The impact of job insecurity and contract type on attitudes, well‐being and behavioural reports: A psychological contract perspective

Abstract

Research on the impact of job insecurity for temporary employees has been largely exploratory and atheoretical in nature. This paper addresses this issue by considering the role of job insecurity on job satisfaction, organizational commitment, life satisfaction, and self‐rated performance among permanent employees (N = 396) as compared with temporary ones (N = 148). Hypotheses are formulated using the tradition of transactional versus relational psychological contract types. Psychological contract theory assumes (1) that job insecurity effects are due to a violation of the relational psychological contract, and (2) that permanents as compared with temporaries engage more in relational psychological contracting. As a result, job insecurity is expected to be problematic in terms of outcomes for permanents, but not for temporaries. Results validate the assumptions made in psychological contract theory. Furthermore, job insecurity proved problematic for permanents but not for temporaries when job satisfaction and organizational commitment are concerned. No such differential effects are observed for life satisfaction and self‐rated performance. Implications for future research are discussed.