Abstract
There exists a lack of specific research methods to estimate the relationship between an organization and its employees, which has long challenged research in the field of organizational management. Therefore, this article introduces psychological distance concept into the research of organizational behavior, which can define the concept of psychological distance between employees and an organization and describe a level of perceived correspondence or interaction between subjects and objects. We developed an employee-organization psychological distance (EOPD) scale through both qualitative and quantitative analysis methods. As indicated by the research results based on grounded theory (10 employee in-depth interview records and 277 opening questionnaires) and formal investigation (544 questionnaires), this scale consists of six dimensions: experiential distance, behavioral distance, emotional distance, cognitive distance, spatial-temporal distance, and objective social distance based on 44 items. Finally, we determined that the EOPD scale exhibited acceptable reliability and validity using confirmatory factor analysis. This research may establish a foundation for future research on the measurement of psychological relationships between employees and organizations.
Highlights
Along with the development of the global economy, marketing competition has intensified and the value of human resource has gradually been highlighted, which have brought complex employment relationship challenges to many companies
We introduce psychological distance into the field of organization behavioral science and propose the concept of employee-organization psychological distance (EOPD), which can be used to describe the level of perceived correspondence or interaction between subjects and objects
Based on the statements above, we introduced psychological distance into the area of organizational management and focused on the development and examination of an EOPD scale
Summary
Along with the development of the global economy, marketing competition has intensified and the value of human resource has gradually been highlighted, which have brought complex employment relationship challenges to many companies. In the second step, based on the consciousness of the first stage, the individual will develop subjective (implicit or explicit) judgments on the self-other (“other” here refers to different people, they are all others) relationship or self-organization relationship and generate related emotional experiences, which usually manifest as psychological attractions or exclusions (Agnew et al, 2004). Psychological attraction or exclusion will influence the individual’s decisions regarding behaviors (Trope and Liberman, 2010) These decisions immediately produce the sense of closeness or distance in the aspects of time, space, social expectations and emotional belonging between individuals and their organization, and these senses constitute the realistic and psychological attributes of the employee-organization relationship. This study used interviews to develop the initial scale through qualitative analysis method and used investigation questionnaire data to quantitatively analyze the EOPD scale structure
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