Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Fanning The Embers Of Discrimination At Work: Does Reward Structure Fuel Incivility?, Sam Allen

University Honors Theses

In recent years, there has been an uptick in public awareness of systemic and structural inequities within the workplace. Organizational reward structures (i.e., performance-based and seniority-based) act as incentives for employees' contributions toward organizational goals, but could also motivate employees' drive for gaining or maintaining social status by undermining other employees, particularly targeting people with minority status. The proposed research will study the relationship between reward structures and the perpetration of incivility by accounting for perpetrators' social dominance orientation (SDO), their motivations to protect the status quo (MPSQ), and the presence of minority race targets. We draw from SDO, status …

Examining Alignment Of Leadership Education And Observed Practices: A Study Of Leadership Studies Department Chairs, Sara Zare

Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative study examined how leadership studies academic department chairs’ leadership is influenced by their discipline and their professional identities as leadership educators. This study is an exploration of the alignment between leadership theories and practice. Two conceptual frameworks informed this study: (a) the leadership educator professional identity development (LEPID) model (Seemiller & Priest, 2015) and (b) the four frames model (Bolman & Deal, 2017). Using the LEPID model, this study investigated the intersection of leadership education professional identity dimensions and the leadership role of the leadership studies academic department chairs. Bolman and Deal’s (2017) four frames model was used …

Exploring Cultural Boundary Spanning Functions That Bridge Across National And Cultural Boundaries In Mncs, Tamara Downs

Theses and Dissertations

In multinational corporations (MNCs), cross-cultural interactions and collaboration are unavoidable. Cultural boundary spanning (CBS) is a behavior that has been shown to reduce conflict and ensure project success. It is a behavior that bridges internal and external organizational boundaries. This study examined if and how CBS functions (behaviors) change across national and cultural boundaries in MNCs. These boundaries were characterized by four demographic groups of people found within MNCs: (a) parent country nationals, (b) host country nationals, (c) third country nationals, and (d) parent country national expats. The findings of this research suggest that any of these demographic groups can …

Psychological Safety In Startup Organizations, Jessica Barhydt

Theses and Dissertations

Psychological safety is an individually held belief that a group is safe for interpersonal risk-taking. Scholars have studied the concept primarily as a team-level construct. However, recent studies suggest that climates of psychological safety exist at the organizational level. An examination of the dynamism of the construct at the organizational level is needed: how it grows, changes, and declines. Startups, which grow and change quickly, are an excellent context to study organizational psychological safety. Through interviews, this study explored psychological safety as an organizational-level construct in startup organizations. Specifically, it examined potential commonalities between high and low psychological safety as …

Clarifying And Measuring Inclusive Leadership, Kelly Mason Hamilton

Dissertations and Theses

Many organizations view diversity as a strategic business priority that provides important benefits such as increased creativity and innovation. Research indicates, however, that the potential benefits of diversity cannot be realized without employees feeling a sense of inclusion, which involves feeling like one belongs and can be themselves at work. Although scholars acknowledge the important role managers play in fostering inclusion, there remains limited research on specific behaviors they can enact to foster inclusion perceptions in their work groups. Additionally, there is a lack of agreement in the literature about the scope of "inclusive leadership." Historically, scholars viewed inclusive leadership …

Explaining The Nras Radical Transformation : The Role Of Identity And Strategy In Discursive Boundary Work And The Emergence Of Sub-Group Dominance, William A. Sisk

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This dissertation asks how a radical faction within the National Rifle Association (NRA) took over the organization and transformed it into such a dominant force in American politics. To address this question, the researcher conducted a historical discourse analysis of articles and letters in two prominent gun magazines – Guns & Ammo and Field & Stream – during a critical period of development from 1958 to 1978. The project integrates existing theoretical models based on identity (Castells 2004) and discourse coalitions (Dodge & Metze 2016; Hajer 1995) to understand the process by which coalitional boundaries get shaped and reshaped in …

