ATTITUDES & JOB SATISFACTION

Chapter 3
LEARNING OUTCOMES
AFTER STUDYING THIS CHAPTER, YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO:
1. Contrast the three components of an attitude.
2. Summarize the relationship between attitudes and behavior.
3. Compare the major job attitudes.
4. Define job satisfaction.
5. Summarize the main causes of job satisfaction.
6. Identify three outcomes of job satisfaction.
7. Identify four employee responses to job dissatisfaction.

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 2

CONTRAST THE THREE COMPONENTS OF
AN ATTITUDE
Attitude: Evaluative statements or judgments
concerning objects, people, or events.
Three components of an attitude:

The emotional or
feeling segment
Affective of an attitude
Cognitive
The opinion or
belief segment Behavioral
of an attitude
An intention to
behave in a certain
way toward someone
Attitude or something

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 3

ATTITUDES & BEHAVIORS

Early research on attitudes Leon Festinger—argued that

assumed that they were attitudes follow behavior
causally related to behavior

Cases of attitude following

The attitudes people hold behavior illustrate the effects
of cognitive dissonance
determine what they do

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 4

COGNITIVE DISSONANCE
Any incompatibility between two or more attitudes
or between behavior and attitudes. Individuals seek
to reduce this uncomfortable gap, or dissonance, to
reach stability and consistency. Consistency is
achieved by changing the attitudes, modifying the
behaviors, or through rationalization. The desire to
reduce dissonance depends on:
• Importance of elements
• Degree of individual influence
• Rewards involved in dissonance

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 5

CHANGING ATTITUDE OR
BEHAVIOR
Sometimes we observe people who will change what they
say so it doesn’t contradict their behavior. When attitudes
and behaviors don’t line up, individuals will experience
cognitive dissonance. This clash is uncomfortable, and
individuals will seek to reduce the dissonance to find
consistency.

People are willing to live with some discomfort but the

degree to which this is true depends upon the importance
of the elements, how much influences the individual has in
the situation, and the rewards available
Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 6
SUMMARIZING RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN
ATTITUDE AND BEHAVIOR
• Importance of the attitude Attitude
• Its correspondence to behavior

Mitigating Variables
• Its accessibility
• The presence of social pressure Predicts

• Whether or not a person has had direct

experience with the behavior
• The attitude/behavior relationship is stronger Behavior
if it refers to something in our direct personal
experience
Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 7
JOB ATTITUDES

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 8

COMPARE & CONTRAST MAJOR JOB
ATTITUDES
PSYCHOLOGICAL
JOB SATISFACTION JOB EMPOWERMENT
INVOLVEMENT
A positive feeling Degree of Belief in the degree
about the job psychological of influence over the
resulting from an identification with the job, competence, job
evaluation of its job where perceived meaningfulness, and
characteristics performance is autonomy
important to self-
worth

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 9

COMPARE & CONTRAST MAJOR JOB
ATTITUDES

ORGANIZATIONAL COMMITMENT

• Identifying with a particular organization and its goals, while wishing

to maintain membership in the organization.
• Three dimensions:
• Affective – emotional attachment to organization
• Continuance Commitment – economic value of staying
• Normative – moral or ethical obligations

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 10

COMPARE & CONTRAST MAJOR JOB
ATTITUDES

ORGANIZATIONAL COMMITMENT (CONT.)

• Has some relation to performance, especially for new employees.

• Theoretical models propose that employees who are committed will be
less likely to engage in work withdrawal even if they are dissatisfied,
because they have a sense of organizational loyalty.

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 11

COMPARE & CONTRAST MAJOR JOB
ATTITUDES

PERCEIVED ORGANIZATIONAL SUPPORT (POS)

• Degree to which employees believe the organization values their

contribution and cares about their well-being.
• Higher when rewards are fair, employees are involved in decision
making, and supervisors are seen as supportive.
• High POS is related to higher OCBs and performance.

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 12

COMPARE & CONTRAST MAJOR JOB
ATTITUDES

EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT

• The degree of involvement with, satisfaction with, and enthusiasm for

the job.
• Engaged employees are passionate about their work and company.

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 13

COMPARE & CONTRAST MAJOR
JOB ATTITUDES

ARE THESE JOB ATTITUDES REALLY DISTINCT?

