Akkermans Jos, Bal P Matthijs, De Jong Simon B
School of Business and Economics, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Lincoln International Business School, University of Lincoln, Lincoln, United Kingdom.
Front Psychol. 2019 Mar 5;10:473. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00473. eCollection 2019.
Despite the wealth of research showing that psychological contract breach (PCB) has negative outcomes for individuals, knowledge about the influence of the social context in which breaches are experienced is still scarce. This is surprising, as scholars have argued that work climates, such as when unit members are generally highly committed, could buffer an individual's negative experiences at work. Yet, to date, the unit climate and PCB literatures have largely remained separated and our main goal is to integrate these fields. This is especially timely and relevant, because recent work in the unit climate literature indicates that merely looking at the average climate might not be enough, because the climate's (i.e., the agreement or homogeneity within the unit) could also provide important social cues. Building on these recent advances, we develop and test a theoretical framework which links both climate concepts to PCB. More specifically, we hypothesized that especially when all unit members are highly homogeneously committed, an employee would reframe their PCB in such a way that it would less adversely affect work engagement and turnover intentions. Using data from 1,272 employees across 36 healthcare units, multilevel structural path analyses supported this three-way interaction. By answering recent calls for more "social PCB research" and integrating the unit climate and PCB literatures, we aim to provide guidance to scholars and practitioners who want to understand in more depth the social context's influence on PCB.
尽管大量研究表明心理契约违背（PCB）会给个体带来负面结果，但对于个体经历心理契约违背时所处社会环境的影响，我们仍知之甚少。这令人惊讶，因为学者们认为，诸如单位成员普遍高度投入的工作氛围，可能会缓冲个体在工作中的负面体验。然而，到目前为止，单位氛围和心理契约违背的文献在很大程度上仍相互分离，而我们的主要目标是整合这些领域。这一点尤为及时且具有相关性，因为单位氛围文献中的近期研究表明，仅仅考察平均氛围可能并不够，因为氛围的一致性（即单位内部的共识或同质性）也可能提供重要的社会线索。基于这些最新进展，我们开发并检验了一个将两种氛围概念与心理契约违背联系起来的理论框架。更具体地说，我们假设，尤其是当所有单位成员都高度且同质投入时，员工会以一种对工作投入和离职意图产生较小负面影响的方式重新诠释他们的心理契约违背。通过使用来自36个医疗单位的1272名员工的数据，多层次结构路径分析支持了这种三方交互作用。通过回应近期对更多“社会心理契约违背研究”的呼吁，并整合单位氛围和心理契约违背的文献，我们旨在为那些希望更深入理解社会环境对心理契约违背影响的学者和从业者提供指导。
