This article investigates the effects of job involvement, affective organizational commitment, and collectivism on organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) using data collected from 131 professors and clerical workers in a private Japanese university. Results show that job involvement had a significantly positive relationship on civic virtue and helping behavior, and affective organizational c...

We use information on second-generation migrants to study the existence of a cultural component on the formation process of noncognitive skills and its effect on education and employment outcomes. Our measures of noncognitive skills include: personality traits that children are encouraged to learn and civic capital. Individuals whose cultural heritage places a lower value on child qualities pos...

This article moves the debate on the integrative mechanisms of civil society from the study of individual civic engagement and associational life to the study of interorganizational civic networks. Drawing upon evidence from Bristol and Glasgow, we identify a polycentric model of civic networks, based on horizontal solidarity and generalized reciprocity, in which organizations engage in micro r...

Civic virtue is generally understood as relating to a specific polity and in that way to be distinct from virtues appropriate to a human being as such, the subject matter of most "virtue theory." This conception does not rule out "universal" civic virtues-ones appropriate to membership in a "world community"-and some theorists speak of and advocate some form of such "world citizenship." Neverth...

Digital technology is increasingly being recognized as a catalyst for national progress and social transformation. Using an in-depth case study of social media-enabled crime-fighting communities in Malaysia, this paper explores the use of social media in bringing societal change through civic engagement. We adopt the notion of boundary object to conceptualize how social media could be enacted t...

Critics of voting by mail express concern over its impact on civil society. For example, Thompson (2004) posits that voting by mail limits electoral civic engagement by preventing the temporal norm of simultaneity on Election Day. I, however, find that the open ballot system of voting by mail promotes deliberation, which encourages civic engagement. This study tests if voting by mail increases ...

Flow theory offers an individualistic explanation of media enjoyment, while cooperative learning theory posits a social explanation for enhanced learning in groups. This classroom-based experimental study examines whether game players can experience both conditions and the influence of each on several types of civic knowledge, skills, and dispositions. We find that high quality cooperative lear...

A Web survey of 1,715 college students was conducted to examine Facebook Groups users' gratifications and the relationship between users' gratifications and their political and civic participation offline. A factor analysis revealed four primary needs for participating in groups within Facebook: socializing, entertainment, self-status seeking, and information. These gratifications vary dependin...

This article presents an overview of current understandings in the study of political and civic engagement and participation, drawing in particular on innovations which have emerged from the PIDOP project. For the purposes of the article, ‘engagement’ is defined as having an interest in, paying attention to, or having knowledge, beliefs, opinions, attitudes or feelings about either political or...

We use the China General Social Survey (2005) and the Home Office Citizenship Survey (2005) to study civic engagement and neighbourhood trust in China and Britain in this paper. We focus on class differences in participation in sports/recreation, religion, children's/adult education and public-welfare activities, and trust in the neighbours. We find higher levels of civic involvement in Britain...