European Journal of Social Sciences – Volume 21, Number 3 (2011)
The Effects of the Organizational Psychological Capital on the attitudes of Commitment and Satisfaction: A Public Sample in Turkey Fatih Çetin Defense Sciences Institute, Turkish Military Academy,Bakanlıklar,Ankara,Turkey E-mail:
[email protected] Tel: +90 312 4175190 Abstract Organizational psychological capital is employee’s psychological states beyond intellectual capital in obtaining and sustaining the competitive advantage. The purpose of this study was to explore the effects of hope, resilience, optimism and self efficacy sub dimensions of the psychological capital on the attitudes of organizational commitment and job satisfaction. The survey method was used with using a questionnaire including Organizational Psychological Capital Scale, Organizational Commitment Scale and Job Satisfaction Scale with demographic information. Data were collected from 213 employees working different units in ministries and connected institutions in Ankara. Confirmative factor analysis and structural equating modeling were employed with using Amos v.16.0. The results showed that organizational commitment has positive relationship between hope and optimism dimensions and job satisfaction has positive relationship between resilience, hope and optimism dimensions of the organizational psychological capital. Ultimately organizational psychological capital was found a significant predictor of the employee attitudes of organizational commitment and job satisfaction.
Keywords: Organizational Psychological Capital, Organizational Commitment, Job Satisfaction, Structural Equating Modeling
1. Introduction Nowadays the roles of the social capital that describes the interpersonal relations and organizational networking, and human capital that refers the knowledge, capabilities and experiences of the employees are getting important in the organizational field. Paralleled with these development another term as organizational psychological capital that is discussed in terms of valuing and evaluating the human resources is becoming subject of different researches (Wright, 2003; Luthans, 2002b; Nelson and Cooper, 2007; Luthans et al, 2006). This new approach explores the psychological capacities and strengths of the positively oriented human resource for improving the organizational and personal performance and achieving the organizational success (Turner et al, 2002). Organizational psychological capital may regarded as a strength that should be retain and manage in promoting the personal development and performance at personal level and in increasing the leverage, performance, income and competitive advantage at the organizational level (Luthans vd., 2007; Wright, 2003). The attitudes of employees as organizational commitment and job satisfaction are known to be leading to important consequences for the organization behaviors such as performance, turnover, absenteeism, burnout, productivity, and customer satisfaction (Judge et al, 2001; Saari and Judge, 2004; Wegge et al, 2007; Meyer and Becker, 2004; Meydan et al, in press). Committed and satisfied employees who identify with organizational goals and values may be seen as a human resource for 373
European Journal of Social Sciences – Volume 21, Number 3 (2011) improving the organizational performance and for achieving the organizational success in catching the competitive advantage. Form this point, because organizational commitment and job satisfaction attitudes have been relate to organizational performance, ultimately the components of organizational psychological capital may relate to these work attitudes. We suggest that employees who have high levels of self-efficacy, hope, optimism, and resiliency as components of organizational psychological capital may be more satisfied with their job and committed to their organization by the virtue of their cognitions, motivations and behaviors. This understanding may associate with the role of the core psychological states of organizational psychological capital in predicting employee’s desirable attitudes in improving organizational performance. Specifically, the aim of the present study is to explore the effects of the organizational psychological capital on the attitudes of commitment and satisfaction. This study is organized as follows: the terms of organizational psychological capital, organizational commitment and job satisfaction are examined based on the literature in the next titles. The proposed hypothesizes and the methodology is handled in the following title with the sample, instruments and findings of the research. Eventually the summary and the concluding remarks are touched briefly in the last part with the results, limitations and advices for the future studies.
