significant (or marginally so) for all but avoidant

participants.


65

Table 17: Study 1: t-comparison of SPE/SNE between Experimental Conditions

FFI vs. control FFI vs. no-treat.

Attachment Style df t df t

Secure 47 4.53 ** 51 2.17 *

Anxious 29 2.89 ** 36 1.62 †

Avoidant 28 -.27 36 -1.30

Fearful 53 2.65 ** 37 1.39 †

* p<.05, † p<.1.

Figure 6 presents the means of NA by experimental manipulation and

attachment style. The interaction is in line with H5a, and significant (Table 12).

Inspection of the interaction suggests that FFI produced lower NA for all participants,

except for secure individuals who showed low NA in both interviews. Also, whereas

secure and anxious individuals reported the highest NA in the no treatment condition,

fearful and avoidant individuals reported the highest NA in the control interview. This

pattern was not replicated in other affect measures and could be due to sampling error.

Nevertheless, FFI appears equal (for secure individuals) or superior (for all others) to

other experimental conditions in terms of producing low levels of NA.

0.0

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5


Attachment Style

NA

FFI

Control

No Treatment

Figure 6: Study 1: Experimental Effects on NA by Attachment Style.


66

Learning: supporting H3, perception of learning was significantly higher in the

FFI condition than in the control condition, and anxiety level, but not avoidance, was

positively correlated with learning. Comparing the perceived learning between the

experimental conditions separately for each attachment style (see table 18), suggests

that the FFI's advantage was significant for anxious and secure participants,

marginally significant for fearful participants, and not significant for avoidant ones.

Table 18: Study 1: t-comparison of Learning between FFI and FB Conditions

FFI vs. control

Attachment Style df t

Secure 51 1.98 *

Anxious 36 2.32 *

Avoidant 36 .74

Fearful 37 .64 † * p<.05, † p<.1.

Self-efficacy: contrary to H2, self-efficacy was lower (and equal) in both FFI

and control conditions, compared with no-treatment condition. A one-way ANOVA

separately for each attachment style (see table 19) suggests that this difference is

related to avoidance level, and was marginally significant for avoidant and fearful

participants, while secure and anxious participants were similar in the three

conditions.

Table 19: Study 1: One-way ANOVA of the Effect of Experimental Condition on Self-Efficacy by Attachment Style

Attachment Style df F Eta2

Secure 2,73 .27 .01

Anxious 2,50 1.36 .05

Avoidant 2,49 2.98 † .11

Fearful 2,71 2.79 † .07

† p<.1.


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Discussion

Results suggest three general conclusions regarding FFI: it was clearly

beneficial for emotions and for learning, did not influence self-efficacy as predicted,

and yielded mixed and conflicting results regarding performance.

First, FFI produced more positive emotions and perception of learning than

control interview, which in turn produced more positive emotions than no

intervention. The positive effect of FFI relative to no-intervention is moderate to

strong (with many of the differences exceeding half of a standard deviation. This

contrast shows clear benefit not only for general emotions (e.g., PA, NA, or PA/NA)

but also unique benefits for social emotions controlled for general emotions (e.g.,

SPE/SNE’). FFI's unique benefit for social emotions can be interpreted as a form of

support for the bonding hypothesis (which was not tested directly in this study), since

it taps feelings of being close with others. The advantage of FFI for emotions over the

control interview is weaker but still significant for some of the measures (e.g., PA/NA

and SPE/SNE), suggesting that FFI has some unique benefit over other types of

interviews. Similarly, relative to the control interview, FFI produced a stronger

perception that learning occurred due to the interview. In summary, the weak form of

my hypothesis that FFI is beneficial for emotions is strongly supported, and the strong

form of my hypothesis that FFI is beneficial above and beyond a neutral interview

received weaker support both regarding emotions and perception of learning.

Importantly, the effects on emotions may be moderated by attachment style

such that the benefits of FFI (as well as the control interview) are not conferred on

participants characterized by avoidant attachment style. Yet, the moderating effects of

attachment style were sporadic, perhaps due to relatively small sample size to detect

interactions with six degrees of freedom. Hence, future assessment of the limitation of

FFI for some segments of the population should be carried out on larger samples.


68

Second, my hypothesis regarding the benefits of FFI for self-efficacy was not

supported. Moreover, the result showed that the no-treatment group reported the

highest self-efficacy. The later finding may be an artifact of self-presentation. Yet, the

effect of FFI on self-efficacy was practically identical to the effect of the control

interview. Perhaps more idiosyncratic measures are needed to assess self-efficacy

because each interviewee may had considered a different aspects of one’s ability in

his or her story told in the FFI condition. It is also possible that the use of a single-

item measure masked potential FFI effects on different aspects of self-efficacy. Thus

future research should attempt to tailor self-efficacy measures to the specific content

of stories to be elicited in pre-testing.

Third, the effects of FFI on performance were mixed: there was no evidence of

FFI effects on individual performance measure; FFI was detrimental to performance

measured with average number of ideas generated by a group but FFI, at least relative

to no intervention, produced higher percentage of groups reaching decision within

five minutes and higher ratings of cooperation and communication as rated by the

judges. This pattern of results can stem either from lack of relevance of the

experimental task the FFI manipulation, complex performance effects, or both. The

underlying message in FFI is to support an idiosyncratic discovery of crucial

conditions to produce superior performance. In this process control is placed in the

hands of the interviewee. Yet, the experimental task might not have been related to

any of the discoveries of the conditions the interviewee requires for top team

performance. Rather, the experimental protocol imposed a task and setting without the

considering the voice of the interviewees. This might have destroyed whatever

motivational gain FFI produced relative to the control interview. Therefore, future

evaluation of FFI effects on performance, may wish to carefully tailor the

performance measures to the conditions discovered during FFI. Also, the significant

effects on reaching a decision and ratings relative to the no-treatment group combined


69

with the detrimental effect for number of ideas may indicate that FFI has complex

performance effects. It may direct FFI recipients to qualitative aspects of team work at

the expense of production of quantity. Thus, it is possible that brainstorming might

not be an ideal task to examine FFI's benefits for performance. Again, future research

should carefully tailor both quality and quantity measures of performance to the tested

content of the FFI protocol.

FFI's advantages over the control interview in producing positive emotions

were all relatively weak (under half a standard deviation). Yet, the control interview

in this experiment was amicable. In organizations, many interviews could be conflict-

producing such as a selection interview or performance appraisal review. Thus, the

effects found here could be an underestimate of the benefits of FFI in the field. For

example, in the field, FFI could be used before, or as a replacement, of the traditional

performance appraisal interview (Kluger & Nir, 2010). FFI is likely to produce much

better reaction that the known strife created in traditional performance appraisal

reviews (Coens & Jenkins, 2002). Moreover, recent organizational application of FFI

at Brembo (Italian manufacturer of high quality car breaks) indicated that after FFI,

360-degrees feedback review session with external consultants are characterized with

much higher managers’ openness than reviews without FFI (Chinotti, 2008).

Limitations

Study 1 has several limitations that may explain the partial support to the

research hypotheses. First, the FFI effects on performance were not clear. This might

be explained by the interview's topic which was pre-selected by me and might have

not been relevant to the lives of the participants. Alternatively, it is possible that the

relevance of the interview's content to the upcoming task was not clear, thus making it

difficult for participants to implement the enabling conditions discovered in the

interview in the brainstorming task – a novel task for most participants, limited in

time, with unfamiliar group members.


70

Second, although the results of Study 1 supported the effect of FFI on

learning, the evidence was based on a single item. Third, the FFI and the control

interviews depressed reported self-efficacy and there was no difference in self-

efficacy between these conditions. These results may be explained both by the

questionable relevance of the task to the participants and by reliance on a single-item

measure. Finally, while attachment style moderated as expected some of the FFI

effects, the effects were observed only for affect measures and they were weak.

Another possible limitation is the multi-cultural sample of the study. The

Hebrew University students' population (like the Israeli population in general) is a

multi-cultural, multi-religious one. Though participants' mother tongue and Hebrew

mastery (for FFI and control participants) were collected, it was not controlled, and

many groups were of mixed religion and culture. This heterogeneity might have

caused participants belonging to minority groups (such as Muslims, Christians or

immigrants) to feel uncomfortable to fully express themselves during the task. Indeed,

Hebrew mastery and having Hebrew as mother tongue positively correlated with the

number of ideas participants provided, their performance ratings by the observers, and

their avoidance and anxiousness levels. Participants' age also correlated positively

with number of ideas (and with having Hebrew as mother tongue, which makes this

complicated pattern of relationships difficult to control statistically while keeping a

satisfying sample size). It is known that despite the facilitator's encouragement,

participants in brainstorming do exert self-censorship regarding the ideas they express

(Elron & Goldenebrg, 1999; Goldenberg & Mazursky, 2002), and it is possible that

participants belonging to minority groups where more aware of how they are

perceived by other group members, or simply had language difficulties36.

36 This is a well-known issue in the Hebrew University and many researchers limit their sample population to Hebrew-natives only. Due to moral and ethical considerations I chose not to prevent minority students from participating.


71

To sum, Study 1 provide a partial support for the overall theoretical model and

further explorations are needed in order to strengthen this support, while answering to

Study 1's limitations. With these I attempted to deal in Study 2.

Study 2: Students' Personal Goals in Academic Life

Introduction

Study 2 was designed with a number of goals in mind. The first one was

overcoming Study 1's design limitations: First, the task was made relevant by

instructing student participants to phrase the FFI (or control treatment) about topics

relevant to their academic studies. Second, participants were instructed to work on

their own goals for their studies, and to make a plan to achieve them. Third, the

interview was designed to establish a clear link between the interview's content and

the experimental task, so that the experimental manipulation would have a better

chance of affecting performance. Fourth, a multiple-item measures of self-efficacy

and learning were tailored to the experimental task. Fifth, bonding between

interviewer and interviewee was measured directly this time, through assessing liking

and appreciation of the other party and willingness to cooperate in the future. Sixth,

the control interview was designed to match a possible organizational feedback

intervention, in which participants received external guidance and feedback from their

partner regarding their plans to achieve their personal goal. A third condition, self-

reflection, in which participants worked individually, was also used.

In addition to measurement and design improvements, Study 2 also tested

recent theoretical development of FFI (Kluger & Nir, 2010) that suggested that one

unique feature of FFI is its potential to benefit not only the interviewee but also the

interviewer. Therefore, in Study 2 all the outcomes (e.g., affect, self efficacy,

learning, bonding and performance) were measured on untrained interviewers (unlike


72

Study 1, where interviewers were trained research assistants). This design permitted

the examination of FFI's effect on an individual, rather than group task, and to apply

FFI in a workshop context, using peer-interview, which is more similar to

organizational FFI interventions.

A last objective of Study 2 was to conduct a preliminary examination of

possible long-term effects of FFI. Some authors suggest that successfully achieving

personal goals leads to happiness and satisfaction (Diener, Emmons, Larsen, &

Griffin, 1985), and that engaging in activities that fulfill personal motives leads to

positive well-being and emotions (Brunstein, Schultheiss, & Grassmann, 1998). To

examine the possibility that FFI in this context can lead participants to more effective

goal-pursuit, their perceived success in pursuing their goals, their academic well-

being and lasting emotions were measured a few weeks following the experiment.

Though admittedly not truly a measure a long-term benefit, these measures can

provide preliminary assessment of FFI's psychological benefits that are not solely

momentary.

Hypotheses

Hypothesis 1: Participation in FFI will increase, relative to control treatments:

(a) Positive emotions, and reduce negative emotions.

(b) Positive social emotions and reduce negative social emotions, above and

beyond its effect on positive and negative affectivity.

(c) State self-efficacy.

(d) Learning and revealing of new information.

(e) Bonding between interviewer and interviewee.

Hypothesis 2: There will be in interaction between FFI and attachment style

such that

(a) Following FFI, avoidant individuals will show less increase (possibly a

decrease) in positive emotions and less decrease (possibly an increase) in negative

emotions, both personal and social, compared with secure and anxious individuals.


73

(b) Following FFI, anxious individuals will show a lesser raise in self-

efficacy and amount of learning, compared with secure individuals.

(c) Following FFI, securely attached individuals will show a greater increase

in performance, compared with avoidant and anxious individuals.

Hypothesis 3: FFI will lead to improved performance, relative to control

treatment.

Method

Participants

A total of 236 students (mean age = 23, 53% males) participated in groups of

3-14, randomly assigned to FFI, Feedback or Self-Reflection conditions. Participants

received course credits for their participation, and the chance to win 200 NIS

(~53USD; two prizes) cash or 50NIS (two prizes) shopping vouchers.

Measurements

Affect. Affect was measured as in Study 1 (using a newer version of the social

emotions items, see appendix 5). Cronbach alphas were .79 (PA, 10 items), .89 (SPE,

21 items37), .88 (NA, 8 items38) and .75 (SNE, 9 items39).

As in Study 1, a general and social affect ratios were calculated by dividing

the positive (PA, SPE) scales by the negative ones (NA, SNE, respectively). The

original PANAS was measured a second time, few weeks following the experiment,

asking participants to report to what extent did they experience each emotions during

the last few weeks (Watson & Clark, 1994). Cronbach alphas for the PA and NA

scales were .78 and .88, respectively40.

37 Sympathetic, fond, surprised, connected, grateful, understanding, empathic, confidence, caring, honest, self-importance, open, belong, appreciative, closeness, intimacy, friendliness, forgiving, admiring, trust, kindness. 38 Excluding 'hostile' and 'ashamed' that were moved to the SNE scale, following previous results. Including these two items in the NA scale did not change its Cronbach alpha. 39 Hostile, ashamed, jealous, embarrassed, humiliated, supremacy, merciful, distant, contempt. 40 These items were part of a questionnaire that was administered a few weeks following the experiment (T3).


74

Self-efficacy in achieving personal goal. A 6-item scale was constructed

following Bandura's (2006) guidelines of tapping belief in ability to perform a task

(here, to achieve personal goals and face challenges and difficulties along the way).

Due to the open context here, the current scale did not assess exact probabilities to

succeed, as in Bandura's (2006) examples. Items were rated on a 1-5 likert type scale.

Interviewees rated their self-efficacy on the following items (see appendix 6):

(1) I can achieve the goal I worked on; (2) I will succeed in achieving the goal I

worked on; (3) I can overcome the difficulties on my way to achieve the goal I

worked on; (4) I can influence promoting the goal I worked on (5) Achieving the goal

I worked on depends on me; (6) I am on the right path to achieve the goal I worked

on. In the scales answered by Interviewers (see appendix 6) and participants in the

reflection condition (see appendix 6), "I worked on" was dropped from the end of

each item. Cronbach alpha for the self-efficacy items was .8041.

Self-efficacy was measured a second time (at T3) concerning general efficacy

in achieving personal goals for participants' studying period. Cronbach alpha for the

second self-efficacy measure was .86.

Learning. Learning from the process was measured using five items for

interviewees and four items for interviewers that were rated on a 1-5 likert type scale

(See appendix 6). Interviewees answered the following items: (1) I have learnt from

the process; (2) The process helped my reveal new knowledge about myself; (3) The

process helped me develop new thinking directions about my plans; (4) The process

helped me develop new thinking directions about my studies; (5) The process had a

personal contribution for me. Interviewers answered the following items: (1) I have

learnt from the process; (2) The process helped me reveal new knowledge about

41 Examined separately for Interviewees, interviewers and reflection participants, alphas were .85, .82 and .68, respectively. Self-efficacy scale was calculated by averaging the 6 items.


75

myself; (3) The process provided me with learning that is relevant for me; (4) The

process had a personal contribution for me. Cronbach alpha for interviewees and

interviewers were .92 and .93, respectively. Learning was measured a second time (at

T3) a few weeks following the experiment, using the original interviewees' five items.

Cronbach alpha was .94.

Bonding. Bonding between interviewee and interviewer was measured using

items tapping participants' liking of their partner, appreciation of partner, and

interviewers' belief in their interviewee (see appendix 6). Liking of partner.

Participants rated the following 5 items: (1) I became closer to my partner following

the process; (2) I like my partner; (3) I think my partner is nice; (4) I enjoyed working

with my partner; (5) I would be happy to keep social contact with my partner.

Appreciation of and willingness to cooperate with partner. Participants rated the

following 7 items: (1) I appreciate my partner; (2) My partner helped me; (3) I feel

that I helped my partner; (4) I would like to cooperate with my partner in the future;

(5) I would be happy to work with my partner in the future; (6) I would have liked to

write papers with my partner during our studies; (7) My partner is an adequate partner

for consultation. Factor analysis of the 12 liking and appreciation items yielded a

single factor (explaining 50% of the variance), consisted of items 2-5 of the liking

scale and items 1 and 4-7 from the appreciation scales. Therefore, a single Bonding

scales was calculated, with a Cronbach alpha of .9342.

Belief in Interviewee. Interviewers rated additional three items: (1) My partner

can succeed in achieving his or her goals; (2) My partner will succeed in achieving his

or her goals; (3) My partner is successful. Cronbach alpha was .86.

42 Partners' bonding scales were positively correlated with each other, so were combined and tested with only experimental condition as a between-subjects dependent variable. Though in the hypothesized direction, results were not significant and will not be reported.


76

Attachment Style was measured as in Study 1 (see appendix 3). Cronbach

alphas were .90 for the anxiousness scale and .89 for the avoidance scale. The scales

were positively correlated (r=.20, p<.01). Due to small sample sizes in cells created

by crossing the experimental conditions with the categorical definitions of attachment

style anxiousness and avoidance variables were analyzed as continuous variables.

Academic WB. Diener et al.'s (1985) Satisfaction With Life Scale was adjusted

to the academic context (e.g., 'In most ways my studies are close to my ideals').

Cronbach alpha of the five items was .6743.

Performance and Related Cognitions Measures

Performance was measured using the following measures (1) perception of the

clarity of personal goals and plans; (2) actions participants can perform to achieve

chosen goal; (3) intentions to actually perform these actions; and (4) personal

resources (strengths, skills, etc.) they hold that can help them achieve their goal.

Goals and Plans Clarity (as performance antecedents). Performance was also

assessed using seven-item 1-5 likert-type scale (see appendix 6): (1) My goals are

now clearer to me; (2) My plans are now clearer to me; (3) My intentions are now

clearer to me; (4) I intend to reconsider my plans; (5) I intend to change my plans for

the near future; (6) I intend to change my plans for the distant future; (7) I intend to

perform actions that will promote the goal. (* Item no. 7 was concluded with "I

worked on" in the interviewees' questionnaires). Cronbach alpha was .77.

