A CULTURAL ANALYSIS OF ORGANIZATIONAL COMMITMENTAND TURNOVER INTENTIONS IN A COLLECTIVIST SOCIETY.

Abstract

Previous studies investigating cultural differences in organizational commitment have produced mixed results, primarily owing to methodological problems. Such studies have assumed that organizational commitment has the same meaning across cultures and have compared the mean level of commitment across cultures using instruments developed in one, typically an individualistic culture. The main argument of this study was that culture influences the meaning of the commitment employees feel towards their organizations rather than the intensity. To understand how individual differences in cultural values of individualism and collectivism (idiocentrism and allocentrism, respectively) are reflected in the meaning of organizational commitment, the relationship between organizational commitment and turnover intentions was examined in the Turkish context. In Study 1, several emic organizational commitment items were generated by in-depth interviews with Turkish employees and were added to the scales by Meyer, Allen and Smith (1993). The etic-emic scales demonstrated enhanced psychometric properties when administered in Turkey. In Study 2, using Triandis' (1980) theory of interpersonal behavior, turnover intentions were predicted as a function of an individual's affective, continuance, normative commitment, and the perceived appropriateness of quitting for his or her specific reference group(s). The results show that whereas affective commitment is the strongest predictor of intention to stay with the organization for idiocentrics, affective and normative commitment are equally strong predictors for allocentrics. Further, social factors, operationalized as the approval of the individual's family, do not predict turnover intentions for idiocentrics, but do so significantly for allocentrics.