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© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Autonomy & Control in the Workplace and Beyond
Contemporary Data Issues in `Capital’
Dr Philip Cunliffe & Dr Lucy Barnes
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Autonomy in the workplace How much independence do you have in
performing your tasks at work? If you do not currently work, characterize your major work in the past.
Complete independence … something in between No independence at all
How well does this survey question track concepts that would be useful for a Marxist analysis?
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
A broader survey sample To your laptops…
Open up www.worldvaluessurvey.org in a browser Left-hand menu
select Data and Documentation Select Online Analysis
Select Wave: 2005-2009 Select `United Kingdom’ (bottom right) Type: V246 in the box named `Variable’, and click
`Show’.
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Workplace independence in the UKThis shows the responses from a representative survey of about 1000 people in the UK for the same question you answered.
In the WVS: Complete independence: 24% … something in between: 63% No independence at all: 5 %
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Summarizing this information What’s the average (mean) level of autonomy
at work?
How precise do you think this estimate is?
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
How precise? We can say more exactly how precise this
estimate from 1000 people is The standard error of the mean
Imagine we took a bunch of 1000 person samples, and got the averages over and over again
We’d get slightly different answers each time On average we’d be estimating the population
mean, but there would be variability
The standard error of the mean captures that variability, based on our original sample
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
The standard error of the mean
SEM (variability) = variability / sample size SEM = standard deviation / sample size
Use the sample standard deviation in the data The sample size is the number of substantive
responses (i.e. excluding NAs and Don’t Knows) in the data
Calculate the SEM
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Confidence intervals A different way of thinking about variability 95% confidence interval is the interval within which 95% of
the estimates of the mean will fall, based on our data
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Calculating confidence intervals Confidence intervals use the variability in the
SEM 95% of estimates fall in the interval defined
by
Calculate the gap from the mean to the boundary (1.96*SEM)
Add/subtract this from the estimate of the mean (7.13)
Calculates confidence intervals!
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Interpreting the survey information How does the average in the survey sample
compare to that in our class? Does this relate to the kinds of jobs you/we How do you expect autonomy to vary with
level of education? have had?
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Back to the WVS On your ‘results’ page, find the box called
`cross by’. Scroll down and select `highest educational level attained’. What group has the highest level of autonomy at
work? How does this compare to your expectations?
If different– does this mean that the statistics are Wrong Useless Incomplete
Or something else?
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Broader contrasts How do you think autonomy at work would
change with the level of capitalist development?
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
More countries Click back to the `Select countries’ tab and
also select China and India
Click again through V246, ‘Show’., and consider the shares in each country who claim to have ‘complete control’ What does this look like, across countries? Is this surprising? Why, or why not? What else about the comparative information do
you notice?
© University of Kent Q-Step Centre 2015
Employer control outside the workplace Can (should?) employers be able to control
what employees say on social media?
"As more and more of our daily speech migrates online, business groups are hoping that [the regulatory agency] will make it easier for employers to control that speech":
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/07/getting_fired_for_what_you_post_on_facebook.html