Work commitment across cultures Ron Fischer Psyc338

Overview Components of commitment Culture and commitment – Theoretical approaches Research on affective commitment Different foci of commitment

Components of commitment to the organization Continuance commitment –Side-bet theory (Becker) Affective commitment –Identification and affective involvement –Porter, Mowday, Steers Normative commitment –Normative pressures and socialization –Allen & Meyer

Affective Commitment and Culture Japan versus the West (US) –Cole (1979); Lincoln & Kalleberg (1985, 1990); Near (1989); Luthans et al. (1985) Lower attitudinal commitment but higher behavioural commitment

Commitment and culture (cont’) Application of cultural values (e.g., Hofstede, 1980): e.g., Randall (1993); Cohen (2003) Individualism-Collectivism –Affective ties Power Distance –Decentralisation effects Uncertainty Avoidance –Reduction of uncertainty Masculinity-Femininity –Nurturance versus Assertiveness

Alternative explanations Besser (1993): Neglect of political, economic and social context Response sets (see Smith, 2004)

Goal of study Explaining affective commitment levels –Artefact (measurement, response sets) –Industry, job and employee characteristics –Economic indicators –Cultural indicators Relationship to turnover intentions –Relationship to behaviour (intentions)

Meta-analysis Literature search (PsycINFO from 1990 to 2004, published meta-analyses & reviews, reference lists) Effect sizes: –Means standardized to common metric (0 < x < 1) –Mean X = Σ x j /n –SE m = sd x / ٧ n After deleting 12 outliers: 352 samples with 105,335 employees, 49 countries Mean: X =.6542; se = Heterogeneity: Q = , df = 351, p <.001

Explaining mean levels Measurement and artefacts –Commitment scale used, number of items, number of response options, response sets [Smith, 2004; Smith et al., 2002] Industry, employee and job –Industry post-hoc coding scheme, 12 dummies comparing particular clusters of industries and jobs with representative samples –Blue and white collar, mean age, mean tenure Economic –GNI per Capita; GDP per Capita growth (World Bank, 2004) Culture (Hofstede, 2001)

Analysis strategy Mixed effects model (level 1: random effect sizes; level 2: fixed study effects) Allows generalization of results beyond the particular studies involved in the present study Variance-known random coefficient regression model using HLM2 (Raudenbush et al., 2002; Raudenbush & Bryk, 2002)

Power distance Uncertainty Avoidance Masculinity Individualism-Collectivism.0005†.0003 GNIpC * GDPGpC *.0027 No unexplained Variance left: χ 2 (319) = , n.s.

Other commitment forms? Abrams et al. (1998): normative pressures versus identification

What are we committed to??? The importance of foci of commitment Organization Work team Supervisors Family and important groups (clan, religion, etc.) Occupation Union

Discussion Controlling for response sets, measurement artefacts, industry, job and employee characteristics: Commitment higher in poorer economies with slow (negative) economic growth –Availability of job alternatives is crucial National culture less important –Commitment higher in individualistic cultures –Commitment-turnover intention relationship stronger in individualistic cultures –In collectivist cultures: affective commitment (identification) less important, normative factors might be more important

Practical Implications Organizational interventions more important in richer countries and when economic growth is high Economic incentives as a way of inducing higher commitment Identification with organization is linked to intention to stay, especially in individualistic cultures Other forms of commitment might be important in collectivistic cultures (normative commitment, commitment to supervisor or work team)

Theoretical Implications Affective commitment and Identification with organization is tied to the economic situation Relationship between affective and continuance commitment (Meyer et al., 2002: r =.02 vs.13) Affective ties weaker in more collectivistic cultures: –Conceptualisation of commitment culturally appropriate? –Different commitment foci? –Normative pressures (but not identification)? –Exploitation of employees in more collectivistic cultures?