Action items. A second performance measure was the number of action items

participants (excluding interviewers) indicated they can perform to achieve the goal

they worked on (open list with a space for up to 8 actions). Possible actions people

43 Collected at T3.


77

can perform to achieve a future desired goal, has been consistently documented to be

a significant predictor of actual goal achievement (e.g., Gollwitzer & Sheeran, 2006).

Behavioral Intentions. Another variable that is known to be a predictor of

behavior is the intention to perform this behavior (Ajzen, 1985). Participants' mean

rating of intention to perform each action was used as a third performance measure

(see appendix 6).

Personal recourses. A fourth performance measure was the total number of

strengths, abilities and personal skills participants listed as personal resources they

posses and can use to achieve the goal they worked on (see appendix 6).

Action items, performance intentions and personal resources – second goal.

Interviewees and self-reflection participants were asked to think of an additional goal

they did not work on but was also important to them. Participants filled out these

performance measures for this second goal as well (see appendix 6).

Table 20 shows correlations between action-items, behavioral intentions,

personal resources and plans clarity. Actions, behavioral intentions and resources

items were submitted to factor analysis, yielding two factors (explaining 35 and 22

percent of the variance), with actions and resources items loaded together on the first

factor and behavioral intentions items loaded on the second one. Based on these

results, a combined scale for action items and personal resources and a second scale

for behavioral intentions were calculated. These two scales were calculated for each

goal separately and for both goals combined.


78

Table 20: Correlations between Performance and Related Cognitions Measures

Goal 1

Goal 2

N Clarity

Actions

Behavioral Intentions

Resources

Actions


Clarity (.77)

Goal 1

Actions 235 .03

Behavioral Intentions 234 .15 * -.08

Resources 234 .06 .47 ** .02

Goal 2

Actions 154 .07 .49 ** -.02 .47 **

Behavioral Intentions 150 .17 * -.08 .42 ** -.01 -.07

Resources 151 .03 .41 ** .06 .59 ** .50 ** .01

* p<0.05, ** p<.01

Procedure

Attachment questionnaire was collected during class 2-6 weeks before the

experimental sessions. Participants who were absent from class that day completed it

following the experimental session.

Procedure

The experimental sessions took place during the last month of the academic

year (N=132) or during the first semester of the following year (N=104). Participants

registered to the experiment via email, during class, or using an experiment

registration website of the Hebrew University. Experimental sessions were in groups

of 3-14, in a seminar room with a big oval table in the center, around which the

participants and the author sat. Upon arriving participants were asked for their name

and offered to pour themselves a glass of water from a bottle that was placed on the

table. Behind the author, a blank PowerPoint slide was projected on a screen. A

research assistant was sitting at the side of the room.

Before starting, participants were welcomed into the seminar room, and were

explained that they were participating in a research in which the author examines

various techniques aiming at helping students to achieve their personal goals during


79

their study period. Administrative issues like the credits they got and the other

questionnaires they filled out or were to fill out (see below) were explained. They

were asked not to disclose the content of the session to other students, since different

groups worked using different techniques. Participants were then given a chance to

clarify any administrative issues. At this point they were told by the author:

"It is known that there is large diversity of goals students have for the duration of their studies at University, such as succeeding in their studies, acquiring professional skills, learning interesting material, having fun or making friends and contacts. Right now, I want each of you to think about one goal that is especially important to you and would like to work on now." After 15 seconds given to chose their goals, and making sure they each had a

goal in mind, participants in the experimental conditions were told: "We will work in

pairs. I will now assign you into pairs." At this point the author assigned participants

into pairs, according to their sitting order around the table, noting in each pair who

will be the interviewer. If the number of participants were odd, the last participant was

asked to wait outside, and a few minutes later, when the pairs started interviewing, the

author went outside and explained to the person waiting that he or she were

participating in the experiment like everybody else, only doing something a little

different since another participant was missing. At this point they were asked again to

make sure they have a personal goal in mind they wanted to work on, and were given

the reflection condition questionnaire, thus being assigned to the reflection condition.

After participants were divided to pairs and each knew their role (interviewer

or interviewee), the author provided interviewing instructions, stressing that

interviewers' goal was to help their interviewees to think how they can achieve their

goal. They were told that the interview protocol would be projected on the screen, so

they did not have to memorize anything, only to understand how they should act, what


80

should they ask and pay attention to. They were instructed to introduce themselves,

and then to ask their interviewee what was the goal he or she chose to work on.

In the FFI condition, interviewers were requested to ask their interviewees to

tell them about a specific experience they had, in which they achieved the same or as

similar as possible goal. They were instructed to use the following protocol:

Could you please tell me a story about a specific experience where you succeed in [personal goal here], during which you felt at your best, full of life, and you were content even before the results of your actions became known to you?

- Would you be happy to experience a similar event again? What was the peak moment of this story? What did you think at that moment? How

did you feel at that moment (including your emotional and physiological reaction)?

What were the conditions in yourself, in others around you, and the physical surrounding that made this story possible?

The conditions you have just described seem to be your personal code for achieving [personal goal]. If this is so, think of your current actions, priorities and plans for the near and distant future, and consider to what extent they lead you towards these conditions, or away from them. What can you do to move closer to them?

Interviewers were encouraged to make sure they were told a specific

experience, to concentrate on listening and understanding the story, and to ask

clarifying questions to make sure they understood the story. They were also

encouraged to offer additional conditions to the ones given by their interviewees, if

they felt it was in place, and to help their interviewees review their plans in light of

the enabling conditions.

In the Feedback condition, interviewers used the following protocol:

1 What do you think you can do to achieve this goal? 2 What do you intend to do to achieve this goal? 3 [Interviewer:] provide feedback to your interviewee: tell him/her your opinion

about his or her plans – what is good about them, what is not so good, what can be improved.

4 [Interviewer:] tell your interviewee what else you think he or she can do to achieve his or her goal.

Interviewers were encouraged to ask clarifying questions regarding their

interviewees' ideas of what they can do and intend to do to achieve their goal.


81

At this point participants in both conditions were invited to ask clarifying

questions regarding their role, and then were told to spread around the room, face

their partners and start interviewing. They were told the interview would take around

20 minutes, and that they can ask the author questions if they wished. The interview

protocol was then projected on the screen (see appendix 7).

Upon interview completion, participants received questionnaires and were

asked to sit apart to fill it out. Interviewees' questionnaires included the following

measures (in this order): emotions, indicating their chosen goal, learning, satisfaction,

self-efficacy, clarity, liking of partner, appreciation of partner, action items and

behavioral intentions, personal resources, action items and behavioral intentions for a

second goal, personal resources for a second goal and demographics (see appendices

6). Interviewers' questionnaires included the following measures (in this order):

emotions, learning, satisfaction, liking of partner, appreciation of partner, belief in

interviewee, recalling interviewee's goal, writing down their own goal of choice, self-

efficacy, clarity, action items and behavioral intentions, personal resources and

demographics (see appendix 6).

Participants in the Reflection condition received the same instructions until the

point where participants in the experimental conditions were assigned to pairs. At that

point Reflection participants received the questionnaire. Reflection questionnaires

included the following measures (in this order): emotions, indicating their chosen

goal, self-efficacy, clarity, action items and behavioral intentions, personal resources,

action items and behavioral intentions for second goal, personal resources for second

goal and demographics (see appendix 6). The blank slide (same green template but

without the interview text) was projected on the screen during the whole session.


82

When participants (in all conditions) were given the questionnaires, the author

left the room, to avoid experimenter's bias. The research assistant, who was blind to

the research hypotheses, stayed in the room, collected the questionnaires, gave

attachment questionnaire to those who didn't fill it out previously, and took

participants' emails on a separate page for contacting them at time 3 to fill out T3

questionnaires. Lastly, participants were given participation credit and thanked. After

leaving the room, participants were debriefed individually by the author.

Between 2 to 10 weeks after the experimental sessions were concluded,

participants were approached via email by a research assistant, asking them to fill out

the third questionnaire (PANAS, academic well-being and self-efficacy regarding

achievement of personal goals). They were asked to return the filled out questionnaire

via email or print and leave it at the author's mailbox. Due to insufficient response-

rate (N=69, representing 29% of the participants), T3 measures are not reported.

Results

Table 21 shows means, standard deviations and intercorrelations between all

the dependent variables.


83

Table 21: Study 2: Dependent Variables and Attachment: Means, Standard Deviations and Correlations

M SD N 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

1 PA 3.06 .59 235 (.79)

2 NA - 8 Items 1.79 .69 235 .29 (.89)

3 SPE 3.00 .57 235 .69 .16 (.88)

4 SNE 1.45 .41 235 .17 .60 .15 (.75)

5 General Aff. Ratio 1.91 .65 235 .27 -.78 .22 -.46

6 Social Aff. Ratio 2.20 .64 235 .30 -.37 .54 -.71 .52

7 Self-Efficacy 4.36 .49 235 .22 -.21 .11 -.12 .35 .16 (.80)

8 Learning 3.09 .96 161 .33 .10 .35 -.04 .08 .25 .09 (.92)

9 Bonding 3.70 .73 161 .39 .02 .45 -.13 .18 .43 .15 .30 (.93)

10 Belief 4.27 .57 80 .25 -.18 .29 -.21 .28 .37 .19 .16 .35 (.85)

11 Anxious 3.37 1.00 176 .17 .28 .20 .39 -.22 -.20 -.19 .19 -.02 -.06 (.90)

12 Avoidance 3.31 .89 176 -.12 .11 -.20 .11 -.16 -.23 -.21 -.11 -.08 -.04 .27 (.90)

13

Clarity 3.12 .69 235 .26 .12 .26 .05 -.01 .13 .06 .44 .18 .13 .17 -.11

14

Behavioral Intentions Goal 1 4.08 .62 235 .18 -.06 .19 .00 .19 .13 .21 .15 .19 .24 .02 -.01 .15

15 Goal 2 4.05 .58 154 .01 -.14 .08 -.11 .15 .17 .24 -.09 .08 - -.05 -.15 .17 .42

16 Both goals 3.97 .66 235 .09 -.09 .12 -.06 .16 .15 .27 .09 .16 - -.02 -.07 .22 .83 .86

17

Personal Resources Goal 1 4.20 1.32 235 .27 .13 .19 .08 .06 .04 .23 .13 -.05 -.05 .04 -.02 .06 -.03 -.05 -.05

18 Goal2 3.30 1.37 154 .13 -.01 .13 .02 .09 .04 .18 .07 -.18 - .00 .09 .07 .04 -.03 .00 .63

19 Both goals 3.79 1.22 155 .20 .03 .17 .04 .10 .04 .22 .08 -.19 - .03 .06 .07 -.01 -.04 -.03 .90 .90

<ote: correlations significant at the .01 level are in bold italics; correlations significant at the .05 level are in bold; correlations marginally significant (p<.1) are in italics. Cronbach alphas are at the diagonal when applicable.


84

Because this study had multiple dependent variables (DVs), as a first step an

omnibus test (MANOVA) was ran to examine whether the experimental manipulation

had a general effect on all the DVs. Following, a series of ANOVAs were run,

examining the effect on each DV individually. Due to the unbalanced design (with

one condition – reflection – having no different roles), MANOVA was ran twice –

first, comparing interviewees from FFI and FB conditions and reflection participants,

and second, comparing only FFI and FB participants, examining condition x role

differences. Each MANOVA compares all the relevant DVs together, and is followed

by the matching ANOVAs.

The first MANOVA indicates systematic differences in the outcome of the

experimental conditions, with F18,280=2.20, p<.01, η2=.1244. However, examining the

means of variables that yielded significant differences (see table 22 and figure 7

below) shows that these differences were not always in the hypothesized direction.

The means suggest that FFI had a detrimental effect on interviewees' social emotions

compared with both FB interviewees and reflection participants, thus failing to

support H1, and on goals and plans clarity, compared with reflection participants. FFI

did have a positive influence on interviewees' behavioral intentions, compared with

both FB interviewees and reflection participants. FFI was also beneficial in its effect

on personal resources participants listed compared with FB interviewees, although

they scored lower than reflection participants, thus providing mixed support to

hypothesis H3, regarding FFI's influence on performance. To sum, FFI was somewhat

beneficial in terms of performance variables compared with FB condition, but was not

beneficial compared with FB in terms of the mediating variables, thus failing to

44 Variables examined: general affect ratio, social affect ratio, self-efficacy, clarity, behavioral intentions both goals and personal resources both goal.


85

support H2 as well, and beside its positive effect on behavioral intention, it was

mostly inferior to reflection.

Table 22: Study 2: One-Way ANOVAs Testing the Effects of the Experimental Manipulation (FFI Interviewees vs. FB Interviewees vs. Reflection) on the Dependent Variables

Experimental condition; df = 2, 155

Dependent Variable F Eta2

PA .39 .01 NA .34 .00 SPE .39 .01 SNE 1.42 .02 General affect ratio .91 .01 Social affect ratio 2.73 † .03 Self-efficacy 1.77 .02

Clarity 3.49 * .04


Goal 1 1.61 .02

Goal 21 4.69 * .06

Both goals2 4.10 * .05

Personal Resources

Goal 1 3.10 * .04

Goal22 1.96 .03

Both goals 2.69 † .03

<otes: * p < .05; † p < .1; 1 df = 2, 150; 2 df = 2, 154

1.00

2.00

3.00

4.00

5.00

Social Aff. Clarity Behavioral Intentions Resources

FFI Interviewees FB Interviewees Reflection

Figure 7: Study 2: ANOVAs for the Significant Effects of Experimental Condition on Dependent Variables – Between Subjects Comparison


86

Table 23: Study 2: MANOVA for the Effects of Experimental Condition (FFI vs. FB) x Role (Interviewee vs. Interviewer) on the Dependent Variables

Source df F η2

Condition 8,149 1.72 † .08

Role 8,149 1.71 † .08

Condition x Role 8,149 .82 .04

<otes: †p=.1; variables examined: general affect ratio, social affect ratio, self-efficacy, learning, boding, clarity, behavioral intentions goal1, resources goal1.

Overall, the second MANOVA (see Table 23) provides only marginal support

the research hypothesis, and indicates that there might be systematic differences

between interviewers and interviewees – effects that were not hypothesized, and were

only marginally significant. Therefore, any significant ANOVAs reported below

should be considered with caution.

Examining the means of variables that yielded significant differences (see

table 24 and figure 8 below) suggests that in both FFI and FB conditions interviewers

felt better than interviewees, both in terms of their general affect (mainly through a

large difference in NA) and social affect. Social affect also marginally interacted with

condition, suggesting that FFI interviewers felt somewhat better than FB interviewers,

while FFI interviewees felt somewhat worse than FB interviewees. FFI did have a

positive influence of self-efficacy and behavioral intention, for both interviewers and

interviewees, compared with FB participants, thus providing some support for

hypotheses H2 and H3, respectively.


87

Table 24: Study 2: One-Way ANOVAs Testing the Significant Effects of Condition (FB vs. FFI) x Role (Interviewee vs. Interviewer) on the Dependent Variables

Condition; df = 1, 161 Role; df = 1, 161 Condition x Role;

df = 1, 161

Dependent Variable F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2

PA .30 .00 .26 .00 .82 .01

NA .87 .01 8.24 ** .05 .12 .00

SPE .00 .00 2.31 .01 .69 .01

SNE 1.41 .01 2.05 .01 .78 .00

General affect ratio .05 .00 9.97 ** .06 1.67 .01

Social affect ratio .92 .01 4.01 * .03 3.15 † .02

Self-efficacy 6.27 * .04 .02 .00 1.68 .01

Learning .27 .00 1.39 .01 2.54 .02

Bonding 1.62 .01 .03 .00 .00 .00

Clarity .23 .00 .60 .00 .23 .00


Goal 1 4.42 * .03 .00 .00 .02 .00

Personal Resources

Goal 1 1.47 .01 .12 .00 .17 .00

<otes: * p < .05; ** p < .01; † p < .1.

1.00

2.00

3.00

4.00

5.00

General Affect Social Affect Self-Efficacy Behavioral Intentions

Interviewees FFI Interviewees FB Interviewers FFI Interviewers FB

Figure 8: Study 2: MANOVA for the Significant Effects of Experimental Condition (3 conditions) on Dependent Variables – Between Subjects Comparison


88

Table 25: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Dependent Variables and Attachment by Experimental Conditions, and Mean Comparisons with Cohen’s d Values

Interviewees Interviewers Reflection Interviewees Interviewers

Inter-viewees

Inter-viewers

FFI FB FFI FB FFI vs. FB

FFI vs. ref.

FFI vs. FB

FFI vs. Ref.

vs. ref. vs. ref.

