- Polychronicity
Polychronicity is a term that describes people who prefer to work on multiple activities at the same time. Examples of polychronic behaviors include talking on the phone while driving a car and browsing the
internet while sitting in meetings. Polychronicity is in contrast to those who prefer monochronicity (doing one thing at a time). The polychronic-monochronic concept was first developed by Edward Hall in 1959 in his anthropological studies of time use in different cultures.Measuring Polychronicity
Researchers have developed the following questionnaires to measure polychronicity:
* Inventory of Polychronic Values (IPV) developed by Bluedorn et al. (1997) which is a 10-item scale designed to assess "the extent to which people in a culture prefer to be engaged in two or more tasks or events simultaneously and believe their preference is the best way to do things."
* Polychronic Attitude Index (PAI) developed by Kaufman-Scarborough & Lindquist in 1991 which is a 4-item scale measuring individual preference for polychronicity:
***1. I do not like to juggle several activities at the same time.
***2. People should not try to do many things at once.
***3. When I sit down at my desk, I work on one project at a time.
***4. I am comfortable doing several things at the same time.See also
Chronemics Further reading
* Bluedorn, A., Kalliath, T., Strube, M. & Martin, G. (1999). Polychronicity and the Inventory of Polychronic Values (IPV). Journal of Managerial Psychology, Volume 14, Numbers 3-4, 1999 , pp. 205-231(27)
* Conte, J. M., Rizzuto, T. E., & Steiner, D. D. (1999). A construct-oriented analysis of individual-level polychronicity. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 14, 269–288.
* Kaufman-Scarborough, Carol and Jay D. Lindquist (1999), "Time Management and Polychronicity: Comparisons, Contrasts, and Insights for the Workplace," Journal of Managerial Psychology, special issue on Polychronicity, Vol. 14, Numbers 3 /4, 288-312.
* Timesense: Polychronicity and Monochronicity http://www.harley.com/writing/time-sense.html
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