10 Commitment Across Cultures

Journal of International Business Studies (2009) 40, 13391358
& 2009 Academy of International Business All rights reserved 0047-2506

www.jibs.net
Commitment across cultures: A meta-analytical approach

Ronald Fischer1 and Angela Mansell2
Centre for Applied Cross-Cultural Research, School of Psychology, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand; 2Ministry of Health, Wellington, New Zealand Correspondence: R Fischer, Centre for Applied Cross-Cultural Research, School of Psychology, Victoria University of Wellington, PO Box 600, Wellington, New Zealand. Tel: 64 4 463 6548; Fax: 64 4 463 5402; E-mail: Ronald.Fischer@vuw.ac.nz
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Abstract The present study reports two sets of meta-analyses of employee commitment across cultures. First, using three-level hierarchical linear modeling, differences in mean levels of commitment were investigated. We examined the effects of individualismcollectivism and power distance values and practices (Hofstede, GLOBE) while controlling for study and industry effects. The findings showed that affective commitment (across 48 countries), continuance commitment (31 countries) and normative commitment (30 countries) were influenced by country-level individualism and power distance. Greater collectivism was associated with higher normative commitment, and greater power distance was associated with higher continuance and normative commitment. Economic variables were found to exert a strong influence on affective and normative commitment means. Second, relationships between affective commitment and turnover intentions (across 26 countries) were found to be somewhat stronger in individualistic settings, whereas the normative commitmentturnover intentions relationships (across 10 countries) were stronger in collectivistic settings. Overall, absolute cross-cultural differences in all analyses were relatively small compared with differences due to study and industry effects, but country-level predictors accounted for substantive proportions of the variance between countries. Implications for commitment and crosscultural research are discussed, and particular attention is drawn to the need to explore the meaning of commitment across cultural and economic contexts. Journal of International Business Studies (2009) 40, 13391358. doi:10.1057/jibs.2009.14
Keywords: meta-analysis; commitment; multilevel analysis; GLOBE; Hofstede; culture
Received: 27 January 2005 Revised: 10 November 2008 Accepted: 15 November 2008 Online publication date: 30 April 2009
INTRODUCTION Since Coles (1979) comparison of behavioral commitment levels in Japan and the US, researchers have focused on differences and similarities in both behavioral and affective commitment across cultural groups. Japanese workers appeared to be more committed to their organizations, as evidenced by lower levels of staff turnover. However, researchers investigating cultural differences were quick to notice that the lower turnover among Japanese workers did not coincide with higher affective commitment, that is, their self-reported identification with their company and the goals and values of their company (e.g., Lincoln & Kalleberg, 1990). The first aim of the current study is to investigate, using metaanalysis, which country-level variables could contribute to our understanding of organizational commitment. This is the first comprehensive study of commitment levels across a large number
Commitment across cultures
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of cultural contexts. To date, there is no overarching theory concerning cultural differences in organizational commitment. Therefore our second aim is to propose a theoretical account of how the concepts of country-level individualism and power distance are related to organizational commitment. We focus on these two dimensions because they are the most well-understood dimensions of cultural variability (Smith, Bond, & Kagitc ibasi, 2006), and both are conceptually related to the commitment process. Our paper therefore contributes to and expands existing theories of cultural influence by theorizing and testing the effects of national culture on organizational commitment. Using both older (Hofstede, 1980) and more contemporary (House, Hanges, Javidan, Dorfman, & Gupta, 2004) indicators of culture, we are also in a position to examine the validity of cultural indicators. Finally, it has been observed that commitment and turnover intentions (as a key outcome of commitment; Porter, Steers, Mowday, & Boulian, 1974) do not always co-occur. Therefore our final aim is to expand current commitment and cultural theory by investigating the link between commitment and turnover intentions across different cultures. Previous research has not provided a theoretical basis for the observed differences in these relationships across cultural contexts (e.g., Meyer, Stanley, Herscovitch, & Topolytsky, 2002). To avoid confusion about the level of analyses (Fischer, 2009; Fischer, Ferreira, Assmar, Redford, & Harb, 2005; Hofstede, 1980; Kirkman, Lowe, & Gibson, 2006), we will focus on and discuss cultural effects only at the country level. Our focus is on the impact of shared cultural values, norms and practices at the country level on commitment processes at the individual level. Commitment is an internal force that binds an individual to a course of action or target, and is often conceptualized as an attitude that reflects feelings such as attachment, identification or loyalty (Cohen, 2003). There is now strong evidence that the organizational commitment of North American and Western European employees can be differentiated along three dimensions, labeled affective, continuance and normative commitment (Meyer, 1997; Meyer et al., 2002). The most common and well-researched dimension is affective commitment a strong belief in and acceptance of the goals and values of an organization (Porter et al., 1974). Second, extending the original work of Becker (1960), Meyer, Paunonen, Gellatly, Goffin, and Jackson (1989) discuss commitment as a result of
side-bets, or investments that increase the costs an individual would accrue if they left a particular organization. This calculative aspect of commitment is labeled continuance commitment (Meyer, 1997; Meyer & Allen, 1991; Meyer et al., 2002). Third, normative commitment is viewed as a sense of obligation, or a feeling that one ought to remain with the organization (Meyer & Allen, 1991). Most cross-cultural work has focused on affective commitment, but there is evidence that the other two dimensions might be more susceptible to cultural influences (Wasti, 2003). In this paper we extend both cultural and commitment theories by examining all three dimensions of commitment from a global perspective. In doing this, we specifically investigate the extent to which the larger cultural context serves as an antecedent of commitment and a moderator of the commitmentturnover intentions link.
HYPOTHESES DEVELOPMENT
Commitment Across Cultures Since the seminal study by Hofstede (1980), there have been a significant number of large-scale projects investigating dimensions of cultural variability at a country level (e.g., Chinese Culture Connection, 1987; House et al., 2004; Schwartz, 1994; Smith, Dugan, & Trompenaars, 1996). Across these various projects, three consistent dimensions of cultural variability emerged: individualism collectivism, power distance and masteryharmony (Smith & Bond, 1998; Smith et al., 2006). Individualismcollectivism refers to the subordination of personal interests to the interest of the group (collectivism) vs an emotional independence and pursuit of personal goals irrespective of group goals (individualism). Power distance refers to the extent to which inequality and power differentials are accepted within a society; and masteryharmony refers to whether there is a cultural emphasis on assertiveness, material success, advancement and dominance over others, resources and the environment (mastery) vs an emphasis on harmony, positive relationships and fitting in. Of these dimensions, individualismcollectivism and power distance are especially interesting, since both are theoretically related to attachment to, and acceptance of, groups and group hierarchies, which is the basis of commitment. Individualismcollectivism as a theoretical dimension specifies culturally acceptable norms and processes for individual and group relationships, which is the essence of
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commitment (whether and why people feel committed to a group). Power distance specifies appropriate relationships between individuals across different hierarchical ranks, which is related to the reasons why people might feel attached to an organization (normative pressures, emotional identification, rational calculation of costs). In contrast, harmony vs mastery relates to competition between individuals (irrespective of group membership), which does not relate directly to ones commitment with to employing organization. Therefore we shall consider individualism collectivism and power distance1 in relation to the three different forms of commitment. As discussed previously, affective commitment is the voluntary identification with, and acceptance of, the organizations goals and values. Randall (1993) originally proposed that affective commitment should be higher in collectivist cultures than in individualistic cultures. This prediction was based on the observation that individuals in more collective cultures display greater loyalty and attachment to their in-group. The underlying (and untested) assumption is that managers, owners and co-workers within an organization will be seen as an in-group, and consequently individuals in more collective cultures will form affective ties to the larger organization (e.g., Boyacigiller & Adler, 1991; Cohen, 1999, 2003). Randalls (1993) initial review contradicted this hypothesis by suggesting that affective commitment was actually lower in samples that came from supposedly more collectivistic cultures. Upon closer examination, Randalls (1993) result suggests a different underlying mechanism. As noted by Triandis (1995), the relevant in-group is likely to differ across cultures, with the family most likely to be the primary in-group in South American or Chinese societies, whereas in Japan the business organization might be seen as an important ingroup. A recent study by Fischer et al. (2009) found that the immediate and extended family was the most important in-group in peoples life (for students and employees in all 14 countries included in their data set). Work groups were ranked as less important. In their research nine groups were included, of which work groups were ranked as the third most important group across cultures after the immediate and extended family (participants were allowed to add extra groups that might be relevant e.g., business organizations but no further category emerged). Based on this evidence we would like to propose a different mechanism, outlined below.
Triandis (1995) proposed some defining attributes of individualismcollectivism: that people in individualistic societies rely on their personal attitudes and feelings when deciding to engage with groups, develop a more independent self-identity, calculate costs and benefits rationally, and that they are more likely to pursue their own goals when there is a conflict between their personal goals and any group they belong to. The acceptance of organizational goals and values as measured by affective commitment is voluntary, but important, since a positive identification has positive effects on self-esteem (e.g., Hogg & Terry, 2000) and reduces cognitive dissonance (e.g., Festinger, 1957). In individualistic contexts, organizations are more likely to operate in a way that supports these identification processes, by providing commitment-enhancing features that focus on the individual in their work practices (such as benefits and retirement funds) (e.g., Aycan et al., 2000; Erez, 1997; Erez & Earley, 1993). In collectivistic societies this voluntary and individual-focused attachment to the organization is less important, and organizations are less likely to provide commitment-enhancing features that focus on the individual (Aycan et al., 2000; Erez, 1997; Erez & Earley, 1993). Consequently, we predict that greater individualism is associated with higher affective organizational commitment. Hypothesis 1: Individualism is positively associated with affective commitment. Continuance commitment traditionally refers to attachment based on calculation of the perceived costs and benefits associated with staying in an organization (for a recent extension of the construct, see Powell & Meyer, 2004). The rational calculation of costs and benefits is one of the defining attributes of individualism (Triandis, 1995) and, as noted before, in individualistic societies organizations are more likely to include commitment-enhancing features. To the extent that these costs are associated with material aspects (i.e., the costs are not seen as social costs, such as loss of friends if leaving), we would predict that increased individualism at the society level is associated with greater continuance commitment at the individual level. Hypothesis 2: Individualism is positively associated with continuance commitment.
