How do demographic characteristics relate to organizational commitment? Evidence from Croatia

Abstract

Organizational commitment gets significant attention from both scientists and practitioners alike since the 1950s. This interest is evident in the literature in the area of management and organizational behaviour, in an impressive number of studies exploring the nature, antecedents, and outcomes of organizational commitment. The aim of this paper is to contribute to the clarification of the relationship between employees’ demographic characteristics and their organizational commitment, since research studies imply mainly inconsistent results about this relationship. The empirical research was carried out in Croatia. The research sample includes 304 employees. A self-developed questionnaire was used for data collection, specifically about gender, age, tenure, education, and marital status. In order to assess organizational commitment, the Organizational Commitment Scale was applied. Research results showed no differences in organizational commitment regarding the employees’ gender or marital status, while the differences in employees’ organizational commitment exist regarding employees’ age, tenure in organization and education. Dwelling into these differences, this paper demonstrates that the level of organizational commitment varies according to different subcategories of each demographic characteristic. In addition, this paper explains the origin and possible reasons of differences in organizational commitment regarding the different subcategories of each demographic characteristic.