1982/05/01 by Melvin L. Kohn, Carmi Schooler · 7 citations
Health Professions · Psychology · Business, Management and Accounting · #Employment and Welfare Studies #Psychological Well-being and Life Satisfaction #Job Satisfaction and Organizational Behavior
paper · doi:10.1086/227593
openalex publication_date 1982/05/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
In earlier work, we assessed a longitudinal causal model of the reciprocal effects of the substative complexity of work and intellectual flexibility. In this paper, we greatly expand the causal model to consider sumultaneously several structural imperatives of the job and three major dimensions of personality-ideational flexibility, a self directed orientation to self and society, and a sense of distress. The analysis demonstrates that the structural imperatives of the job affect personality. Self-directed work leads to ideational flexibility and to a self-directed orientation to self and society; oppressive working conditions lead to distress. These findings strongly support a learning generalization model. Personality, in turn, has important consequences for an individual's place in the job structure and in the system of social stratification. In particular, both ideational flexibility and a self-directed orientation lead, over time, to more responsible jobs that allow greater latitude for occupational self-direction.