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Finally, normative commitment is most likely to be associated with greater collectivism. This is because, in collectivistic societies, interpersonal relationships are regulated through norms and duties. In the case of organizational commitment this entails moral obligations by the family or wider community to stay in an organization, irrespective of personal feelings. The normative and reciprocal nature of personal relationships such as guanxi in shaping commitment to the organization in Chinese society is one example of this wider cultural process (Chen & Francesco, 2000; Redding, Norman, & Schlander, 1994). In contrast, in individualistic settings normative pressures are less salient, interpersonal relationships are less tight, and mutual obligations and duties are weaker (Triandis, 1995): therefore normative commitment should be less important (e.g., Smith, Fischer, & Sale, 2001). In support of this, Abrams, Ando, and Hinkle (1998) found that normative pressures were more important in more collectivistic societies such as Japan, compared with the UK. Hypothesis 3: Collectivism is positively associated with normative commitment. Focusing on power distance, the literature consistently demonstrates that in power-distant cultures status-relevant information is less important, since hierarchy is generally accepted, and the relative position of group members in firmly embedded groups is well known (e.g., Farh, Earley, & Lin, 1997; Fischer & Smith, 2006; Fischer, 2008). At the same time, these stable groups reduce the need to develop strong affective ties to the group and identification with the group. In contrast, in more egalitarian settings group members are often unaware of their relative position and status in the group, and increasing the identification and internalization of group values and goals is likely to increase perceived prototypicality, leading to higher perceived in-group status (e.g., Hogg & Terry, 2000). Therefore we propose that affective commitment is less important in power-distant and more important in egalitarian societies. Hypothesis 4: Power distance is negatively associated with affective commitment. Continuance commitment would be expected to be higher in more egalitarian contexts. In more egalitarian cultures there is weak respect for hierarchy, and a lower degree of subordination to
status hierarchies. Lower power distance is associated with a more rigorous evaluation of authorities, and an assessment of which benefits are associated with continuing attachment to these authorities (e.g., Farh et al., 1997; Fischer & Smith, 2006). Such a calculation is likely to be seen as inappropriate and rude in more power-distant settings that demand loyalty and obedience. Furthermore, in many power-distant societies such as Japan, thoughts about quitting an organization based on costs and benefits are irrelevant, because such decisions were often made a long time ago (sometimes by the parents of the individual when deciding about which course of study to take, eventually leading to a job with a particular firm). Any benefits in a company are based on long-term or time-indifferent criteria, such as seniority, age or family status (Near, 1989): therefore, calculating costs and benefits in the short term, indicative of continuance commitment, is not relevant in these contexts. Hence we propose that greater power distance is associated with lower continuance commitment. Hypothesis 5: Power distance is negatively associated with continuance commitment. Finally, the acceptance of authority in more power-distant cultures may be associated with stronger normative attachments to authorities. Organizations play an important role in most peoples lives, and employment organizations tend to be hierarchically structured. In power-distant societies there is greater emphasis on obedience and loyalty (Hofstede, 2001). Loyalty is a strong social norm in Confucian cultures such as Japan, Korea and China (e.g., Lee & Mathur, 1997). Confucian social order (Farh & Cheng, 2000; Farh et al., 1997) specifies five main relationships: emperorminister, fatherson, husbandwife, elderyounger brothers, and friendfriend. Individuals in the inferior role are supposed to be obedient and loyal, whereas the superior individual has to act benevolently and kindly. These mutual obligations regulate social interactions and form the base of a strong normative commitment of individuals to their organization and its leaders (Chen, Tsui, & Farh, 2002). As a result, normative attachment and loyalty to authorities will be higher in more power-distant cultures, leading to generalized greater normative commitment to organizations in cultures characterized by greater power distance.
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Hypothesis 6: Power distance is positively associated with normative commitment.
Commitment and Turnover Intentions Early research focusing on cross-cultural differences has observed a paradox whereby turnover and turnover intentions (as key correlates of commitment) were lower in some cultures (e.g., Japan) than in the US, whereas self-reported levels of commitment were generally higher in the US than in other cultures (Besser, 1993; Lincoln & Kalleberg, 1985, 1990). A recent meta-analysis by Meyer et al. (2002), focusing on the Affective Commitment Scale (ACS), found that the strength of the relationship between turnover cognitions and self-reported commitment was higher within the US and Canada than outside North America. However, the same analysis showed that the link between turnover cognitions and normative commitment was stronger outside North America. Applying the dimension of individualismcollectivism to the commitmentturnover intention relationship, we can make some more specific predictions. Collectivism is about normative pressures from important individuals, relations and groups within ones network (Hofstede, 1980). Therefore normative commitment is likely to be more important than affective commitment in collective contexts. For example, a study by Abrams et al. (1998) found that normative pressures were much better predictors than identification (affective commitment) of turnover intentions in Japanese organizations than in UK organizations. As discussed before, individualists are more likely to calculate the costs and benefits associated with staying in a group: therefore continuance commitment could be expected to relate more strongly to turnover intentions in individualistic settings. Furthermore, a meta-analysis by Bontempo and Rivero (1992) found that personal attitudes were stronger predictors of behavioral intentions than norms in individualistic countries, whereas in more collective contexts subjectively perceived norms were more strongly related to behavioral intentions. In line with this argument, and the defining attributes of individualism collectivism reviewed above, we predict that the link between affective and continuance commitment and turnover intentions will be weaker in collectivistic cultures, whereas the link between normative commitment and turnover intentions will be stronger in collectivistic cultures.
Hypothesis 7: The affective commitment turnover intention and continuance commitmentturnover intention relationships will be weaker in collectivistic cultures and stronger in individualistic cultures, whereas the normative commitmentturnover intention relationship will be stronger in collectivistic cultures and weaker in individualistic cultures. Similar to our arguments outlined above, loyalty is very important in power-distant contexts: therefore normative pressures are likely to be more important in predicting turnover in power-distant contexts, whereas personal (affective) or rational (continuance) attitudes would be more important for predicting turnover in egalitarian contexts. Hypothesis 8: The affective commitmentturnover intention and continuance commitment turnover intention relationships will be weaker in power-distant cultures and stronger in egalitarian cultures, whereas the normative commitment turnover intention relationship will be stronger in power-distant cultures and weaker in egalitarian cultures.
METHOD
Study Collection and Coding of Study Characteristics We searched for studies that had measured organizational commitment. An electronic literature search was conducted in PsycINFO for studies published between 1990 and 2004, using the keywords organizational commitment. In addition, the following meta-analyses were consulted to identify other studies: Jaramillo, Mulki, and Marshall (2005); Meyer et al. (2002); Randall (1990); Riketta (2002, 2005); and Riketta and Van Dick (2005). Furthermore, the following reviews of cross-cultural differences in commitment were consulted: Besser (1993); Cohen (2003) and Randall (1993). Arzu Wasti (2009) provided an additional list of commitment studies conducted outside the US. Finally, 25 researchers who have conducted studies in regions that were under-represented in the final data set were contacted to obtain unpublished data. A number of qualitative reviews (Besser, nder, 1993; Cohen, 2003; Randall, 1993; Wasti & O 2009) have found very few studies published prior to the 1990s, so a cut-off date of 1990 was used. We included only non-experimental studies
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that had measured commitment among working populations. As the majority of commitment research has been conducted in the US, we randomly selected 50 US articles from the Mathieu and Zajac (1990), Meyer et al. (2002) and Riketta (2002) meta-analyses. We then added any additional study that compared US samples with non-US samples. The following study characteristics were coded: country in which the study was conducted; sample size; percentage of males; whether the sample was blue or white collar or mixed; mean age (younger than 29 years, 29 to 39 years, older than 40 years; contrast coding comparing under 29-year-olds with over 40-year-olds); mean tenure (up to 2 years, 3 to 8 years, more than 9 years; contrast coding comparing the under-2-year group with the over-9-year tenure group); response rate; and the nature of the sample (industry, type of organization, type of jobs).
Concerning affective commitment, most studies used the Organizational Commitment Questionnaire (OCQ) (Mowday, Steers, & Porter, 1979; 52.4%), followed by the ACS (Allen & Meyer, 1990; 30.4%). Some studies used a commitment scale developed by OReilly and Chatman (1986; 4.1%) and the Cook and Wall (1980) scale (3.0%). The remainder used a mix of items from various scales or other alternate scales (10.1%). For continuance and normative commitment, we coded only studies using the Meyer and Allen scales (Allen & Meyer, 1990; Meyer, Allen, & Smith, 1993). For the turnover intentions scales, the majority of studies did not specify the origin of their items (41.1%). The Camman, Fichman, Jenkins, and Klesh (1979) scale was used most often (15.1%), followed by some version of Mobley (Mobley, 1977; Mobley, Horner, & Hollingsworth, 1978) and Hanisch and Hulin (1990, 1991) (both 6.8%) and finally Bluedorn (1982; 5.5%). The remainder of the studies used other scales.

