Self-esteem as a moderator of the relationship between scientific interests and the job satisfaction of physicists and engineers.

A study with 121 engineers and 93 physicists tested the prediction that interests in science, as measured with the Strong Vocational Interest Blank for men, would be positively related to intrinsic satisfaction for high-self-esteem physicists and engineers but would be unrelated for low-self-esteem physicists and engineers. The predictions were confirmed for the sample of physicists to the extent that high-self-esteem Ss showed a significant correlation between interests and intrinsic satisfaction, but low-self-esteem Ss showed a nonsignificant correlation. Because the difference in correlations was nonsignificant, it could not be concluded that self-esteem was a moderator in the case of the physicists. Self-esteem did moderate the relationship between interests in science and both extrinsic and intrinsic satisfaction for engineers, but the correlations were in a direction opposite to those predicted. (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceptions of organizational politics as a moderator of the relationship between consciousness and job performance.

Meta-analytic studies of the relationships between the five-factor model of personality constructs and job performance indicate that conscientiousness has been the most consistent predictor. Recent research has sought to identify situational factors that may explain additional variance beyond what has been reported by simple bivariate relationships. The authors hypothesized that perceptions of organizational politics would moderate the relationship between conscientiousness and job performance. Data collected from 234 male and 579 female workers in 4 organizations indicated that conscientiousness was related to job performance among workers perceiving average to high levels of organizational politics but unrelated to performance among workers perceiving low levels of organizational politics. Moreover, perceptions of organizational politics were negatively related to job performance only among workers of average to low levels of conscientiousness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Occupational group as a moderator of the job satisfaction-job performance relationship.

In a study of 2 occupational groups at small scientific stations in Antarctica, the motivations of 129 Navy enlished men who volunteer were less related to their specific jobs in the Antarctic than those of 66 civilian scientists. Results confirm the hypothesis that occupational group is a moderator of the job satisfaction-job performance relationship, and that the relationship is more pronounced for the scientist group than for the Navy enlisted group. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Expectancy as a moderator of the relationship between job attitudes and turnover.

Tested the hypothesis that the strength of the predictive relationship of job attitudes on turnover is moderated by the expectancy of finding a comparable job. Tests were made separately with a sample of 222 office workers and a sample of 354 managers. Results, while supporting this hypothesis, show little enhancement of the typical relationship. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reward structure as a moderator of the relationship between extraversion and sales performance.

The proposition that the relationship between extraversion and sales performance is moderated by reward structure was investigated. Specific hypotheses were tested with data obtained from 152 sales representatives. One group of sales representatives was rewarded primarily for obtaining new sales and another primarily for retaining customers. Data pooled across the 2 groups showed that extraversion did not correlate significantly with either new sales or customer retention. However, moderator analysis revealed that extraversion was positively associated with the dimension of performance that was explicitly rewarded but not with the nonrewarded dimension. A significant correlation between conscientiousness and new sales, but not between conscientiousness and customer retention, was found with the pooled data. As expected, relationships between conscientiousness and sales performance were not moderated by reward structure. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Performance as a moderator of the job satisfaction–turnover relationship.

Examined the effects of job satisfaction and rated job performance on voluntary turnover among 295 hospital employees (approximate average age 35 yrs). Measures of job satisfaction were obtained from Ss, independent performance ratings by superiors were obtained from company records, and voluntary turnover data were collected 1 yr after administration of the questionnaire. With the use of subgroup analysis and moderated regression, it was found that employee performance ratings significantly moderate the job satisfaction–turnover relationship. Results suggest that satisfaction level represents a greater influence for low performers than for high performers on the decision to stay in a job. (7 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Autonomy as a moderator of the relationships between the Big Five personality dimensions and job performance.

Investigated the moderating role of autonomy on the relationships between the Big Five personality dimensions and supervisor ratings of job performance. On the basis of data from 146 managers, results indicate that 2 dimensions of personality, Conscientiousness (r?=?.25) and Extraversion (r?=?.14), were significantly related to job performance. Consistent with expectations, the validity of Conscientiousness and Extraversion was greater for managers in jobs high in autonomy compared with those in jobs low in autonomy. The validity of Agreeableness was also higher in high-autonomy jobs compared with low-autonomy ones, but the correlation was negative. These findings suggest that degree of autonomy in the job moderates the validity of at least some personality predictors. Implications for future research are noted. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Meta-analyzing the relationship between grades and job performance.