• No: these attitudes are highly related

• Variables may be redundant (measuring the same
thing under a different name)
• While there is some distinction, there is also a lot of
overlap
• Overlap may cause confusion

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 14

 DEFINE JOB
SATISFACTION
AND SHOW HOW IT CAN
BE MEASURED

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 15

DEFINE JOB SATISFACTION AND SHOW
HOW IT CAN BE MEASURED

JOB SATISFACTION
• A positive feeling about a job resulting from an evaluation of
its characteristics

• Two approaches for measuring Job Satisfaction are popular:

• The single global rating
• The summation of job facets

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 16

DEFINE JOB SATISFACTION AND SHOW HOW
IT CAN BE MEASURED

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 17

DEFINE JOB SATISFACTION AND SHOW HOW
IT CAN BE MEASURED

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 18

SUMMARIZE THE MAIN CAUSES
OF JOB SATISFACTION
Pay influences job satisfaction only to a point.
• After about $40,000 per year (in the U.S.), there is no
relationship between amount of pay and job
satisfaction.
• Money may bring happiness, but not necessarily job
satisfaction.

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 19

SUMMARIZE THE MAIN CAUSES OF JOB
SATISFACTION
Personality also plays a role in Job Satisfaction.
• People who have positive core self-evaluations, who believe in their inner
worth and basic competence are more satisfied with their jobs than those
with negative core self-evaluations.
• Those with negative core self-evaluations set less ambitious goals and are
more likely to give up when confronting difficulties.

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 20

WHAT CAUSES JOB
SATISFACTION?

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 21

WHAT CAUSES JOB SATISFACTION?

JOB CONDITIONS

• Generally, interesting jobs that provide training, variety, independence,

and control satisfy most employees
• Characteristics of the work itself, interdependence, feedback, social
support, and interaction with coworkers outside the workplace are also
strongly related to job satisfaction
• Managers also play a big role in employees’ job satisfaction

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 22

WHAT CAUSES JOB SATISFACTION?

PERSONALITY
• People who have a positive core self-evaluation (CSE)—who believe in their
inner worth and basic competence—are more satisfied with their jobs

PAY
• Effect of pay can be smaller once an individual reaches a standard level of
comfortable living
• Money does motivate people, but what motivates us is not necessarily the same as
what makes us happy

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 23

WHAT CAUSES JOB SATISFACTION?

CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

• Self-regulated actions to benefit society or the environment beyond what is
required by law, increasingly affects employee job satisfaction

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 24

OUTCOMES OF JOB
SATISFACTION

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 25

OUTCOMES OF JOB SATISFACTION

JOB PERFORMANCE

ORGANIZATION CITIZENSHIP BEHAVIOR

CUSTOMER SATISFACTION

LIFE SATISFACTION
• Your attitudes and experiences in life spill over into your job approaches and
experiences
• Life satisfaction decreases when people become unemployed
Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 26
THE IMPACT OF JOB
DISSATISFACTION

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 27

THE IMPACT OF JOB DISSATISFACTION

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 28

THE IMPACT OF JOB DISSATISFACTION
• Exit: A behavior directed toward leaving the organization, including looking for a
new position as well as resigning.
• Voice: Actively and constructively attempting to improve conditions, including
suggesting improvements, discussing problems with superiors, and some forms of
union activity.
• Loyalty: Passively, but optimistically, waiting for conditions to improve,
including speaking up for the organization in the face of external criticism, and
trusting the organization and its management to “do the right thing.”
• Neglect: Involves passively allowing conditions to worsen, including chronic
absenteeism or lateness, reduced effort, and increased error rate.

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 29

THE IMPACT OF JOB DISSATISFACTION

COUNTERPRODUCTIVE WORK BEHAVIOR (CWB)

• Actions that actively damage the organization, including stealing, behaving
aggressively toward coworkers, or being late or absent
• This behavior often follows negative and sometimes long-standing attitudes
• According to some research, sometimes CWB is an emotional reaction to
perceived unfairness

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 30

THE IMPACT OF JOB DISSATISFACTION

COUNTERPRODUCTIVE WORK BEHAVIOR (CWB) (CONT.)

• As a manager, you can poll employee attitudes, identify areas for workplace
improvement, and attempt to measure CWB through self report surveys,
coworkers and supervisor surveys
• Creating strong teams, integrating supervisors within them, providing formalized
team policies, and introducing team-based incentives may help lower the CWB
“contagion” that lowers the standards of the group

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 31

SUMMARY
• Satisfied and committed employees have lower rates of
turnover, absenteeism, and withdrawal behaviors.
• Managers will also want to measure job attitudes effectively
so they can tell how employees are reacting to their work.
• The most important thing managers can do to raise
employee satisfaction is focus on the intrinsic parts of the
job, such as making the work challenging and interesting.
• Although paying employees poorly will likely not attract
high-quality employees to the organization or keep high
performers, managers should realize that high pay alone is
unlikely to create a satisfying work environment.

Attitudes & Job Satisfaction 32

THANK YOU