Sector was coded as public sector vs private, mixed or unspecified. An initial coding scheme with 16 categories for industries was devised by the first author. The second author then coded all studies again. The first and second author agreed in 82% of the studies. Based on the disagreements and a further discussion, the coding scheme was revised, and categories were merged to make the coding more parsimonious. The final coding scheme classified samples into service industry, health care, manufacturing, police, army and security personnel, sales and other/mixed. The other/mixed category served as a reference category for dummy coding. For the commitment variable, the following information was coded: the commitment scale used; the number of response options (ranging from at least three rating options to 100-point Likert scales; scales that used binary yesno coding were not included); the number of items included (between 2 and 30 items, mean9 items); and reported reliability estimates. The same information was coded for turnover intentions.
Cultural Indicator Variables The cultural mean scores provided by Hofstede (2001) and the GLOBE project (House et al., 2004) were used. Missing country information was substituted by using the regional scores from the GLOBE study: for example, the mean for Arab countries was used for Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman and the United Arab Emirates; Bulgaria was given the Eastern European regional score. The mean for Yugoslavia was used for Croatia, and the Greek mean was used for Greek Cypriots. We used only the power distance, in-group collectivism and institutional collectivism dimensions of the GLOBE project. Similar to Hofstedes (1980) conceptualization, in-group collectivism measures pride in group members accomplishments and loyalty to ones group. Institutional collectivism measures the extent to which leaders and institutions foster loyalty and commitment, without designating a specific focus, making it therefore somewhat more ambiguous. This dimension did not correlate with in-group collectivism. We used both practice (as is) and value (should be) scores. These two sets of scores varied in their correlation between 0.61 (institutional collectivism practices and values) and 0.55 (in-group collectivism practices and power distance practices). A consideration of all scores provides a more comprehensive multidimensional picture of cultural influence on commitment, and the findings can be used in future research for attempts to clarify the meaning of the dimensions.
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Control Variables The gross national income per capita (GNI per capita), gross-domestic product growth per capita (GDP growth per capita) (World Bank, 2004) and average gross domestic product growth between 1990 and 2000 (World Bank, 2004) were used as economic controls, since previous work has found that these variables are highly correlated with the cultural variables of interest (e.g., Hofstede, 2001). It should be noted here that average economic growth was relatively independent of the other two variables (r0.24 with GDP growth, r0.33 with GNI), and that it was not adjusted for population differences. We used the Hong Kong indicators as a substitute for Taiwan. If sufficient data were available, we also controlled for number of items (as a proxy for reliability; see Cortina, 1993), number of response options (since this has been shown to affect mean responses; see Hui & Triandis, 1989), type of scale being used (OCQ , ACS or other), and sector and industry (since these variables might bias cultural differences; see Smith et al., 2001). Computation of Effect Sizes Concerning the mean commitment levels across studies, a common metric was first established. Reported means were converted to POMP scores (percent of maximum possible score; Cohen, Cohen, Aiken, & West, 1999). The converted scores range between 0 and 100, and have the advantage of conveying immediate meaning and allowing direct comparisons of scores across alternative scorings, test versions and populations (see Fischer & Chalmers, 2008, for an application with metaanalyses). The standard error of these means was calculated by using the standard deviation divided by the square root of the sample size (Lipsey & Wilson, 2001). Missing standard deviations were imputed using the means for the respective scale and response format. The reported correlations between commitment and turnover intention were used in the second set of analyses. Correlations with intentions to stay were inversed to make them consistent with the intention to leave scales. We then transformed the correlations using Fisher r-to-z transformation (see Rosenthal, 1991, 1994). Analytical Strategy To test the effects of cultural variation, we used a mixed-effects model (Lipsey & Wilson, 2001). A mixed-effects model has the advantage of
combining random and fixed-effects models. Traditionally, researchers have used fixed-effects models for meta-analysis, where effect sizes are seen as direct replications of each other, where it can be assumed that all studies are measuring the same effect size (all samples are drawn from the same population), and where only subject-level sampling error is allowed. In contrast, random-effects models assume that studies are random samples drawn from a population of studies: therefore both subject-level sampling error and random differences between samples are considered (Lipsey & Wilson, 2001; van den Noortgate & Onghena, 2001). It has been shown that random-effects models provide more adequate representations of most meta-analytical data sets (Konstantopoulos & Hedges, 2004). The major advantage of a mixed-effects model approach is that it allows generalization of findings beyond the particular studies sampled, increasing the generalizability of the findings. Mixed-effects models use a random-effects approach to estimating the effect sizes, considering both subject-level sampling error and a random study-sampling component. However, these models go beyond the random-effects approach by allowing the testing of whether this component may be systematic and explicable by specific study characteristics, beyond just simple random variation (Lipsey & Wilson, 2001). A more detailed discussion of the different approaches can be found in Field (2003), Hedges and Olkin (1985), Hox and de Leeuw (2003), Konstantopoulos and Hedges (2004), and van den Noortgate and Onghena (2001). We conducted a three-level variance known meta-analysis using the Hierarchical Linear and Nonlinear Modeling (HLM) program (Raudenbush & Bryk, 2002; Raudenbush, Bryk, Cheong, & Congdon, 2004). HLM is a standard program for analyzing hierarchical or nested data. One main difference between meta-analytical data and other hierarchical data sets is that in meta-analysis the variance of each effect size is assumed to be known (based on the standard deviation and the sample size in our case). Hence this so-called varianceknown hierarchical linear model treats the study effect sizes (standardized commitment means and correlations in our case) as random effects at level 1 (level of effect sizes); study characteristics (industry and method effects) are included at level 2 (the study level), and country (including cultural and economic effects) at level 3. Random effects were included at both level 2 and level 3. We used full maximum likelihood estimation. The aim of the
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analysis is to estimate the average effect size across studies, and to estimate and explain the variance of the effect size parameters (Raudenbush & Bryk, 2002). We used grand-mean centering for all continuous variables at level 3. The procedure is described more fully in the Appendix.
ciated with lower commitment. Third, stronger current economic growth was associated with lower affective commitment.
RESULTS
Affective Organizational Commitment Across Cultures The final data set consisted of 215 articles that reported 352 independent samples with a total N of 105,335 (Table 1). The weighted mean using a random-effects model was 61.07 with an associated standard error of 0.461. The Q statistic (Hedges & Olkin, 1985; Lipsey & Wilson, 2001) was highly significant (Q61,966.55, d.f.351, po0.001), indicating that the means were very heterogeneous. 22.89% of the variance in means was due to national background. Therefore a search for moderator variables was warranted, and we tested whether culture-level variables could explain this variability, controlling for measurement artifacts, industry and economic characteristics. Table 2 reports the raw correlation between all coded study characteristics (excluding macroeconomic and cultural indicators) and affective commitment means. Table 3 reports the study-level correlations between the macroeconomic and cultural indicators and commitment means (and commitmentturnover intentions correlations). First, the correlations with Hofstedes indicators were not significant (see Table 3). The HLM analysis of the Hofstede indicators (with 48 countries; see Table 4) showed, that after controlling for method, industry and economic effects, neither individualism nor power distance was significant, rejecting Hypotheses 1 and 4. Second, correlations between in-group collectivism as is scores and commitment were significant, but positive (contradicting Hypothesis 1). In the HLM analysis, the GLOBE cultural practices (with 48 countries) did not reach commonly accepted significance levels. Third, none of the GLOBE values significantly correlated with the means at the effect size level. This is confirmed in the HLM analyses, since none of the value indicators was significant. A few points about the control variables are also worth noting. First, the Meyer and Allen scale (the ACS) showed lower means on average than the OCQ. Second, greater current income was asso-
