The Interactive Effects of Procedural Justice and Equity Sensitivity in Predicting Responses to Psychological Contract Breach: An Interactionist Perspective

Purpose  The purpose of the study was to examine the combined interactive effects of a situational variable (procedural justice) and a dispositional (equity sensitivity) variable on the relationship between breach and employee outcomes. Design/methodology/approach   Data were obtained from 403 full-time employees representing a wide variety of business sectors in the Philippines. Supervisors were requested to provide an assessment of their subordinate’s civic virtue behavior. Findings  Results showed that equity sensitivity and breach interacted in predicting affective commitment. The negative relationship between breach and affective commitment was stronger for employees with an input-focused approach to organizational relationships (referred to as benevolents) than for those with an outcome-focused approach (referred to as entitleds). Results also indicated a stronger negative relationship between contract breach and civic virtue behavior under conditions of high procedural justice. Finally, a three-way interaction was found between contract breach, procedural justice and equity sensitivity in predicting affective commitment. Implications  Our findings provide a new insight suggesting that worse outcomes are to be anticipated especially if employees have an expectation that procedural justice can prevent any form of contract breach. In addition, although previous research has portrayed benevolents as more accepting of situations of u under-reward, this study has demonstrated that they too have their limits or threshold for under-reward situations. Originality/value  This research suggests that the type and intensity of one’s reactions to psychological contract breach is influenced by interactive forces of the individual’s disposition and the organizational procedures. A portion of this paper was presented at the 64th annual meeting of the academy of management meeting, New Orleans, USA, August, 2004.     

Psychological contracts and their implications for commitment: A feature-based approach

Two studies were conducted to examine the link between employee perceptions of the psychological contract and their affective and normative commitments to the organization. The authors adapt a new approach to the study of psychological contracts by developing a generalizable measure of contract features (e.g., scope; time frame). In Study 1 (N = 301), the authors predicted and found that employees’ perceptions of the contract’s features contributed beyond perceptions of contract type (i.e., transactional; relational) and fulfillment to the prediction of affective and normative commitment. In Study 2 (N = 147), the features measure was refined and results from the first study were largely replicated. In both studies, affective and normative commitment were greater when employees viewed the contract as broad, trust-based, equal, negotiated, tangible, and long-term, and weaker when they saw it as unequal, imposed, and short-term. We also found evidence for patterns of features that correspond to transactional and relational contracts, as well as to recently proposed balanced contracts and I-Deals. Implications for theory and the management of psychological contracts are discussed.     

Perceived organizational support, organizational commitment and psychological well-being: A longitudinal study

Using longitudinal data (N = 220), we examined the contribution of perceived organizational support and four mindsets of organizational commitment (affective, normative, perceived sacrifice associated with leaving and perceived lack of alternatives) to employee psychological well-being. In order to assess the contribution of support and commitment independently from workplace stressors, we controlled for the effects of role ambiguity, role conflict and role overload. Analyses showed affective organizational commitment to mediate a positive relationship between perceived organizational support and well-being. In addition, perceived organizational support negatively related to perceived lack of employment alternatives which, in turn, was negatively related to well-being. Normative commitment and perceived sacrifice associated with leaving were unrelated to well-being. The implications of these findings are discussed under the lenses of social exchange and conservation of resources theories.     

Who they are and what de se: Burge on quasi-memory

Tyler Burge has recently argued that quasi-memory-based psychological reductionist accounts of diachronic personal identity are deeply problematic. According to Burge, these accounts either fail to include appropriately de se elements or presuppose facts about diachronic personal identity—facts of the very kind that the accounts are supposed to explain. Neither of these objections is compelling. The first is based in confusion about the version of reductionism to which it putatively applies. The second loses its force when we recognize that reductionism is a metaphysical thesis, not an epistemological one.

Why there are no good arguments for any interesting version of determinism

This paper considers the empirical evidence that we currently have for various kinds of determinism that might be relevant to the thesis that human beings possess libertarian free will. Libertarianism requires a very strong version of indeterminism, so it can be refuted not just by universal determinism, but by some much weaker theses as well. However, it is argued that at present, we have no good reason to believe even these weak deterministic views and, hence, no good reason—at least from this quarter—to doubt that we are libertarian free. In particular, the paper responds to various arguments for neural and psychological determinism, arguments based on the work of people like Honderich, Tegmark, Libet, Velmans, Wegner, and Festinger.     

