The data was collected from 510 participants with or without the experience of M&A in their working experience. 277 valid samples which fit the requirement of this study are from the respondents who stay in the remained company even though their company had been through M&A. To collect the information of the respondents, there were several questions written into demographic information. They were gender, age, education level, position, tenure, yearly income, company types and the M&A happened year. The written answers such as age, tenure and the M&A happened year were transferred into certain levels.
The gender of the respondents was pretty equal. Most of them were aged from 26 to 35 years old (40.8%). When it comes to the education background, over 78.4% of participants had bachelor degree or above. Regarding their working position, most of them were general employees (57.0%) and their tenure was principally for 1 to 5years (34.7%). The frequency and percentage of the demographic information are summarized in Table 4.1.
Table 4.1
Descriptive Statistics (n=277)
Item Sample characteristics Frequency Percentage
Gender 0. Female 142 51.3
1. Male 138 49.8
Total 277 100
Age 1. 25 and below 11 4.0
2. 26-35 113 40.8
3. 36-45 94 33.9
4. 46-55 49 17.7
5. 56-65 10 3.6
Total 277 100
(Continued)
Table 4.1 (continued)
Item Sample characteristics Frequency Percentage
Educational level 1. Elementary and below 4 1.4
Correlations
Pearson‟s correlations analysis was conducted for the three main variables which are psychological contract breach, Perceived Organizational Justice and Job involvement. Plus three demographics as control variables, they are company type, job position and annual salary. The correlations are shown in Table 4.2. As stated in H1, psychological contract breach has a significantly negative correlated to job involvement (r= -.38, p<0.05). For H2, psychological contract breach has a significantly negative correlated to perceived organizational justice (r=-.58, p<0.05). All control variables (experienced time, company type, job position, and annual salary) were significant related to job involvement (p<0.05) as anticipated.
Table 4.2
Mean, Standard Deviations, Correlations, and Reliability (n=277)
Note. Note. Numbers in the brackets represent the Cronbach’s Alpha values of the variables.
PCB represents psychological contract breach, POJ represents perceived organizational justice, and JI represents job involvement.
+P<0.1,*P<.05, **p<0.01, ***p<0.001
Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5 6
1. Company type 1.41 .492
2. Job position 1.63 .846 .228***
3. Annual salary 2.42 1.393 .170** .488***
4. PCB 3.33 1.135 -.254*** -.235*** -.105+ (.94)
5. POJ 3.38 .731 .251*** .240*** .119+ -.596*** (.98)
6. JI 3.61 .610 .239*** .305*** .285** -.378*** .587*** (.90)
Results of Hypotheses Test
Hierarchical regression was used in this research for statistical analysis. Demographic factors such as experienced time, company type, job position and annual salary were included as control variables. Regression equations were constructed in order to test the proposed hypotheses results were shown in Table 4.3 and Table 4.4.
Table 4.3
Results of Regression Analysis for Hypothesis
Job involvement
Model 1 Model 2
Variables β β
Step 1: Controls
Company type .16** .087
Job position .18** .107*
Annual salary .17* .178**
Step 2: Main Effect
PCB -.32***
R² .14 .23
Adj. R² .13 .22
ΔR² .14 .09
F 14.06*** 19.26***
ΔF 14.06*** 30.16***
Note. *p< .05, **p< .01, ***p< .001, PCB represents psychological contract breach
Hypothesis1 proposed that psychological contract breach had a negatively effect on job involvement. In Model 1, all the control variables showed significant effect on job involvement (p<.05). As for Model 2, psychological contract breach was added to examine its relationship with job involvement. The result showed that psychological contract breach was significantly and negatively related to job involvement (β=-.32, p<.05). Therefore,
employees who perceived more psychological contract breach have lower job involvement in their current job. Thus, Hypothesis1 was supported.
Moderating effect of perceived organizaitonal justice on the relationship between psychological contract breach and job involvement
Hypothesis 2 in the study proposed that perceived organizaitonal justice negatively moderates the relationship between psychological contract breach and job involvement. In order to test the moderating effect of perceived organizaitonal justice, the three steps were conducted in hierarchical regression analysis. In step 1, the control variables such as company type, job position and annual salary were entered. In step 2, the independent variable and moderating variable were entered. In step 3, the interaction term of psychological contract breach and perceived organizaitonal justice was entered and the beta coefficient as well as the significance of the interaction was examined .Table 4.4 summarized the regression results of testing Hypothesis 2.
Model 3 presents that the interaction of psychological contract breach and perceived organizatonal justice was significant when job involvement was entered as the dependent variable, and the beta coefficient was negative (β=-.10, p<.05). Base on the result, Hypothesis 2 was supported. It meant that the degree of perceived organizaitonal justice would moderate the relationship between psychological contract breach and job involvement.
Table 4.4
Note. *p< .05, **p< .01, ***p< .001, PCB represents psychological contract breach, POJ represents perceived organizational justice.
To interpret the moderating effect in detail, perceived organizational justice was divided into high and low level group based on the mean. Figure 4.1 showed the interactional graphs between psychological contract breach and perceived organizational justice. Psychological contract breach was put in x axis and Job involvement in y axis. Two different lines represents different levels of group. The dotted line represent low level group of people who perceived organizational justice while the solid line represent the employee who have higher perceived organizational justice. As expected, psychological contract breach had a relatively
justice getting higher; however, psychological contract breach weaken negative effect on job involvement for individual when the perceived organizational justice is considerately higher.
Hence, Hypothesis 2 was supported that perceived organizational justice showed significantly negative moderating effect between psychological contract breach and job involvement.
Figure 4.1. Interaction Plot for the Moderating Effect of Perceived Organizational Justice
In conclusion, the summary of hypotheses testing result was shown in Table 4.5. All of the hypotheses were supported.
Table 4.5
Result of Hypotheses Testing
Hypotheses result
H1. Psychological contract breach is negatively correlated with job involvement.
supported
H2. Perceived organizational justice moderates the relationship between psychological contract breach and job involvement.
supported