Continuance Organizational Commitment Across Cultures A total of 67 samples with 15,734 participants from 31 countries were analyzed. The average sample sizeweighted mean computed using a random-effects model was 51.11. The standard error was 1.049. The Q statistic was highly significant: Q(66)5846.04, po0.001, justifying our moderator analysis. 13.67% of the total variance was due to country differences. There were not enough sales samples: therefore we did not include it in the following analyses. We had cultural estimates for all 30 countries. For Hofstede indicators, none of the correlations was significant. In the HLM analysis, against our predictions, greater power distance was associated with greater continuance commitment. Therefore there was no support for Hypothesis 5. Second, for the GLOBE practices no zeroorder correlation was significant. This was also found in the HLM analyses, rejecting Hypotheses 2 and 5. Finally, contrary to predictions, power distance values were positively correlated with continuance commitment. In the HLM analysis, none of the GLOBE values significantly predicted continuance commitment. In line with the correlations, power distance values approached significance (p0.06). When using only the GLOBE values (and not controlling for economic variables), the effect became significant (po0.05); however, the direction was opposite to what we predicted. Similar to the Hofstede analysis reported above, greater power distance was associated with a tendency towards higher continuance commitment (Table 5). Normative Organizational Commitment Across Cultures There were 52 samples from 30 countries with a total of 12,204 participants. The average sample size weighted mean computed using a random-effects model was 38.924. The standard error was 1.617. The Q statistic was highly significant: Q(51)12,329.85, po0.001. 71.08% of the total variance was due to sampling location. We therefore estimated the effect of cultural variables, after accounting for method, industry and economic effects. Similarly to continuance commitment, we did not include sales samples as a control variable.
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Table 1
Descriptive statistics for sample size weighted means per country
Affective commitment k Argentina Australia Bangladesh Belgium Brazil Bulgaria Canada China, Peoples Republic Croatia Cyprus Denmark Finland France Germany Greece Guatemala Hong Kong Hungary India Ireland Israel Italy Japan Jordan Kuwait Malaysia Malta Mexico Nepal Netherlands New Zealand Norway Oman Pakistan Philippines Poland Portugal Russia Saudi Arabia Singapore South Africa South Korea Spain Sweden Taiwan Turkey United Arab Emirates United Kingdom USA 1 24 2 10 2 1 22 10 2 1 2 5 1 13 1 3 15 3 16 1 26 1 9 1 1 1 1 4 1 7 5 4 1 2 1 1 2 2 5 16 5 18 4 4 3 2 7 14 68 N 203 7576 289 2340 640 565 4996 2451 762 40 732 629 40 3529 33 310 3018 1476 2032 89 5388 58 5943 45 297 286 108 745 103 2464 2352 5415 153 1116 114 143 280 1978 384 2668 504 9138 1135 1739 1487 1252 2288 3210 22,720 x 66.50 60.61 74.75 55.79 64.87 68.25 58.08 60.14 64.17 62.33 57.44 66.49 66.50 57.75 63.75 70.11 56.10 54.02 69.00 40.00 66.66 58.75 57.38 65.00 49.00 73.00 79.50 70.50 86.80 60.52 54.47 59.64 65.67 34.90 58.17 64.33 60.74 53.15 64.28 59.15 62.11 57.54 45.47 58.15 64.04 62.22 72.43 60.65 61.40 sex 8.04 1.66 5.69 2.55 5.68 7.99 1.72 2.54 5.67 8.29 5.75 3.62 8.33 2.26 8.41 4.68 2.08 4.61 2.02 8.03 1.58 8.22 2.68 8.16 8.00 8.00 8.06 4.03 8.03 3.06 3.59 4.00 8.08 5.73 8.10 8.04 5.77 5.66 3.63 2.02 3.61 1.89 4.05 4.04 4.61 5.64 3.03 2.16 0.98 k 1 3 3 2 11 3 2 1 1 1 2 1 3 1 1 1 1 1
Continuance commitment N 203 781 475 640 2593 300 762 50 56 40 866 33 1120 159 89 183 58 45 x 60.50 52.19 47.51 40.37 56.64 59.08 52.50 50.75 41.00 45.50 52.52 35.50 52.57 28.67 56.67 32.50 42.75 70.00 sex 5.98 3.50 3.50 4.22 1.82 3.48 4.22 6.30 6.26 6.40 4.31 6.50 3.01 6.00 6.01 6.06 6.25 6.09 k 1 3 1 2 6 1 2 1 1 1 2 1 2 1 1 1 1
Normative commitment N 203 781 58 640 1582 103 762 50 56 40 866 33 345 159 89 58 45 x 59.50 41.68 13.50 44.10 42.96 44.25 50.02 7.75 13.50 18.00 23.46 15.50 51.02 57.67 49.00 13.00 52.50 sex 5.99 3.44 6.13 4.22 2.46 6.10 4.22 6.17 6.14 6.25 4.25 6.32 3.44 5.94 6.10 6.13 5.99
1 1 1 1 1
383 103 21 145 153
59.25 68.80 54.50 45.17 63.17
5.97 6.29 6.82 6.12 6.08
1 1 1 1 1
383 103 21 145 153
63.50 68.80 5.00 43.50 59.00
5.93 6.26 6.57 6.05 5.97
280
32.59
4.36
280
22.59
4.31
4 2 1 2 3 1 7
1281 719 51 1252 982 61 1657
44.16 51.90 38.75 48.96 55.06 48.25 53.27
2.98 4.37 6.30 4.18 3.48 6.23 2.27
3 2 1 2 2 1 5
1054 719 51 1252 835 61 1084
40.48 22.26 10.75 56.67 61.18 11.75 40.75
3.43 4.30 6.17 4.15 4.19 6.12 2.86
Note: knumber of studies; Nnumber of participants; xmean effect; sestandard error.
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Table 2
Intercorrelation matrix between coded study variables and affective commitment levels
1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Affective commitment Number of items Number of response options ACS vs OCQ Other scales vs OCQ Public vs private sector Service industry vs other Health care vs other Manufacturing industry vs other Army and police vs other Sales vs other 0.12* 0.16** 0.22** 0.03 0.01 0.01 0.02 0.01 0.04 0.12**
10
11
0.16** 0.38** 0.16** 0.08 0.05 0.00 0.09 0.25** 0.10
0.11* 0.34** 0.06 0.06 0.05 0.07 0.03 0.04
0.32** 0.16** 0.05 0.02 0.14** 0.12** 0.11*
0.07 0.13* 0.12* 0.09 0.06 0.12*
0.07 0.10 0.14** 0.08 0.08
0.12* 0.18** 0.13* 0.11* 0.08 0.11* 0.11* 0.07 0.10 0.06
*po0.05; **po0.01.
Table 3
Rank-order correlation between macroeconomic and cultural indicators and coded means and correlations at the effect size level
Means Affective commitment Hofstede Individualism Power distance GLOBE as is In-group collectivism Institutional collectivism Power distance GLOBE should be In-group collectivism Institutional collectivism Power distance Economic indicators Gross national income per capita Gross domestic product growth per capita Average gross domestic growth 19902000
*po0.05; **po0.01.
Correlations with turnover intentions Normative commitment Affective commitment Continuance commitment Normative commitment
Continuance commitment
0.04 0.09
0.09 0.17
0.29* 0.53**
0.27* 0.16
0.38 0.30
0.65** 0.16
0.16** 0.01 0.02
0.10 0.04 0.19
0.60** 0.07 0.31*
0.27* 0.08 0.02
0.31 0.18 0.38
0.16 0.06 0.51*
0.01 0.07 0.00
0.03 0.10 0.29*
0.02 0.21 0.15
0.16 0.18 0.05
0.09 0.27 0.39
0.20 0.33 0.59*
0.18** 0.13* 0.18**
0.06 0.10 0.13
0.48** 0.06 0.54**
0.28* 0.10 0.22
0.27 0.59** 0.08
0.26 0.72** 0.21
First, Hofstedes individualism indicator correlated negatively with normative commitment means (in line with Hypothesis 3) and positively with power distance (in line with Hypothesis 6). These effects were not significant in the standard HLM analysis. When using robust standard errors, the effect for power distance became significant (po0.05), supporting Hypothesis 6.
Second, both in-group collectivism and power distance practices correlated positively with normative commitment (supporting Hypotheses 3 and 6). Running the HLM analysis, only in-group collectivism practices remained a significant predictor after controlling for other variables. In line with Hypothesis 3, greater collectivism was associated with more normative commitment. No other cultural variable was significant.
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Table 4
Results of mixed-effects meta-analysis predicting affective commitment levels
Cultural effects: Hofstede Intercept (mean) Control variables (level 2) Number of items Number of response options ACS vs OCQ Other scales vs OCQ Service industry vs other Health care vs other Manufacturing industry vs other Army and police vs other Sales vs other Proportion of explained variance (level 2) Random effect (R0) Country variables (level 3) Gross national income per capita Gross domestic product growth per capita Average gross domestic growth 19902000 Cultural variables Power distance Individualism In-group collectivism Institutional collectivism Power distance Proportion of explained variance at level 3 Random effect (U00)
*po0.05; **po0.01.
Culture effects: GLOBE as is 63.940
Culture effects: GLOBE should be 63.871
64.061
0.312 0.133 5.203** 1.009 0.003 0.115 2.372 4.253* 2.876 7.35% 70.86**
0.251 0.107 5.042** 1.155 0.072 0.171 2.051 4.289 3.121 7.38% 70.85**
0.191 0.096 4.869** 1.197 0.0223 0.196 2.212 4.338 2.981 6.99% 71.14**
0.0002* 0.891** 0.421
0.0002* 0.817* 0.817
0.0003** 0.942** 0.321
0.090 0.092 0.460 0.796 1.776 47.21% 11.99** 0.258 2.153 2.124 50.83% 11.17**
54.68% 10.23**
Finally, none of the GLOBE value dimensions correlated significantly at the effect size level. In line with this, the HLM analysis did not show any significant effects for the GLOBE value dimensions. It is worth noting that GDP growth per capita was a significant predictor. Greater economic growth was consistently and negatively associated with normative commitment. Second, an increasing number of response options were associated with higher normative means, but an increased number of items led to lower means. Finally, health-care samples showed lower normative commitment compared with other samples (Table 6).