Spontaneous trait inference and construal level theory: Psychological distance increases nonconscious trait thinking

Can psychological distance affect how much perceivers form spontaneous trait inferences (STI) from others’ behaviors? On the basis of construal level theory (CLT) which posits that distant (vs. near) entities are represented more in terms of their abstract, global, and decontextualized features, we predicted that perceived distance would increase the tendency for perceivers to draw spontaneous trait inferences from behavioral information about actors. In two experiments, participants learned about people who were perceived as being distant or proximal to the self, and STI formation was subsequently assessed. We found that perceivers were more likely to form STIs about distant vs. near actors from the same behavioral information. These findings generalized across two distance dimensions: space and time. In addition, we found that priming individuals to adopt a high-level (vs. low-level) construal mindset also resulted in increased STI (Experiment 3). In sum, psychological distance facilitates STI formation, and this occurs via high-level construal of actors and their behaviors.     

On the optimality of serial and parallel processing in the psychological refractory period paradigm: Effects of the distribution of stimulus onset asynchronies

Within the context of the psychological refractory period (PRP) paradigm, we developed a general theoretical framework for deciding when it is more efficient to process two tasks in serial and when it is more efficient to process them in parallel. This analysis suggests that a serial mode is more efficient than a parallel mode under a wide variety of conditions and thereby suggests that ubiquitous evidence of serial processing in PRP tasks could result from performance optimization rather than from a structural bottleneck. The analysis further suggests that the experimenter-selected distribution of stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) influences the relative efficiency of the serial and parallel modes, with a preponderance of short SOAs favoring a parallel mode. Experiments varying the distribution of SOAs were conducted, and the results suggest that there is a shift from a more serial mode to a more parallel mode as the likelihood of short SOAs increases.     

Multiple Psychological Senses of Community in Afghan Context: Exploring Commitment and Sacrifice in an Underground Resistance Community

The study of positive outcomes associated with strong psychological sense of community (PSOC) has grown worldwide. Yet most research explores PSOC as a uni-dimensional (positive) variable operating in a single referent community. Theoretical and empirical literature has suggested, however, that PSOC can be positive, neutral or negative (Brodsky in J Commun Psychol 24(4):347–363, 1996; Brodsky et al. in Psychological sense of community: Research, applications and implications. Kluwer, New York 2002) and since people live in multiple physical and relational communities, there may be multiple PSOCs (M-PSOC) operating simultaneously and interactively (Brodsky and Marx in J Commun Psychol 29(2):1–18, 2001). This paper explores the operation of M-PSOC in the lives of Afghan women, and male supporters, who belonged to a resistance organization before, during and after the Taliban regime. Decisions to join and stay in this community can be explained, in part, through the differentiation of positive, organizational-level PSOC from negative, macro-community-level PSOC. In addition, M-PSOC suggests unique cultural meanings of the terms “community” and “choice.” Findings have implications for cross-cultural community work and for fostering resilient sub-communities in the face of macro and societal-level risks and oppression.     

The Challenge-and-Response Model of Normal Anxiety

This article attempts to provide a conceptual framework placing anxiety in a personal growth perspective. The authors first discuss two different theories of anxiety, review some structural models of anxiety, and stress that anxiety should be studied as a certain kind of relation or interaction between the subject and her stimuli. Then a challenge-and-response model of normal anxiety of its cognitive components is established, which sorts anxiety into heteronomous one and autonomic one, and supposes that heteronomous anxiety includes two dimensions: the fall between the level of external challenge and the level of self challenge, and the importance of the external challenge. Some related evidences for the preceding hypothesis are examined, and then compared with related models. Finally, based on the model, a valid coping strategy of anxiety was put forward, from which the mechanism of normal coping style of anxiety in daily life can be well understood.     

Mothers’ and Fathers’ Reluctance to Seek Psychological Help for Their Children

We investigated the gap between parents’ willingness to seek help for their children and their willingness to refer other parents to help, and the relationship of this gap to gender. Two hundred and eleven parent couples with elementary-school children reported their willingness to seek help from professional and informal sources for a hypothetical problem with their child, and their willingness to refer a friend’s child with an identical problem to similar help. Attitudes toward help seeking and parental behaviors were also measured. Findings revealed that parents were more willing to refer a friend’s child to professional help than they were to seek such help for their own child, although no gap was found regarding informal help. No gender differences were found regarding willingness to seek help or to refer another, although gender was related to variables that predicted help seeking.