The relationship between work engagement and organizational citizenship behavior among nurses in tertiary hospitals

Abstract

Objective We tried to explore the relationship between work engagement and organiza-tional citizenship behavior among nurses in tertiary hospitals in order to provide evidence for implementing targeted interventions to promote nurses' organizational citizenship behavior and job performance from a perspective of positive psychology. Methods Totally 511 nurses from four tertiary hospitals of Jinan city were enrolled using multistage sampling. Data were collected with Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9) and Chinese Organizational Citizenship Behavior Scale. Data analysis included descriptive analysis, Pear-son correlation analysis and stepwise multiple regression analysis. Results The average scores of work engagement and organizational citizenship behavior were (3.82 ± 1.08) and (5.89 ± 0.66) , respectively. Work engagement accounted for 25.4% of the variance in identification with the company, 14.6% of the variance in altruism and 18.7% of the variance in conscientiousness. Conclusions Work engagement is a significant predictor of organizational citizenship behavior. Nurse managers are suggested to take actions in aspects of professional practice environment, resources allocation and staff training so as to enhance nurses' work engagement and subsequent their organizational citizenship behavior. Key words: Organizational citizenship behavior; Work engagement; Nurses; Hospitals