February Lightning Talk:

Abstract

TRG member Ariane Froidevaux presented her research: Changes in perceived age discrimination over time: Patterns, predictors, and outcomes. Then, Kate Zernike (New York Times) gave us a preview of her soon-to-be-published book The Exceptions (2023), which documents the process and outcomes of systematic discrimination that occurred against female faculty at MIT.

Date : Feb 9, 2023 11:00 AM — 12:30 PM

Event : TRG February Lightning Talk

Lightning Talks

Changes in perceived age discrimination over time: Patterns, predictors, and outcomes

by Ariane Froidevaux

Abstract: Age discrimination represents a major challenge with detrimental impacts on both employees and organizations. Although age discrimination theories suggest that workers will experience increasing age discrimination at work over time, this prediction remains insufficiently tested, and prior empirical evidence suggests the potential existence of heterogeneity in workers’ perceived age discrimination over time. Conceptualizing age discrimination at work as a stressor and integrating the model of exposure and reactivity to stressors with allostatic load theory, the current study enhances the understanding of how employees perceive and react to the experience of age discrimination over time. Adopting a person-centered approach, we provide a progressive examination of our research questions with two studies based on a nationally representative archival dataset from Switzerland (N = 1,110) using a prospective design over seven years. In the first study (n1 = 555), our results revealed three change patterns (i.e., increasing, decreasing, and stable nonexistent) of perceived age discrimination at work. In the second study (n2 = 555), we replicated these three patterns and further found that the heterogeneity in change patterns was predicted by employees’ age and belief in a just world, but not neuroticism. In addition, we found that these change patterns were associated with job satisfaction, work strain, and perceived employability. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed. Keywords: perceived age discrimination at work; age; belief in a just world; neuroticism; job satisfaction; work strain; perceived employability.