The Relationship Between Social Isolation, Telecommuting Intensity Levels, Autonomy, And Job Satisfaction During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Kristy Williams

Dissertations

The COVID-19 pandemic forced workplaces to social distance, and millions of workers began telecommuting or working from home (Kniffin et al., 2021). Becker (2002) stated, “How well companies manage their human capital is a crucial factor in their success (p. 8).” The pandemic has profoundly affected human capital (Ballotpedia, 2021; Collings et al., 2021; Jesuthasan et al., 2020; Kniffin et al., 2021). This study examined the relationship between social isolation, telecommuting intensity levels, autonomy, and job satisfaction during the COVID-19 pandemic. The researcher attempted to answer the research question and objectives by conducting a quantitative correlation study using a survey …

Social Identities At Work : How Do Multiple Social Identities Influence Organizational Attraction?, Aileen Dowden

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Social Identity Theory posits that people hold a social identity from which they derive meaning to groups and organizations they join. That individuals use group affiliation to serve social identity concerns is a hallmark of social identity theory. In these studies, two social identity concerns were tested, social adjustment and value expression, to examine if people could hold both or neither concerns simultaneously (study 1) and how they influenced attraction to organizations (study 2). For study 1, archival data was analyzed using latent class analysis to extract groups of respondents for different levels of social identity concerns. Five classes were …

The Longitudinal Effects Of A Family And Sleep Supportive Intervention On Service Member Anger And Resilience, Shalene Joyce Allen

Dissertations and Theses

The vast majority of workplace intervention research on employee anger and resilience primarily focuses on individual-level strategies for mitigating employee anger and resilience outcomes in the workplace, with no studies having examined these outcomes with tangible occupational health interventions utilizing organizational-level techniques. Thus, the current study extends the literature on how to provide improvements in employee anger and resilience using higher system and organizational change mechanisms by providing evidence-based support for the effectiveness of a Total Worker Health® intervention, referred to as the Family and Sleep Supportive Intervention Training (FaSST). This approach employs both health protection and health promotion strategies …

Employee Perceptions Related To Specific Work Processes Within The Crime Control Model Known As The Stratified Model, Robert William Steinkraus

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to measure employee perceptions of satisfaction as they relate to specific work processes and products within the Stratified Model. The Stratified Model is a crime-reduction model that was developed and gradually implemented first within the Port St. Lucie Police Department between 2004-2011. The full implementation of this crime-reduction model occurred in 2012. The Port St. Lucie Police department has since achieved greater reductions of the overall crime rate than other cities in Florida consisting of similar populations. In 2019, Port St. Lucie had the 7th largest population in Florida.

Currently, it is unknown how …

Organizational Dissonance In The Context Of Organizational Decline And Turnaround Of A Security Printer: A Quantitative Case Study, Tina Marie Ramirez-Dominguez

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this non-experimental, quantitative study was to examine organizational identity dissonance experienced by an organization's social actors in the context of organizational decline and turnaround utilizing factor structures from five years of pre-existing, employee surveys to determine whether differences in factor scores occurred over the 5-year time frame. Organizational identity dissonance is the psychological stress or discomfort experienced by an organization's social actors from holding two or more contradictory attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors (McLead, 2008) in relation to the organization's identity. A social actor is an individual participating in a communal environment (Whetten & Mackey, 2002). A communal …

How Leaders And Employees Experience, Make Sense Of, And Find Meaning In Humility, David Perryman

Theses & Dissertations

By just about any measure, organizations today are more dynamic, diverse, and interdependent than at any other time in history. This environment puts unprecedented pressure on the human capacity to lead. And still, we demand more from our leaders—even as employees experience rising stress levels, declining loyalty, and deteriorating trust in their employers, and organizations face historically high rates of employee turnover along with the resulting financial and emotional costs. Clinging to romanticized notions of the larger-than-life leader blinds us to the paradoxical promise of humility; namely, that a leader’s greatest strength may lie, ironically, in the ability …

Organizational Risk In Multi-Sector Health Partnerships: A Case Study Of Oregon's Accountable Health Communities, Shauna Jean Nicole Petchel

Dissertations and Theses

The literature on collective action has documented that the perception of organizational risk -- both the uncertainty of potential outcomes and the meaning attached to them -- is an important factor in whether and how organizations engage in cross-sector collaborations. Yet there are few examples to date that document how health and social service leaders perceive organizational risks in cross-sector health partnerships focused on social determinants of health, or how their perceptions influence organizational commitment and willingness to engage in these partnerships over time.

