Aim: This study examines the predictors and outcomes of organizational employee friendliness. By doing this, this research helps in understanding the psychological relevance of organizational...Show moreAim: This study examines the predictors and outcomes of organizational employee friendliness. By doing this, this research helps in understanding the psychological relevance of organizational employee friendliness. Methods: The study used a cross-sectional survey design to collect data from 162 employees across various industries. Analysis included reliability analysis, factor analysis, correlation analysis to explore associations, and regression analysis to test for direct effects and mediation regression analysis to test for indirect effects. Results: The findings reveal that perceived organizational friendliness significantly predicts employee performance and well-being and reduces work-stress. Significant predictors of organizational friendliness included employee friendly leadership and employee friendly work climate, not significant predictors were employee friendly job content and employee friendly policies. The study also identified significant indirect effects of employee friendly leadership and employee friendly work climate on performance, well-being and stress mediated by perceived organizational friendliness. Key conclusions: Organizational employee friendliness plays an important role in enhancing employee performance and well-being and reducing stress. These results suggest that organizations, for instilling perceptions of organizational employee friendliness in employees, should focus on enhancing employee friendly leadership qualities and improving employee friendly work climate.Show less
This thesis aims to address the increasing necessity for employers to provide policies to support their employees’ parenthood. How successfully parents’ cope with the competing demands of being a...Show moreThis thesis aims to address the increasing necessity for employers to provide policies to support their employees’ parenthood. How successfully parents’ cope with the competing demands of being a working parent can have an influence on their well-being. It was proposed that a relationship between the policies parents use, and their general well-being would be also influenced by several factors, such as the age of the child, the gender of the parent, and the characteristics of the child. 137 working parents accessed an online survey through social media where they would report on demographics and the policies they have used and their level of satisfaction. Additionally, they completed the GHQ-12 for general well-being and Mary Rothbart’s temperament questionnaires, IBQ, ECBQ or CBQ, depending on their youngest’ child age. Linear regression analyses were performed to analyze the potential relationship between policies and well-being, as well as a hierarchical multiple regression analyses for moderation effects. Lastly, results did not support the hypotheses; however, a relationship between policies and general well-being was concluded. Against the initial hypothesis, it was found that parents that make use of a lot of policies are predicted to report lower general well-being levels, presenting a quality-quantity dilemma. This is explained through the parents’ subjective experience of policies. Companies are urged to provide adjusted support to their working parents while taking their opinion and individual circumstances into consideration.Show less
Foreign aid policies vary greatly in their means and ends. Long-term development policies, aiming to promote development and welfare, distinguish from short-term humanitarian policies that respond...Show moreForeign aid policies vary greatly in their means and ends. Long-term development policies, aiming to promote development and welfare, distinguish from short-term humanitarian policies that respond to humanitarian emergency crises. Politicians seem to differ in their preferences, leading scholars to question how these preferences emerge. Existing literature has been focusing on theories of elite competition in explaining why states construct and implement certain policies. However, these theories seem to ignore the concept of political agency, and grant no primacy to the role of ideas and values. This thesis aims to fill this gap by asking how party ideologies influence foreign aid policy preferences. It employs the discursive legitimation model of Van Leeuwen (2008) to analyze Dutch parliamentary debates. Here, it is found that conservative values affect politicians to refer to authorization and rationalization when legitimizing their preferences, while liberal values work through to moral evaluation and story-telling strategies. This confirms that ideas and ideologies do matter for policy preferences.Show less
The reality of a shrinking labor market as the population is aging and birthrate is declining in Japan, is asking for more female participation. Changing economic demands and working conditions is...Show moreThe reality of a shrinking labor market as the population is aging and birthrate is declining in Japan, is asking for more female participation. Changing economic demands and working conditions is leading to an increasing number of double-income families. It is creating variety in the gender roles and contributing to a new order. A study of ten qualitative interviews was conducted to examine the working conditions and experiences of working mothers in Tokyo. The case study shows that working mothers are facing three main challenges when trying to find a work-life balance: (1) time management, (2) high responsibility of work within the household and (3) working culture that impacts career. The case study of this thesis gives an insightful assessment of policies, what they do and do not address. Analyzing narratives and understanding how mothers approach their working situation and lifestyle is an important element in discussing the work-family balance to clarify remaining issues in working culture. It turns out that informal resources and strategies are important to overcome or deal with the challenges, as formal policies still seem to lack in addressing part of the core labor issues and remaining gender inequality.Show less
This thesis focused on South Korean movies and researched how North Korea is represented in movies produced from 1999 to 2018. In order to complete this research, the paper was divided into three...Show moreThis thesis focused on South Korean movies and researched how North Korea is represented in movies produced from 1999 to 2018. In order to complete this research, the paper was divided into three main sections. The first chapter introduced the Korean cinema and the governmental policies applied to the film industry. It also gave an overview of the historical and political situation of the two Koreas by looking at the inter-Korean relations through South Korea’s foreign policies. The second chapter discussed the literature review on film theories, including the narrative theory of Roland Barthes and the theory of realism, used in the analysis. In addition, the methodology explained how the research is conducted. Lastly, the third chapter was dedicated to the case studies analysis and the related discussion. In this study it was discovered that the representation of North Korea changed throughout the years. These changes often corresponded to the political and social situation experienced in reality.Show less
This thesis examines how Japan's declining birth rate and women's work-life balance are related, and how the government has responded to this in terms of policies.
