Abstract
PurposeHappiness has been the most important goal for humans throughout history and is a significant issue among university lecturers facing a rapid digital technology change. It is usually described as a well-being state, feeling satisfied and contented, consisting of positive happenings in an individual’s life concerning the social, spiritual, economic, psychological, and physiological spheres. This research examines the relationship between happiness, attitudes toward technology, and lecturers’ job performance in higher education.Design and MethodologyThis research design was a cross-sectional design that asked the respondents from lecturers of Institut Teknologi Bandung, one of the best universities with technology-based education in Indonesia, to complete a group of well-validated questionnaires. The questionnaires mentioned earlier include the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire and three other newly constructed questionnaires, made to measure attitude toward digital technology, job satisfaction, and job performance.FindingsThis research confirmed that happiness fully mediated the relationship between attitude toward digital technology and job performance. Additionally, this research also confirmed that happiness partially mediated the relationship between job satisfaction and job performance. These results implied that a positive attitude toward digital technology and higher job satisfaction would lead to happier lecturers who increase their job performance.OriginalityThis study suggests that a positive attitude toward technology has a higher impact than job satisfaction as determinant factors of happiness and its association with lecturers’ job performance such as universities, especially Institut Teknologi Bandung as a technologically advanced workplace environment. Additionally, the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire framework, frequently used in studies of other countries, is now being used in the context of an Indonesian case study, precisely to measure happiness among lecturers in Indonesian higher education.
Highlights
Happiness has become a popular topic with the increasing concern for people’s importance in establishing the organization’s success
Condition 3 was met because when happiness entered the equation at step 2 of the hierarchical regression, it significantly predicted job performance, β = 0.22, t(124) = 2.34, p = 0.021, and reduced the beta weight for attitude toward digital technology to non-significance, β = 0.15, t(124) = 1.60, p = 0.133
Because condition 4 was met, it showed that the relationship between attitude toward digital technology and job performance was fully mediated by happiness
Summary
Happiness has become a popular topic with the increasing concern for people’s importance in establishing the organization’s success. Happiness affects organizational performance (e.g., Warr, 2007; Fisher, 2010; Demircioglu, 2014; Santoso and Kulathunga, 2016). Zhou and Qiu (2013) stated that in a company, happiness, enthusiasm, initiative, and creativity are essential things to be considered when implementing peopleoriented management. Despite being a problematic term to define, happiness has been the most crucial goal for humans throughout history (Compton, 2005). Aristotle (2012) believed everyone would agree that the term “eudaimonia” (happiness) was apt for such a state, which he regards as a metric for living well, central to human existence and purpose (Heeks, 2012). The pursuit of happiness is the ultimate goal in human existence (Pishva et al, 2011)
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