This research aimed to fill this gap through a mixed methods case study of health and …

Religion, Spirituality, And The Workplace: A Meta-Analytic Study On Outcomes Of Job Satisfaction, Job Performance, And Organizational Citizenship Behaviors, Juan Balcazar

Dissertations

Research indicates behavioral and attitudinal manifestations of religion and spirituality exert cross-domain impact across cognitive, intrapersonal, biological, industrial-organizational, and behavioral domains (Calman, 2008; Ngunjiri & Miller, 2004). The present study conducted a meta-analysis of both religious and spirituality (RS) as predictors on outcomes of job satisfaction, job performance, and organizational citizenship behavior. The present study seeks to delineate and distinguish religious faiths from spirituality by comparing the pooled effect size of religion studies with spirituality studies. A random effects model was analyzed for two subgroups on each dependent variable. Next, a subgroup fixed effects (plural) model was utilized to detect …

Rising Above The Adobe Ceiling: A Hermeneutic Phenomenological Study Of Mentoring And Social Capital Influences Among California Latina Nonprofit Leaders, Belinda Hernandez

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

Empirical research studies that focus on the experiences of Latinas in executive leadership are limited. In its entirety, workforce research has overlooked how social and cultural experiences influence this group’s leadership development. This gap in research has failed to uplift the Latina executive voice and their achievements. Addressing this gap has the potential to influence distinctive workforce practices and future scholarship. Utilizing an asset-based perspective, this study presents counter narratives that intentionally focus on exploring Latina leaders’ voices. The importance of intersectional experience and social identities illustrate non-monolithic, yet aligned, experiences among study participants.

This foundational dissertation explored mentoring phenomena …

Innovation Within Regulations: Gaining Insight On Cultivating Employee-Led Innovation In California Public-Sector Organizations, Rebecca N. Franklin

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

The inquiry concerned gaining insights into environmental elements needed within California public-sector organizations to increase employees’ willingness to share innovative ideas. Although research exists regarding the need for service innovation and employees as fruitful sources of innovative ideas, there have been limited studies concerning public-sector organizations and the best method to solicit employee ideas. The data collection for this qualitative research study consisted of a series of interviews with front-line, non-supervisory civil servants. The results provide insights and information on how public-sector organizations may foster a culture that promotes and encourages employee-led innovation. The themes that emerged were (a) transparency …

Picture The Magic: Exploring Black Girl Identity Using Photovoice, Leha Anaya Hawkins

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

Using a youth-led participatory action inquiry and photovoice methodology, this study investigated the self-perceptions of Black girls in a suburban area of Northern California. The objective of the project was to explore the perspectives and lives of Black girls. It is through gained insight from their lived experiences that we can come to understand their needs and develop approaches to advance their own holistic empowerment. By gathering self-perceptions of Black girls using photovoice, the project aimed to inform youth workers, educators, and youth-serving organizations such as Magic Black Girls Leadership Institute (MBG) on how to meet the needs and cultivate …

African American Female Law Enforcement Officers' Lived Experiences And Mentoring: A Thematic Narrative, Harold Wilson

Doctoral Dissertations

Black female officers are an underrepresented sub-group of the law-enforcement profession. The bulk of research on women’s policing has focused on the growth of women in law enforcement, barriers, sexual harassment, gender differences, why women are deterred from law enforcement, physical limitations, and instruments used during the recruitment process, and the stress endured after entry into the profession. When looking at Black female officers’ lived experience and perceptions around mentoring; research is lacking. Eight Black female officers from the San Francisco Bay Area participated in this study. Findings revealed that all of the women have faced a recurring sense of …

