Self-study
In the decade from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, large corporations were rocked by mergers, reengineering, and downsizing. █████ ██████ █████████████ ██████████ ██████████ ███ █████████ █████████████ ████████ ██████████ ██████████ ██ █████ ███ ███ ████████ ██████ ███████ ████ ████ ███████ ███████████ ███████ ██ █████████ ████████ ██ ████ ███ ██ ███████ ████████ ██ ████ ██████ ████ █████ ███ ████ ████ ████ ███████
"Surprising" Phenomenon
Why did corporate employees not perceive their job security to have changed appreciably from the beginning to the end of a decade during which their jobs were less secure?
Objective
The correct answer must fail to identify a reason for employees in 1994 to be as confident in their job security as employees in 1984. Every wrong answer, meanwhile, will provide a good hypothesis suggesting that the employees’ jobs were equally secure in both years, or that employees in 1994 were more likely than employees in 1984 to say their jobs were secure for a different reason.
19.
Each of the following contributes ██ ██ ███████████ ██ ███ ██████████ ██████ ███████ █████████ █████ ███████
a
A large number ██ ███ ██████ ██ ████ ███████ ████ ██ █████ █████████ ████ ████ ███ ████████ ██ ████████ ██████████████ ███ ███████████
This explains the consistent confidence measurement. The workers surveyed were largely not the ones at risk, so they did not perceive their job security to have changed much.
b
Employees who feel ██████ ██ █████ ████ ████ ██ █████ ████ ███ ████ ██ ██████ ███ ███████
This does not explain why employees remained apparently overconfident in their own job security. The author does not imply that employees were asked about other employees' jobs.
c
The corporate downsizing ████ ████ █████ ██████ ████ ██████ ███ ████ ██████ ███████████ ███ ███████ █████ ██████ ███ ██████████
This makes the consistent job confidence less surprising. If employees in 1984 were expecting downsizing, and employees in 1994 had experienced it, then employees in both years responded to the survey based on similar outlooks.
d
Most of the █████ ██████████ ██████ ████ ██████ ███ █████████ ██████ █ ████ █████ ███ █████ ███████
This makes the consistent survey results less surprising. If the survey was conducted in years before and well after significant downsizing, employees in both years were likely not expecting it.
e
In the mid-1990s, ██████ ████ █████████ ████ ██████████ █████ █████ ██████ ████ ██ ███ ████ ██ █████████ ████ ████ ████ █ ██████ ███████
This contributes to an explanation of the survey results. Employees in 1994 had an optimistic outlook that countered the effects of their declining job security to keep the survey results roughly consistent.