Variable M SD N M SD N M SD N M SD N M SD N d d d d d d

PA 3.00 .60 44 3.04 .60 37 3.14 .58 43 3.00 .71 37 3.09 .54 74

-.06 -.16 .22 .08 -.13 -.03

NA - 8 Items 1.96 .72 44 1.83 .70 37 1.63 .63 43 1.57 .48 37 1.87 .77 74 .18 .12 .11 -.33 * .04 -.40 **

SPE 2.89 .64 44 2.98 .54 37 3.11 .65 43 3.04 .50 37 2.98 .53 74 -.14 -.16 .12 .22 -.09 .17

SNE 1.57 .52 44 1.43 .41 37 1.41 .38 43 1.39 .32 37 1.44 .40 74 .29 .29 .06 -.06 .15 -.09

General Affect R. 1.71 .63 44 1.82 .53 37 2.17 .79 43 2.01 .61 37 1.86 .62 74 -.19 -.25 .22 .44 * -.17 .35 *

Social Affect Rat. 1.96 .54 44 2.24 .68 37 2.34 .77 43 2.26 .52 37 2.20 .62 74 -.46 * -.41 * .13 .21 -.19 .16

Self-Efficacy 4.36 .51 44 4.26 .55 37 4.48 .46 43 4.17 .56 37 4.44 .39 74 .19 -.18 .62 ** .10 -.26 -.22

Learning 2.91 .89 44 3.08 1.01 37 3.33 .98 43 3.01 .94 37 - -.17 - .33 † - - -

Bonding 3.78 .64 44 3.63 .78 37 3.76 .73 43 3.61 .77 37 - .20 - .20 - - -

Belief in Interviewee - - 4.33 .58 43 4.19 .55 37 - - - .25 - - -

Anxious 3.35 .92 31 3.22 .93 29 3.32 1.15 34 3.36 1.19 25 3.49 .92 57 .14 -.14 -.03 -.16 -.21 -.14

Avoidance 3.27 1.07 31 3.30 .76 29 3.12 .92 34 3.45 .74 25 3.39 .89 57 -.03 -.13 -.39 -.30 † -.12 -.15

Action-items and Personal Resources

Goal 1 4.08 1.39 44 3.92 1.14 37 4.23 1.28 43 3.91 1.24 37 4.53 1.39 74 .13 -.32 † .26 -.22 -.39 * -.34 *

Goal 2 3.38 1.50 44 2.92 1.21 37 - - 3.45 1.35 73 .33 † -.05 - - -.21 -

Both goals 3.72 1.34 44 3.44 .97 37 - - 3.99 1.23 74 .24 -.21 - - -.33 * -


Goal 1 4.20 .63 44 3.98 .52 37 4.19 .61 43 4.00 .73 36 4.04 .59 74 .38 * .26 † .29 † .25 † .09 .10

Goal 2 4.22 .56 43 3.89 .64 34 - - 3.85 .69 73 .55 * .57 ** - - .34 * -

Both Goals 4.22 .50 44 3.95 .54 37 - - 3.95 .52 74 .51 ** .51 ** - - .27 * -

Clarity 3.00 .82 44 3.00 .72 37 3.15 .73 43 3.03 .66 37 3.29 .56 74 .00 -.44 * .16 -.23 -.43 ** -.31 *

** p<.01, * p<.05, † p<.1


89

Goal Type

Goal setting theory (e.g., Locke & Latham, 2002) states that types of goals

mediate the effect of feedback on performance. As a consequence, it is possible that

the type of goal participants chose to work on mediated the manipulations' effects on

the dependent variables. Thus, the type of goals participants chose to work (academic

success, professional development or personal interests) was examined as a mediating

variable. Repeating the first MANOVA yielded no main effect for goal type, nor a

goal type x condition interaction. Repeating the second MANOVA did not yield a

main effect for goal type, but goal type did interact with condition (F24,236=1.61,p<.05,

η2=.14) and with role (F24,236=1.65,p<.05, η2=.14) in its effects on the dependent

variables (the three-way interaction was not significant). Since this effects was not

hypothesized, and since goal type was not balanced (resulting in cells with very small

Ns), this effect was not explored further.

Interactions between Attachment and Experimental Treatments

Attachment questionnaires were collected separately from the experiment,

resulting in only partial data (N=117, roughly half of the total sample). Thus, using

attachment style categorically resulted in very small sample sizes (down to N=2 in

some cells). Therefore, median split as described in Study 1 of the anxiousness and

avoidance dimensions was not used here. Categorical distinction is discussed only for

exploring the direction of significant interaction effects that immerged using the

continuous measures. These interactions were again examined first with MANOVA

analysis, followed by ANOVAs to examine the DVs individually; this set of analyses

was ran twice, once comparing FFI and FB interviewees and reflection participants,

and a second time comparing FFI and FB conditions and condition x role interactions.


90

Table 26: Study 2: MANOVA for the Interaction between Experimental Manipulation (FFI interviewees vs. FB interviewees vs. Reflection) and Attachment Style on the Dependent Variables

Source df F η2

Condition 18,188 1.20 .10

Anxious 9,93 1.56 .13

Avoidance 9,93 2.58 * .18

Condition x Anxious 18,188 1.19 .10

Condition x Avoidance 18,188 1.21 .10

Anxious x Avoidance 9,93 1.90 † .16

Condition x Anxious x Avoidance 18,188 1.19 .10

<otes: *p<.05, †p<.1; variables examined: general affect ratio, social affect ratio, self-efficacy, clarity, behavioral intentions and personal resources for both goals.

The first MANOVA (table 26) did not support the research hypotheses, as there

were no systematic interactions of attachment dimensions and experimental conditions

on the DVs.

Table 27: Study 2: MANOVA for the Interaction of Experimental Condition (FFI vs. FB) x Role (Interviewee vs. Interviewer) and Attachment Style on the Dependent Variables

Source F (8,95) η2

Condition 1.33 .10

Role 3.14 ** .21

Anxious 1.37 .10

Avoidance 1.12 .09

condition * Role .86 .07

condition * Anxious 1.43 .11

condition * Avoidance 1.59 .12

Role * Anxious 2.68 * .18

Role * Avoidance 3.18 ** .21

Anxious * Avoidance 1.10 .09

condition * Role * Anxious .86 .08

condition * Role * Avoidance .73 .06

condition * Anxious * Avoidance 1.71 .13

Role * Anxious * Avoidance 3.03 ** .20

condition * Role * Anxious * Avoidance .76 .06

<otes: *p<.05, **p<.01; variables examined: general affect ratio, social affect ratio, self-efficacy, learning, boding, clarity, behavioral intentions goal1, resources goal1.


91

Again, the second MANOVA (table 27) indicates that attachment style did not

interact with experimental condition as hypothesized. It did interact systematically

with experimental role, however, an effect that was not directly hypothesized, but is

not surprising.

Examining the DVs individually (the full ANOVAs table can be found in

appendix 8) show that only learning yielded a systematic effect for both role and

condition (see figure 9). Examining the means show that anxious participants reported

the highest learning in both FFI and FB conditions. Anxious and avoidant participants

reported higher learning in the FB condition, while secure participants reported higher

learning in the FFI conditions. In the FFI condition avoidant participants reported

lowest learning, compared with secure and anxious participants. This finding is in line

with the interaction hypothesis, which predicts FFI to be more beneficial to secure

individuals than for anxious and avoidant ones. Regarding the roles participants were

assigned to, secure participants reported higher learning as interviewers than as

interviewees, while anxious and avoidant participants' learning was equal in both

roles. Here, too, anxious participants reported the highest learning in both roles.

Surprisingly, there was a main effect of attachment style on learning such that

anxious participants reported higher levels of learning compared with secure

participants in both conditions, contradictory to H2b. As anxious individuals are

preoccupied with how others perceive them (Hazan & Shaver, 1990), this might lead

to an increased desire to create positive impression through satisfying expectations by

claiming the experimental manipulation helped them.


92

A last finding that worth noting is regarding personal resources, where both

secure and avoidant participants had a tendency to list more personal resources in the

FFI condition, consistent with the hypotheses, while anxious participants, who

unpredictably performed better in both conditions, did not show a preference to either

condition (see figure 10). As personal resources is an objective measure, it indicates

an actual advantage of anxious participants. It might suggest that anxious individuals'

preoccupation with how they are perceived increased their motivation to perform

well. If this is the case, it suggest that participants' motivation had a stronger effect on

performance than the influence of the experimental manipulations.

3.0

3.5

4.0

4.5

Secure Anxious Avoidant

FFI FB

Figure 10: Interaction between Experimental Condition and Attachment Style on Personal Resources for Goal 1

Condition

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0


FFI FB

Role

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0


Interview ees Interview ers

Figure 9: Interaction between Experimental Condition and Role and Attachment Style on Learning


93

Discussion

Overall, results of Study 2 show that FFI resulted in different outcomes,

compared with the alternative treatments, both for interviewers and interviewees.

However, these outcomes were not necessarily beneficial, and effects were mainly

small in magnitude. This could result from either methodological flaws of the

experimental design and its implementation or from theoretical issues regarding the

guiding hypotheses. At this stage of development of FFI's theory and experimental

research, it is premature to abandon the theory I presented. It does seem, however,

that several methodological flaws could account for Study 2's results.

Design of experimental conditions. In hindsight, there were design problems in

all experimental conditions. First, FFI condition was constructed as an attempt to

imitate as much as possible organizational workshops that were conducted by Kluger

& Nir (2010) and myself in the past years. However, due to time constrains and

experimental considerations, couples did not switch roles, which might have caused

them to feel less comfortable (interviewees knowing their partners will not have their

time to self-disclose in return; interviewers knowing they will not have the benefit of

working with their partners on their own goals). Also, the rationale behind FFI was

not explained to the participants, who only received the interview instructions. Two

facts strengthen the assumption that the experimental interventions (both FFI and FB)

did not work as intended: First, being an interviewee (rather than interviewer) did not

result in better performance, although partners supposedly worked on the

interviewee's goal. Second, securely attached participants (and only them) showed a

preference to the interviewer role in terms of affect and behavioral intentions. These

findings suggest that interviewees did not feel comfortable with their role and that

interviewers did not manage to perform their role as intended.


94

Moreover, when performed in organizational context, participants move from

the interview to work in small groups, thus further consider the various outcomes on

one hand, and allowing participants who did not manage to perform a constructive

interview to benefit from the work of others. Lastly, participants were not allowed

sufficient time to consider the Feedforward question before moving to the

performance task. This might have masked an existing positive effect on self-efficacy.

Furthermore, Study 2 failed to replicate the results of Study 1, showing a

positive influence of FFI on interviewees' affect. The main differences between the

two experiments' FFI was the use of trained interviewers in Study 1, who were

research assistants, likely to create a sense of authority in their interviewees' mind,

compared with the use of untrained fellow-participants in Study 2. Though the current

design is more similar to organizational workshops (where untrained colleagues

interview each other), the failure to replicate Study 1's strongest result, suggests that it

was not done properly. Second, FB condition was designed trying to imitate

traditional organizational FB processes. In practice, participants were instructed to

work on future plans and not on past behavior, as is usually done in FB processes,

resulting in an intervention more similar to what Goldsmith terms Feedforward

(Goldsmith, 2009) and claims to be beneficial. Furthermore, FB interviewers were

encouraged to ask clarifying questions regarding their interviewees' plans, which is

not a common practice in organizational FB processes. Third, self-reflection condition

was initially intended to act as a no-treatment condition. Only following participants'

comments it was realized that rather than examine outcomes without intervention,

they were actually reflecting on their goals and ways to achieve them (and reported

they have learnt from it), thus resulting in another effective intervention (e.g., Anseel,

Lievens, & Schollaert, 2009). The absence of a true no-treatment condition might


95

have masked positive outcomes of FFI, in case they were not stronger than those of

the two control treatments.

Lastly, is it possible that allowing participants to freely choose their own

goals, introduced an effect of goal type chosen on the results. It might have been

advisable to direct participants to choose goals in a certain context (e.g., academic

success), thus controlling for goal-type variance.

Following instructions. Despite the fact the following instructions in

conducting FFI is crucial to its outcome (i.e., analyzing a specific, process-based

event), it was not measured. Since FFI sometimes draws resistance from some

participants, it is possible that having controlled this aspect and separating participants

who performed FFI as intended from those who did not, might have resulted in

stronger outcomes. Another fact that suggests participants did not perform the

interview as well as possible, is that though the interview's time-constrain was tighter

than usual (15 minutes, compared with 20-25 minutes), there were no cases where

partners had to be hurried-up or stopped, as is common in FFI organizational

workshops. The fact that participants needed significantly less time than is normally

needed might suggest that the interviews were more superficial.

Interview topic. Participants were given absolute freedom in choosing the

goals they worked on. This was done in order to make the task as personally-relevant

to them as possible. However, the path to achieve some goals might be easier to

visualize and verbalize than others, and some goals might be easier to discuss than

others (e.g., getting good grades vs. meeting a significant other). It might be that

assigning a specific goal to all participants (instead of letting them choose for

themselves) would have reduced this variance (and a possible interaction between

goal's nature, individual differences and experimental outcome), and control for


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similarity between the first and the second goal and goal's importance to each

participant, thus decreasing some noise in the outcomes.

Cultural and sex differences. As discussed in Study 1's discussion above, the

research population consisted of few distinct cultures: Israeli-Jewish, Israeli-

Palestinians (Muslims and Christians), and immigrants. These populations rarely mix

with each other in the academic environment, and the assignment of mixed-culture

couples surely resulted in further noise. Indeed, analyzing the results separately for

Hebrew speakers altered the results, though due to small sample size it was not

reported. Also, examining some of the extreme negative results (e.g., in the bonding

scale) showed them to belong to mixed-culture couples. Creating culturally-

homogeneous experimental groups (and perhaps using translated questionnaires to

overcome language barriers) could have eliminated cultural-differences-related issues,

instead of creating them. It is also possible that assigning males and females to work

together also created noise (for example, discussing the search for a significant other

with an opposite-sex partner), since the work was in pairs and in a somewhat intimate

manner, so it might have been advantageous to use same-sex couples.

Participants' seniority. When results were analyzed separately for roughly the

first half of the participants (those who participated at the end of their first academic

year, N=132), FFI had a more positive effect than was found in the full sample: FFI

had positive significant effect on emotions compared with both FB and reflection

conditions (thus does replicating results of Study 1); a significant effect on self-

efficacy compared with FB (but not compared with reflection), and a significant effect

on bonding and belief in interviewee, compared with FB (bonding was still higher for

FFI in the full sample, but failed to reach significance). Repeating the first


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MANOVA, comparing FFI and FB interviewees and reflection participants45 while

entering seniority as a dummy variable did not yield a main effect for seniority, but

the condition x seniority interaction was marginally significant (F2,148=3.03, p=.05, η2

=.04). Examining the means suggests that senior participants performed better in the

FFI condition and worse than in the FB and reflection conditions, compared with

junior participants; and that senior participants in the FFI and reflection conditions

performed equally and better than participants in the FB condition. Junior participants

in the FFI condition performed the poorest, followed by FB and reflection

participants, who performed best.

Repeating the second MANOVA, comparing FFI and FB participants and

examining condition x role interaction46, again did not yield main effect for seniority,

but a significant condition x seniority interaction (F1,152=11.35, p<.01, η2=.07; role x

seniority and the three-way interaction were not significant). Examining the means

suggest that senior participants performed better in the FFI condition than in the FB

condition, while the opposite was true for junior participants. Figure 11 shows the two

MANOVAs results of the overall effects of the condition x seniority interactions on

all the relevant DVs.

Figure 5:

45 Conducted on general affect ratio, social affect ratio, self-efficacy, clarity, behavioral intentions both goals and personal resources both goal. 46 Conducted on general affect ratio, social affect ratio, self-efficacy, learning, boding, clarity, behavioral intentions goal1, resources goal1.

2.50

3.00

3.50

End of 1st Year Beginning of 1st Year

FFI FB Reflection

2.50

3.00

3.50

End of 1st Year Beginning of 1st Year

FFI FB

Figure 11: MANOVAs for the Effects of Experimental Manipulation (FFI Interviewees vs. FB Interviewees vs. Reflection; Left or FFI vs. FB; right) Interaction with Seniority on the Dependent Variables


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These differences between the results of the two sub-samples might suggest

that more experience with academic life (e.g., having one exam period behind them)

can help participants further enjoy FFI, that draws on relevant past experience.

Moreover, as was described in the introduction, when past experience is scarce or

absent FFI is more challenging and demands higher expertise from the interviewer, to

relate past experiences from other contexts to current circumstances. Having more

relevant experience is also closer to organizational FFI, as well as being more familiar

with the organization (the Hebrew university), academic life in general and

participation in experiments, which might have helped senior participants to feel more

at ease in the situation.

Role preference. The fact that participants, specifically those with secure

attachment style, preferred the role of interviewer also suggest that the experimental

conditions did not act as expected, contradicting the experience in organizations that

managers and employees often yearn to be heard. It is possible that students do not

have this need, and/or that the position of interviewee of a fellow-student made them

feel insecure and uncomfortable. It is worth noting that FFI resulted in higher self-

efficacy and learning for interviewers, compared with FB condition. This might

suggest that there are some possible benefits to FFI that are yet to be understood.

To sum, results of Study 2 add to those of Study 1 in showing that there is a

potential in FFI to be an effective intervention, for interviewees and interviewers

alike, and that attachment style has the potential to explain individual differences in

reaction to FFI (or any other interpersonal interaction). Still, some methodological

improvements are necessary to further examine its effectiveness empirically, and to

scientifically support the theory behind its practice.


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Field Studies

Introduction to Field Studies

Since FFI is an organizational intervention, is was important to test its

effectiveness also in field studies. I cooperated with two organizations, performing

FFI workshops in a quasi-experimental design and collecting relevant data. In the first

one, I worked with senior Air-Force officers and introduced FFI as a practical tool for

career planning. My goal was to see whether participants feel the workshop helped

them in their own career planning, that is, if they perceive their knowledge regarding

their career planning following the FFI as better than it was before.

In the second field study I worked with managers high-technology firm

toward an upcoming employees-evaluation process. In this case I used the evaluation

forms as a more objective measure of actual performance, rather then participants'

perception of the process. Unfortunately, both samples were too small to provide solid

conclusions, though they both provide some support for FFI's positive effects.

Field Study 1: FFI at an Army Base

FFI workshop was given to senior officers of an Air-Force army base, as a part

of an introduction day to a forthcoming large scale career-planning process that was

conducted during the following months by participants with their subordinates. The

process aimed for short- and long-term career planning of the base's officers. I

introduces FFI as a practical tool that can be used for career planning, revealing

enabling conditions for top performance and considering possible future career

directions that will promote a working environment that provides these conditions.


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Method

Participants

A total of 22 officers (19 majors and 3 lieutenant colonels) participated in an

FFI workshop, as a part of a half-day mandatory seminar about the career planning

process. The seminar was organized by the base' organizational consultant and was

accompanied by her and the base' commander (a colonel). All participants were about

to participate in the career planning process both as participants (the 3 lieutenants with

supervisors outside the camp) and as supervisors of their own subordinates (thus, the

lieutenants' subordinates were among the participants). Seven participants were

excluded from the data due to failure to match their before and after questionnaires or

to complete all items, resulting in N=15.

Measures

Workshop self-report questionnaires. Immediately before and after the

workshop, participants filled out a 16-items self-report questionnaire, in which they

rated on a 1-7 likert-type scale: (1) to what extent they felt they their professional

objectives were clear to them (4 items); (2) to what extent they believed they can

perform their own career planning (self-efficacy, 5 items); (3) their commitment to the

process (4 items) and (4) their perception of the organizations' commitment to it (3

items; see appendix 9 for the full questionnaire). Since all items were inter-correlated,

they were combined into a single scale. Table 28 displays means, standard deviations,

intercorelations and Cronbach alphas of the scales.