The Affective CommitmentTurnover Intention Relationship Overall, data from 19,992 participants from 74 samples were available. The average correlation across all studies was 0.522. The variance across studies was 0.014. Following Rosenthal (1991, 1994)
and Hox and de Leeuw (2003), we z-transformed the raw correlations. The resulting mean correlation was 0.593, with an associated standard error of 0.007. The Q statistic was highly significant again (Q363.24, d.f.73, po0.01), indicating that the effect sizes were highly heterogeneous. 8.18% of the variance in correlations was due to sampling of countries. We had 26 countries in all our analyses (Table 7). Investigating correlations with cultural indices at the study level first, greater individualism as measured by Hofstede was associated with stronger (more negative) correlations between affective commitment and turnover intentions (see Table 3). Similarly, greater institutional collectivism values and greater in-group collectivism values as measured by the GLOBE researchers were associated with weaker (less negative) correlations between affective commitment and turnover intentions. The link between affective ties to the organization and turnover intentions was therefore stronger
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Table 5
Results of mixed-effects meta-analysis predicting continuance commitment levels
Cultural effects: Hofstede Intercept (mean) Control variables (level 2) Number of items Number of response options Service industry vs other Health care vs other Manufacturing industry vs other Army and police vs other Proportion of explained variance at level 2 Random effect (R0) Country variables (level 3) Gross national income per capita Gross domestic product growth per capita Average gross domestic growth 19902000 Cultural variables Power distance Individualism In-group collectivism Institutional collectivism Power distance Explained variance Random effect (U00)
*po0.05; **po 0.01.
50.487
1.355 0.004 3.061 7.912* 5.364 17.468 3.87% 72.28**
1.403 0.366 5.068 5.954 4.601 21.341 12.79% 65.57**
1.650 0.849 1.650 8.529 3.544 18.941 3.91% 72.24**
0.0001 0.202 1.024
0.0001 0.345 0.099
0.0002 0.301 0.218
0.200* 0.176 5.892 3.943 5.335 58.96%% 11.32** 0.641 2.478 10.494 99.86% 0.04*
99.78% 0.16*
in more individualistic cultures. This supports Hypothesis 1. Using the more stringent HLM analysis, after accounting for method, industry and economic indicators, neither Hofstedes power distance nor individualism (which had shown a significant zeroorder correlation) emerged as a significant predictor. Excluding economic indicators, the effects for Hofstedes indicators were not significant either. Second, among the GLOBE practice dimensions, only in-group collectivism was significantly correlated with the affective commitmentturnover intentions correlation. This effect was not significant in the HLM analysis when including economic variables (unstandardized coefficient: 0.089, p40.20). When excluding the economic variables, the effect became significant (unstandardized coefficient: 0.134, po0.01). In line with Hypothesis 7, higher collectivism was associated with a weaker relationship between affective commitment and intentions to turnover (all between-country variance was accounted for by this effect). Finally, none of the GLOBE value dimensions related significantly to affective commitmentturn-
over intentions, neither in the zero-order correlations nor after controlling for method, industry and economic indicators in the HLM analyses. Across all three analyses, sales representatives had significantly weaker correlations (coefficients ranging between 0.232 and 0.282, po0.01) compared with representative and general working populations, indicating that affective commitment is not as strongly related to turnover intentions among salespeople. Gross national income per capita emerged as a significant predictor (unstandardized coefficient: 4.006, po0.05), explaining all the between-country variance. In higher income countries, the correlation between affective commitment and intentions to turnover was somewhat stronger. The detailed results are available from the first author.
Continuance CommitmentTurnover Intention Relationship A total of 21 samples with a total number of 6396 individuals was used. The z-transformed mean correlation was 0.190 (standard error0.014).
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Table 6
Results of mixed-effects meta-analysis predicting normative commitment levels
Cultural effects: Hofstede Intercept (mean) Control variables (level 2) Number of items Number of response options Service industry vs other Health care vs other Manufacturing industry vs other Army and police vs other Proportion of explained variance at level 2 Random effect (R0) Country variables (level 3) Gross national income per capita Gross domestic product growth per capita Average gross domestic growth 19902000 Cultural variables Power distance Individualism In-group collectivism Institutional collectivism Power distance Explained variance Random effect (U00)
*po0.05; **po0.01.
38.282
2.912** 2.951* 4.421 14.368** 7.148 6.030 72.71% 29.66**
2.958** 2.849* 2.282 14.026** 7.848 6.156 74.03% 28.24**
2.644** 2.854* 4.716 13.934** 8.205* 6.783 73.10% 29.25**
0.0005 1.081* 2.141*
0.0000 1.178* 0.676
0.0007** 1.256* 1.676
0.229 0.179 10.709* 3.750 4.972 80.07% 51.54** 6.005 4.018 7.828 81.80% 48.64**
80.04% 53.34**
36.27% of the variance was due to country differences. Owing to the small number of available studies and countries (k10), we conducted exploratory correlation analyses at the country level. Cultural variables were not significantly related to these correlations. Hypotheses 7 and 8 were therefore not confirmed. For economic indicators, greater GDP growth was associated with a strengthened continuance commitmentturnover intention relationship (r0.80, po0.01). Therefore the link between continuance commitment and turnover intentions is stronger in faster-growing economies. All these results are available from the first author.
The Normative CommitmentTurnover Intention Relationship Our data set consisted of 16 samples with a total of 5210 participants from 10 countries. The z-transformed correlation across samples was 0.482 with a standard error of 0.014. The variance due to country was 72.97%. At the effect size level, a correlation with Hofstedes individualism
suggested, in line with Hypothesis 7, that stronger individualism is associated with weaker links between normative commitment and turnover intention. Correlations at the study level also indicated that power distance practices correlated negatively, but power distance values correlated positively with the normative commitmentturnover intention relationship. This indicates that power distance practices within a society lead to stronger (more negative) links between normative commitment and turnover intentions (supporting our Hypothesis 8), but greater valued power distance is associated with weaker (more positive) normative commitmentturnover intention correlations (rejecting our Hypothesis 8). However, when examining these correlations at the country level (thereby taking into account dependencies due to country), none of the culture-level variables remained significant.
DISCUSSION Our findings extend previous research in a number of ways. First, we extend previous research by providing a theoretical account of how power
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Table 7
Commitmentturnover intentions relationship
Affective commitment K Australia Bangladesh Belgium Bulgaria Canada Croatia Germany Hong Kong Hungary India Ireland Israel Japan Mexico Nepal New Zealand NL Poland PRC Russia Singapore South Africa South Korea Taiwan Turkey UK USA 4 2 3 1 2 2 1 4 1 2 1 7 2 1 1 4 1 3 1 5 1 4 2 2 2 15 N 909 289 804 565 964 762 1021 859 614 261 89 1562 116 127 103 896 143 833 180 1174 112 1281 1123 1252 96 3857 r 0.525 0.344 0.540 0.570 0.420 0.539 0.510 0.354 0.590 0.413 0.460 0.475 0.527 0.370 0.240 0.577 0.680 0.476 0.564 0.518 0.430 0.592 0.504 0.546 0.698 0.579 k 2
Normative commitment N 613 r 0.252 k 2 1 1 1 603 762 0.309 0.678 1 2
Continuance commitment N 613 201 603 762 r 0.002 0.103 0.000 0.422
1 1
159 89
0.070 0.459
1 1 1
159 89 183
0.151 0.321 0.046
1 1
103 145
0.172 0.485
1 1
103 145
0.050 0.161
3 2 2
1054 1252 478
0.621 0.614 0.233
4 2 4
1281 1252 1068
0.153 0.304 0.214
distance and individualismcollectivism at the culture level can be linked to all three dimensions of organizational commitment and the link between commitment and turnover intentions. Second, we empirically test these relationships on large samples using independent cultural indicators. Third, we demonstrate that cultural variables are systematically related to commitment, but are generally less powerful in explaining differences in commitment. Method and macroeconomic variables are better able to account for cross-cultural differences, and these variables should take a more central role in commitment research. We will discuss these effects in turn.
