Organizational Behavior and Theory Commons^™

The Effects Of Covid 19 Job Demands On Public Sector Employees’ Organizational Commitment: The Mediating Roles Of Work Engagement And Job Burnout, And The Moderating Role Of Supervisor Support, Benjamin R. Kaufman

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

United States citizens rely on state government employees to provide essential public services. During the COVID-19 pandemic, these employees responded by administering both routine and novel procedures to protect public health, often placing them on the frontlines and at increased risk of contagion. Concurrently, the pandemic-driven economic downturn created budget shortfalls that threatened the job and financial security of the state workforce. Together, these conditions substantially increased job demands for state government employees.

Guided by the Job Demands–Resources (JDR) Model, this study examined how COVID‑19-related job demands influenced state employees’ work engagement, job burnout, and organizational commitment, and whether supervisor …

Does Job Satisfaction Take A Hit? The Relationships Between Employee Cannabis Use, Job Satisfaction, And Absenteeism, Caroline Jordan Moughan

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Despite the frequency of cannabis use, limited research has examined how employees’ cannabis use relates to job attitudes and behaviors. This study responds to calls to examine the effects of employee cannabis use on work-relevant outcomes by exploring how employee cannabis use relates to job satisfaction and voluntary absenteeism by analyzing a sample of 526 employed young adults from the most recent three waves of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) Child and Young Adult Cohort. Through estimating cross-lagged panel models, this study clarifies the direction of relationships between employee cannabis use and job satisfaction, and how these relate …

Building Trust Through Allyship: Moderating Roles Of Motivation And Perspective, John Michael Savage

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Previous research has indicated demographic differences between employees may influence relational development. To address this concern the current study examined the interpersonal influence that racial allyship has on trustworthiness. The first hypothesis was formed using social exchange theory to predict that allyship behaviors would increase perceptions of trustworthiness. Additionally, relational signaling theory was integrated to inform the second hypothesis, which predicted that self-interest motivations would attenuate the relationship between allyship and trustworthiness. To account for differences in perspective the third hypothesis predicted that race would moderate the conditional effect of self-interest motivation. Employees were recruited online to complete a questionnaire …

First-Generation College Students And Sense Of Belonging At School: The Moderating Effect Of Remote Learning, Christina Su Ju

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

This study examines the effect of first-generation college student status on students’ sense of belonging, and whether remote learning moderates this effect. Specifically, this study examines whether first-generation college students’ sense of belonging at university differs from their continuing-generation college student counterpart, and whether taking remote courses impacts that relationship. It was hypothesized that first-generation college students would report lower sense of belonging than continuing-generation college students, and that remote learning would moderate the relationship such that the negative effect of first-generation student status on sense of belonging is strengthened when the student takes more remote courses. Survey data from …

The Effects Of Covid-19 Stressors And Supervisor Support On Emotional Exhaustion And Work Engagement, Meiqiao Gu

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, working conditions have worsened, subjecting employees to numerous stressors. Analyzing the impact of COVID-19 stressors on employees‘ well-being and work motivation is crucial. The job demands-resources model (JD-R; Demerouti et al., 2001a) provides a framework for evaluating how COVID-19 stressors affect employees‘ well-being and motivation in the workplace. Given the complexity of job characteristics during the COVID-19 pandemic, coupled with challenges in obtaining adequate support from supervisors who are also facing considerable work pressure, this study examines the continued relevance of the JD-R model in this evolving work environment. Specifically, four hypotheses were …

Third-Party Reactions To Performance Feedback, Daroon Mohammed Jalil

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Although the provision of feedback has traditionally been treated as a dyadic event, I argue for the existence of a neglected third-party - the witness. Drawing from the dual process model of vicarious mistreatment and feedback intervention theory, I hypothesize that 1) third parties experience negative [positive] affect when witnessing an unjust [just] feedback event, 2) negative [positive] affect is stronger when feedback cues are self-referenced [task-referenced], and 3) negative [positive] affect is related to a subsequent decrease [increase] in feedback seeking intentions. Results from a 2x2 between-subjects experiment with 470 participants provide partial support for the hypotheses. Third-parties experienced …