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Table 28: Field Study 1: Means, Standard Deviations, Cronbach alphas and Intercorrelations of the Four Scales, Before and After the FFI

M SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

1 Clear Objectives - Before 5.37 1.18 (.72)

2 Clear Objectives - After 5.67 1.02 .81 ** (.74)

3 Belief in Ability - Before 5.97 .68 .42 .37 (.56)

4 Belief in Ability - After 6.05 .58 .61 * .62 * .86 ** (.49)

5 Commitment - Before 5.73 1.03 .30 .23 .59 * .46 † (.85)

6 Commitment - After 5.95 .73 .29 .50 † .68 ** .69 ** .80 ** (.77)

7 Org. Commitment - Before 6.38 .74 .41 .33 .55 * .55 * .86 ** .76 ** (.83)

8 Org. Commitment - After 6.42 .58 .49 † .47 † .56 * .59 * .85 ** .76 ** .92 ** (.74)

9 All items - Before 5.85 .70 .69 ** .58 * .79 ** .77 ** .86 ** .79 ** .86 ** .87 ** (.88)

10 All items - After 5.99 .63 .71 ** .84 ** .73 ** .87 ** .63 * .84 ** .68 ** .77 ** .87 ** (.90)

N=15; ** p<.01, * p<.05, † p<.1, one tailed


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Procedure

The workshop. The workshop began with a general overview of the

approaching career planning process, given by the base' commander. Following, the

base' organizational consultant discussed the personal meetings with subordinates as a

central part of the process, and its goals. Next, I conducted an FFI workshop.

After a general introduction to AI and FFI, participants interviewed each other

in pairs. They were instructed to discuss specific events of professional peak

experiences, and review their future career plans in light of the enabling conditions for

top performance. They had 40 minutes for both interviews. Next, participants were

divided to groups of four (breaking former pairs), and each group chose one personal

story of one of its members, as a basis of further development. The idea was to work

extensively on few examples, to teach them how to use peak experiences and enabling

conditions as guidelines for short- and long-term career planning, so that later they

will be able to (1) improve their own career planning as participants in the process;

and (2) better plan with their subordinates their careers later. Participants worked in

groups for 45 minutes. During these group discussions the base' commander, the

organizational consultant and I moved around the groups and helped when necessary.

Finally, participants were given a theoretical review of FFI's potential, and

were given the opportunity to ask questions and discuss possible challenges and

concerns regarding using FFI with their subordinates. Unfortunately, time constrains

prevented this last (and important) discussion from being fully developed.

Results

Table 29 shows effect sizes for the differences between T1 and T2 scales. It

can be seen that they were all in the hypothesized direction, though only medium-size

effect were marginally significant due to the small sample,.


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Table 29: Field Study 1: Paired-Comparisons of Before and After Scales

Scale d

Clear Objectives .61 †

Belief in Ability .33

Commitment .56 †

Org. Commitment .24

All items .57 †

df=14, † p<.1, one-tailed

In a second analysis I counted the number of participants that responded in a

way consistent to the hypothesis (i.e., an increase of each scale following the

workshop), the number of participants that responded contradictory to the hypothesis

and those who showed no change. Table 30 indicates that beside participants'

perception of the organizations' commitment to the process, there was a strong

tendency for participants to respond in a way consistent with the hypothesis.

Table 30: Field Study 1: Percentage of Responses Consistent or Contradictory to Hypothesis

Consistent Contradictory No change

Clear Objectives 67% 13% 20%

Belief in Ability 47% 33% 20%

Commitment 53% 27% 20%

Org. Commitment 13% 13% 73%

All items 67% 17% 17%

Discussion

Results of Field Study 1 provide some indication that the FFI workshop was

effective. Participants felt that their career objectives were clearer to them following

FFI and reported higher commitment to the process they were facing. However, the

study had some limitations: First, sample size is very small, and there is some

possibility that the results are random. Second, there is no control group. It is possible

that other types of activities working toward the career planning process would have

produced positive results, or even that simply filling out the questionnaire twice in


104

proximity would have created the same effect. However, the fact that one of the scales

(perception of organization's commitment) did not change counteracts this possibility.

Third, there is a risk of bias in the reports, either due to experimenter bias or fear of

participants for their anonymity, since they indicated their army ID number on the

questionnaires.

To sum, Field Study 1 provided some support, though not conclusive, that FFI

is beneficial to participants' cognitions relevant to performance, such as self-efficacy,

clarity of future plans and goals, and commitment to the task.

Field Study 2: Performance Evaluation at a High-Technology Firm

Introduction

Field Study 2 was conducted in a medium-size international communication

(high-technology) company, before the annual performance evaluation process. The

FFI workshop I conducted with junior and senior managers was defined as a

developmental activity.

Method

Participants

A total of 28 managers participated in the experiment. They were divided by

the company's HR manager to experimental and control groups based on their

previous experience in performance evaluation, attempting to equate experience

between the experimental and control groups. Five of the participants were top-level

managers who conducted the performance evaluation to the other managers who

participated in the study. In total, 15 managers were assigned to the experimental

group, receiving FFI prior to the performance evaluation process, and 13 managers

were assigned to the control group, receiving FFI four months later, when the

evaluation process was concluded.


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The final data consisted of 47 performance-evaluation forms. One manager

(evaluating 3 employees) could not be identified and was dropped from the analysis,

as well as one additional form that was partly filled out in English47, leaving 43 forms

for the analysis, filled out by ten managers in the FFI condition and six managers in

the control condition.

Measures

The evaluations forms had three parts. In the part 1, managers responded to

open-ended questions regarding the subordinate's (1) job description; (2) knowledge

and professionalism; (3) keeping schedule; (4) job performance; (5) responsibility and

adhering to protocol; (6) interpersonal relationships and cooperation and (7)

leadership ability. While filling out these open ended questions, the amount of text

and richness of content can be considered to represent the rater's effort and investment

in the process. Therefore, the total number of words and the number of different

issues (content items) considered in response to each question were both used as

performance measures, totaling seven measures of text length and seven measures of

number of content items considered. Data for each manager was collapsed across the

forms he filled out. Mean number of forms for each manager was 2.63 (ranging from

1 to 6). Empty sections were coded as zero, except leadership ability (question 7),

which might have been left blank due to irrelevance. Submitting the seven word-count

measures to factor analysis yielded a single factor, explaining 81% of the variance. A

number-of-words scale was calculated, with Cronbach alpha = .96. Submitting the

seven number-of-items measures to factor analysis yielded two factors. The first

factor explained 74% of the variance and all items were loaded on it, thus a number-

47 Since performance measures (see below) were based mainly on words-count, the use of a different language deemed this form irrelevant for comparison with the others.


106

of-items scale was calculated, with Cronbach alpha = .9348. To control for

confounding between these two measures, a words-per-item measure was also

calculated by dividing number of words by number of items.

In addition, the number of positive and negative items in each section was

counted as well49. Since the first question – job description – is inherently neutral

(75% of the items were classified as neutral), it was not analyzed. The other six

questions were factor analyzed. Positive items yielded a single factor, explaining 79%

of the variance, and were averaged to a single number-of-positive-items scale with

Cronbach alpha = .96. Factor analyzing the six negative items yielded two factors,

explaining 42% and 34% of the variance. A negative-items scale was computed by

averaging questions 3, 4 and 5, with Cronbach alpha = .74. To better compare positive

and negative scales on common grounds, a corresponding positive-items scales of

questions 3, 4 and 5 was calculated with Cronbach alpha = .87.

The last measures were the proportion of positive and negative items from the

total number of items (thus controlling for a confound between measures). These

proportions were calculated for each positive/negative scale from the mean number of

items for the same questions (i.e., proportion of positive and negative scales that are

based on questions 3, 4 and 5 are calculated for the mean number of items of

questions 3, 4 and 5).

Part 2 was filled out by the subordinate and was not analyzed50.

48 The second factor accounted for 15% of the variance, and only the first item had a higher load on it than on the first factor. 49 Number of items and characterizing them as positive, negative or neutral was coded by me. A second rater, an experienced manager familiar with performance evaluations, coded half of the forms, randomly chosen, with ICC(2) = .94. 50 Since some of the subordinates were junior managers who participated in the experiment, and since there was no account of the various instructions they received on how to fill out part 2 (at their own time, during the meeting, with certain emphases, etc.), it is unlikely that this part can uncover any effect of the supervisor's experimental group.


107

In part 3, managers listed (1) goals of the evaluation term and to what extent

they were achieved; (2) goals for the coming term; (3) strengths; (4) points for

improvement; (5) successes and (6) failures. Parts 1 and 6 were characterized by low

response rate (50% and 31%, respectively, compared with 86% average for the other

parts) and were dropped from the analysis. Number of items listed and number of

words for each part were used as performance measures. Factor analyzing the number

of words yielded a single factor, explaining 78% of the variance. A number-of-words

scale was calculated with Cronbach alpha = .79. Factor analyzing the number of items

yielded a single factor, explaining 81% of the variance. A number-of-items scale was

calculated with Cronbach alpha = .91. A words-per-item measure was calculated by

dividing the number of words scale by number-of-items scale for each question. One

manager in each group did not fill out this section, and was dropped from the analysis

of part 3.

Procedure

Managers in the FFI group received FFI workshop before the evaluation

process began. The workshop was performed in the context of evaluation process as

feedback giving, and interviews were conducted on past effective feedback-giving

experiences. After participants finished interviewing each other (20 minutes for each

interview), pairs were broken and participants worked in small groups, identifying

common conditions for effective feedback-giving. Finally, we made a list of common

conditions and discussed few of them as examples of how participants should go on

considering what they have learnt. The workshop lasted two hours, and the evaluation

process started a week later and lasted over three months. Managers in the control

group participated in FFI workshop (focusing on successful communication

experiences) four months later, after the evaluation process was concluded.


108

Results

Averaging the data for each manager across his or her various employees

resulted in a very small sample size, which makes it difficult to arrive to solid

conclusions regarding FFI's effectiveness.

Part 1

First, a MANOVA was ran (based on the nine measures displayed in table 31

below) to examine whether the experimental manipulation had a general effect on all

the DVs. The MANOVA suggests a marginally significant advantage to FFI mangers

(F(2,14)=1.82, p<.1 (one-tailed), η2=.81).

Table 31 shows means, standard deviations and Cohen's d values of mean

comparisons between FFI and control managers for the DVs in part 1 of the

evaluation form.

Table 31: Field Study 2: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Part 1 Dependent Variables by Experimental Conditions, and Mean Comparisons with Cohen’s d Value

FFI (& = 10) Control (&=6)

Variable M SD M SD d

Number of Words 41.74 17.02 28.52 26.32 .64

Number of Items 4.25 .91 2.92 1.84 1.04 *

Words per Item 9.57 2.71 8.06 3.57 .51

Positive Items 3.04 .89 1.77 1.36 1.22 *

Positive Items (2) 3.13 .97 1.66 1.41 1.33 *

Negative Items 1.06 .42 1.04 .74 .03

Proportion of Positive Items .73 .12 .51 .24 .82 †

Proportion of Positive Items (2) .72 .10 .56 .29 .90 †

Proportion of Negative Items .24 .08 .41 .31 -.89 †

df=14; * p<.05, † p<.1; one-tail

The MANOVA and table 31 show FFI did have a beneficial effect on

performance in the evaluations, in terms of the total number of items, the number and

proportion of positive items and the proportion of negative items – while not affecting


109

the actual number of negative items. FFI managers also tended to use more words in

their forms, and more words for each item they addressed, although these differences

did not reach statistical significance. This can be interpreted as FFI causing managers

to be more serious in their approach to the evaluation process, and directing their

attention to the positive aspects of their subordinates functioning, without neglecting

the negative aspects.

Examining the means of number of words and items in part 1 shows that FFI

managers performed better in each and every one of these variables (see figure 12).

Figure 12: Field Study 2: Part 1 Number of Words and Number of Items of FFI and Control Groups

Part 3

Table 32 shows means, standard deviations and Cohen's d values of mean

comparisons between FFI and control managers for the DVs in part 3 of the

evaluation form.

Table 32: Field Study 2: Means (M), Standard Deviation (SD) of Part 3 Dependent Variables by Experimental Conditions, and Mean Comparisons with Cohen’s d Value

FFI (& = 10) Control (&=6)

Variable M SD M SD d

Number of Words 14.58 6.51 7.55 3.12 1.30 *

Number of Items 3.18 .93 2.38 .44 1.03 †

Words per Item 4.45 1.35 3.08 1.03 1.13 *

df=12; * p<.05, † p=.05; one-tail. Figure 13 shows that here, too, there is a consistent advantage of managers in

the FFI group over those in the control group.

0.00

20.00

40.00

60.00

Job

Desc.

Pro

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Sch

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Invo

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ent

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hips

Lead

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FFI Control

0.00

2.00

4.00

6.00

Job

Des

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FFI Control


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Figure 13: Field Study 2: Part 3 Number of Words (left) and Number of Items (right) of FFI and Control Groups

Results were also analyzed using HLM (analyzing the proportion variables),

providing corresponding results, as seen in table 33:

Table 33: Field Study 2: HLM results of the experimental effect on the proportion variables

Variable Coefficient SE T-ratio

Words per Item 1.60 1.59 1.00

Proportion of Positive Items 0.15 .06 2.72 *

Proportion of Negative Items -0.17 .09 -1.99 *

Words per Item – part 3 1.00 .66 1.53 †

<otes: Approx. df=15; * p<.05, † p<.1; one-tailed. Variables (measured at level 1) were tested separately, with experimental condition inserted to the equation at the manager's level 2.

Discussion

First, it is important to remember the small sample size of Field Study 2, so

results need to be considered with caution. Still, results indicate a clear advantage of

managers who participated in FFI prior to the evaluation process, in terms of number

of words they wrote and the number of content-units they considered, as well as the

proportion of positive content-units. They were no clear outliers that biased the

results. This advantage might indicate that these managers took the process more

seriously, and spent more time thinking about it and preparing it, while giving more

attention to positive aspects of their subordinates' performance. FFI managers also set

more future goals to their subordinates, described more strengths and successes, but

also more points for improvement for them – and they were more detailed in their

description of each of these sections.

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

Future Goals Strengths Successes Improve

FFI Control

0

1

2

3

4

5

Future Goals Strengths Successes Improve

FFI Control


111

Current application of FFI includes a more thorough and systematic

consideration of enabling conditions-implementation, as described in the introduction.

It is likely that incorporating this practice here would have increased FFI's effect.

Also, data consists of performance done during three months following the

intervention, thus suggesting a long-term benefit of FFI.

Limitations

Field Study 2 had several limitations. Since there was no control treatment, it

is possible that FFI's positive effects was due to the fact that managers participated in

some kind of intervention that brought the upcoming performance reviews to their

attention, while emphasizing its importance to the organization. Future studies should

include control treatments to determine whether FFI has also relative advantage.

Some managers in the final data are represented by a singe form (one sub-

ordinate evaluated), while others are represented by up to six subordinates. This fact

impairs the reliability of the measures for some of the participants, and can also have

various effects on performance. It is possible, on one hand, that managers with fewer

subordinates can afford more resources to the process, and spend more time preparing

and conducting the evaluation. On the other hand, being an experienced evaluator can

also have positive effect on performance. Larger sample sizes can enable controlling

for this variable, as well as for tenure and length of knowledge with the subordinate.

HLM analysis do showed no effect for number of subordinates, but the small sample

size suggests this consideration should be examined further.

Also, assignment to experimental conditions was not completely randomized,

and was done manually by the organization's HR director. Although attempting to

control for experience, seniority and position in assigning to experimental groups, it is

naturally possible that there were some biases that might have affected the results.


112

Lastly, the measures used here do not necessarily support positive effect of

FFI on performance. Number of words, content units and positive tone were used as

proxies for evaluation quality, but a proof of evaluation quality would lie in the ratees

future performance. It is not necessarily clear that the measures used here, even if they

do indicate more consideration of the process, actually led to better performance of

the evaluation. It might be that more information causes an overload for the

subordinate, for example, or that abundance of text might cost in over-simplicity of

the information provided.

To sum, Field Study 2's results display FFI's potential as an effective

organizational intervention, but cannot be considered has hard evidence regarding.


113

GENERAL DISCUSSION

Chapter Overview

This chapter have four parts. First, I summarize and discuss the accumulated

empirical findings presented in the methodological section above. I then move to

suggest some implications of these findings to the fields of organizational

interventions, performance evaluations, Appreciative Inquiry, positive organizational

behavior, social emotions at the work place, strengths development and the emotions

research. Next, I suggest some lines of research aims at a deeper understanding of

FFI's influence on work-related variables. Lastly, I conclude this dissertation.

Summary and Discussion of Findings

In this part I overview the findings presented in the methodological chapter of

this dissertation. Considered from a bird's eye view, and in relation to FFI theory I

proposed, there is some supportive evidence for each theoretical proposal and

research hypothesis (though not consistent). Table 34 summarizes the findings from

all the studies, regarding each hypothesis.

Table 34: Summary of experimental findings

Preliminary Pilot Field Studies Hypothesis Study 2 Study Study 1 Study 2 1 2 Juniors Seniors

H1: affect ++ + ++ 0 ++ H2: self-efficacy - + + H3: learning ++ + + H4: bonding + + + - ++ H5: performance + + - + + + H6: interaction with attachment + + +

<otes: ++ supported; + weak or partial support; - not supported; 0 evidence opposite to hypothesis. Preliminary Study 1 was aimed at establishing the uniqueness of social emotions and the construction of relevant measures, and is not relevant to my theoretical hypotheses regarding FFI.


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FFI's influence on Affect

Hypotheses 1a and 1b predicted that FFI will be beneficial to participants'

general and social affect. These hypotheses received support in Preliminary Study 2

and strong support in Study 1's. However, results were mixed in the pilot study, and

were only partially replicated in Study 2.

Study 2's data indicated that FFI was beneficial to students at the end of their

academic year, but detrimental for those at the beginning of the academic year. Thus,

the reason for the overall lack of support seems to lie in the participants'

characteristics or the context of the intervention. Specifically, senior students had

more relevant and recent experience to rely on regarding the interview content

(academic life goals). Since FFI draws on past experience, its relative absence for

students at the first weeks of their academic lives might have been detrimental to FFI's

effectivity. When interviewees lack relevant past experience, administrating FFI is

more challenging to the interviewer and requires higher degree of expertise in guiding

the choice of event to describe and finding ways to relate past experience from other

fields or contexts to current circumstances and future plans51. The use of novices in

Study 2 might have caused FFI to be less effective under these circumstances. Lastly,

senior students are more familiar with academic life in general, with the organization

and participation in experiments in particular and probably also with each other. Each

of these factors potentially helped them feel more at ease and less threatened during

the interview, another requirement of FFI.

Overall, results support the assumption that FFI has a distinct effect on

participants' emotions, although in some conditions, this effect might be negative.

