Dear Colleagues,
Please let us know if you have any questions, and we look forward to seeing your proposals!
All the best,
Cort.
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Special Issue Call for Papers for Work, Aging and Retirement: "Work and the Multitude of Age Constructs"
Special Issue Guest Co-Editors:
• Cort W. Rudolph – Saint Louis University
• Florian Kunze – University of Konstanz
• Hannes Zacher – Leipzig University
Scope of the Special Issue
Research has demonstrated that chronological age is only weakly, if at all, associated with important work-related outcomes, such as performance, job attitudes, and occupational well-being. Therefore, organizational researchers have argued that it is important to "move beyond chronological age" and investigate alternative age constructs, such as perceived, subjective, and relative age, as well as functional, psychosocial, organizational, and lifespan age. Based on research in the gerontology and lifespan developmental psychology literatures, it is often assumed that these alternative age constructs predict work outcomes better than chronological age. However, so far very few empirical studies have examined the content, construct, and predictive validity of these alternative age constructs. Moreover, most research in this area has relied on cross-sectional, single-source designs and neglected potentially important confounding variables (e.g., health, work ability, core self-evaluations).
The purpose of this special issue is to advance knowledge of the multitude of age constructs through innovative conceptual, methodological, and empirical contributions. These contributions can be based on previous theoretical work (deductive) or inform theorizing (inductive). The submission of studies with high statistical power is encouraged, and studies with null findings will be considered if combined with adequate statistical power and appropriate study design. Suitable manuscripts may focus on conceptual, methodological, and empirical issues including but not limited to:
• Theory development and conceptual papers on alternative age constructs.
• Qualitative and quantitative (i.e., meta-analytic) reviews on alternative age constructs.
• Methodological advancements and analytical techniques to investigate alternative age constructs.
• Sophisticated empirical work (e.g., experiments, experience sampling, qualitative studies, longitudinal research, cross-sectional studies with large, representative samples).
• Scientific evaluation of (work-related) interventions to change alternative age constructs.
• Empirical studies on interrelationships among various alternative age constructs.
• Empirical studies demonstrating incremental predictive validity of alternative age constructs above and beyond chronological age and important confounding variables.
• Empirical studies examining the stability or fluctuation of alternative age constructs over several time points (e.g., work days).
• Empirical studies examining antecedents and consequences of alternative age constructs, as well as mediators and moderators of these effects.
• Empirical studies examining how individual and contextual factors within the organization (e.g., organizational climate, human resource management practices) and those outside work (e.g., family demands) influence alternative age constructs.
• Empirical studies that adopt comprehensive multi-level approaches to the study of alternative age constructs at the individual, team, and organizational levels of analysis.
Some past references that are illustrative of the purpose of this special issue are listed at the end of this CFP.
Timeline and Submission Process
December 31, 2017 -- Initial manuscript proposals due
February 28, 2018 -- Proposals evaluated; invitations for full manuscript submission sent to authors
October 31, 2018 -- Full manuscript submission deadline
Proposal Process
Manuscript Proposals
Interested authors should submit a short proposal (1,000 words maximum, excluding references) that describes the paper they intend to write (including an outline). Proposals are due by December 31, 2017. Proposals will be reviewed by the co-editors and evaluated using the following criteria: (a) responsiveness to the call, (b) degree of potential to enhance our understanding of alternative age constructs, (c) scientific merit, (d) likelihood of successful completion within timeline, (e) fit with other submissions, and (f) applicability to journal mission.
Please submit manuscript proposals directly at the following link:
https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/workar
In the cover letter, please indicate that it is a proposal submitted to the special issue on Work and the Multitude of Age Constructs.
Full Manuscripts
Full manuscripts will be limited to 60 standard manuscript pages (including all figures, tables, and references; authors can ask for editorial approval of a longer paper if commensurate to its contribution) and will be due by October 31, 2018. Manuscripts will undergo a regular double-blind peer-review process.
All full-manuscript submissions should be prepared in accordance with Work, Aging and Retirement's author guidelines and be submitted through the journal's submission portal. Contributors should indicate in their cover letter that they would like to have the paper considered for the Special Issue on Work and the Multitude of Age Constructs.
Illustrative References
Barnes-Farrell, J. L., & Piotrowski, M. J. (1989). Workers' perceptions of discrepancies between chronological age and personal age: You're only as old as you feel. Psychology and Aging, 4(3), 376-377. doi:10.1037/0882-7974.4.3.376
Barnes-Farrell, J. L, Petery, G. A. (2017, in press): The moderating role of employment status and gender on relationships between psychological age and health: A two-wave cross-lagged panel analysis of data from the health and retirement study. Work, Aging and Retirement. doi.org/10.1093/workar/wax019
Cleveland, J. N., & Hanscom, M. (2017). What is old at work? Moving past chronological age. In E. Parry & J. McCarthy (Eds.), The Palgrave handbook of age diversity and work (pp. 17-46). London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Cleveland, J. N., & Shore, L. M. (1992). Self- and supervisory perspectives on age and work attitudes and performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 77(4), 469-484. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.77.4.469
Cleveland, J. N., Shore, L. M., & Murphy, K. R. (1997). Person- and context-oriented perceptual age measures: Additional evidence of distinctiveness and usefulness. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 18(3), 239-251. doi:10.1002/(SICI)1099-1379(199705)18:3<239::AID-JOB794>3.0.CO;2-A
Kotter-Grühn, D., Neupert, S. D., & Stephan, Y. (2015). Feeling old today? Daily health, stressors, and affect explain day-to-day variability in subjective age. Psychology & health, 30(12), 1470-1485. doi.org/10.1080/08870446.2015.1061130
Kooij, D. T. A. M., De Lange, A. H., Jansen, P. G. W., & Dikkers, J. S. E. (2008). Older workers' motivation to continue to work: Five meanings of age. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 23(4), 364-394. doi:10.1108/02683940810869015
Kunze, F., Raes, A. M., & Bruch, H. (2015). It matters how old you feel: Antecedents and performance consequences of average relative subjective age in organizations. Journal of Applied Psychology, 100(5), 1511-1526. doi:10.1037/a0038909
Settersten Jr, R. A., & Mayer, K. U. (1997). The measurement of age, age structuring, and the life course. Annual Review of sociology, 23(1), 233-261.
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Cort Rudolph
Saint Louis University
Saint Louis MO
(314) 977-7299
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