Research Framework
Figure 3.1. illustrates the research framework which demonstrates the effect of psychological capital on organizational citizenship behaviors and OCB’s three dimensions, including in-role behavior, OCB-Individual, OCB-Organizational. It also shows the moderating effect of team identification and team cohesion on the relationship between psychological capital and organizational behaviors. There is one independent variable which is psychological capital (PsyCap). The moderators are team identification and team cohesion. The dependent variable is organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB).
Research Hypotheses
The hypotheses were proposed as follows:
Hypothesis1. Psychological capital is positively related to employee citizenship behavior.
Hypothesis2. Team identification moderates the relationship between psychological capital and employee citizenship behavior, such that the relationship is stronger as team identification increases.
Figure 3.1. Research framework
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Hypothesis3. Team cohesion moderates the relationship between psychological
capital and employee citizenship behavior, such that the relationship is stronger as team cohesion increases.
Research Procedure
Research procedure explains the steps taken in order to develop this research. The first step is exploring the research topic to develop the research questions. In second step in order to answer the research questions the researcher reviewed literature to develop the basis for the research. The research questions and hypotheses were developed from literature review. Once the variables have been identified, a research framework was developed in order to represent the relationships between variables.
From the literature, the researcher chose the measurement to collect data to answer the research questions and to test the hypotheses. After collecting data, a series of analysis was performed in order to answer research questions. Finally, the researcher will discuss the research results, answer research questions, suggest future research and conclude the study. The procedure is as shown in Figure 3.2.
Figure 3.2. Research procedure
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Research Design Sampling and Data Collection
The sample for this research consisted of 175 individuals from 50 work groups.
All of the work team can be classified as in the real estate industry. The researcher opted for a quantitative method through distribution of survey questionnaires to measure the impact of psychological capital on organizational citizenship behaviors in Taiwan. The population is the real estate agents who work in an organization in Taiwan and have teamwork experience. Survey questionnaires were distributed by the researcher to the targeted employees who have at least three months’ work experience in the same team.
The reason why the researcher chose three months as one of the criteria is because, in Labor Standards Act, Article 16-1, it regulates: “Where a worker has worked continuously for more than three months but less than one year, the notice shall be given ten days in advance.” The researcher believes that an employee who has worked in the company more than three months will have sufficient time to familiarize themselves with the job, colleagues and organization culture.
Initial contact was made with the researcher visiting real estate agencies with an explanation of the purpose of the study in order for the researcher to gain access to the potential respondents. At the end, 175 respondents from 50 real estate teams participated in this study. From the 175 respondents, there were 61 females, 114 males, with their age ranging from 23 to 54 years old, and the majority of the sample (161, or 92%) had a bachelor degree. The 175 respondents had been working in organizations for more than 3 months up to 168 months and the majority of the sample (152, or 86.9%) did not hold a managerial position in the organization. The respondents had been working in a work team for more than 3 months up to 240 months and the majority of the sample (152, or 86.9%) were team members in the team. The majority of the sample
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(80, or 45.7%) had a salary range of 40,001 NTD~ 60,000 NTD. There were 11 teams belonging to problem-solving team, 29 teams belonging to self-managed, 10 teams belonging to cross-functional team and no team belonging to virtual team. There were 5 teams had 3~5 team members, 27 teams had 6~8 team members, 11 teams had 9~11 team members, 7 teams had more than 11 team members in the team. Table 3.1. shows the descriptive statistics of the sample. For this study.
Table 3.1.
Descriptive Statistics of the Sample
Variable Item Frequency Percentage (%)
Gender Female
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Table3.1. (continued)
Variable Item Frequency Percentage (%)
(continued) month(s) Mean: 45.57
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Table3.1. (continued)
Variable Item Frequency Percentage (%)
Salary Under 20,000
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Instrument
This survey design targeted employees who work in organizations and have teamwork experience in Taiwan. The original questionnaire had been translated into Chinese which is an official language of the country, then a backward translation into English will be performed in order for the researcher to be sure that there would be no loss of the meaning for the questionnaire items. The questionnaire had been divided into six parts: The first part measures organizational citizenship behaviors (dependent variable) with nine items. The second part measures psychological capital with sixteen items. The third part is team identification with nine items and the forth part is team cohesion with ten items; the fifth part measures social desirability with ten items for helping the researcher to identify if respondents answer honestly. (Stahan & Gerbasi, 1972) In the sixth part, eleven demographic questions be asked including some control variables. In addition, there is one screening question for making sure if the respondent has teamwork experience. Totally the questionnaire has 66 items.