51 This issue was discussed in the introduction chapter and is also implicated in Kluger and Nir (2010).


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FFI's Influence on Self-efficacy

Hypothesis 2 predicted that FFI will positively influence participants' self-

efficacy. Study 1 (in which self-efficacy was measured using a single-item measure)

found that self-efficacy was higher for no-treatment participants. Study 2 showed that

FFI led to higher self-efficacy compared with FB condition (interestingly, also for

interviewers), but equal to reflection condition. These findings suggest a possible

advantage of FFI over some common organizational interventions, but their complex

patterns calls for more thorough consideration of the nature of FFI's effect self-

efficacy. The fact that FFI and reflection led to equal levels of self-efficacy might

suggest that the self-reflection aspect of FFI has a unique contribution to self-efficacy.

Experiences of success have been shown to increase self-efficacy (Wood & Bandura,

1989a), as they strengthen people's belief in their ability to achieve similar desired

outcomes in the future. It is possible that reliving a past success and deeply processing

it, as is done in FFI, operates in a different manner than the actual experience of

present success. The realization of enabling conditions for top performance was

initially supposed to increase people's sense of self-efficacy. However, sometimes the

path to recreate these conditions is not immediately clear. In such cases perhaps the

Feedforward question – how can future plans bring one closer to his or hers enabling

conditions – while hypothetically increases motivation (Carver & Scheier, 1981;

Kluger & Nir, 2010), might simultaneously lower self-efficacy.

Current application of FFI incorporates explicit consideration of the enabling

conditions and future plans to enhance and recreate them, while overcoming possible

obstacles. This elaborated processing of the enabling conditions aims at making the

path to top performance clearer, thus increasing participants' expectancy to succeed.


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FFI's Influence on Learning

Hypothesis 3 predicted that FFI will result in learning. Results of Study 1

(using a single-item measure) supported H3 and showed FFI to be beneficial for

participants' learning. Study 2 found this advantage for interviewers, with no

significant differences among interviewees. This effect on interviewers, which is in

line with FFI theory, might suggest that the use of novices (without explaining FFI's

rationale, as was discussed above) caused interviewers to be preoccupied with their

own learning, or that FFI was more novel to them and therefore more difficult to

administer relative to feedback providing, with which they might have been more

comfortable.

FFI's Influence on Bonding

Hypothesis 4 predicted that FFI will strengthen bonding between interviewers

and interviewees. Considering the social affect scales as a proxy for interpersonal

bonding, both Preliminary Study 2 and Study 1 provided support for H4, while the

pilot study's results were mixed. In Study 2, that explicitly measured bonding, results

were in the hypothesized direction, though did not reach significance. Again, results

were significant for the senior students, both for bonding and the social emotions

scale, with the two measures positively correlated.

Attachment Style as a Moderator of FFI's Influence on Participants

Hypotheses 5a-c predicted interactions between FFI and attachment style on

the dependent variables – emotions, self-efficacy, learning and performance. Study 1's

finding that anxiety level was higher in the no-treatment group than both experimental

groups suggests a possible influence of FFI (and other interpersonal interactions) on

the attachment system. This effect was not predicted and might result from response

bias, but it is not surprising, and therefore should be considered. FFI's effect on the


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attachment system, if existent, can be either calming down the system or activating it,

and might be different for participants with different initial levels of anxiety and

avoidance. For example, secure and anxious participants might react by feeling more

at ease, while avoidant participants might become increasingly insecure. This

possibility calls for caution in interpreting the current findings regarding attachment,

and to further explore FFI's influence on the attachment system in the future.

H5a predicted that FFI will not have a positive effect on emotions for avoidant

participants. The results of Study 1 are in line with this prediction. Findings show that

secure and anxious participants feel better following FFI relative to alternative

treatments, while avoidant individuals do not show any preference. As was discussed

in Study 1, this pattern of differing preferences can be ascribed, at least partly, to the

treatments' level of self-exposure. These results are in line with Mikulincer &

Nachshon's (1991) finding that avoidant individuals tend to avoid self-disclosure,

anxious individuals tend to embrace it and secure individuals tend to match their

behavior to the situation, self-disclosing when appropriate.

In Study 2 attachment style did not interact with experimental manipulation's

influence on participants' affective reaction. However, having only partial data

(N=117), some of which was again collected following the intervention, might have

prevented evaluating the actual influence of attachment style on participants

emotional reaction to different treatments. Lastly, consistent with attachment literature

(Hazan & Shaver, 1987; Mikulincer & Shaver, 2005), both studies found negative

correlations of anxiety and avoidance with affect.

Hypothesis 5b predicted that anxious participants will show less increase in

self-efficacy and learning following FFI, compared with secure participants. This

hypothesis was partially supported in study 2. In Study 1 both secure and anxious


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participants reported higher learning following FFI. In Study 2, secure participants

reported higher learning, while anxious participants reported lower learning following

FFI, compared with FB, in accordance to H5b. In both studies the interaction between

condition and attachment style was not significant in its influence on self-efficacy.

Managing self-efficacy better, as was discussed above, and considering possible

influence of FFI on the attachment system, is necessary in order to further assess this

possible interaction.

Hypothesis 5c predicted that secure participants will show higher

performance improvement following FFI. Study 2 provided partial support.

Specifically, secure and avoidant participants, but not anxious ones, performed better

after FFI compared with FB, on one performance measure (i.e., personal resources).

Interestingly, in Study 2 interviewers' avoidance negatively correlated with

interviewee's self-efficacy (r=-.32, p<.05), the performance measure of personal

resources (r=-.53, p<.01), and marginally with interviewee's learning (r=-.24, p<.1).

Interviewer's anxiety in the FFI condition negatively correlated with interviewee's

learning (r=-.33, p=.01). These results suggest that attachment style of the person

administering FFI might affect its influence on the interviewee, such that interviewers'

high levels of anxiety and avoidance impair FFI's effects. It is also worth noting that

participants, especially secure, showed a preference to the interviewer's role. These

findings suggest that participants high on either avoidance or anxiety, might be less

willing to perform as interviewers and be less suited for the role.

FFI's Influence on Performance

Finally, H6 predicted FFI to have positive influence on performance. Some of

the pilot study's findings have shown benefits to FFI compared with no-treatment. H6

also received weak support in Study 2. FFI led to stronger behavioral intentions,


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compared with FB and reflection, and to realizing more personal resources, compared

with FB. Further support for H6 were found in Field Studies 1 and 2, where FFI led to

somewhat improved performance, either in a within-subject design (Field Study 1) or

relative to no-treatment condition (Field Study 2).

To sum, the accumulated data provides some support to all research

hypotheses. The cases where hypotheses were not fully supported can be used to

extract insights regarding FFI's benefits. Considering the differences between Study 1

and Study 2's design and results, it seems that untrained interviewers should receive

elaborated instructions regarding what they should do, why and how they should do it,

in order to encourage positive affect and learning.

It is important to note that since FFI is a new intervention, it has been

constantly developing and more deeply understood, both theoretically and practically,

during the years I have been studying it. During this time, some changes have been

made in the way FFI is being practiced. Specifically, nowadays participants are

instructed to consider specific actions they can take to promote the enabling

conditions. They are further instruct to consider possible obstacles and how they

would overcome them. This focus can potentially enhance participants' self-efficacy.

It is also might be advisable to consider individual and task characteristics for

which FFI might be more adequate. For example, FFI might be found especially

effective for tasks that are relatively complex, not completely novel, and those that

performance relies on individual characteristics that are less suited for formal training.

Prior knowledge with the interviewer, or interviewer being in a position authority,

might also be beneficial, rather than a stranger peer.

Lastly, attachment style seems to moderate FFI's effects but also be affected

by it, in a complex manner that should be more thoroughly researched, with specific


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attention not only to interviewees' attachment, but also to interviewers' and their

possible dyadic inter-relationships.

Implications of Current Findings

The current work contributes to several fields of organizational research and

practice as well as to emotion literature. I will now suggest some implications of this

work to organizational interventions, performance evaluations, Appreciative Inquiry,

positive organizational behavior, social emotions at the workplace and strengths

development. Next, I present some general implications to the study of emotions.

Individual Differences in Organizational Interventions

One important finding of this work is the focus it places on individual

differences in people's reaction to FFI. Organizations have long since been attempting

to modify various aspects of their employees' behavior in order to improve their

performance. Such interventions range from individual-level training such as

feedback interventions (e.g., Ilgen & Davis, 2000), enhancing motivation through job

enlargement (e.g., Campion & McClelland, 1991, 1993) and job enrichment (e.g.,

Cherrington & England, 1980; Griffeth, 1985), through group-level training (e.g.,

Bushe & Coetzer, 1995), and up to organizational-level interventions (e.g., Whitney

& Trosten-Bloom, 2003). With the exception of Goal Setting theory (Locke, 2001;

Locke & Latham, 2002), organizations usually use the 'one-size-fits' all approach,

implementing interventions uniformly, mostly disregarding Ilgen et al.' (1979) call

from over 40 years ago to consider individual differences in organizational

interventions. The few exceptions (e.g., Heslin & Latham, 2004) seem to be those that

prove the rule, rather than represent a true change in the field.

Adopting the view that interventions' effectivity can differ for different people,

this work shows that attachment style influences participants' reaction to and


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performing of (as interviewers) FFI. These results suggest several implications

regarding individual differences in organizational interventions, considering emotions,

self-efficacy and learning, and their overall effectiveness.

Current results show an overall negative correlation of attachment dimensions

and affect, and distinct pattern of affective reaction to interpersonal interactions,

resulting, at least to some extent, from the level of self-disclosure required (higher in

FFI). Results further show anxiety and avoidance to be negatively related to self-

efficacy, thus deepening our understanding of individual differences in self-efficacy

(see Mikulincer & Shaver, 2008). These findings can be generalized to other types of

social interactions at work, suggesting organizations and managers should adopt a

more individualized approach that takes people's attachment style into account, as

different training and development programs can be effective to employees with

different levels of anxiety and avoidance.

The current findings imply that actions that have positive influence on affect

for some people, might not work for others. While a positive and close interpersonal

interaction can serve to improve people's mood and enjoy its benefits, the effect will

not happen, and possibly be reversed, for those with high avoidance. Thus, while

employees with low avoidance might benefit from training programs that include

human interaction (e.g., group-tasks, mentoring), those with high avoidance might

benefit more from impersonalized training (e.g., computerized, reading material).

When interpersonal interaction does take place, employees with high avoidance might

benefit more when the it is less personal and intimate and more strictly professional,

and might require different treatments to positively influence their affect.

This line of thinking can also help organizations counteract known

disadvantages of anxious employees in terms of performance, satisfaction from work


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and earnings (Hazan & Shaver, 1990) and their impaired relationships with

subordinates (Johnston, 2000). Individualized training programs, with pleasant and

attentive interaction and specific focus on recognizing the professional contribution of

anxious employees, might help them feel more comfortable and confident, thus more

professionally, rather than personally oriented.

Further research is still needed to assess the validity of participants' self-

reports, as the positive correlation between anxiousness and learning was not

hypothesized, and might be the result of response bias rather than a true effect.

Study 2 showed that attachment style of the interviewer interacts with FFI's

effectivity. Combined with the finding that attachment style predicted participants'

preference to the role they were assigned to (interviewer or interviewee), these results

can promote the designing of more effective interventions, with participants with high

avoidance and anxiety not being assigned to roles comparable to FFI's interviewer. It

might further suggest a general advantage to people with relatively low levels of

anxiety and avoidance in training and development positions.

This interaction between interviewers' attachment style and FFI's effectiveness

can be considered in the context of Levints-Gilai's (2008) findings of the relationships

between managers' attachment style and subordinates' commitment to the

organization. Current results support Levints-Gilai' view that attachment style should

be explored not only at the individual level, but also at the manager-subordinate

dyadic level. This suggests the possibility of a fruitful future line of research that will

explore the influence of one persons' attachment on others he or she interacts with.

Taking attachment style into account can also promote the effectiveness of

performance evaluation processes. Considering anxious individuals' preoccupation

with how they are valued (Hazan & Shaver, 1990), it might be found effective to


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provide anxious subordinates with clear behavioral goals that will make their

managers more satisfied with their performance. On the other hand, considering

avoidant individuals' preference to work alone (Hazan & Shaver, 1990), for

employees higher on avoidance it might be more effective to know what behaviors

will grant them more autonomy and decrease their reliance on others.

Considering the dyadic relationships can also help organizational placement to

be more effective. Secure managers might be better capable to adapt to varying needs

of their subordinates and anxious managers might be specifically equipped to provide

the natural needs of anxious subordinates. Other combinations might be found less

effective due to incompatible needs, such as avoidant managers finding it hard to

decentralize to avoidant subordinates and anxious managers having difficulties in

maintaining personal distance from them.

Performance Evaluations

Performance evaluations and feedback interventions are commonly used by

organizations (mainly) to improve performance. However, such interventions often

fail to achieve performance improvement (Kluger & DeNisi, 1996; Smither et al.,

2005) and lead to conflict and frustration (Coens & Jenkins, 2002). One reason for

this failure is that performance evaluations are characterized by anxiety and rejection,

by managers and employees alike (Coens & Jenkins, 2002; Rechter, 2006). These

negative emotions can lower employees' willingness to receive feedback about their

behavior (Trope & Netter, 1994), to remember less of what they are told (Ravid,

Rafaeli, & Grandey, in press) and to focus their attention mostly on cues that will help

them feel better, while disregarding important information (Trope & Netter, 1994).

On the other hand, positive emotions increase people's interest in and deep processing

of self-relevant critical information (as is normally required in performance


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evaluations and training programs), leading to stronger attitude change and behavioral

intentions (Raghunathan & Trope, 2002; Trope & Netter, 1994).

The finding that FFI can improve participants' mood (except for those with

low avoidance), suggests that people will be more open to critical information about

themselves (Trope & Netter, 1994) and to information that does not fit their previous

expectations (Isen, 2002). Thus, incorporating FFI in performance evaluations can be

not only effective through its focus on top performance and how to achieve it, but

help improve the effective use of the corrective approach traditionally used in

performance evaluations. Furthermore, FFI's positive influence on emotions can

potentially broaden employees' scope of attention and behavioral repertoire (e.g.,

Fredrickson, 1998). Thus, FFI can help both managers and employees to consider

more relevant information and realize more possible actions that can promote desired

goals (Gollwitzer, 1990). This is consistent with Kluger & Nir's (2010) call to use FFI

before using traditional performance appraisal and with the experience gained from a

few such applications (Kluger & Nir, 2010).

Appreciative Inquiry (AI)

Appreciative Inquiry is being practiced for nearly 25 years and its popularity

increases with time: a PsychNet database search of the keywords "appreciative" and

"inquiry" (done in October, 2010) provided 3 results in the first three years since

appreciative inquiry's first publication (Cooperrider & Srivastva, 1987), and 74 results

in the years 2008-2010. Though calls have been made to empirically examine its

effectivity (e.g., Grant & Humphries, 2006), response is still scarce (e.g., Bushe &

Kassam, 2005; Peelle, 2006). FFI is developed from the first stage of AI, the

appreciative interview, which is also focused on peak experiences, and is

characterized in large variations in length and protocol.


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There is no known theoretical attempt in the existing literature to explain the

specific mechanisms through which the appreciative interview affects participants.

The theory presented here suggests specific variables that are affected by FFI –

emotions, self-efficacy, learning and bonding. These variables are likely to be

influenced by AI's appreciative interview as well. Understanding these mechanisms,

and the specific aspects of FFI through which they operate, can promote the

effectiveness of AI through focusing on important aspects of the interview that should

be maintained, while others can be varied to fit specific circumstances and context.

For example, in some cases enhancing positive emotions might be more

important, while in others an increase of self-efficacy. In the former case, interviewers

can be instructed to focus on making their interviewees feel comfortable and to pay

special attention to the interview's atmosphere, surrounding and timing. In the latter

case, special attention can be directed to analyzing the enabling conditions and the

ways to recreate them in the future. Lastly, FFI can possibly offer an alternative to AI

when circumstances do not allow the resources for AI, which is highly demanding in

terms of time and manpower. Understanding the mechanisms through which FFI

operates can further enhance its effectiveness, as it provides opportunities to

specifically tailor an intervention to meet organization's most urgent needs.

Positive Organizational Scholarship (POS) / Positive Organizational Behavior (POB)

FFI is consistent with POS's goal of finding ways through which organizations

and their members function at their best (Cameron, Dutton, & Quinn, 2003). It is also

consistent with POB's explicit goal of enhancing positive emotions (e.g., Fredrickson,

2003b; Isen, 2003). FFI provides a mean to positively influence people's emotions

while directly considering their work. This might be more effective to organizational


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performance than using alternative interventions that simply target emotions (e.g.,

Fredrickson, Cohn, Coffey, Pek, & Finkel, 2008).

FFI aims at finding ways to enhance enabling conditions for top performance,

and through the Feedforward question, enhance the motivation to achieve it. This

approach corresponds to the concept of hope in positive organizational studies,

defined as having the combination of willpower – the drive to achieve a certain goal –

and waypower – the realization of ways to achieve it (Luthans & Jensen, 2002). Hope

and self-efficacy are two components of organizational positive psychological capital

(Avolio & Luthans, 2007), thus FFI might be found to increase it as well.

Lastly, findings related to Job Demands-Resources model (Bakker &

Demerouti, 2007) suggest that social resources at the workplace moderate the

negative effects of the psychological and physiological demands of the job:

disengagement, exhaustion, absenteeism and leaving (Schaufeli & Bakker, 2004).

FFI, through its effect on bonding, can build people's social resources, thus

diminishing negative effects of job demands.

Social Emotions at the Workplace

This work provides evidence regarding the unique contribution of social

emotions to the understanding of people's emotional states. Its contribution to

emotions research and theory are discussed below. However, people's emotional

reactions to organizational interventions provide specific contribution to the research

of emotions at the workplace.

Emotions are recognized to play in important part in various fields such as

performance (Fredrickson, 2003a; Hareli & Rafaeli, 2008; Isen & Reeve, 2005),

leadership (Bono et al., 2007), feedback (Raghunathan & Trope, 2002) and decision


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making (Isen, 2001). For each of these concepts, it is likely that social emotions can

have an explanatory power above and beyond that of general emotions.

For example, social emotions might be found especially important to

performance of tasks involving social interactions, such as sales and customer service.