Mean Levels of Commitment: Control Variables Effects One of the most consistent results was the relatively strong influence of our macroeconomic control variables on commitment levels, particularly affective and normative commitment. Such an
influence might be expected, as it has been observed that economic development is strongly correlated with cultural indicators, particularly individualismcollectivism (Hofstede, 2001). In less economically developed societies individuals are more likely to grow up in socially crowded living spaces with greater material and social interdependencies (Kagitc ibasi, 1997; see also Fischer, Milfont, & Gouveia, forthcoming). The material dependencies on those in paid employment to support families and the greater intergenerational interdependencies (e.g., children taking care of parents and grandparents) are likely to increase normative pressures to remain with one organization. If a larger number of individuals are dependent on ones income, the social pressures to stay with an organization are likely to be greater. Similarly, affective ties to important in-groups are likely to be influenced by material conditions. Recent economic performance (controlling for past growth) is associated with a weakening of affective
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ties because of potentially increased opportunities in the larger economy. This suggests that expectancies and exchange principles are important contextual antecedent variables that have been under-represented in previous commitment research (see Meyer & Allen, 1991). The meaning of commitment may also change in different macroeconomic conditions. It might be that, in poorer and less developed contexts, commitment aspects may be less clearly differentiated and influence each other. To test for such effects, we used the observed correlations between commitment forms and correlated it with our macroeconomic indicators (reporting only correlations larger than |0.30|). We found that increasing income per capita (in 2004) was associated with smaller correlations between the continuance and affective commitment components, r0.32, po0.05 (based on observations from 21 countries), and with smaller continuance and normative commitment correlations, r0.31, p0.08 (based on observations in 19 countries); and the relationship between normative and affective commitment increased in faster-growing contexts (in 2004): r0.47, po0.05 (based on observations in 19 countries). This indicates that the continuance commitment component is more highly correlated with affective and normative components in lower income contexts, and therefore these commitment components might be less distinguishable in more adverse economic contexts. Identification with ones organization and normative obligations might be driven more strongly by economic calculations than by value judgements or perceived group pressure. These findings suggest that the macroeconomic context has an influence on the conceptualization of commitment. This provides an interesting and largely neglected avenue for further research on the meaning of commitment in context. Turning to method control variables, we found that an increasing number of response options was associated with higher reported normative commitment means. Research on cultural response styles (Hui & Triandis, 1989) has reported that changing the number of response categories may lead to different response means across different groups. Consequently, researchers have to consider how the number of response categories or options is likely to affect responding in their samples. This method artifact requires more attention, in order to help researchers in developing and using appropriate research tools. Using comparable metrics across
instruments and studies would also help in making results more comparable across studies (Cohen et al., 1999).
Mean Levels of Commitment: Country-Level Effects Focusing on our substantive hypotheses, we did not find significant effects of country-level values or practices on affective commitment, after controlling for macroeconomic variables. It appears that macroeconomic conditions are more important for explaining affective ties to organizations than more distal cultural variables. By contrast, in collectivistic settings, normative commitment was found to be higher, which supported our hypothesis. Normative pressures are typically higher in societies in which people are well integrated in their immediate in-groups, leading to greater normative ties to organizations. It should be emphasized that we are concerned with countrylevel effects. It may well be possible that a different relationship is found at the individual level (e.g., Kirkman & Shapiro, 2001; Wasti, 2003). At the individual level, individuals endorsing more collectivistic values are more likely to focus on personal relationships rather than contextual organizational factors, which may then lead to a positive relationship between collectivism and affective commitment. It is also important to notice that affective and normative commitment components are highly correlated at the individual level, potentially leading to spillover effects. Similar discrepancies across levels (individual vs country) have been observed with regard to job satisfaction (Hui, Yee, & Eastman, 1995). This highlights the importance of distinguishing clearly between effects across levels (Kirkman et al., 2006). Second, we observed a significant effect of both Hofstedes power distance measure and the GLOBE power distance value scores, contrary to what was predicted in Hypothesis 5. We had predicted that continuance commitment levels should be lower in more collectivistic and power-distant settings, since in the calculation of economic benefits the costs associated with leaving are thought to be unacceptable in these settings (e.g., Boyacigiller & Adler, 1991; Farh et al., 1997; Near, 1989). The current pattern suggests that individuals in collectivistic and power-distant settings show higher levels of continuance commitment. Continuance commitment consists of two subcomponents: low perceived alternatives to the current organization, and high personal sacrifices
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associated with leaving (McGee & Ford, 1987; Meyer et al., 2002). We did not have sufficient studies to separate these two components across cultures. However, it has been observed that in collective and hierarchical settings rewards are often allocated on non-performance-based criteria (e.g., seniority, family status), and decisions to join or leave an organization are often made by parents or the wider family (Near, 1989). Powell and Meyer (2004) argued that costs could also be based on social considerations, rather than on rational economic considerations. Therefore it may be that the sacrifices of leaving are very high, and perceived alternatives based on multiple considerations along both economic and social dimensions are low in highly collective and hierarchical contexts. The evaluation of the costs associated with leaving has larger implications when a greater number of people would be affected and involved. Commitment components could be blurred in these contexts. Indeed, an examination of the relationship between continuance commitment with affective and normative commitment suggests that in more hierarchical and more collective settings continuance commitment is less clearly differentiated from the other two components. For example, the correlation between normative and continuance commitment increased with increasing GLOBE power distance practices (r0.47, po0.05), increasing in-group collectivism practices (r0.35, po0.05) and decreasing Hofstede individualism (r0.36, po0.05). The continuance and affective commitment correlation increased with Hofstedes power distance (r0.42, po0.05), greater GLOBE collectivism practices (r0.42, po0.05), and increasing in-group collectivism practices (r0.38, po0.05). Therefore the meaning of continuance commitment seems to have stronger social implications in collectivistic and power-distant contexts, leading to increased levels of this commitment component.
previous research (e.g., Abrams et al., 1998), affective commitment is less strongly associated with turnover intentions in more collectivistic settings. We also found a trend showing stronger correlations between normative commitment and turnover intentions in collectivistic settings. This is in line with previous evidence that, in more collective cultures, norms are stronger predictors of behavioral intentions, whereas in more individualistic societies attitudes (affective commitment) are better predictors of intentions (Bontempo & Rivero, 1992). We had small samples of countries; these findings need more rigorous testing in a larger set of samples. However, the current findings provide a good starting point for important cultural processes to be explored.
CommitmentTurnover Intentions Correlation Our second set of analyses revealed that affective commitment was most strongly related to turnover intentions, followed by normative and then continuance commitment. These results replicate previous findings (e.g., Mathieu & Zajac, 1990; Meyer et al., 2002). However, our analysis extends previous results by specifically considering cultural variation in these relationships. We found significant relationships for in-group collectivism practices, supporting Hypothesis 7. In line with
