Perceived Overqualification and In-Role Job Performance: Mediating and Moderating Mechanisms

Abstract

This study investigates the effects of perceived overqualification (POQ) on in-role job performance and examines job frustration and psychological entitlement as underlying mechanisms in this relationship. Drawing on person-job fit theory and relative deprivation theory, we predict that feelings of being overqualified for one’s job will elicit job frustration which in turn reduces in-role job performance. Moreover, we hypothesize that psychological entitlement acts as a moderator of the indirect effect of POQ on in-role performance through job frustration. Results from two separate studies using samples of working adults in the U.S. and China lend support for these hypotheses. Our findings showed that POQ has a significant negative effect on in-role job performance through increasing job frustration. In both studies, psychological entitlement was found to be a significant moderator of the relationship between POQ and job frustration. Individuals who reported high levels of psychological entitlement reacted to POQ with greater job frustration. The findings make important contributions by identifying job frustration as an explanatory mechanism for the detrimental effects of POQ on performance and by demonstrating that reactions to being overqualified vary depending on individual differences.