Leadership research emphasizes the emotional bond between leaders and followers

(e.g., Shamir, 1991). Social emotions are likely to be part of this emotional bond, such

that not only the affective tone of interactions with a leader would affect her followers

(Bono et al., 2007), but specifically the social emotions they feel toward each other.

Social emotions between managers and subordinates might have a unique

explanatory power of subordinates' openness to and acceptance of feedback they

receive from their managers. They can also affect decision making (Isen, 2001), as

many decision making processes are done groups. Social emotions can potentially

influence group cohesiveness (Lott & Lott, 1965) and might also be related (either

positively or negatively) to groupthink (Janis, 1972).

Lastly, in the field of motivation, interpersonal relationships and bonding hold

a central importance in Maslow's (1943) social and esteem needs and Alderfer's

(1972) relatedness needs, McClelland's (1985) need for affiliation and in intrinsic

motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2000). Naturally, social emotions constitute, at least partly,

people's social bonding with others.

FFI, as was shown here, provides organizations with effective means to

strengthen bonding between people in a professional context, and can therefore

contribute to effective management and development of the above concepts (i.e.,

performance, leadership, performance evaluations, decision making and motivation).

Such a measure that is developed here, that can tap people's social emotions

alongside their general emotions, can be of interested to other related fields such as


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emotional intelligence (Goleman, 1995; Salovey & Mayer, 1990), or for Hareli and

Weiner's (2002) model of emotional consequences of success and failure, which they

see as emotions that include consideration of others, and even term them as social

emotions.

Strengths Development

Recently there has been a growing interest in strengths development (Roberts,

Spreitzer, Dutton, Heaphy, & Barker, 2005). Strengths are suggested to represent a

combination of natural talent, knowledge and skill in a certain area (e.g., analytical

skills or developing others), resulting in optimal performance across situations

(Buckingham & Clifton, 2001). This view is in line with Holland's (1985) claim that

people's occupational preferences and individual skills match, since through life,

personal preferences guide people's choice of activities, consequentially developing

their skills. Indeed, some findings suggest that managers' focus on subordinates'

strengths rather than weaknesses leads to higher engagement and increase loyalty to

the organization (Gallup, 2008).

FFI, through the analysis of peak experiences and focusing on personal

contribution, can be used to reveal employees' strengths and situations that enable

their expression. Organizations can use FFI to help employees to better craft their jobs

(e.g., Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001) in a way that maximizes the use of their

strengths, while simultaneously enhancing their emotional well-being (Seligman et

al., 2005).

Implications to Emotions Research and Theory

This work suggests and establishes the concept of social emotions as a distinct

construct. Adopting the dimensional view of emotions (Russell, 1980; Russell &

Barrett, 1999; Tellegen, Watson, & Clark, 1999; Watson et al., 1999), current results


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have shown that the broad dimensions of positive and negative social emotions (SPE

and SNE) have a unique contribution to the understanding of people's emotional

reactions and states.

SSA analysis indicates that the social and general negative items are closer

together and tend to mix, while the social and general positive items are widely spread

and clearly distinct (see Preliminary Study 1's results). This might indicate either that

general and social negative emotions are more closely related to each other, or that the

items chosen do not represent the underlying constructs well enough. Fredrickson's

view of the differences between positive and negative emotions (Fredrickson, 1998)

coincides with the first alternative. Fredrickson suggests that the evolutionary role of

negative emotions is to preserve the organism's life, therefore direct behavior with

specific action tendencies (e.g., rage leads to attack). Positive emotions, on the other

hand, play a role in broadening people's resources, and do not have specific action

tendencies. This view can suggest that the facets of positive emotions might be wider

and more obscure than those of negative emotions.

As in the case of general emotions, social emotions can too be further

subdivided to more subtle categories, such as feelings of resentment (e.g., contempt,

scorn), hostility (e.g., rage , hatred), feelings of closeness (e.g., friendliness, intimacy)

or feelings of admiration (e.g., appreciation; Rechter et al., Work in progress). Further

research is still needed in order to construct a valid measure of social emotions, and to

establish its importance as an antecedent to other dependant variables, such as well-

being, self-evaluation, and performance in various contexts.

A further contribution of the current findings is the use of a novel

manipulation to enhance positive emotions. The recall of positive personal

experiences is commonly used as an experimental manipulation to enhance positive


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mood (e.g., Isen, 2003; Raghunathan & Trope, 2002). Here it was found that sharing

such experiences is another alternative to achieve this goal. It was further found that

sharing such experiences through FFI simultaneously strengthen bonding between

partners. It will be interesting to examine, for example, if sharing past negative

experiences have a positive effect on social emotions, but a negative effect on general

emotions. Another point worth noting is that FFI was found to increase positive

emotions, despite the attention it directs to the gap between present situation and a

desired one that can potentially create negative emotions (e.g., Higgins, 1987).

Future research

At this point of FFI's development, future research should first focus on

deepening our understanding of FFI's influence on work-related variables (i.e., affect,

self-efficacy, learning, bonding and performance), while considering the part

attachment style plays on their correlations. FFI enjoys increasing popularity,

conducted both in Isreal (Bouskila-Yam & Kluger, in press) and world wide

(Budworth & Latham, work in progress; Chinotti, 2008), and can be easily practiced

using Kluger and Nir's (2010) detailed protocol (see also Kluger & Van Dijk, 2010).

A possible growing interest and practice of FFI (as any other novel practice) brings

with it the risk of misuse (Abrahamson, 1996; Bushe & Kassam, 2005). Thus,

establishing FFI's theoretical basis and its influence on performance should be the first

goals of future studies. Such understanding can help pointing out important aspects of

FFI that should be maintained and offer possible adjustments to better fit it to specific

circumstances and needs. This section will therefore mainly focus on future research

directly derived from the current work, and only briefly consider other variables that

might be relevant for future research.


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Two main future lines of research could best achieve these goals of providing

deeper theoretical understanding and further establish FFI's influence on performance:

controlled experiments, where variables can be manipulated and measured, should be

used to further establish the theoretical model suggested here; and field studies,

conducted in natural environment and professional context, should be done to further

assess FFI's practical implications, through measuring its influence on performance

and performance-related measures such as self-efficacy and bonding in the workplace.

I now provide guidelines and points to consider while planning future research.

Controlled Experiments

Using trained interviewers. Controlled experiments should be done using

trained interviewers, preferably ones with relatively lower levels of attachment

anxiety and avoidance. Using trained interviewers would minimize variations in FFI's

actual administration and the influence of the interpersonal interactions between

partners, and guarantee adherence to protocol. Moreover, trained research assistants

(rather than peers) can enhance interviewers' cooperation, and monitor and assess the

process. Results of Preliminary Study 2 suggest that trained interviewers (already

during the first interviews) can assess the FFI in a way that reflects important aspects

of it quality, and hence, its outcome. This would enable evaluating specific aspects of

FFI that contribute to it effectiveness when done appropriately. Such design can

further be used to assess the effect of ongoing training of FFI's administration.

Results could be used to improve instructions, guidance and training when

using peer interviews, increasing novice interviewers' ability to conduct FFI.

Following lines of research could then focus on the dyadic aspects of the interaction

and its consequences to FFI's results, in terms of attachment dimensions and relevant

individual differences. It is possible, for example, that FFI would be found more


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effective for participants with higher levels of extraversion. When using peer

interviews, experiments should incorporate group discussions of the interviews and

their implications to performance, similar to how FFI is done in organizations. Such

group work would allow participants who did not perform FFI as intended to learn

from their peers' experience and still benefit from the process.

Cultural differences. While conducting controlled experiments, samples

should be initially homogeneous (e.g., Israeli-born, native Hebrew speakers),

eliminating cultural differences that likely influenced the results of Studies 1 and 2.

Later, using different samples (such as immigrants, Muslims, Christians and Orthodox

Jews) can be generalized to cultural differences that predict FFI's effectiveness. For

example, it is possible that cultures characterized with low power distance (Hofstede

& Hofstede, 2005) or organizations whose cultures are less hierarchical (Greenberg &

Baron, 2008) or promote theory Y (McGregor, 2006) are more naturally suited for FFI

than cultures characterized with high distance power or organizations that are more

hierarchical or promote theory X.

Self-efficacy. Controlled experiments should allow consideration of ways to

promote the enabling conditions. This should be done though a guided written

processing (assessing possible measures to enhance or recreate conditions and

considering possible challenges and ways to overcome them). Alternatively,

participants could be given some time to consider the Feedforward question in private.

Self-efficacy is a part of Core Self Evaluation, (CSE; Judge, Erez, Bono, &

Thoresen, 2003), which encompasses generalized self-efficacy (Locke, McClear, &

Night, 1996), self-esteem (Harter, 1990), locus of control (Rotter, 1966) and

neuroticism (Watson, 2000). CSE was found to be a significant predictor of job

satisfaction, job performance and life satisfaction (Judge & Bono, 2001; Judge et al.,


133

2003)52. As FFI focuses on the strengths and abilities people displayed during past

successes, and considering the possible reciprocal relationships between self-esteem

and strengths (Dodgson & Wood, 1998), FFI is likely to increase self-esteem.

Through its emphasis of the interviewees' influence and control over past and future

successes, FFI can situationally increase locus of control. Thus, FFI might be found to

positively influence not only self-efficacy, but also these aspects of CSE.

FFI's influence on the attachment system. Following results of study 1, FFI's

influence on the attachment system should be treated as a DV, examining whether this

influence does occur, its magnitude and length. Such examination can also provide

insight to the direction of influence and individual differences. It is possible, for

example, that while successful FFI eases the system, unsuccessful FFI activates it,

thus increasing anxiety and/or avoidance levels. It is also possible that participants'

avoidance level moderates the attachment system's activation by FFI.

Relationships between FFI's outcomes. Results suggest some systematic

relationships between the various outcomes of FFI, specifically, between learning and

emotions and self-efficacy. The correlations found here cannot lead to causal

explanations, but raise some theoretical questions with practical implications. For

example, if more positive emotions (and/or less negative emotions) would be found to

promote learning, a stronger emphasis to enhancing positive emotions can be given

during training. If learning would be found to lead to higher self-efficacy, FFI can be

more explicitly directed to the discovery of new knowledge, emphasizing detailed

stories, or additional stories. Such explorations can provide deeper understanding of

the ways FFI operates, and the role its specific aspects (like atmosphere, interpersonal

relationships, amount of past experience, etc.) play in its various outcomes.

52 Though see Baumeister, Campbell, Krueger, & Vohs, (2003) for counter arguments and findings.


134

Field Studies

Field studies offer a number important advantages to the exploration of FFI.

Employees have richer relevant experience to rely on when selecting the story they

share, and past work experience can be clearly linked to future plans. People with

some work experience can better understand FFI's rationale, and its potential

relevance to their own career. They can better relate to the rarity of a situation in

which they openly discuss their peak experience, recognizing their own contribution

and skills. They have more prior knowledge with each others and common

professional and organizational background. These differences between employees

and students enhance the likelihood of FFI's leading to actual performance

improvement, as was suggested in Field Studies 1 and 2.

On the individual level, FFI might be more effective for tasks that are less

structured, and those where individual characteristics have important consequences

for performance. In such tasks, such as teaching or service providing, crucial

conditions for top performance can be more idiosyncratic, and their understanding

through FFI especially beneficial. On the group level, group tasks that require

interpersonal cooperation, communication and knowledge of self and others'

individual strengths, are especially likely to benefit from FFI.

Beside obvious performance measures, such as supervisor' evaluations, sales

or customer satisfaction, other measures can be used to assess FFI's consequences,

such as group cooperation and communication or mutual knowledge and appreciation.

Since FFI can be fully incorporated in organizational worklife, rather then

used as a single incident, future field research can also examine reactions to multiple

FFIs, with participants who are familiar with the process. In this context, broader

organizational consequences can be measured, such as organizational commitment,


135

absenteeism and turnover. If ongoing use of FFI can contribute to positive and

empowering work environment, it is likely to influence these often desired outcomes.

Conclusion

Along with being a first attempt to empirically examine a newly-developed

organizational intervention, this dissertation may be the first to offer a quantitative

evaluation of (FFI's variant of) the discovery stage of AI. While showing various

positive outcomes of the appreciative interview to most people, it also provides a

challenge to interpersonal interventions as a whole, by demonstrating that not all

participants react to it positively. This challenge calls to consider individual

differences in applying various interventions, since different people sometime react to

the same situation in a different manner. Following, there is a need to develop

interventions to address varying needs of individuals with different personalities.

The current findings further emphasis the need to consider contextual and

situation variables that, in addition to individual differences, can impact the effectivity

of such interventions.

Lastly, this work have shown that it is possible to induce positive mood,

enhance people's self-efficacy and create a sense of learning and belonging – all of

which have known benefits that were discussed throughout this dissertation – through

FFI. It was further showed that FFI can be used as an effective and economical means

to boost some aspects of work performance, thus being a useful method that can be

easily adopted by organizations.


136

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APPENDICES

Appendix 1: General and Social Emotions Item, Versions 1, 2, 3

השאלון הנוכחי כולל מספר מילים המתארות רגשות. קרא/י כל מילה וסמן/י לצידה את הספרה המתאימה לתיאור הרגשתך. . בסימונך, השתמש/י בסולם הבא:הרגשתך ברגע זהסמן/י בהתאם להרגשתך כעת, כלומר,

מעט מאוד או כלל לא מעט במידה מסוימת הרבה הרבה מאוד5 4 3 2 1

Version 1 ersion 2V (English) Version 2 Version 3

מבוכה עניין lonely interested חיבור עניין קירבה עניין

שותפות מצוקה understanding distressed בדידות מצוקה הבנה מצוקה

בדידות התרגשות empathic excited הבנה התרגשות אמפתיה התרגשות

הבנה דאגה detached upset אמפתיה דאגה ניתוק דאגה

אמפתיה חוזק disjointed strong ניתוק חוזק כנות חוזק

ניתוק אשמה honest guilty כנות אשמה עלבון אשמה

כנות פחד insulted scared עלבון פחד השפלה פחד

עלבון עוינות affronted hostile השפלה עוינות פתיחות עוינות

השפלה התלהבות humiliated enthusiastic פתיחות התלהבות ריחוק התלהבות

פתיחות גאווה open proud ריחוק גאווה הערכה גאווה

ריחוק מתח distant irritable הערכה מתח קנאה מתח

הערכה עירנות appreciative alert קנאה עירנות אינטימיות עירנות

קנאה בושה jealous ashamed אינטימיות בושה עצב בושה

אינטימיות השראה intimate inspired געגוע השראה הנאה ראההש

אהבה עצבנות longing nervous אהבה עצבנות הקלה עצבנות

רחמים נחישות loving determined רחמים נחישות עוצמה נחישות

בוז שקט-חוסר merciful attentive בוז שקט-חוסר שלווה קשב

סלידה פעלתנות contemptuous jittery סלידה פעלתנות חולשה שקט-חוסר

הערצה חשש scornful active הערצה חשש אכזבה פעלתנות

תיעוב סימפטיה loathsome afraid תיעוב סימפטיה ערך עצמי חשש

חיבה averse sympathetic שביעות רצון חיבה חרדה סימפטיה

admiring fond תחושת גדילה מבוכה תקווה חיבה

abhorrent affectionate תסכול בוכהמ

satisfied embarrassed שביעות רצון שותפות

growing connected תחושת גדילה כעס

שמחה


153

Appendix 2: Pilot Study for Study 1

Preliminary Study 3: Pilot Study

Introduction

The main goal of the pilot study was to choose the performance task to be used

for testing the theoretical model in Study 1. Additional goals were to provide

preliminary examination of FFI's effects on emotions, individual and group

performance, and assessment of the process by participants and observers. The

experiment was performed as a project in an MBA Research Methods in

Organizational Behavior course, at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (academic

year 2006-7); the students were the experimenters of the pilot study.

Since FFI is based on positive interpersonal interaction, it was desired to find a

task that involves teamwork and interpersonal dynamics. Using AI (of which FFI is a

variant of the appreciative interview stage) has been found before to be an affective

intervention in teams, specifically in newly-formed teams (Bushe, 1998; Peelle,

2006). These findings suggest that FFI can have a strong effect on performance in

teamwork context. Another important condition for task choice was that participants

would be able to relate relevant past experiences (that they were to describe in the

FFI) to the task they were facing. This way, meaningful interview-questions could be

tailored to the specific task, helping participants recall relevant past experiences to

enable meaningful (and applicable) learning.

Four tasks were tested: presenting a dialogue in front of an audience, survival

task, stimulation of a negotiation, and brainstorming (which was subsequently

chosen). I will now describe the each task and the rationale behind choosing it.

Giving a presentation in front of an audience can be an anxiety-enhancing

situation. FFI relating to past experiences where the interviewee enjoyed giving a


154

presentation or facing others could relieve this anxiety, above FFI's other influences,

and therefore help participants to per-form better. Survival tasks (e.g., Eady &

Lafferty, 1974), in which participants rate importance of various objects to survival in

a certain setting (such as in tropical or subarctic conditions), are popular group tasks

that provide measures of individual and group performance, as well as group

cohesiveness, communication and cooperation (e.g., Wanous & Youtz, 1986). FFI

may enhance group cooperation, above its other influences. <egotiation is a situation

where non-optimal strategies of competition and optimal strategies of cooperation can

be clearly distinguished. While competing, each side is focused on maximizing his

own outcome at the expense of his counterpart (leading to win-lose solutions). While

cooperating, both sides join forces in an effort achieve an integrative outcome that

will fulfill both' important interests (win-win outcome; Pruitt & Rubin, 1986).

Integrative bargaining (leading to win-win outcomes) was found to be related to

positive affect (Carnevale & Isen, 1986), so FFI may encourage participants to

consider both sides and be more cooperative in a negotiation situation, above FFI's

other influences. Brainstorming (Osborn, 1957) is a popular ideation method aimed to

enhance creativity through mutual inspiration and group synergy, and can provide

both individual and group performance measures. Though not superior to other

methods (Diehl & Strpebe, 1987), successful brainstorming requires participants to

avoid self-censorship while expressing their own ideas, and to cooperate with and be

open to others' ideas so mutual fertilization can occur, leading to better group

performance (Osborn, 1957; Goldenberg & Elron, 1999). It is therefore seems like a

group task that can be positively affected by FFI, through helping participants feel

more comfortable, facilitate their creativity and increase their cooperation, above its

other influences.


155

Method

Participants

A total of 116 subjects participated, either as a voluntary class activity

(survival task, N=23 and brainstorming task, N=30), for course credits (negotiation

task, N=32), or as an activity of a pre-army leadership training program (presentation

task, N=31). Participants were randomly assigned to FFI or no-treatment conditions,

and performed the task in groups of 2-6 (depending on the task).

