Externalism Vs Internalism

Literature about OB and the illustrations of internalist and externalist balancers present two conceptualizations of OB: as a state of balance, comprised of a certain combination of different occupations and the person seeking to attain or maintain that state or as an intermittent state within the process of balancing. On the other hand OB can be seen as an act of balancing whereby a person juggles various occupations to feel balanced. While the connections between an externalist balancer and a perception of OB as a state of balance is rather straightforward, the link between internalist orientation and perception of OB as an act of balancing needs further explanation. An internalist balancer creates an individualistic PDO that leads to an

The fact that individualists and collectivists rely on different information sets while making life satisfaction judgements have strong support in cultural studies (Suh, Diener, Oishi, & Triandis, 1998) is significant in the discussion of OB and its relation to internalist and externalist orientation. Suh et al. (1998) found that while collectivists made judgements about their life satisfaction based on their emotional experience and social norms, individualists based their judgements based on their emotional experiences alone. In a similar vein, it can be argued that internalsists and externalists rely on different information sets while making judgements about OB with externalists making reference to the PDO or a state of balance which the society considers to be optimal, and the internalists referring to acts of balancing that provide satisfying occupational experiences while making judgements about OB. As shown in the vignettes, circumstances in which the individual does not have the mental capacity to determine a satisfactory OB or in individuals whose personal interpretation of PDO as self-satisfying differs from a healthful interpretation, positing PDO as a yardstick on which both the individual as well as others could make judgements about OB could be helpful to understand and resolve differences. For individuals who share space, time and meaning with loved ones in terms of

Therefore balance can be viewed as acts of balancing in order to attain and/or maintain a state of balance. In terms of OB, it is juggling occupations to create a PDO that reflects a satisfactory state of balance in daily occupations. Therefore it is proposed that OB models should incorporate both conceptualizations of balance, as a state as well as an act with personal orientation acting as a link between the conceptualizations. Westhrop’s (2003) three step process to achieve OB could be seen as one such pluristic model incorporating both the conceptualization of a state of balance and an act of balancing. Personal orientation could be utilized in the second step in the model to determine the set of occupations as it explains why an individual choose one occupation over another in their PDO for a satisfying OB. For externalist balancers, this balanced PDO reflect societal norms, who tend to view OB as a state of balance and compare their PDO with those of the healthy members of the society while making judgements about OB. Therefore, experiential model of OB and Wilcock’s (1999) model could be of significance to externalist balancers in creating their PDO for OB. However, these models need to be validated in local cultures. The balanced PDO for internalist balancers, on the