The Effect Of Self-Esteem, Bullying, And Harassment On Nurse Turnover Intention, Joyce Richelle Arand

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Currently there is a high rate of registered nurse (RN) turnover due in part to bullying and harassment among peers; which fosters lower quality nursing care, jeopardizes patient safety, and increases healthcare costs. The purpose of this quantitative nonexperimental study was to examine the relationship between inpatient nurses' individual self-esteem and reported bullying and harassment with their intent to leave their job. Two theories were used to provide structure to this work: cognitive experimental self theory and oppressed group theory. Data were collected using the Negative Acts Questionnaire, the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, and the Turnover Intentions Measure. All RNs in …

Dialogue During Team Problem Solving Using Visual Representation Boundary Objects: A Case Study, Julie Marie Webb

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

Organizations benefit from the knowledge held by individual members as well as knowledge that is shared among those members. In order for knowledge to co-develop between members, and to spread, organizations must provide opportunities for members to collaborate. Organizational teams sometimes require assistance with interpersonal communication, establishing consensus, and sharing knowledge when collaborating. Group facilitators can offer guidance and intervene when teams need support. In addition, teams can find support through the use of visual representation boundary objects (VRBOs) to build trust, improve communication, increase cooperation, and share ideas. This study explores how knowledge is shared between team members and …

How Much Weight Do Organizational Personality Inferences Have On Judgments Of Organizations?, Levi Sassaman

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Organizational personality inferences are the human-like attributes individuals ascribe to organizations. Extant research has shown that individuals can reliably distinguish organizations on these traits, and that these inferences can influence individuals’ judgments of organizations. Theory of Symbolic Attraction (TSA) posits that the importance given to an organizational personality trait when forming judgments depends on the type of person. Utilizing a full-factorial policy capturing design, this study (1) investigated how much weight individuals give to each personality factor when forming judgments of organizations, and (2) tested TSA propositions that individual social identity concerns moderate the weight given. Results show that organizational …

Near Miss Reporting: Perspectives On Worker Conversance Of Incident Events Across Two Industries, Julia Mcgee

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

The practice of reporting workplace incident events is adopted as best practice by organizations and complies with Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) mandates. Reporting the near miss incident type in which no injury or damage to equipment or the environment occurs is buttressed by the assumption that both the worker and the organization ascribe to the same goal to identify workplace hazards and prevent incident recurrence. The goal of incident reporting is not apparent, and the path to achieving the goal is obstructed by internal and external hazards that act to oppose the reporting process, such that the goals …

A Systematic Comparison Of Functional Assessment Outcomes In Organizational Behavior Management, Nathan T. Bechtel

Dissertations

The primary purpose of this study was to compare the recommendation outcomes of two commonly utilized functional assessment tools in the field of Organizational Behavior Management (OBM): the Performance Diagnostic Checklist (PDC) and the Performance Flowchart. Recommendations made using these tools fell into one of three categories: antecedent-based, consequence-based, and uncategorized interventions. In order to assess the recommendations resulting from each of these tools, participants were trained to either (a) play the role of a manager with an organizational issue, or (b) play the role of a performance consultant. A between-groups design was utilized in which performance consultants used either …

Quantifying And Qualifying The Links That Bind, Jared Dirghalli

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Employees’ links to organizations and coworkers represent an important factor related to many work-related constructs in the Industrial-Organizational (I-O) Psychology literature. Often, I-O researchers conceptualize these employee links through either the number of workplace links or an employee’s perceived social support. However, these conceptualizations are potentially limited. Research into Social Network Analysis has investigated different quality dimensions in links (e.g., link strength and valence) which can significantly influence outcomes in social, workplace, and general well-being contexts. Thus, the present thesis project was undertaken to explore whether incorporating these quality dimensions of link strength and link valence adds any incremental utility …