Dealing With The Effects Of Covid-19 Job Demands On Public Sector Employees’ Work Engagement And Job Burnout: The Role Of Public Service Motivation, Servant Leadership, And Mission Valence, Phillip Joseph Dillulio

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

The global recession stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on the public sector of the U.S. economy. Specifically, reduced tax revenues from a dramatic decline in economic activity and increased demand for public services resulted in new and increased job demands for public sector employees (Eggers et al., 2020). However, limited research has examined the effects of COVID-19-related demands on job burnout and work engagement among public sector employees, and the role of personal, social, and organizational resources to protect their well-being (Demerouti & Bakker, 2023). The current study addressed this gap by employing the Job Demands …

Towards A Formal Theory Of Humor In Organizations, Richard Joseph Hayes

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Current theories and models of humor conceptualize humor at the individual, dyadic, and organizational level. These theories laid the foundation for research and empirical findings that have established humor’s impact in the workplace. Yet, because these theories are not integrated, they individually do not offer a comprehensive view of humor in the workplace across different levels, hindering the development of multilevel research designs. Additionally, the ambiguity of these narrative theories hampers empirical testing precision. This dissertation expands the literature by introducing a mathematical, multilevel model of humor and tests that theory using computational simulation methods. Synthetic environments reproduced observed correlations …

What Is The Meaning In This? Teachers' Propensity To Search For Meaning In Life During Covid-19 And The Role Of Meaningful Work, Seterra D. Burleson

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

The global COVID-19 pandemic has presented notable challenges in teachers’ career paths. In the present study, Super’s life-span, life-space theory was applied to examine the interplay between K-12 teachers’ propensity to search for meaning in life and meaningfulness attributed to their work role (i.e., meaningful work) in predicting career-relevant outcomes in the face of challenging circumstances over the course of a semester. A model was proposed in which propensity to search for meaning in life led to better work and career outcomes, an effect moderated by meaningful work. Longitudinal data from a sample of 617 teachers over eight outcome measurement …

How Leader And Follower Mindfulness Relate To Performance And Ocb Through Conversation Quality And Empathy: A Moderated Mediation Model, Arianna White-Levatich

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Interest within the organizational research community regarding mindfulness has recently surged. Little research, however, has examined how employees’ mindfulness may influence interactions between leaders and followers. This study examined how followers’ trait mindfulness related to two specific aspects of dyadic interactions: leader – member conversational quality (LMCQ) and follower empathy toward a leader. Further, the study examined how this influence extended (via LMCQ and leader-oriented empathy) to task performance and organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), two important workplace outcomes for followers. Leader mindfulness was also expected to have a significant influence on the relationships, in that it was expected to strengthen …

A Leader, A Follower, And Some Humor Walk Into A Meta-Analysis: A Review Of Positive And Negative Leader Humor, Richard Hayes

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Although leader humor is a growing research topic, there are still unaddressed issues surrounding this topic. In particular, there is disagreement surrounding the conceptualizations of positive and negative leader humor, conflicting theoretical predictions and empirical findings on the effects of leader humor, a dearth of research on the antecedents and correlates of leader humor, as well as a lack of research on the boundary conditions of these relationships. This qualitative and quantitative review of the nomological networks of positive and negative leader humor addressed these issues based on a meta-analysis of 67 empirical studies (N = 21,121). Results indicate that …

The Effects Of Optimism, Transformational Leadership, And Work Engagement On Work Outcomes: A Moderated Mediation Model, Chad Kenneally

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Optimism serves as a powerful resource that can help employees accomplish tasks at work and overcome challenges. However, there are still psychological connections that need to be drawn to explain why optimism has these effects. The Job Demands-Resources Model and the general resource perspective have previously investigated resources in the workplace and the relationships they hold with different work outcomes. In this study, work engagement was investigated as a mediator between optimism and task performance, work withdrawal, and turnover intention. Transformational leadership was investigated as a moderator for the relationship between optimism and work engagement. Optimism was expected to have …