Measurement Organizational Citizenship Behaviors
This research modified William and Anderson’s (1991) 9-item questionnaires using a 5-point Likert-type scale, with response categories from 1 representing not frequent at all to 5 representing very frequent. This questionnaire has 2 dimensions including: (1) Individual level-OCB (OCBI), which is questions from 1 to 7. OCBI means employee has altruistic behaviors, for example “Take time to listen to coworkers’
problems and worries.” (2) Organization level-OCB (OCBO), which is questions from 8 and 9. OCBO means compliance to the organization’s formal or informal rules, for
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example “Conserves and protects organizational property.” In this study the Cronbach’s α is 0.82 the result indicated that the internal consistency reliability is acceptable.
Psychological Capital
Psychological Capital questionnaire is based on Luthans, et al. (2007b) who developed the 24-item PsyCap Questionnaire (PCQ) using a 6-point Likert-type scale, with response categories from 1 representing strongly disagree to 6 representing strongly agree. PCQ are divided into four dimensions: (1) Self-efficiency a sample question is “I feel confident helping to set targets/goals in my work area.” (2) Hope a sample question is “I can think of many ways to reach my current work goals.” (3) Resilience a sample question is “I usually manage difficulties one way or another at work.” (4) Optimism an example is “I'm optimistic about what will happen to me in the future as it pertains to work. In this study the Cronbach’s α is 0.87; the result indicated that the internal consistency reliability is good.
Work Team Identification
For the measure of work team identification, the researcher used Huang’s (2013) questionnaire. Huang (2013) provided this questionnaire to measure the relationships among organizational identification and work-group identification. For the purpose of this study team identification items will be adopted. The version of this measure for team identification adopted for this study contains 4 items to be responded using a 5-point Likert-type scale. Response categories are from 1 representing strongly disagree to 7 representing strongly agree. The sample items include: “I don’t like to hear others criticize my work-group.” and “My work-group is like a family to me.” In this study
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the Cronbach’s α is 0.81, the result indicated that the internal consistency reliability is acceptable.
Work Team Cohesion
For the measure of work team cohesion, the researcher adopted Carless and Paola’s (2000) measurement. Respondents rate if a work team member sees other team members and the group as a whole. This measure of work team cohesion contains 10 items using a 9-point Likert-type scale, with response categories from 1 representing strongly disagree to 9 representing strongly agree. The sample item includes “Our team would like to spend time together outside of work hours”. In this study the Cronbach’s α is 0.93 the result indicated that the internal consistency reliability is acceptable.
Control Variables
Past research had demonstrated that gender, age, educational level and tenure impact employee’s organizational citizenship behaviors (Podsakoff et al., 2000).
Likewise, some other demographic variables may be suspected to also influence the dependent variable in this study. Therefore, this study included the following demographics as control variables: gender, age, educational level, organization tenure, position tenure, team type, team size, monthly salary. Gender is coded as: (0) female, (1) male. In age the researcher asked participants to fill out the year he/she was born.
In organization tenure the researcher asked the participant to fill out the year(s) and month(s) he/she has been working for this organization. In position tenure the researcher asked the participant to fill out the year(s) and month(s) he/she has been working for this team. Team type is coded as: (1) problem-solving team, (2)
self-36
managed team, (3) cross-functional team, (4) virtual team. Team size is coded as: (1) 1~2, (2)3~5, (3)6~8, (4)9~11, (5) above 11 people. Monthly salary is coded as: (1) Under 20,000 NTD, (2) 20,001~40,000 NTD, (3) 40.001~60,000 NTD, (4) 60,001~80,000 NTD, (5) 80,001〜100,000 NTD,(6) Above 100,000 NTD.
Team type was considered as a control variable. As rapid growing in work team in organizations, there are many different definitions of team types. Robbins and Judge (2000) captured the most common team types which are related to work environment into four types of teams, including problem-solving team, self-managed work team, cross-functional team and virtual teams. (1) Problem-solving team:
The problem-solving team usually formed of 5 to 12 teammates which created for achieving or solving some specific project or problems in organizations. This kind of team is formed by different level or background, skills people in order to solve the problem. Problem-solving team usually make suggestions to the organizations, it doesn’t have the authority, therefore, once the problem is solved the problem-solve team will disband. (2) Self-managed work team: Self-managed also ‘self-directed teams’
and ‘semi-autonomous work team’, this kind of team usually composed of 10 to 15 members. It is the most empower and autonomy work team type. This kind of team takes the most of the responsibilities of supervisors. The team members in self-managed work team usually planning the schedule, completing tasks, delivering services, even evaluating each other’s performance by themselves. (3) functional Team: Cross-functional team means team members come from the same level but diverse work areas, they gather together in order to achieve the same goal or finish the complex projects.