An Investigation Into Full Range Leadership And Leadership Development Methods In Public Parks And Recreation Organizations In California, Heather Vilhauer

Doctoral Dissertations

As current public parks and recreation organizational leaders age and retire, it will become important for qualified professionals to be prepared to fill these positions. A study by Hurd and McLean (2004) examined the perceived competencies of CEOs in public park and recreation organizations. Leadership and management were rated as the most important competencies for CEOs. However, these perceived competencies are not only for the CEOs; all professionals employed in parks and recreation, from administrative leaders to direct service providers, must demonstrate leadership to succeed in their positions (Russell, 2005). Thus, it is crucial for parks and recreation organizations to …

Assessing Training Impact: Exploring Perspectives On Leadership Training In Healthcare Through A Multi-Frame Lens, Nekeisha G. Bascombe

Department of Conflict Resolution Studies Theses and Dissertations

A major concern for most leadership development teams is aligning training and development goals to desired outcomes, especially when looking at overall costs to plan and implement effective training programs. Leadership training in healthcare is increasing due to the complexity of duties and the need to deal with conflicting situations on a regular basis. This study explored whether goals and assessment instruments identified and applied by program development managers were adequate to reflect a multi-frame perspective, and whether participant feedback articulates benefits encompassing multiple frames. Four main questions were used in the study: “What potential benefits do leadership development staff …

An Exploratory Study Of Mexican American Perceptions Of The American Automobile Association, Manon Prevost-Mullane

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this study was to better understand the needs of the Mexican American community in relation to the services offered and what their perception was of the American Automobile Association (AAA). At the time of the study, the AAA membership rate for the Hispanic/Latino community was 5% (American Automobile Association, 2014) while this same population in the United States was approximately 17.8% (U.S. Census Bureau, 2016). White/Caucasian members in the AAA accounted for 87% of total memberships yet was estimated at 77% of the U.S. population. With a steady population growth of the Latino community, the AAA seeks …

The Influence Of Leader Behaviors And Individual Cultural Values On Interpersonal And Informational Justice Perceptions, David Swiderski

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Leadership and culture are two constructs often studied along with organizational justice, however; much of the past research has focused on measuring these constructs broadly. By measuring these constructs at a more granular level, this study aims to explore the specific linkages between clarifying, supporting, and recognizing leader behaviors and their relationship with interpersonal and informational justice. Results from this study go beyond broader leadership theories by finding that clarifying, supporting, and recognizing leader behaviors are important for predicting interpersonal justice perceptions. In addition, clarifying and supporting leader behaviors were also important predictors of informational justice perceptions. No significant moderating …

Examining The Impact Of Selection Practices On Subsequent Employee Engagement, Sofia N. Rodriguez

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Employee engagement is often defined as the vigor, dedication, and absorption one feels about and/or displays within their job. It has long been asserted that engagement is highest for employees who “fit” better with their work. Applicants determine their anticipated levels of fit throughout the selection process. Therefore, it is crucial that the information organizations provide will allow applicants to make accurate assumptions of fit to increase the probability that the vacancy will be filled by an applicant best suited for the position. This study was designed to identify if the practices used during organizations’ selection processes influence the accuracy …

Assessing Factors Influencing Employees' Voice Behavior In Organizations, Nikita Agnihotri

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The purpose of the present study was threefold: (1) to investigate the relationship between organizational based self- esteem and voice behavior, (2) to examine whether or not organizational identification interacts with organizational based self-esteem in significantly predicting voice behavior, and (3) to test another moderation effect, interaction of perceived organizational support and organizational based self-esteem in predicting voice behavior. Based on data from 482 undergraduate students, results suggested organization based self-esteem is strongly positively related to voice behavior. Additionally, the interaction of organization based self-esteem with both perceived organizational support and organizational identification in predicting voice behavior was not significant. …