{"title":"Facilitating Unlearning: The Paradoxical Roles of Developmental Job Experience and Psychological Safety in Early-Career Employees","authors":"Satoshi Tanaka, Megumi Ikeda","doi":"10.1111/ijtd.70021","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div>\n \n <p>Building on transformative learning theory, this study develops and tests a moderated mediation model to explain how developmental job experience fosters unlearning among early-career employees, while also illuminating the paradoxical role of psychological safety. Using two-wave survey data from 1382 young Japanese employees, hierarchical regression and moderated mediation analyses revealed that developmental job experiences directly and indirectly promote unlearning through the mediating effect of critical reflection. Paradoxically, while higher psychological safety encourages employees to undertake challenging tasks, which strengthens the positive influence of developmental job experience, it also weakens the link between developmental job experience and critical reflection by reducing the tension necessary for in-depth self-examination. These findings advance the literature on unlearning by elucidating the complex interplay between individual developmental experiences and the dynamics of organizational culture. From a practical perspective, human resource development professionals should strategically balance psychological safety and constructive tension to optimize adaptive learning and agility among younger employees.</p>\n </div>","PeriodicalId":46817,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Training and Development","volume":"30 3","pages":"258-269"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6000,"publicationDate":"2026-08-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"International Journal of Training and Development","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ijtd.70021","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"2026/1/7 0:00:00","PubModel":"Epub","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"MANAGEMENT","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Building on transformative learning theory, this study develops and tests a moderated mediation model to explain how developmental job experience fosters unlearning among early-career employees, while also illuminating the paradoxical role of psychological safety. Using two-wave survey data from 1382 young Japanese employees, hierarchical regression and moderated mediation analyses revealed that developmental job experiences directly and indirectly promote unlearning through the mediating effect of critical reflection. Paradoxically, while higher psychological safety encourages employees to undertake challenging tasks, which strengthens the positive influence of developmental job experience, it also weakens the link between developmental job experience and critical reflection by reducing the tension necessary for in-depth self-examination. These findings advance the literature on unlearning by elucidating the complex interplay between individual developmental experiences and the dynamics of organizational culture. From a practical perspective, human resource development professionals should strategically balance psychological safety and constructive tension to optimize adaptive learning and agility among younger employees.
期刊介绍：
Increasing international competition has led governments and corporations to focus on ways of improving national and corporate economic performance. The effective use of human resources is seen as a prerequisite, and the training and development of employees as paramount. The growth of training and development as an academic subject reflects its growth in practice. The International Journal of Training and Development is an international forum for the reporting of high-quality, original, empirical research. Multidisciplinary, international and comparative, the journal publishes research which ranges from the theoretical, conceptual and methodological to more policy-oriented types of work. The scope of the Journal is training and development, broadly defined. This includes: The determinants of training specifying and testing the explanatory variables which may be related to training identifying and analysing specific factors which give rise to a need for training and development as well as the processes by which those needs become defined, for example, training needs analysis the need for performance improvement the training and development implications of various performance improvement techniques, such as appraisal and assessment the analysis of competence Training and development practice the design, development and delivery of training the learning and development process itself competency-based approaches evaluation: the relationship between training and individual, corporate and macroeconomic performance Policy and strategy organisational aspects of training and development public policy issues questions of infrastructure issues relating to the training and development profession The Journal’s scope encompasses both corporate and public policy analysis. International and comparative work is particularly welcome, as is research which embraces emerging issues and developments.
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