Helping Employees Help The Environment: An Intervention To Increase Environmental Organizational Citizenship Behaviors (Ocb-E) Via A Subtle Stimulus, Rebecca C. Garden

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Researchers’ understanding of the relationships between environmentally-oriented organizational citizenship behaviors (i.e., OCB-Es) and other workplace variables have improved since the turn of the century, but both our comprehension of the behaviors and the effectiveness of interventions targeting them require much more investigation. Further, there is very little research that examines the role of positive affect in promoting these behaviors, even though scholars have suggested that it may be the “silver bullet” (Kals & Müller, 2012) to facilitating employees’ voluntary environmental actions. To that end, the aim of the current research is to take an initial step towards understanding how organizations …

The Effects Of Rating Source, Rating Target, And Job Position On Ratings Of Perceived Training Needs, Phillip Joseph Dillulio

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Organizational investments in employee training and development have steadily increased over the past decade, with a recent estimate of $160 billion dollars annually. An important component of any training program is the subsequent training needs assessment (TNA), which provides critical information regarding who and what needs trained. Unfortunately, TNA research is severely limited compared to other aspects of the training process. The primary aim of the current study was to examine two important variables that can potentially influence TNA ratings beyond an actual need for training, the source and target of TNA ratings. Based on the assumptions of attribution theory, …

Grateful Beneficiaries And Proud Benefactors: A Moderated Mediation Model Relating Supervisors' Gratitude Expression To Employees' Organizational Citizenship Behavior, William Peter Jimenez

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Few organizational researchers have considered examining gratitude or pride—much less both simultaneously. In the present study, two complementary emotion theories (i.e., affective events theory and broaden-and-build theory) are integrated in an examination of the prosocial consequences of supervisors’ gratitude expression, employees’ authentic and hubristic pride experiences, and employees’ narcissism in a large construction company in China. Results from the analyses of the moderated mediation model pathways indicated that most of the proposed relationships were nonsignificant. Supervisors’ gratitude expression predicted employees’ organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) but did not predict employees’ authentic or hubristic pride. Employees’ hubristic pride—but not authentic pride—predicted employees’ …

Threat Or Challenge? Intensified Job Demands And The Moderating Effect Of Differentiated Transformational Leadership, Benjamin Bass

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Over the past 30 years, industrialized democracies have experienced major economic change due to globalization, economic instability, and rapid technological innovation. To remain viable, organizations maximize flexibility through strategies like downsizing, just-in-time inventory, and temporary labor. Consequently, employees face heightened responsibility, variable workloads, and rising job insecurity. While these demands are stressful, at times, some may represent an exciting challenge. Recently, researchers started studying how the long-term intensification of work affects employees via intensified job demands. This dissertation builds on their efforts by exploring short-term job demand intensification. Specifically, the transactional model of stress and the job demands-resources model were …

Supervisor And Subordinate Perceptions Of Leader-Member Exchange: Examining Idiosyncratic Deals And Work-Family Experiences In A Moderated Mediation Model, Michael L. Litano

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

The extant literature recognizes that subordinates in high-quality leader-member exchange (LMX) relationships experience the most favorable outcomes (Dulebohn, Bommer, Liden, Brouer, & Ferris, 2012). In exchange for their unwavering commitment and superior job performance, high LMX subordinates benefit from greater access to valuable resources (e.g., communication, support, and negotiating latitude; Gerstner & Day, 1997), which can then be used to combat job demands and facilitate accomplishment of the subordinates’ salient goals (Agarwal, Datta, Blake-Beard, & Bhargava, 2012; Hobfoll, 2001). Meta-analytic evidence suggests that LMX also has critical implications for work-family outcomes (Litano, Major, Streets, Landers, & Bass, 2016), however, the …

An Evaluation Of Game Fiction-Enhanced Training: Using Narrative To Improve Trainee Reactions And Learning, Michael Beaumont Armstrong