Employers and academics have differing views on the value of grades for predicting job performance. Employers often believe grades are useful predictors, and they make hiring decisions that are based on them. Many academics believe that grades have little predictive validity. Past meta-analyses of the grades–performance relationship have suffered either from small sample sizes or the inability to correct observed correlations for research artifacts. This study demonstrated the observed correlation between grades and job performance was .16. Correction for research artifacts increased the correlation to the .30s. Several factors were found to moderate the relationship. The most powerful factors were the year of research publication and the time between graduation and performance measurement. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cumulative evidence of the relationship between employee age and job performance.

On the basis of a review of 22 years of articles published in 46 behavioral science journals, we found a total of 96 independent studies that reported age–performance correlations. Total sample size was 38,983 and represented a broad cross-section of jobs and age groups. Meta-analysis procedures revealed that age and job performance generally were unrelated. Furthermore, there was little evidence that the type of performance measure (ratings vs. productivity measures) or type of job (professional vs. nonprofessional) moderated the relation between age and performance significantly. However, for very young employees the relation between age and job performance was consistent and modestly positive. Implications of these results for future research are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Employee age as a moderator of the relation between perceived work alternatives and job satisfaction.

This study was designed to explore whether employee age influences the relation between perceived work alternatives and job satisfaction. Moderated regression analyses were conducted using the survey responses of 226 employees between the ages of 24 and 50 who worked for a mental health institution. The analyses revealed that a Perceived Work Alternatives?×?Employee Age interaction significantly predicted job satisfaction. Neither organizational tenure nor employee educational level accounted for job-satisfaction variance beyond that accounted for by perceived work alternatives alone, nor did they interact with perceived work alternatives to predict job satisfaction. These findings indicate that employee age is associated with the relation between perceived alternatives and job satisfaction. They also provide some insight into which of a number of age-related effects may be most pertinent to this relation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Value importance as a moderator of the value fulfillment–job satisfaction relationship: Group differences.

Short forms of the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire and the Work Values Inventory were used to measure intrinsic and extrinsic facets of job satisfaction and dimensions of value fulfillment and importance in 264 Ss in 3 groups: state employees, bank employees, and US Navy cadets. Moderated regression techniques did not support a fulfillment–importance interaction effect in 1 organization, found inconsistent effects in another, and obtained strong, consistent effects in the third. Differences among the organizations are discussed, and it is proposed that control over value fulfillment and anticipated impact of fulfillment on future outcomes might be joint moderators, along with value importance, of the fulfillment–satisfaction relationship. (38 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Strain as a moderator of the relationship between work characteristics and work attitudes.

Research on the psychological effects of work characteristics has investigated their relationships with both work attitudes and psychological strain, with the latter 2 variables being treated as alternative or joint dependent variables. The focus of this article is to propose that strain moderates the relationship between perceptions of work characteristics and work attitudes. The proposition is tested on a maximum sample of 9,327 health care employees by using moderated multiple regression followed by subgroup comparisons. The results strongly support the moderating effect, showing that as strain increases, the strength of the relationship between perceptions of work characteristics and work attitudes decreases. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dysphoria as a moderator of the relationship between perceived effort and perceived ability.

Although Heiderian logic (F. Heider, 1958) proposes an inverse relationship between ability and effort, research has uncovered dramatic individual differences in the judged relationship between the two. Some view ability and effort as positively related; others view them as negatively related. Study 1, with 64 undergraduates, explored dysphoria as a moderator of this relationship by gathering dysphoric and nondysphoric individuals' perceptions of their effort and ability on daily activities. Although ability and effort generally were positively related, dysphorics reported lower ability on high effort tasks. In Study 2, 84 undergraduate Ss rated their effort as high or low. Dysphorics discounted ability when effort was high; nondysphorics reported the greatest ability when they expended the greatest effort. Collectively, there was no support for an inverse relationship between ability and effort. However, dysphorics infer less ability than nondysphorics following high effort. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Smoking as a moderator of the relationship between affective state and absence from work.

