Meta-analytic structural equation modeling for exploring workplace friendship, well-being, and organizational commitment

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Workplace friendships, which are informal relationships in the workplace, foster mutual trust, assistance, and emotional support and create a sense of belonging among coworkers. Employees with positive perceptions of their job responsibilities, psychological needs, and work environment experience happiness, satisfaction, and an overall sense of well-being. A heightened sense of well-being in the workplace positively affects employee satisfaction with job tasks and the work environment, reinforcing employees’ sense of belonging and organizational commitment. OBJECTIVE: The study proposed and validated a theoretical model, with meta-analytic structural equation modeling employed to conduct quantitative, empirical research on workplace friendships, well-being, and organizational commitment in Taiwan and to analyze correlations between relevant variables. METHODS: The theoretical model was further validated through structural equation modeling, which yielded favorable goodness of fit in terms of various indicators. RESULTS: The mediating effect of well-being was verified through bootstrapping analysis. Within a 95% confidence interval, the total effect size of workplace friendships on organizational commitment was 0.549, which is the sum of its direct effect (0.255) and indirect effect (0.294). CONCLUSIONS: This finding indicates that well-being plays a mediating role in the association between workplace friendships and organizational commitment. The proposed theoretical model in this study is supported. Finally, the research results are discussed, and practical suggestions are provided.