The purpose of the cross-functional team is for exchanging information, delivering services and solving problems more efficiently. (4) Virtual team: The virtual team is developed by the computer technology’s improvement. This type of teams uses the
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network, email, videoconferencing and smart phone to achieve the goal；therefore, the virtual team has ability to overcome the time and space differently.
Social Desirability also was considered as a control variable. The researcher used Stahan and Gerbasi (1972) social desirability as measurement. It was adapted from Marlow-Crowne Social Desirability Scale, and totally has ten true or false items. Social desirability is an instrument that helps researchers to identify if respondents answer honestly. The sample items include “I am always willing to admit when I make a mistake” and “At times I have really insisted in having things my own way.”
A summary of the items used in the questionnaire and their sources are provided in Table 3.2.
Table 3.2.
Measurement Scale Items
Variable Items References
Organizational
Citizenship Behaviors 9 items
William and Anderson (1991)
Psychological Capital 16 items Luthans et al., (2007a) Work Team identification 9 items Huang (2013)
Work Team cohesion 10 items Carless and Paola (2000) Social Desirability 10 items Stahan and Gerbasi (1972)
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Reliability and Validity
To ensure the validity of the measures, the researcher conducted literature review and expert review to ensure content validity. The researcher first conducted the pilot test and exploratory factor analysis in order to understand how the original measurement scales work in the current study. According to the EFA result, the researcher deleted some items or classified items into new dimensions. In the main study, the data was collected using modified measurement from the pilot test, therefore, the researcher used confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to confirm construct validity.
The reliability of the scales was tested and the Cronbach’s alpha of each of the measures was calculated to check the reliability. Cronbach’s alpha should be greater than .70.
Exploratory Factor Analysis
SPSS was performed to test the exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and check for errors, outliers, and the distribution of the data.
In the pilot test there were 104 respondents, the intended population was the employees who work in an organization and have teamwork experience in Taiwan. As there is no sampling frame of this population, convenience sampling was adopted. The researcher set the criteria to delete an item if the item’s factor loading is below 0.5 in the EFA result.
EFA for Organizational Citizenship Behaviors. Organizational Citizenship Behavior questionnaire was measured with 14-item questionnaires. The questions from 1 to 7 measure Individual level-OCB (OCBI). Questions from 8 to 14 measure Organization level-OCB (OCBO). According to the pilot test result OCB’s Cronbach's alpha was 0.76. The Table 3.3. shows EFA result of OCB in the pilot test.
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Table 3.3.
Pilot Test EFA Result: Rotated Component Matrix for Organizational Citizenship Behaviors (N=104)
Component
1 2
OCBI4_Take time to listen to coworkers’ problems and worries.
.749
OCBI5_Goes out of way to help new employees. .694 OCBI6_Takes a personal interest in other employees. .678 OCBI1_Helps others who have been absent. .666 OCBI3_Assists supervisor with his/her work (when not
asked).
.633
OCBI7_Passes along information to co-workers. .599 OCBI2_Helps others who have heavy workloads. .584 OCBO11_Great deal of time spent with personal phone
conversations.
<.4
OCBO8_Attendance at work is above the norm. .673
OCBO9_Gives advance notice when unable to come to work.
.651
OCBO10_Take undeserved work breaks. (R) .496
OCBO12_Complains about insignificant things at work.
(R)
.489
OCBO13_Conserves and protects organizational property.
.413
OCBO14_Adheres to informal rules devised to maintain order.
<.4
Note. N=104. Extraction method: Principal Component Analysis.
Rotation Method: Varimax
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As EFA result shown that item OCBI1 to OCBI7 was in OCBI dimension；the items OCBO8 and OCBO9 was in OCBO dimension. The item OCBO 10, OCBO11, OCBO12, OCBO13 and OCBO14 had a factor loading below the value of 0.5, therefore, they were deleted for the main study. Totally there were 5 items removed and 9 items remained. To see a list of full items, dimensions and which items were deleted, refer to Table 3.4.
Table 3.4.
Organizational Citizenship Behaviors Variable Items
Item Description Status
OCBI1 Help others who have been absent.
OCBI2 Help others who have heavy workloads.
OCBI3 Assist supervisor with his/her work (when not asked).
OCBI4 Take time to listen to coworkers’ problems and worries.
OCBI5 Go out of way to help new employees.
OCBI6 Take a personal interest in other employees.
OCBI7 Pass along information to co-workers.
OCBO8 Attendance at work is above the norm.
OCBO9 Give advance notice when unable to come to work.