LIMITATIONS A post hoc coding scheme was used to classify organizations and jobs. The information available and the nature of the samples did not allow the use of a more sophisticated approach. Meyer and Allen (1991) also noted the absence of systematic research on more distal organizational antecedents, whereas more research includes more proximal work experiences (e.g., Meyer et al., 2002). Our analysis has shown that it would be interesting to investigate more structural antecedents. Future primary research might differentiate more precisely between industry types and job classification to disentangle any effects. Only main effects were investigated. Interactions between the explanatory variables might have been able to explain some more variance in our models. However, the number of studies and number of countries available would not allow such analyses without further compromising power in detecting effects. Finally, the majority of studies used scales developed in Western contexts, and our analysis does not rule out the possibility that more culturally sensitive measures and constructs developed in different contexts might show different results. For example, Wasti (2003) has developed an emic measure of commitment in a Turkish context and it would be interesting to investigate whether such emic measures would differ in their means and correlations compared with imposed Western instruments. CONCLUSIONS We conducted two sets of meta-analyses to empirically examine cultural differences in organizational commitment. First, we were able to show consistent
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but relatively small culture-level effects. Affective commitment is higher in more individualistic settings, whereas normative commitment increases with collectivism and power distance at the country level. Our results also suggest that the continuance commitment levels increase in more power-distant settings, potentially because of the larger social pressures and costs associated with leaving an organization. Concerning turnover intentions, individual attitudes (affective commitment) are less strongly associated with turnover intentions in collectivistic settings, in which normative pressures (normative commitment) become more important. Furthermore, our use of mixed-effects meta-analysis means we are now in a position to generalize these effects to other studies. Nevertheless, our results also suggest that cultural effects based on these findings are not particularly strong. It would be meaningful to investigate other effects (within cultural contexts) to investigate more clearly the unexplained variability in both means and correlations of commitment components across our samples. Our analyses provide preliminary evidence for the importance of economic variables. The interesting patterns of interrelationships between economic variables, cultural variables and commitment components should be more thoroughly investigated.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to thank the Editor, Lorraine Eden, the former Departmental Editor, Mark Peterson, and five anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions, in particular one reviewer who checked our analyses. We would also like to thank Peter B. Smith and Birgit Schyns for comments on previous drafts. We would like to acknowledge Michael Riketta and Arzu Wasti for their support and willingness to share information, as well as all the scholars who provided additional information on published or unpublished studies. A previous version of this paper has been presented at the International Congress of the International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology in Xian, PRC in July 2004.
NOTE House et al. (2004) distinguished between two different types of individualismcollectivism, and also measured these dimensions using two different formats (as is and should be indicators). We do not make differential predictions, since the interpretation and the meaning of these constructs are debated (Fischer, 2009; Hofstede, 2006; Peterson, 2004; Smith, 2006).
1
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APPENDIX
Three-Level Meta-analysis With HLM Meta-analysis is a special form of a hierarchical model, since individuals are nested within studies. One main difference between meta-analytical data and other hierarchical data sets is that in metaanalysis the variance of each effect size is assumed to be known (the sampling variance of individuals within studies). Therefore meta-analytical problems belong to a category of so-called variance-known or v-known models. For meta-analysis, level 1 is typically the effect size, and level 2 includes variables at the study level. Using a random-effects approach to meta-analysis, this set-up better reflects the reality of real-world data structures, and prevents spuriously significant effects (Field, 2003). Cross-cultural meta-analysis adds another level to this hierarchy, since individual studies are nested within countries. At level 1, the base-level of a random-effects meta-analysis is
ESijk g000 r0 u00 A:1
where ESijk is the estimated effect size i of study j in country k; g000 is an estimate of the true unknown
1358
effect size (the population parameter, the intercept); r0 is the random study effect that is differences between studies that are the result of sampling variation; and u00 is the random country effect. In our analysis, we were interested in the effects of level 3 (country) variables on the average mean or correlation, while controlling for level 2 variation. Therefore our model is an intercepts-asoutcomes model, with variables at level 2 and 3 to explain the variability in effect sizes (the intercepts). The following equations follow the format of the equations as used in HLM. At level 2, we can add study effect variables that can explain variability in mean effect sizes: ESijk g000 g010 Xjk r0 u00 A: 2 where Xjk is a fixed effect of study-level variables at level 2. In our analysis this includes both study variables (type of scale being used, number of items, number of response options) and sample variables (professional group, sector). At level 3, we can add country effect variables that also explain variability in mean effect sizes: ESijk g000 g001 Zk r0 u00 A: 3 where Zk is the effect of country-level variables on mean effect sizes. In our analysis this includes macroeconomic variables and culture-level values and practices. To give an example of an equation including predictors at level 2 and 3: ESijk g000 g010 Number of Itemsjk g020 Number of Response Optionsjk g001 Power Distancek g002 Individualismk r0 u00 A: 4
HLML: the batch mode and the windows interface. Multivariate v-known analysis is available only via the batch mode, but is restricted to two levels only (see Raudenbush et al., 2004: 184189). Three-level analysis can be conducted with HLM 3 via the windows interface (see Raudenbush et al., 2004: 189). The data preparation and construction of the MDM file (multivariate data matrix) follows the same sequence as for normal multilevel analyses. Three data files (one for each level) are needed. The effect size and sampling variance of each effect size need to be included in the level 1 file. To run the analysis, the researcher needs to specify the sampling variance at level 1. In HLM 6, this can be done by going to Other Settings, selecting Estimation Settings and Weighting. There, the known level 1 variance can be selected using the pulldown menu under Known variance. This will automatically set sigma^2 to 1.0 (see Hox & de Leeuw, 2003). The default estimation method is Full Information Maximum Likelihood Estimation. The rest of the analysis is identical to standard multilevel analyses. A more detailed discussion of traditional vs multilevel meta-analysis and fixed vs randomeffects meta-analytical approaches can be found in Field (2003), Hedges and Olkin (1985), Hox and de Leeuw (2003), Konstantopoulos and Hedges (2004), and van den Noortgate and Onghena (2001).
In our analysis, we have expanded this model by including a larger set of predictors at each level. Continuous variables were grand-mean-centered. Dummy-coded variables (professional group, sector) were entered uncentered. These models can be run in the Hierarchical Linear and Nonlinear Modeling (HLM) program (Raudenbush & Bryk, 2002; Raudenbush et al., 2004). HLM is a standard program for analyzing hierarchical or nested data. Two options are available for running two-level meta-analyses in
ABOUT THE AUTHORS Ronald Fischer (Ronald.Fischer@vuw.ac.nz) was born in former East Germany and has German citizenship. He received his PhD in Social Psychology from Sussex University, UK. He is working as a Senior Lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington. His main research focuses on cultural differences in attitudes and behavior in applied settings and crosscultural research methods. He is an Associate Editor of the Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology.
Angela Mansell (Angela_Mansell@yahoo.co.nz) is a native New Zealander and received her PhD in Psychology from Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. She is currently working as a senior analyst with the Ministry of Health. Her research interests are in organizational and health system performance.
Accepted by Lorraine Eden, Editor-in-Chief, 15 November 2008. This paper has been with the authors for five revisions.