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Gamification is growing in popularity in instructional contexts like education and workplace training, but it is unclear which game elements are specifically conducive to improve learning outcomes. Narratives, which represent one way the game element “game fiction” is commonly implemented, have been used to improve learning outcomes over expository texts in the context of psycholinguistics, whereas the Technology-Enhanced Training Effectiveness Model (TETEM) proposes that certain individual differences impact the relationships between technology-enhanced training and learning outcomes. From this theoretical basis, this study gamified a training session with game fiction in order to improve reactions to training and learning over the …

Employee Behavioral Intention And Technology Use: Mediating Processes And Individual Difference Moderators, Robert Conrad Brusso

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Considering the substantial amount of time and organizational resources that are involved in the development and implementation of end-user technology (e.g., communication software platforms, social networking sites) within organizations, it is imperative to understand the factors that best predict use of end-user software. Although technology acceptance models, grounded in broader theories of behavior, do exist, these models fall-short in determining the most proximal antecedents of actual behavior. Currently, the majority of the research in the information technology arena posits behavioral intention as the most proximal antecedent of technology use. Behavioral intention does explain variance in use, but this relationship has …

Mutual Performance Monitoring In Virtual Teams, Nathan Haugejorde Bjornberg

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

The use of virtual teams in organizations has become commonplace (SHRM, 2012). While a great deal of research on teamwork exists, much of it has focused on collocated teams. Spatial and temporal separations inherent in virtual teams make working together as a team more difficult. This research examined a teamwork process previously unexplored within virtual teams -- mutual performance monitoring. An experimental intervention was conducted and outcomes at both the individual and team levels of analysis were examined. A total of 161 participants were assigned to work together in 47 teams on a decision-making task. Participants communicated and worked together …

Coping With Customer Sexual Harassment: Examining Retaliation As A Coping Strategy And Testing A Contextual Model, Valerie J. Morganson

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Research has established that customer sexual harassment (CSH) is a widespread and harmful workplace phenomenon. This dissertation consists of two studies on the topic. The first sought to operationalize a measure of coping with customer sexual harassment. In addition to three traditional factors of sexual harassment coping (i.e., external, internal, and social), Study 1 predicted that worker retaliation toward the customer would constitute an additional form of coping with CSH. The measure of coping was tested using a sample of 200 women customer service workers. Data were analyzed using factor analysis. As expected, retaliation was supported as a coping strategy, …

Individuals And Contex00tual Factors: An Interactionist Approach To Understanding Self-Development, Gregory Paul Letller

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

While the extant research has identified several individual and contextual factors influential on an employee's quantity of self-development participation, no prior research has examined potential multiplicative effects among these factors. The current study investigated person-situation interactions among five individual factors ( e.g., self-efficacy for self-development, learning goal orientation, and openness to experience) and the contextual factors of organizational and supervisor support ( combined to reflect overall work support). This study also sought to investigate the influence of proactive personality on self-development participation, a promising individual difference that has received little attention in the self-development literature. Using data collected from 136 …

Effect Of Household Structure On Family-Friendly Benefit Utilization: Implications For Organizational Attraction And Workplace Withdrawal Behaviors Of Federal Government Employees, Sharyn J. Aufenanger

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

This study examined the effect of household structure on utilization of family-friendly benefits in organizations, as well as the impact that family-friendly benefit utilization has on organizational attraction and workplace withdrawal behaviors among Federal government employees with children. Results showed that alternative work arrangements (e.g., compressed and flexible schedules) were popular among all employees who have children. Family-friendly benefit utilization rates were highest among single parent employees and lowest among traditional family employees. Single parent employees were more likely to use flexible schedules, part-time, compressed schedules, telework, and sick and annual leave. Dual income employees were more likely to use …

Teamwork In Chinese Organizations: A New Concept And Framework, Ying Liu

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Teamwork has always been a challenge in China, and the importance of teamwork has not been well recognized. This study was designed to explore the underlying definition of teamwork that Chinese people use to describe their teams, to identify variables related to teamwork, to develop a new framework and measure of teamwork in Chinese organizations, and to test the psychometric properties of the measure as well as the structural relationships of the new framework of teamwork in Chinese teams. This study also examines the influence of guanxi---an important Chinese cultural value that emphasizes exchange and reciprocity in relationships---on teamwork in …