Tasks and Measures

Emotions. Emotions were measured using the emotions questionnaire

described above (version 3, see appendix 1).

Group tasks and performance measures. Measures ranged from judges' ratings

(presenting a dialogue), participants' ratings (brainstorming) and various quantitative

measures derived from each task.

Procedure

In each task, half of the participants were randomly assigned to FFI or control

(no treatment condition). Participants in the FFI conditions were interviewed first

(except in the survival task when they made their individual ratings before), then all

participants filled out the emotions questionnaires, and performed their task.

Results

Since this was a pilot study, and sample sizes were small, results are

summarized and not detailed here.

Emotions. Both PA and SPE scales were significantly higher in the FFI

condition than in the control condition in the brainstorming task (PA: t28=1.70, p<.05;

SPE: t28=1.78, p<.05). They were marginally higher in the survival task (PA: t20=1.66,

p<.1; SPE: t20=1.62, p<.1), and there were no significant differences in the other two


156

tasks. The negative emotions scales were not affected by the experimental

manipulations.

t values of Emotions Differences between FFI and Control Conditions

Cronbach Alphas

Survival df=20

Negotiation df=30

Brainstorming df=28

PA .81-.87 1.66† 0.83 1.70*

NA .80-.84 0.8 -0.98 0.39

SPE .82-.89 1.62† 0.77 1.78*

SNE .50-.70 -0.07 -1.31 -0.5

* Raw data for the dialogue task is missing; there were no significant differences.

Performance. Most performance measures were not affected by the

experimental manipulations. Only in the brainstorming task, FFI participants

produced marginally more ideas than control participants (6.67 vs. 9.13, t28=1.5,

p<.1). Ratings of the process were higher in the FFI condition by both participants'

(t28=1.59, p<.1) and judges' (t28=2.93, p<.01). Moreover, FFI groups took significantly

longer time (t18=10.80, p<.001) to choose the best five ideas, and while none of the

FFI groups failed to reach a decision within the allotted time, two of the three control

groups failed to reach a decision at all.


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Survival

Table 35: Preliminary Study 3: Dependent Variables Comparisons of Individual and Groups Performance Measures Between FFI and Control Conditions – Survival Task

t Individual Measures Performance -3.00 ** Flexibility 1.3 Group Measures Performance -2.86 * Flexibility 2.01 † N=23, df (individual)=21, df(group)=4, **p<.01, *p<.05, †p<.1 Since individual performance was done before the experimental manipulation, it cannot be ascribed to it, and can explain the group performance difference, that opposed the hypothesis.

Negotiation

Table 34: Preliminary Study 3: Dependent Variables Comparisons of Individual and Groups Performance Measures Between FFI and Control Conditions – Survival Task

t Individual Measures Individual Performance .14 Willingness to cooperate in the future .95

Group Performance .35 N=32, df (individual)=30, df(group)=13, **p<.01, *p<.05, †p<.1

++ Raw data for the dialogue task is missing; there were no significant differences between the groups.

Brainstorming

Table 34: Preliminary Study 3: Dependent Variables Comparisons of Individual and Groups Performance Measures Between FFI and Control Conditions – Brainstorming Task

t Individual Measures Judges Ratings 2.93 ** Participants Ratings 1.59 † Number of Ideas 1.50 † Group Measures Total no. of ideas 1.28 Number of categories .72 Judges ratings 3.18 * Members ratings 2.52 * N=30, df (individual)=28, df(group)=4, **p<.01, *p<.05, †p<.1

Discussion

Results suggest a possible (though weak) support for the positive influence of

FFI on positive emotions, but not on negative emotions. Since in most tasks (except

for the survival task) FFI and emotions reports were conducted prior to the

experimental task, differences in results could not be ascribed to the tasks, but rather

to other characteristics such as experimenter effect, contextual variables or simply

statistical noise. Results also suggest that FFI can increase positive emotions even

when performed by untrained participants, as was done in the survival task (which

used peers-interview design). It should be noted, however, that FFI's effects in this


158

case were found when it was conducted during the experiment and not prior to it,

which may indicate a short-lived effect. Furthermore, since FFI was compared with

no-treatment, it is possible that merely the pleasant interaction made participants feel

good (where it did). Results further provide weak support to the hypothesis that FFI

positively influence performance (in the brainstorming task). Lastly, it was found that

both participants' and observers' perceptions can be used to measure FFI's outcomes.

Some facts should be taken into account while considering these results: First,

in some cases FFI was conducted by untrained interviewers (some of the research

assistants or participants themselves), and in non-optimal conditions (background

noises, public place, strict time-constrains) which are likely to impair its effect.

Second, weak statistical power (sample sizes up to 30 for each task) may hinder

detecting small to medium effect sizes.

Since brainstorming showed some performance differences (37% higher in the

FFI compared with no-treatment condition) and significant difference in performance

rating, this task was chosen for Study 1.

Overall, the pilot study achieved its goals: suggesting a task of choice for

Study 1 – brainstorming; and providing some further support for FFI's positive

influence on emotions.


159

Appendix 3: Attachment Questionnaire (used in Studies 1 and 2) נבדק/ת יקר/ה,

המשפטים שלפניך מתייחסים לאיך את/ה מרגיש/ה במערכות יחסים קרובות עם אנשים אחרים, במשפטיםהבאים המונח "אנשים אחרים" מתייחס לאנשים הנמצאים ביחסים קרובים אתך. אנו מתעניינים בדרך שבה את/ה חווה

מה את/ה מסכים/ה או אינך מסכים/ה אתו, על ידיבדרך כלל מערכות יחסים. התייחס/י לכל משפט ע"י דירוג עד כ שימוש בסולם שלהלן:

מאד מסכימה 7

6

5

4

3

2

מאד לא מסכימה

1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מעדיפה לא להראות לאנשים אחרים כיצד אני מרגישה בפנים 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מודאגת מכך שאנטש 2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מרגישה בנוח להיות קרובה לאנשים אחרים 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני דואגת לגבי מערכות היחסים שלי 4 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מתרחקת כאשר אנשים אחרים מתחילים להתקרב אלי 5מני באותה מידה שבה לי אני מודאגת שמא לאנשים אחרים לא יהיה איכפת מ 6

איכפת מהם7 6 5 4 3 2 1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מרגישה לא בנוח כאשר אנשים אחרים רוצים להיות קרובים אלי 7 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מודאגת מכך שאאבד את האנשים הקרובים לי 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני לא מרגישה בנוח להיפתח לאנשים אחרים 9

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ותיהם של אנשים אחרים כלפי יהיו חזקים כמו רגשותיי כלפיהםהייתי רוצה שרגש 10 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני רוצה להתקרב לאנשים אחרים אבל אני ממשיכה לסגת מהם 11לעיתים קרובות אני רוצה להתמזג באופן מוחלט עם אנשים אחרים, וזה לפעמים 12

מרחיק אותם ממני7 6 5 4 3 2 1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ת מתוחה כאשר אנשים אחרים מתקרבים אלי יותר מידיאני נעשי 13 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני חוששת מלהיות לבד 14 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מרגישה נוח לחלוק את המחשבות והרגשות הפרטיים שלי עם אנשים אחרים 15 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 הרצון שלי להיות מאד קרובה, לעיתים מרחיק ממני אנשים 16 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מנסה להימנע מלהתקרב יותר מידי לאנשים אחרים 17 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני נזקקת להרבה אישורים לכך שאני אהובה על ידי אנשים הקרובים לי 18 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מרגישה שזה קל לי יחסית להתקרב לאנשים אחרים 19להראות יותר רגשות ויותר לפעמים אני מרגישה שאני מכריחה אנשים אחרים 20

מחויבות7 6 5 4 3 2 1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 קשה לי להיות תלויה באנשים אחרים 21 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אינני מודאגת לעיתים קרובות מדי מכך שינטשו אותי 22 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מעדיפה שלא להיות קרוב מדי לאנשים אחרים 23חרים להראות בי עניין, אני נעשית כועסת או אם אינני מצליחה לגרום לאנשים א 24

מתוסכלת7 6 5 4 3 2 1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מספרת לאנשים הקרובים לי הכל 25 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מרגישה שאנשים אחרים אינם רוצים להתקרב כפי שאני הייתי רוצה 26 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 בדרך כלל אני דנה בבעיות ובדאגות שלי עם אנשים הקרובים לי 27 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 כאשר אני לא מעורבת במערכת יחסים, אני מרגישה חרדה וחוסר ביטחון מסוים 28 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני מרגישה בנוח להיות תלויה באנשים אחרים 29אני נעשית מתוסכלת כאשר אנשים אחרים לא נמצאים איתי במידה בה הייתי 30

רוצה שיהיו7 6 5 4 3 2 1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 איכפת לי לפנות לאנשים אחרים על מנת לבקש נחמה, עצה או עזרה לא 31 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני נעשית מתוסכלת אם אנשים אחרים אינם זמינים כאשר אני זקוקה להם 32 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 זה עוזר לי לפנות לאנשים אחרים ברגעים שאני זקוקה להם 33 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ם לי אישור, אני מרגישה ממש רע לגבי עצמיכאשר אנשים אחרים אינם נותני 34 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני פונה לאנשים אחרים בקשר להרבה דברים כולל נחמה ואישור 35 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 זה מעורר בי התנגדות כאשר אנשים קרובים לי מבלים זמן רב הרחק ממני 36


160

Appendix 4: Study 1: HLM Results The outcome variable is NUMIDEAS

Final estimation of fixed effects: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Standard Approx. Fixed Effect Coefficient Error T-ratio d.f. P-value

---------------------------------------------------------------------------- For INTRCPT1, B0

INTRCPT2, G00 16.291381 2.830795 5.755 60 0.000 COND12_3, G01 -0.501729 0.816153 -0.615 60 0.541

COND1_2, G02 -0.482599 0.838035 -0.576 60 0.566 GRPN, G03 -1.726580 0.722806 -2.389 60 0.020

For SP slope, B1 INTRCPT2, G10 -6.581406 5.747665 -1.145 211 0.254

COND12_3, G11 2.668133 1.542453 1.730 211 0.085

COND1_2, G12 -3.781093 1.650472 -2.291 211 0.023 GRPN, G13 1.454091 1.444481 1.007 211 0.316

For SN slope, B2 INTRCPT2, G20 -0.324832 10.557685 -0.031 211 0.976

COND12_3, G21 4.639041 3.187779 1.455 211 0.147 COND1_2, G22 -2.897454 3.556660 -0.815 211 0.416

GRPN, G23 -0.874381 2.750428 -0.318 211 0.751 For SELFEFF slope, B3

INTRCPT2, G30 1.533775 4.156619 0.369 211 0.712 COND12_3, G31 -0.009469 1.180226 -0.008 211 0.994

COND1_2, G32 -0.911947 1.176981 -0.775 211 0.439 GRPN, G33 -0.293937 1.073361 -0.274 211 0.784

For ANX slope, B4 INTRCPT2, G40 -1.782628 4.233714 -0.421 211 0.674

COND12_3, G41 -1.306811 1.308693 -0.999 211 0.320 COND1_2, G42 0.349321 1.216504 0.287 211 0.774

GRPN, G43 0.695917 1.079462 0.645 211 0.520 For AVO slope, B5

INTRCPT2, G50 3.669274 5.508622 0.666 211 0.506 COND12_3, G51 -1.381848 1.287795 -1.073 211 0.285

COND1_2, G52 0.891008 1.367184 0.652 211 0.515 GRPN, G53 -1.120595 1.413167 -0.793 211 0.429

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

The outcome variable is NUMIDEAS

Final estimation of fixed effects: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Standard Approx. Fixed Effect Coefficient Error T-ratio d.f. P-value

---------------------------------------------------------------------------- For INTRCPT1, B0

INTRCPT2, G00 16.291407 2.864865 5.687 60 0.000 COND12_3, G01 -0.501716 0.825973 -0.607 60 0.546

COND1_2, G02 -0.482597 0.848118 -0.569 60 0.571 GRPN, G03 -1.726590 0.731505 -2.360 60 0.022

For PA slope, B1 INTRCPT2, G10 -6.343081 5.189702 -1.222 211 0.223

COND12_3, G11 3.367388 1.596108 2.110 211 0.036 COND1_2, G12 -2.369143 1.505593 -1.574 211 0.117

GRPN, G13 1.381379 1.308422 1.056 211 0.293 For NA slope, B2

INTRCPT2, G20 -12.457930 6.900799 -1.805 211 0.072 COND12_3, G21 2.869968 1.763302 1.628 211 0.105

COND1_2, G22 -3.340448 2.049227 -1.630 211 0.104 GRPN, G23 2.859574 1.753862 1.630 211 0.104

For SELFEFF slope, B3 INTRCPT2, G30 1.459806 4.237435 0.345 211 0.731

COND12_3, G31 0.686878 1.188994 0.578 211 0.564

COND1_2, G32 -1.727857 1.208474 -1.430 211 0.154 GRPN, G33 -0.380872 1.099554 -0.346 211 0.729

For ANX slope, B4 INTRCPT2, G40 -1.582248 4.325089 -0.366 211 0.715

COND12_3, G41 -0.653707 1.283938 -0.509 211 0.611 COND1_2, G42 0.059337 1.191155 0.050 211 0.961

GRPN, G43 0.471074 1.094768 0.430 211 0.667 For AVO slope, B5

INTRCPT2, G50 6.893748 5.190794 1.328 211 0.186 COND12_3, G51 -1.407246 1.309732 -1.074 211 0.284

COND1_2, G52 1.111618 1.329914 0.836 211 0.404 GRPN, G53 -1.904333 1.333520 -1.428 211 0.155

----------------------------------------------------------------------------


161

The outcome variable is INDTOTAL

Final estimation of fixed effects:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------- Standard Approx.

Fixed Effect Coefficient Error T-ratio d.f. P-value ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

For INTRCPT1, B0 INTRCPT2, G00 5.405302 0.759627 7.116 60 0.000

COND12_3, G01 0.245057 0.224000 1.094 60 0.279 COND1_2, G02 -0.072924 0.231660 -0.315 60 0.754

GRPN, G03 -0.067030 0.195645 -0.343 60 0.733 For PA slope, B1

INTRCPT2, G10 -0.089743 0.934063 -0.096 211 0.924 COND12_3, G11 0.120446 0.287274 0.419 211 0.675

COND1_2, G12 -0.165059 0.270982 -0.609 211 0.543 GRPN, G13 0.056688 0.235495 0.241 211 0.810

For NA slope, B2 INTRCPT2, G20 -1.711188 1.242033 -1.378 211 0.170

COND12_3, G21 0.617876 0.317366 1.947 211 0.052 COND1_2, G22 -0.125716 0.368828 -0.341 211 0.733

GRPN, G23 0.256547 0.315667 0.813 211 0.417 For SELFEFF slope, B3

INTRCPT2, G30 -0.280565 0.762670 -0.368 211 0.713

COND12_3, G31 0.232763 0.214000 1.088 211 0.278 COND1_2, G32 -0.308719 0.217506 -1.419 211 0.157

GRPN, G33 0.064409 0.197902 0.325 211 0.745 For ANX slope, B4

INTRCPT2, G40 -0.017631 0.778446 -0.023 211 0.982 COND12_3, G41 -0.102490 0.231088 -0.444 211 0.657

COND1_2, G42 0.126800 0.214389 0.591 211 0.554 GRPN, G43 0.021041 0.197041 0.107 211 0.916

For AVO slope, B5 INTRCPT2, G50 1.661575 0.934259 1.778 211 0.076

COND12_3, G51 -0.309630 0.235731 -1.313 211 0.191 COND1_2, G52 0.279542 0.239363 1.168 211 0.245

GRPN, G53 -0.440713 0.240012 -1.836 211 0.067 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

The outcome variable is INDTOTAL

Final estimation of fixed effects:

---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Standard Approx.

Fixed Effect Coefficient Error T-ratio d.f. P-value ----------------------------------------------------------------------------

For INTRCPT1, B0 INTRCPT2, G00 5.405316 0.759284 7.119 60 0.000

COND12_3, G01 0.244876 0.223984 1.093 60 0.279

COND1_2, G02 -0.072894 0.231673 -0.315 60 0.754 GRPN, G03 -0.066987 0.195586 -0.342 60 0.733

For SP slope, B1 INTRCPT2, G10 -0.660492 1.035756 -0.638 211 0.524

COND12_3, G11 -0.014197 0.277957 -0.051 211 0.960 COND1_2, G12 -0.532503 0.297423 -1.790 211 0.074

GRPN, G13 0.235823 0.260302 0.906 211 0.366 For SN slope, B2

INTRCPT2, G20 0.021844 1.902544 0.011 211 0.991 COND12_3, G21 1.754501 0.574452 3.054 211 0.003

COND1_2, G22 -0.495808 0.640926 -0.774 211 0.440 GRPN, G23 -0.300771 0.495640 -0.607 211 0.544

For SELFEFF slope, B3 INTRCPT2, G30 -0.489971 0.749042 -0.654 211 0.513

COND12_3, G31 0.140469 0.212682 0.660 211 0.509 COND1_2, G32 -0.224619 0.212097 -1.059 211 0.291

GRPN, G33 0.140522 0.193425 0.726 211 0.468 For ANX slope, B4

INTRCPT2, G40 -0.278050 0.762935 -0.364 211 0.716 COND12_3, G41 -0.273202 0.235833 -1.158 211 0.248

COND1_2, G42 0.287502 0.219220 1.311 211 0.191 GRPN, G43 0.093796 0.194524 0.482 211 0.630

For AVO slope, B5

INTRCPT2, G50 0.821540 0.992679 0.828 211 0.409 COND12_3, G51 -0.431645 0.232067 -1.860 211 0.064

COND1_2, G52 0.213461 0.246373 0.866 211 0.388 GRPN, G53 -0.206529 0.254659 -0.811 211 0.418

---------------------------------------------------------------------------


162

Appendix 5: Study 2: Emotions Questionnaire

5רגשות

השאלון הנוכחי כולל מספר מילים המתארות רגשות. קרא/י כל מילה וסמן/י לצידה את הספרה המתאימה . בסימונך, השתמש/י הרגשתך ברגע זהסמן/י בהתאם להרגשתך כעת, כלומר, לתיאור הרגשתך.