OCBO10 Take undeserved work breaks. Deleted
OCBO11 Great deal of time spent with personal phone conversations. Deleted OCBO12 Complain about insignificant things at work. Deleted OCBO13 Conserve and protect organizational property. Deleted OCBO14 Adhere to informal rules devised to maintain order. Deleted
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EFA for Psychological Capital. Psychological Capital questionnaire was measured with 24-item questionnaires. The questions from 1 to 6 measure “Self-efficiency.” Questions 7 to 12 measure “Hope.” Questions 13 to 18 measure
“Resilience.” Questions 19 to 24 measure “Optimism.” According to the pilot test result PsyCap Cronbach's alpha was 0.84. The Table 3.5. shows the final result of Psychological Capital.
Table 3.5.
Pilot Test EFA Result: Rotated Component Matrix for Psychological Capital Component
1 2 3 4
5E_I feel confident contacting people outside the company
.792
4E_I feel confident helping to set targets/goals in my work area.
.732
6E_I feel confident presenting information to a group of colleagues.
.726
2E_I feel confident in representing my work area in meetings with management.
.708
1E_feel confident analyzing a long-term problem to find a solution.
.648
8R_I feel I can handle many things at a time at this job.
.601
10H_Right now I see myself as being pretty successful at work.
.489
8H_At the present time, I am energetically pursuing my work goals.
.480
(continued)
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3E_I feel confident contributing to discussions about the company's strategy.
<.4
12H_At this time, I am meeting the work goals that I have set for myself.
<.4
21O_I always look on the bright side of things regarding my job.
.855
19O_When things are uncertain for me at work, I usually expect the best.
.763
22O_I'm optimistic about what will happen to me in the future as it pertains to work.
.740
13R_When I have a setback at work, I have trouble recovering from it, moving on.
.629
9H_There are lots of ways around any problem. .771 11H_I can think of many ways to reach my
current work goals.
.625
14R_I usually manage difficulties one way or another at work.
.573
24O_I approach this job as if “every cloud has a silver lining.”
.533
20O_If something can go wrong for me work-wise, it will.
.438
17R_I can get through difficult times at work because I've experienced difficulty before.
.579
(continued)
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Table 3.5. (continued)
15R_I can be “on my own,” so to speak, at work if I have to.
.504
16R_I usually take stressful things at work in stride.
.481
23O_In this job, things never work out the way I want them to.
-.472
Note. N=104. Extraction method: Principal Component Analysis.
Rotation Method: Varimax
The EFA result shows that items S1, S2, S4, S5, S6, and R18 loaded under Self-Efficiency dimension, items R13, O19, O21, O22 loaded under Optimism dimension, items H9, H11, R14, O24 loaded under Hope dimension, and items R15 and R17 loaded under Resilience dimension. Items S3, O20, O23, H7, H8, H10, H12 and R16 had low factor loading below 0.5, therefore, they are deleted. Totally there were 8 items removed and 16 items remained. To see a list of full items, dimensions and which items were deleted, refer to Table 3.6.
Table 3.6.
Psychological Capital Variable Items
Item Description Status
1E I feel confident analyzing a long-term problem to find a solution.
2E I feel confident in representing my work area in meetings with management.
3E I feel confident contributing to discussions about the company's strategy.
Deleted
(continued)
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Table 3.6. (continued)
Item Description Status
4E I feel confident helping to set targets/goals in my work area.
5E I feel confident contacting people outside the company 6E I feel confident presenting information to a group of
colleagues.
7H If I should find myself in a jam at work, I could think of many ways to get out of it.
Deleted
8H At the present time, I am energetically pursuing my work goals.
Deleted
9H There are lots of ways around any problem.
10H Right now I see myself as being pretty successful at work. Deleted 11H I can think of many ways to reach my current work goals.
12H At this time, I am meeting the work goals that I have set for myself.
Deleted
13R When I have a setback at work, I have trouble recovering from it, moving on.
Optimism
14R I usually manage difficulties one way or another at work. Hope 15R I can be “on my own,” so to speak, at work if I have to.
16R I usually take stressful things at work in stride. Deleted 17R I can get through difficult times at work because I've
experienced difficulty before.
18R I feel I can handle many things at a time at this job. Efficacy 19O When things are uncertain for me at work, I usually expect the
best.
(continued)
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Table 3.6. (continued)
Item Description Status
20O If something can go wrong for me work-wise, it will. Deleted 21O
I always look on the bright side of things regarding my job.
22O I'm optimistic about what will happen to me in the future as it pertains to work.
23O In this job, things never work out the way I want them to. Deleted
23O In this job, things never work out the way I want them to. Deleted