Full-Time versus Part-Time Employees: Understanding the Links between Work Status, the Psychological Contract, and Attitudes

Abstract

Research findings comparing the work attitudes of full-time and part-time employees have been inconsistent and inconclusive. Furthermore, empirical studies have tended to be atheoretical, and there are few convincing psychological explanations to explain differences where found. This article tests the psychological contract as an explanatory framework for attitudinal differences across work status (i.e., whether employed on a part-time or full-time basis). The model is tested across samples from two different organizations using structural equation modeling. The analysis reveals that part-time and full-time employees differed on a number of attitudes and that psychological contract fulfillment could be used to explain differences in certain attitudes (e.g., satisfaction) but not others (e.g., affective commitment). Analyses also show that the relationships between psychological contract fulfillment and outcomes were rarely moderated by work status, suggesting that part-time employees will respond in a similar way as full-time employees to adjustments in their psychological contract.