בסולם הבא:

מעט מאוד או מעט במידה מסוימת הרבה בה מאודהר כלל לא

5 4 3 2 1

_______ כנות _______ קשב _______ עניין

_______ עליונות _______ שקט- חוסר _______ מצוקה

חשיבות _______ פעלתנות _______ התרגשות עצמית

_______

_______ פתיחות _______ חשש _______ דאגה

_______ שייכות _______ סימפטיה _______ חוזק

_______ הערכה _______ חיבה _______ אשמה

_______ קרבה _______ הפתעה _______ פחד

_______ אינטימיות _______ קנאה _______ עוינות

_______ רחמים _______ חיבור _______ התלהבות

הכרת _______ גאווה תודה

_______ ידידותיות _______

_______ סלחנות _______ הבנה _______ מתח

_______ ריחוק _______ מבוכה _______ עירנות

_______ הערצה _______ אמפתיה _______ בושה

_______ אמון _______ בטחון _______ השראה

_______ חביבות _______ אכפתיות _______ עצבנות

_______ זלזול _______ השפלה _______ נחישות

זכר / נקבהמין: גיל: ________ שפת אם: ____________


163

Appendix 6: Study 2: Interviewee questionnaire (FFI and Feedback conditions)

מהי המטרה עליה בחרת לעבוד: __________________________________________ברת. עבור כל משפט, סמן באיזו מידה אתה ענה על השאלות הבאות בהתייחס לתהליך העבודה שע

מסכים או אינך מסכים עמו. בתשובותיך, השתמש בסקאלה הבאה:

בהחלט לא מסכים לא מסכים ניטראלי מסכים מסכים בהחלט

5 4 3 2 1

1 2 3 4 5 למדתי מהתהליך. .1 1 2 3 4 5 התהליך עזר לי לגלות ידע חדש לגבי עצמי. .2 1 2 3 4 5 יווני מחשבה חדשים לגבי התכניות שלי.התהליך עזר לי לפתח כ .3 1 2 3 4 5 התהליך עזר לי לפתח כיווני מחשבה חדשים לגבי הלימודים שלי. .4 1 2 3 4 5 התהליך תרם לי באופן אישי. .5 1 2 3 4 5 אני שבע רצון מהתהליך. .6

1 2 3 4 5 אני מעוניין לעבוד בצורה דומה גם על מטרות נוספות. .7 1 2 3 4 5 טרות נוספות בצורה דומה יכולה לסייע לי.עבודה על מ .8 1 2 3 4 5 אמליץ לחבריי להשתתף בתהליך כזה. .9

1 2 3 4 5 תהליך עבודה כזה יכול לסייע לסטודנטים להשיג את מטרותיהם. .10 1 2 3 4 5 אני יכול להשיג את המטרה שעבדתי עליה. .11 1 2 3 4 5 אני אצליח להשיג את המטרה שעבדתי עליה. .12אני מסוגל להתגבר על הקשיים שיעמדו בדרכי להשגת המטרה .13

שעבדתי עליה.5 4 3 2 1

1 2 3 4 5 אני יכול להשפיע על קידום המטרה שעבדתי עליה. .14 1 2 3 4 5 השגת המטרה שעבדתי עליה תלויה בי. .15 1 2 3 4 5 אני בדרך הנכונה להשגת המטרה שעבדתי עליה. .16 1 2 3 4 5 המטרה עליה עבדתי חשובה לי. .17 1 2 3 4 5 אני מחוייב להשגת המטרה שעבדתי עליה. .18

1 2 3 4 5 תהליך העבודה היה רלוונטי עבורי באופן אישי. .19 1 2 3 4 5 נושא העבודה היה רלוונטי עבורי באופן אישי. .20 1 2 3 4 5 המטרות שלי כעת ברורות לי יותר. .21 1 2 3 4 5 התכניות שלי כעת ברורות לי יותר. .22 1 2 3 4 5 שלי כעת ברורות לי יותר. הכוונות .23 1 2 3 4 5 אני מתכוון לשקול מחדש את התכניות שלי. .24 1 2 3 4 5 אני מתכוון לשנות את התכניות שלי בתקופה הקרובה. .25 1 2 3 4 5 אני מתכוון לשנות את התכניות שלי בטווח הארוך. .26 1 2 3 4 5 אני מתכוון לבצע פעולות שיקדמו את המטרה שעבדתי עליה. .27

כעת, התייחס לבן הזוג שלך לתהליך העבודה, תוך שימוש באותה סקלה:

1 2 3 4 5 יש לי היכרות מוקדמת עם בן הזוג שלי (עוד לפני המפגש). .1 1 2 3 4 5 התקרבתי אל בן הזוג שלי בעקבות התהליך. .2 1 2 3 4 5 אני מחבב את בן הזוג שלי. .3 1 2 3 4 5 בן הזוג שלי נחמד בעיני. .4 1 2 3 4 5 הניתי לעבוד עם בן הזוג שלי. נ .5 1 2 3 4 5 אשמח להישאר בקשרים חברתיים עם בן הזוג שלי. .6 1 2 3 4 5 אני מעריך את בן הזוג שלי. .7 1 2 3 4 5 בן הזוג שלי עזר לי. .8 1 2 3 4 5 אני מרגיש שאני עזרתי לבן הזוג שלי. .9

1 2 3 4 5 אני מעוניין לשתף פעולה עם בן הזוג שלי גם בעתיד. .10 1 2 3 4 5 אשמח לעבוד עם בן הזוג שלי בעתיד. .11 1 2 3 4 5 הייתי רוצה לכתוב עבודות יחד עם בן הזוג שלי בהמשך הלימודים. .12 1 2 3 4 5 בן הזוג שלי הוא שותף ראוי להתייעצות. .13


164

ולה כדי להשיג את המטרה עליה עבדת. בכל שורה רשום פע יכול לבצעחשוב על פעולות שונות שאתה אחת כזו (אין צורך למלא את כל השורות, אבל נסה לחשוב על כמה שיותר פעולות).

לבצע אותה תוך שימוש בסולם הבא: מתכווןעבור כל פעולה, ציין באיזו מידה אתה

במידה רבה ביותר5

במידה רבה4

במידה בינונית3

במידה מעטה2

כלל לא1

1. 5 4 3 2 1

2. 5 4 3 2 1

3. 5 4 3 2 1

4. 5 4 3 2 1

5. 5 4 3 2 1

6. 5 4 3 2 1

7. 5 4 3 2 1

8. 5 4 3 2 1

פרט את היכולות, התכונות והכישורים האישיים שלך שיכולים לסייע לך להשיג מטרה זו:1. 5. 2. 6. 3. 7. 4. 8.

ייצג את השגת מ 100לפניך קווים המתארים את המרחק שאתה עשוי להרגיש מהמטרה שלך. המספר על כל קו את המרחק שאתה X -את המרחק הגדול ביותר ממנה. סמן בבקשה ב 0המטרה, והמספר

מרגיש שהיית מרוחק מהמטרה לפני התהליך, המרחק בו אתה מרגיש שאתה נמצא עכשיו, והמרחק .היוםבמידה ותיישם את מה שלמדת שאתה משער שתהיה מהמטרה בעוד שבועיים ובסוף שנת הלימודים,

המטרה שלך

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

לפני התהליך

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

כעת, לאחר התהליך

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

בעוד שבועיים

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

נת הלימודיםבסוף ש

חשוב כעת על מטרה אישית נוספת לתקופת הלימודים שחשובה בשבילך.

מה המטרה: ____________________________________

לבצע אותה. מתכווןכדי להשיג מטרה זו. עבור כל פעולה, ציין באיזו מידה אתה יכול לבצעפרט את הפעולות שאתה

1. 5 4 3 2 1

2. 5 4 3 2 1

3. 5 4 3 2 1

4. 5 4 3 2 1

5. 5 4 3 2 1

6. 5 4 3 2 1

7. 5 4 3 2 1

8. 5 4 3 2 1

פרט את היכולות, התכונות והכישורים האישיים שלך שיכולים לסייע לך להשיג מטרה זו:1. 5. 2. 6. 3. 7. 4. 8.


165

השניה שבחרת לפני על כל קו את המרחק שאתה מרגיש שהיית מרוחק מהמטרה X - כעת, סמן בבקשה ב

התהליך, המרחק בו אתה מרגיש שאתה נמצא עכשיו, והמרחק שאתה משער שתהיה מהמטרה בעוד .במידה ותיישם את מה שלמדת היוםשבועיים ובסוף שנת הלימודים,

המטרה שלך

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

לפני התהליך

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

כעת, לאחר התהליך

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

בעוד שבועיים

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0

בסוף שנת הלימודים

או הסכמתך מידת את ציין. עמן להסכים לא או להסכים יכול שאתה, לגביך הצהרות מספר כתובות למטה

בתשובותיך, .הפריט שלפני הקו על המתאים המספר כתיבת באמצעות, פריט כל עם הסכמתך רחוס השתמש בסקאלה הבאה:

בהחלט לא מסכים לא מסכים ניטראלי מסכים מסכים בהחלט

5 4 3 2 1

.בחיים ראוי אני לה להצלחה שאגיע בטוח אני .1 5 4 3 2 1

.מדוכא מרגיש אני לפעמים .2 5 4 3 2 1

.מצליח כלל-בדרך אני, מנסה כשאני .3 5 4 3 2 1

. ערך-חסר מרגיש אני נכשל כשאני לפעמים .4 5 4 3 2 1

.בהצלחה מטלות משלים אני .5 5 4 3 2 1

. עבודתי על בשליטה מרגיש לא אני לפעמים .6 5 4 3 2 1

.מעצמי רצון שבע אני כללי באופן .7 5 4 3 2 1

. שלי היכולת לגבי ספקות מלא אני .8 5 4 3 2 1

.שלי בחיים יקרה מה קובע אני .9 5 4 3 2 1

.שלי הקריירה הצלחת על בשליטה מרגיש לא אני .10 5 4 3 2 1

.שלי הבעיות רוב עם להתמודד יכולת לי יש .11 5 4 3 2 1

.תקווה וחסרי עגומים די לי נראים שהדברים רגעים יש .12 5 4 3 2 1

זכר / נקבהמין: גיל: ________ שפת אם: ____________

וגי לימודים: __________________________ ח

_ _ _ -ספרות אחרונות של תעודת הזהות (כולל ספרת ביקורת): _ 4- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

במקום Xד, אשמח לשמוע עליו ולשקול את האפשרות להשתתף בו (סמן במידה ותפתחו תהליך עבודה דומה בעתיהמתאים, ניתן לסמן יותר מאפשרות אחת). שים לב, אין בציון פרטיך למטה שום התחיבות מצדך להשתתף בתהליך

גם בעתיד:

___ לצרכים אקדמיים ___ לצרכים מקצועיים

___ לצרכים אישיים ___ אחר: ____________

): _________________________בניסוי קשרות (תישמר אנונימיות מוחלטת של המשתתפיםפרטי הת


166

Appendix 7: Study 2: Interview Protocols that Were Projected During Experimental

Conditions

הנחיות לעבודה בזוגות הנחיות לעבודה בזוגות ספר לי בבקשה על אירוע ספציפי בו הצלחת להשיג ספר לי בבקשה על אירוע ספציפי בו הצלחת להשיג 1.1.

עוד לפני עוד לפני , , והרגשת התלהבות ושמחהוהרגשת התלהבות ושמחה] ] מטרה אישיתמטרה אישית[ [ ? ? שתוצאות האירוע היו ידועות לך שתוצאות האירוע היו ידועות לך

??האם היית שמח לחוות סיטואציה דומה שובהאם היית שמח לחוות סיטואציה דומה שוב

? ? מה חשבת באותו רגעמה חשבת באותו רגע? ? מה היה רגע השיא באירועמה היה רגע השיא באירוע2.2.? ? ) ) כולל תחושות פיסיותכולל תחושות פיסיות( ( איך הרגשת באותו רגע איך הרגשת באותו רגע

שאפשרו שאפשרו , , באחרים ובסביבהבאחרים ובסביבה, , מה היו התנאים בך מה היו התנאים בך 3.3.? ? לאירוע להתרחש לאירוע להתרחש

התנאים שתיארת כרגע נראים כמפתח האישי שלך התנאים שתיארת כרגע נראים כמפתח האישי שלך 4.4.חשוב עכשיו על חשוב עכשיו על , , אם זה כך אם זה כך ]. ]. מטרה אישיתמטרה אישית[ [ להשגת להשגת

, , סדרי העדיפויות והתכניות שלך סדרי העדיפויות והתכניות שלך , , הפעולות שאתה עושההפעולות שאתה עושהוחשוב באיזו מידה וחשוב באיזו מידה , , לעתיד הקרוב ולעתיד הרחוק יותר לעתיד הקרוב ולעתיד הרחוק יותר

או מרחיקים או מרחיקים , , הם מקרבים אותך אל התנאים האלההם מקרבים אותך אל התנאים האלה. . אותך מהם אותך מהם

? ? מה יש ביכולתך לעשות כדי להתקרב אליהם מה יש ביכולתך לעשות כדי להתקרב אליהם

הנחיות לעבודה בזוגות הנחיות לעבודה בזוגות

מה אתה חושב שאתה יכול לעשות כדי להשיג מה אתה חושב שאתה יכול לעשות כדי להשיג 1.1.

? ? מטרה זומטרה זו

? ? מה אתה מתכוון לעשות כדי להשיג מטרה זומה אתה מתכוון לעשות כדי להשיג מטרה זו2.2.

אמור אמור : : ספק למרואיין משוב על דבריוספק למרואיין משוב על דבריו]: ]: למראייןלמראיין[[3.3.

, , מה טוב בהן מה טוב בהן– – לו מה דעתך לגבי התכניות שלו לו מה דעתך לגבי התכניות שלו

..מה ניתן לשפר מה ניתן לשפר , , מה פחות טוב מה פחות טוב

אמור למרואיין מה עוד לדעתך הוא אמור למרואיין מה עוד לדעתך הוא ]: ]: למראייןלמראיין[[

..יכול לעשות כדי להשיג את מטרתויכול לעשות כדי להשיג את מטרתו


167

Appendix 8: Study 2: Main Effects and Interactions between Attachment Styles and Experimental Manipulation (condition x role, FFI vs. FB) on

the Dependent Variables

Role Condition Anxiousness Avoidance Anxious x Avoidance Anxious x Role Avoidance x Role

Anxious x Condition

Avoidance x Condition

Anx. x Avoid. x Role

Anx. x Avoid. x Condition

F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2 F Eta2

PA 3.51 † .03 .97 .01 2.20 .02 .84 .01 .09 .00 1.93 .02 2.08 .02 .00 .00 1.24 .01 1.50 .01 .00 .00

NA 2.80 † .03 .28 .00 .05 .00 1.15 .01 1.52 .01 2.88 † .03 3.30 * .03 .17 .00 .14 .00 4.29 * .04 .12 .00

SPE 8.89 ** .08 .24 .00 1.21 .01 1.86 .02 .00 .00 6.69 * .06 7.04 ** .06 .35 .00 .01 .00 6.00 * .05 .81 .01

SNE .06 .00 .24 .00 .10 .00 3.32 † .03 4.11 * .04 .20 .00 0.21 .00 .29 .00 .19 .00 .78 .01 .14 .00

G. aff. ratio 6.72 * .06 .82 .01 .59 .01 .05 .00 1.14 .01 5.32 * .05 5.60 * .05 .05 .00 .89 .01 5.37 * .05 .08 .00

S. aff. ratio 4.67 * .04 .00 .00 .30 .00 .00 .00 1.13 .01 4.01 * .04 4.55 * .04 .43 .00 .05 .00 4.95 * .04 .65 .01

Self-efficacy .06 .00 .66 .01 1.92 .02 3.76 † .03 1.20 .01 .14 .00 0.28 .00 .20 .00 1.27 .01 .40 .00 .46 .00

Learning 4.81 * .04 7.01 ** .06 3.00 † .03 .02 .00 .90 .01 5.16 * .05 3.47 † .03 8.72 ** .08 7.19 ** .06 4.66 * .04 9.31 ** .08

Bonding .17 .00 .68 .01 1.11 .01 .54 .01 1.37 .01 .19 .00 0.61 .01 .77 .01 1.82 .02 .71 .01 2.23 .02

Belief - .00 .00 .25 .00 .21 .00 .20 .00 - - .00 .00 .08 .00 - .17 .00

Clarity 1.66 .02 .53 .00 1.66 0.02 .11 .00 .15 .00 1.31 .01 2.82 † .03 1.33 .01 .60 .01 2.16 .02 1.55 .01

Action-items and Personal Resources

Goal 1 1.92 .02 2.15 .02 .20 .00 .02 .00 .00 .00 .99 .01 1.17 .01 1.55 .01 4.06 * .04 .62 .01 3.15 † .03


Goal 1 2.32 .02 .09 .00 2.64 .02 5.80 * .05 4.47 * .04 2.80 † .03 2.51 .02 .43 .00 .02 .00 2.86 † .03 .14 .00

<otes: ** p<.01, * p<.05, + p<.1; Dfs = 1, 119, except for Belief, df = 1, 59


168

Appendix 9: Field Study 1: Self-Report Questionnaire

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 יעדיי המקצועיים לטווח הקצר (לשנה הקרובה) ברורים לי. 1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ר לשנה) ברורים לי.יעדיי המקצועיים לטווח הארוך (מעב 2

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 אני יודע מה עלי לעשות על מנת להשיג את יעדיי המקצועיים. 3

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .יםהמקצועי יעדייקשה לי לנסח את 4

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .המקצועיתלהצליח בתכנון התפתחותי כדי יש לי את הידע הדרוש 5

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 שלי. המקצועיתך ההתפתחות יש ביכולתי להשפיע על תהלי 6

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .המקצועית לקדם את התפתחותילא ברור לי מה דרוש 7

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .המקצועית להיות פעיל בניהול התפתחותי מסוגלאני 8

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .המקצועית האתגרים שבניהול התפתחותימ חוששאני 9

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .המקצועית ניהול התפתחותיאני מרגיש מחוייב לתהליך 10

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .המקצועית אני מאמין בחשיבות תהליך ניהול התפתחותי 11

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 יהיה אפקטיבי. המקצועיתאני מאמין שתהליך התפתחותי 12

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .המקצועית להיות שותף בניהול התפתחותיאני רוצה 13

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 חשובה לארגון. המקצועיתחותי התפתאני מרגיש ש 14

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .המקצועית חשוב לארגון שאהיה מעורב בניהול התפתחותיאני מאמין ש 15

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 חשוב לארגון לאפשר לי לתפקד במיטבי.אני מרגיש ש 16

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