2. Review of the Literature The term of organizational psychological capital is based on the theory of positive organizational behavior as Luthans (2002b) states “the study and application of positively oriented human resource strengths and psychological capacities that can be measured, developed, and effectively managed for performance improvement in today’s workplace.” 2.1. Organizational Psychological Capital Organizational psychological capital is interrelated construct with the terms of financial, social and human capital (Figure 1). But different from financial capital (i.e. what you have?), social capital (i.e. who you know?) and human capital (i.e. what you know?), psychological capital emphasizes on “who you are?” and “who you are becoming with regard to psychological development?” (Avolio ve Luthans, 2006; Luthans vd., 2004). Psychological capital is employee’s positive psychological states beyond intellectual capital in obtaining and sustaining the competitive advantage (Luthans et al, 2004). Employee’s psychological states are not like trait or characteristic showing continuity in every condition (self esteem, self discipline etc.) but positive status varying according to the situations. Organizational psychological capital is the whole of these positive attributes changing and improving with the education or development (Luthans ve Youssef, 2007). Thus psychological capital is becoming a positive improvable construct intended to enhance and redirect the organizational and personal performance. Luthans et al (2006) found that psychological capital may be developed with the short practices during group training. Figure 1: Expanding capital for competitive advantage (Luthans et al, 2004) Traditional economic capital
Human capital
Social capital
Positive psychological capital
What you have
What you know
Who you know
Who you are
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Finances Tangible assets
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Experience Education Skills Knowledge Ideas
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Relationships Network of contacts Friends
• • • •
Confidence Hope Optimism Resilience
European Journal of Social Sciences – Volume 21, Number 3 (2011) Organizational psychological capital consists of such integrated psychological states in the organizational context. Various studies have explored these psychological states in the literature for determining the features of the psychological capital as job dependency (Schaufeli ve Bakker, 2004), psychological health (Wright ve Cropanzano, 2004), psychological ownership (Avey vd., 2009), intelligence, courage and forgiveness (Luthans et al, 2007b). But core construct of the psychological capital may consist of psychological states as hope, resilience, optimism and self efficacy (Luthans, 2002a; Luthans ve Youssef, 2004; Luthans ve Youssef, 2007). Hope is a motivational state including one’s determination of precious objectives and belief of getting over the impediments to reach these objectives. Snyder (2000) indicates that hope is a positive state based on agency, pathways and goals. This positive state involves identifying personally valuable goals, generating multiple pathways to this goal and considering the resources required to pursue each pathway. Optimism is a purpose oriented state when a result has high value. Seligman (1998) defines the optimism as an attribution style that explains the positive and negative events in terms of person’s general viewpoints. Optimistic person explains the negative events as external, temporary and situation-specific but pessimistic person defines the negative events as internal, constant and general. Self efficacy is a belief or trust on one’s own capabilities for accomplishing the specific tasks (Bandura, 1997; Stajkovic ve Luthans, 1998). Self efficacy presents positive emotions and builds the person’s confidence to formulate and implement plans to attain goals (Bandura, 1997). Persons who have high self efficacy select compelling tasks in doing their job and pursue their belief even in the face of problems. Ultimately resilience is a person’s psychological capacity to rebound or bounce back from adversity, conflict, and failure (Luthans, 2002a). Resilience can be developed through asset-focused, risk-focused, and process-focused strategies that are relevant to the workplace (Masten, 2001). Bonanno (2005) confirms that state-like resilience can be developed through training. 2.2. Organizational Commitment Organizational commitment refers to an attitude that shows the relationship between employee and organization. Bateman and Strasser (1984) define organizational commitment as employee’s loyalty to the organization, eagerness to attempt on behalf of the organization, extent of goal and value relevance with the organization, and aspire to preserve membership. Mowday et al., (1982) defines the organizational commitment as the strength of an employee’s identification with, and involvement in, a certain organization. Meyer and Allen (1991) proposed three types of commitment; affective commitment, continuance commitment, and normative commitment. Affective commitment is defined as employee’s psychological attachment and involvement to the organization. Continuance commitment is associated with the costs relevant to leaving the organization as employee’s feelings to be dependent on the organization. Normative commitment, relatively new aspect of organizational commitment, is seen as perceived obligation to remain with the organization. Commitment can be identified as three very different types, however, in this study; we will be focus on commitment in general. 2.3. Job Satisfaction Job satisfaction indicates a collection of pleasing or positive emotional attitudes resulting from the appraisal of a job (Locke, 1976). It can be defined as a set of feelings and beliefs that a person has about his job (George & Jones, 1999). These attitudes may derive from an aspect of satisfaction or as an overall facet of the job. Luthans (1998) indicates three dimensions to job satisfaction: it is an emotional response, it is determined by how well outcome meet expectations, and it represents several related attitudes as work itself, pay, promotion opportunities, supervision and coworkers which are important characteristics of a job. The focus of our study is on employees’ general job satisfaction. 375
European Journal of Social Sciences – Volume 21, Number 3 (2011)
3. Research Hypothesizes The main objective of this study is to explore the effects of psychological states of hope, optimism, self efficacy and resilience which forming the construct of organizational psychological capital on the organizational commitment and job satisfaction attitudes of the employees. Larson and Luthans (2006) found positive relationship between production worker’s scores of general psychological capital and job satisfaction. Youssef and Luthans (2007) stated that employees display higher levels of hope, optimism and resilience were found to be more satisfied and committed. Luthans et al (2008) showed that employees’ general psychological capital construct is positively related to their performance, satisfaction, and commitment. Avey et al (2009) found strong and positive relationships between promotion-oriented psychological ownership and employee commitment, job satisfaction and intentions to stay with the organization. Paralleled with these findings we have developed following hypothesizes: Hypothesis 1: There will be a positive relationship between psychological states of hope, optimism, self efficacy, resilience and organizational commitment attitude of the employees. Hypothesis 2: There will be a positive relationship between psychological states of hope, optimism, self efficacy, resilience and job satisfaction attitude of the employees.