192 female student nurses from 2 hospitals were administered the Middlesex Hospital Questionnaire and a measure of smoking behavior. Sickness and absence data were taken from Ss' training records. Prior to exposure to the work situation, levels of affective distress did not differ significantly between groups differing in smoking behavior (nonsmoker, relaxation smokers, and stress smokers). Multiple regression analysis showed overall significant differences in absence frequency between hospitals and between smokers and nonsmokers. There was also a significant interaction between smoking behavior and affective state; only among the stress smokers did initial level of affective distress predict frequency of absence. Thus, the present study (conducted in a setting that did not permit smoking during working hours), showed that withdrawal from work in direct relation to affective symptom levels occurred only among Ss who habitually smoked in response to stress. (56 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Group identification as a moderator of the relationship between perceived social norms and alcohol consumption.

Previous research has shown that social norms are among the strongest predictors of college student drinking. Among college students, perceiving that others drink more heavily than themselves has been strongly and consistently associated with heavier drinking. Research has also shown that the more specifically others are defined, the stronger the association is with one's own drinking. In the current research, we evaluated whether group identification as defined by feeling closer to specific groups moderates the associations between perceived drinking norms in the group and one's own drinking. Participants included 3,752 (61% female) students who completed online assessments of their perceived drinking norms for 4 groups of students on their campus and identification with each group and participants' own drinking behavior. Results indicated that greater identification with same-sex students, same-race students, and same-Greek-status students was associated with stronger relationships between perceived drinking norms in the specific groups and own drinking. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A 5-year study of change in the relationship between well-being and job performance.

Recent research, primarily cross sectional in nature, has established a link between psychological well-being and job performance ratings. Such findings suggest that organizations can improve their overall effectiveness by increasing worker well-being, but they provide little guidance as how these increases can be achieved. One means would be to select only those individuals with high well-being scores. However in addition to various ethical concerns, this approach could also be limited if the association between these two variables deteriorates as the time between the measurement increases. This possibility was examined in a 5-year longitudinal study. Consistent with the expectation of diminishing association, it was found that the well-being–performance relationship is influenced by the interval between assessment of well-being and assessment of performance. When well-being was measured at the same time as performance, or as long as a year before, the two were associated. When well-being was assessed 4.5 or 5 years before job performance, the relationship was no longer significant. Practical implications of these findings for both the individual and the organization are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A moderated mediation model of the relationship between organizational citizenship behaviors and job performance.

Addressing numerous calls for future research on understanding the theoretical mechanisms that explain the relationship between organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs) and job performance, this study focused on how an employee's relationships with coworkers mediate the relationship between his or her OCBs and his or her job performance. It also looked at how task autonomy might moderate this mediated relationship. The results of an empirical study involving 364 jewelry designers, 310 coworkers, and 284 supervisors indicated that coworker relations mediated the relationship between OCBs and job performance. In addition, task autonomy positively moderated both paths of this mediated relationship. Finally, these results hold for OCBs that are targeted at individuals but not for OCBs that are targeted toward organizations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Alcohol expectancies as a mediator of the relationship between injury and readiness to change drinking behavior.

There is a well-established relationship between alcohol expectancies and drinking behavior. The purpose of the present study was to extend the literature by examining the role of alcohol expectancies in determining readiness to change drinking behavior among injured emergency department patients who screened positive for hazardous drinking. Negative expectancies were found to partially mediate the relationships of alcohol-related injuries and injury aversiveness to readiness to change drinking behavior. Results suggest that negative alcohol expectancies are a potential means of increasing patients' readiness to change drinking behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A causal-correlational analysis of the job satisfaction and performance relationship.

Gathered job satisfaction and performance data from about 80 newly hired female telephone operators after 1 and 3 mo work experience. This was not an experimental study, but tentative causal inferences were drawn from these longitudinal data by using a combination of cross-lagged and dynamic correlations. The overall relationship between satisfaction and performance was slightly positive, but the direction of causality was unclear. When job satisfaction was split into extrinsic and intrinsic components, the data suggest that performance causes intrinsic satisfaction and that extrinsic satisfaction causes performance. Both the type of job and the fact that these were new hires were offered as alternative explanations for these results. (23 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)