Professional Documents
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ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION
Affective commitment
Continuance Commitment
Normative Commitment
Finally, a less common, but equally viable, approach has been to view
commitment as an obligation to remain with the organization. Marsh and
Mannari (1977), for example, described the employee with "lifetime
commitment" as one who considers it morally right to stay in the
company, regardless of how much status enhancement or satisfaction the
firm gives over the years. In a similar vein, Wiener (1982) defined
commitment as the totality of internalized normative pressures to act
in a way which meets organizational goals and interests and suggested
that individuals exhibit these behaviours solely because they believe
it is the right and moral thing to do. Normative commitment is
characterized by feelings of loyalty to a particular organization
resulting from the internalization of normative pressures on the
individual (Popper and Lipshitz,1992). Employees with a high level of
normative commitment feel they ought to remain with the organization
(Meyer and Allen, 1991).
There have been repeated calls since the early 1980s for clarification
of the definition and measurement of organizational commitment (McGee
and Ford,1987; Meyer and Allen, 1984; Mowday, Porter and Steers, 1982;
Reichers, 1985). Several distinct views of commitment have evolved and
become well established over the years, making it unlikely that any one
approach will dominate and be unanimously accepted as the correct
definition of commitment. It is important, therefore, that the various
instruments measuring organizational commitment be tested in order to
clarify the distinctions among the various conceptualizations of
organizational commitment dimensions.
Thus, the main purpose of this study was to examine the factor
structure of the Meyer and Allen's (1991) three-component model of
organizational commitment measure by using data obtained from a sample
in Malaysia. It is hoped that the findings from this study will provide
some indications of cross-cultural generalizability of the model.
METHODOLOGY
The Sample
The Instrument
A questionnaire was developed using items taken from Allen and Meyer's
(1990) instrument. Each dimension of organizational commitment -
affective, continuance, and normative - was measured by eight items.
Possible responses were arrayed on a five-point Likert scale (rather
than on Allen and Meyer's seven-point scale) comprising "strongly
disagree" (1), "disagree" (2), "undecided" (3), "agree" (4), and
"strongly agree" (5).
The questionnaire was translated from English into Bahasa Malaysia by a
university lecturer competent in both languages and then back-
translated into English by a different lecturer. Both the English
versions (the original and the translated) were compared to ensure
similarity. The items and the dimensions they measure are shown in
Table 1.
Procedure
Statistical Analysis
RESULTS
Sample Characteristics
DISCUSSION
Two major conclusions may be drawn from this study. First, Meyer and
Allen's conceptualization of organizational commitment is generally
supported by its findings and therefore is generalizable to Malaysia.
Second, their model might be further refined as a four-component model,
with the third component, continuance commitment having two dimensions:
continuance commitment (costs of leaving) and continuance commitment
(availability of alternatives).
The results from both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses lend
support to McGee and Ford (1987), who suggested that the continuance
commitment scale consists of two meaningful sub-scales, one concerning
the personal sacrifice associated with leaving the organization and the
other an awareness of the availability of job alternatives.
REFERENCES
Popper, M and Lipshitz, R (1992). "Ask not what your country can do for
you: The normative basis of organizational commitment", Journal of
Vocational Behavior, 41, pp.1-12.
Today (1995). "Slave bosses don't deserve our loyalty", November 15.