4. Methodology The survey method was used in this study with using a questionnaire including organizational psychological capital scale, organizational commitment scale and job satisfaction scale with demographic information. We analyzed the data with using structural equation modeling for testing hypothesizes. 4.1. Sample Data were collected with using convenience sampling method from 213 employees working different units in ministries and connected institutions in Ankara. The sample composed of 120 females (56,4%) and 93 males (43,6%). The employee sample was aged between 21-43 years old with a mean of 25,7. Educational status of the sample distributed as 17,3% primary education (37), 23,4% high school (50), 40% university (87), 16,9 % master (36) and 1,4% doctoral (3) degree. 4.2. Instruments Organizational Psychological Capital Scale: Luthans et al (2007) developed this scale and translated into Turkish by Çetin and Basım (in press) that includes 4 sub-dimensions: hope, optimism, self efficacy and resilience. Confirmative factor analysis was conducted to determine the validity of the scale and the results support an acceptable fit for the 4 factor structure (X2/df=2,29, RMSEA=0,051, CFI=0,90). The Cronbach’s Alpha coefficients for the scale was calculated 0,71 for the hope, 0,74 for the resilience, 0,82 for the optimism, and 0,77 for the self efficacy sub-dimensions. Organizational Commitment Scale: This scale was introduced by Jaworski and Kohli (1993) and translated into Turkish by Şeşen (2010). It measures employee’s general commitment attitudes towards the organization with one factor structure. Confirmative factor analysis confirmed the fit of the one factor (X2/df=2,01, RMSEA=0,043, CFI=0,95) for the validity. The Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient was calculated as 0,75 for the reliability. Job Satisfaction Scale: Hackman ve Oldham (1975) developed this scale and Şeşen (2010) translated it in Turkish. It rates employee’s overall job satisfaction attitudes. Factor analysis adjusted the fit of the one factor (X2/df=2,65, RMSEA=0,057, CFI=0,93) and Cronbach’s Alpha reliability coefficient for the scale was founded as 0,71.
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European Journal of Social Sciences – Volume 21, Number 3 (2011) 4.3. Findings We explored the effects of sub dimensions of the organizational psychological capital on the organizational commitment and job satisfaction with using structural equation modeling. Accordingly, organizational psychological capital was considered as an independent variable and organizational commitment and job satisfaction were thought as dependable variables. Figure 1 shows the results of the analysis of the structural equation modeling. The results of the fit indexes were calculated as the ratio of chi-square to its degree of freedom (X2/df) is 2,08, the root mean square of approximation (RMSEA) is 0,059 and comparative fit index (CFI) is 0,93. These results confirmed the fit of the model, determining the relationship between variables at different significant levels. Figure 1: Structural Equation Model of the Study e3
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According to the results of the analysis, organizational commitment and job satisfaction were predicted by resilience, hope and optimism sub dimensions of the organizational psychological capital. When examined the figure, organizational commitment has positive relationship between hope (β=34, p