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Journal of International Business Studies (2009) 40, 13391358

& 2009 Academy of International Business All rights reserved 0047-2506

Commitment across cultures: A meta-analytical approach

Commitment across cultures

Ronald Fischer and Angela Mansell

Journal of International Business Studies

Commitment across cultures

Ronald Fischer and Angela Mansell

Journal of International Business Studies

Commitment across cultures

Ronald Fischer and Angela Mansell

Journal of International Business Studies

Commitment across cultures

Ronald Fischer and Angela Mansell

Hypothesis 6: Power distance is positively associated with normative commitment.

Journal of International Business Studies

Commitment across cultures

Ronald Fischer and Angela Mansell

Journal of International Business Studies

Commitment across cultures

Ronald Fischer and Angela Mansell

Journal of International Business Studies

Commitment across cultures

Ronald Fischer and Angela Mansell

Journal of International Business Studies

Commitment across cultures

Ronald Fischer and Angela Mansell

Descriptive statistics for sample size weighted means per country

383 103 21 145 153

59.25 68.80 54.50 45.17 63.17

5.97 6.29 6.82 6.12 6.08

383 103 21 145 153

63.50 68.80 5.00 43.50 59.00

5.93 6.26 6.57 6.05 5.97

1281 719 51 1252 982 61 1657

44.16 51.90 38.75 48.96 55.06 48.25 53.27

2.98 4.37 6.30 4.18 3.48 6.23 2.27

1054 719 51 1252 835 61 1084

40.48 22.26 10.75 56.67 61.18 11.75 40.75

3.43 4.30 6.17 4.15 4.19 6.12 2.86

Note: knumber of studies; Nnumber of participants; xmean effect; sestandard error.

Journal of International Business Studies

Commitment across cultures

Ronald Fischer and Angela Mansell

0.16** 0.38** 0.16** 0.08 0.05 0.00 0.09 0.25** 0.10

0.11* 0.34** 0.06 0.06 0.05 0.07 0.03 0.04

0.32** 0.16** 0.05 0.02 0.14** 0.12** 0.11*

0.07 0.13* 0.12* 0.09 0.06 0.12*

0.07 0.10 0.14** 0.08 0.08

0.16** 0.01 0.02

0.10 0.04 0.19

0.60** 0.07 0.31*

0.27* 0.08 0.02

0.31 0.18 0.38

0.16 0.06 0.51*

0.01 0.07 0.00

0.03 0.10 0.29*

0.02 0.21 0.15

0.16 0.18 0.05

0.09 0.27 0.39

0.20 0.33 0.59*

0.18** 0.13* 0.18**

0.06 0.10 0.13

0.16 0.38 0.16 0.08 0.05 0.00 0.09 0.25 0.10

0.32 0.16 0.05 0.02 0.14 0.12 0.11*

0.48 0.06 0.54

0.0003 0.942 0.321

2.912** 2.951* 4.421 14.368 7.148 6.030 72.71% 29.66

2.958** 2.849* 2.282 14.026 7.848 6.156 74.03% 28.24