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Summary Previous research on the job demand–control–support (JDCS) model of occupational stress has generally been inconsistent at best regarding a key issue: the interaction of demands, control, and support in predicting employee health and well‐being. However, the model continues to be tested in a variety of studies and academic journals owing to its intuitive appeal. By incorporating conservation of resources theory with knowledge from the challenge–hindrance stressor framework, we proposed that hindrance stressors, not the challenge stressors commonly assessed when testing JDCS theory, will provide validation for the model. A two‐wave panel study of 228 employees in a variety of occupations provided support for three‐way interactions between hindrance demands, control, and support predicting job‐related anxiety and physical symptoms. Three‐way interactions using a challenge demand (forms of workload) were not significant, consistent with our propositions. In summary, this study supports the buffering effect of control and support on the relationship between job demands and strain only when job demands reflect hindrance stressors, thereby proposing to alter the JDCS model by specifying that it applies primarily to hindrance stressors in a job hindrance–control–support model. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

This meta-analysis investigates gender differences in mentor-and protégé-reported experience in mentorships as well as career and psychosocial benefits. There are no gender differences in experience as a protégé or protégé receipt of career development, but male protégés report receiving less psychosocial support than female protégés. Furthermore, males are more likely to serve as mentors than females and report giving more career development than female mentors. Conversely, female mentors report providing more psychosocial support than male mentors. In most cases, effect sizes are small and heterogeneous, providing important implications for future research.

Summary There are many ways to categorize work‐related stressors, and in recent years, a common distinction in occupational health psychology is between stressors viewed as challenges versus hindrances. Is this a useful conceptualization that provides practical and theoretical implications for IO psychologists? As Kurt Lewin famously prescribed, “there is nothing so practical as a good theory,” and we discuss the challenge–hindrance framework as a developing theory that can be useful for researchers and practitioners. We note that some of the early thinking and development of the challenge–hindrance distinction relied on both resource and appraisal theories of stress. Overall, we find that the challenge–hindrance distinction can be viewed as a framework that is useful by producing interesting, valuable, and innovative research. Simply striving to find meaningful and useful categorizations of stressors can lead us to discover new insights into the occupational stress domain, and the challenge–hindrance categories have already spurred a great deal of research.

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