Volunteerism, affective commitment and citizenship behavior

Abstract

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship of altruistic and egoistic motives with person- and organization-oriented citizenship behaviors as mediated by affective commitment. The author hypothesized that altruistic motives are positively associated with person-oriented citizenship behavior and affective commitment while egoistic motives are positively associated with organization-oriented citizenship behavior and negatively associated with affective commitment.Design/methodology/approach– The data were collected from 248 middle and senior managers from 20 different locations of a power generation organization in India. Self- and other reported method were used to collect the data by administering the questionnaires.Findings– Results of structural equation analysis have supported, with some exception, the hypotheses. Affective commitment has mediated the relationship between motives and both forms of citizenship behavior. However, altruistic motives had shown a negative relationship with affective commitment and had a positive relationship with person-oriented citizenship behavior. Meanwhile, egoistic motives had a positive relationship with affective commitment and organization-oriented citizenship behavior.Practical implications– Results suggest that organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs)per seis not important rather motives play an important role during the performance appraisal process. Further there is a differential impact of altruistic and egoistic motives on employees’ attitude and behavior, and both can coexist in this process.Originality/value– This is the first study on the relationship of motives, affective commitment and OCBs in India.