How The U.S. Military's Equal Opportunity Training Program Impacts Operational Readiness And Effectiveness: An Exploratory Study, James R. Camic

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

The Department of Defense is dedicated to creating an environment that recognizes individuals' diverse backgrounds. The Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute (DEOMI) was developed to train Equal Opportunity Advisors (EOAs), implement training programs at the unit level, and evaluate the Equal Opportunity Climate of the military. Many of the programs developed at DEOMI were developed with the belief that diversity appreciation and prejudice avoidance (DAPA) lead to combat readiness and operational effectiveness (CROE).

A qualitative, grounded theory approach was employed to help understand how DAP A is related to CROE. Interviews were conducted with retired EOAs in which they related …

The Effects Of Transformational And Transactional Leadership On Job Satisfaction Affective Commitment And Turnover Intentions Among Teleworkers, Janet L. Bryant

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

This study is among the first to examine the influence of leadership among teleworkers. Effects of transformational and transactional leadership on job satisfaction, affective commitment, and turnover intentions were examined in a secondary data analysis of 128 teleworkers. Hierarchical linear regression results support the influence of both forms of leadership on these outcomes, although an augmentation effect for transformational leadership was observed only for affective commitment and turnover intentions. Findings from moderated regression analyses indicate that the effect of transformational leadership degrades with increasing telework frequency. This study shows that leadership is important in telework arrangements, although the manner in …

The Effects Of Communication Modality On Teamwork Processes, Thomas D. Fletcher

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Since the onset of the digital age, organizations have been able to make use of teams of individuals distributed geographically to remain competitive. While strides have been made to understand the effectiveness of collocated teams, research has yet to sufficiently explore the effects of emerging technologies on team processes and effectiveness. A laboratory study, where dyads were asked to create a spreadsheet by following a set of explicit instructions (i.e., a psychomotor task), was conducted to manipulate the communication modalities most commonly used between collaborators (i.e., face-to-face vs. audio) and compare the effects of adding a shared workspace application. The …

Predicting Team Performance Over Time: A Secondary Data Analysis, Hope S. Hanner

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Teams occupy a strong presence in the modern workplace. However, few studies have tracked the evolution of team behavior over time. The use of cross-sectional team research fails to appreciate the stages that teams pass through as they evolve and mature. The present study had three goals in mind. The first goal was to arrive at a causal model of team performance via a secondary statistical analysis on the research conducted by Cunningham (2001) and Strobel (2001). Strobe1 and Cunningham tracked the performance of eleven student-learning teams over the course of a semester. A team training intervention was administered after …

Creating Inclusive Organizations: Its Meaning And Measurement, Bryan Christopher Hayes

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

There is growing interest in the concept of inclusion by both scientists and practitioners. The goal of the current study was to bring empirical support to the organizational inclusion literature. Inclusion was defined as a psychosocial need and a model was developed specifying its relationship to antecedent and consequence variables. The measurement model was explored with a sample of responses from 418 undergraduate students (Study 1). The measurement model was confirmed and the structural model was assessed with a sample of responses from 609 employees of a medical center (Study 2). Results of structural equation modeling provided limited support for …

Breastfeeding And The Supportive Workplace: Integration Of Women's Productive And Reproductive Lives, Rebekah A. Cardenas

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Although authorities advocate breastfeeding for at least six months as the ideal form of infant nutrition, employed mothers may experience barriers to breastfeeding. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, this study examined the relationship between maternal employment, workplace support, and breastfeeding duration. In general, it was predicted that paid employment following childbirth would have a negative impact on breastfeeding duration. In addition, existence of workplace support such as flexibility, childcare, and/or healthcare benefits was predicted to positively impact breastfeeding durations as well as job satisfaction upon returning to work. Hierarchical linear regression analysis offered support for some …