Psychologisches Kapital als Determinante von Eskalierendem Commitment in Organisationen
Third party funded individual grant
Start date : 01.03.2013
End date : 30.06.2013
Project details
Short description
In an experiment it was examined whether people with a lot of "psychological capital" tend to overestimate themselves and their competences and therefore hold on to hopeless projects for an unfounded long time.
Scientific Abstract
The concept of Psychological Capital has its roots in the flourishing of "positive psychology" since the late 1990s. It is a behavioral dimension that is composed of four related but distinct sub-dimensions, self-efficacy (the confidence in being able to make the necessary effort and having the necessary skills available to successfully complete challenging tasks), optimism (a generally positive expectation of the present and future), Hope (characterised by perseverance/endurance in pursuing goals while at the same time being able to adapt the means and ways of pursuing goals to changing circumstances) and resilience (the ability to maintain and even accelerate one's own efforts to achieve success even when under heavy pressure from problems).
Existing research has shown that the level of psychological capital of an organization's employees is positively correlated with a number of favorable outcome measures, such as work performance and job satisfaction (Luthans, Avolio, Avey, & Norman, 2007), psychological well-being, contextual performance (Avey, Reichard, Luthans, & Mhatre, 2011), and organizational commitment (Luthans, Norman, Avolio, & Avey, 2008).
One issue that has been neglected so far, although it has considerable practical significance, is whether psychological capital may also have undesirable consequences. What, emphatically formulated, is the "dark side" of psychological capital?
Of particular interest in the question of this "dark side" of Psychological Capital is the concept of Escalating Commitment. This is the tendency to feel further committed to an earlier decision and to support it by providing additional resources, even though this decision has so far proved ineffective (Brockner & Rubin, 1985; Staw & Ross, 1987). Escalating commitment is a significant problem in many business-related contexts, not only in investment decisions, but also within organisations, for example, when a personnel decision once made is maintained even though it turns out that the new employee is not capable of successfully completing the tasks set (Wolff & Moser, 2008).
In the course of the research project 120 students of the Faculty of Law and Economics underwent a study based on a computer-based experimental scenario from the field of personnel management decision making. The participants were asked to temporarily slip into the role of a manager in a company in the chemical industry, as in a role play. In a short introduction they were informed about the company, their job, their hierarchical position, and other relevant facts. Their main task in the scenario was to mentor a (incompetent) trainee during a 22-month trainee program. During the course of the scenario, the participants in the study received regular information about the behaviour, successes and failures of the trainee, who turned out to be more and more obviously not very competent. After each receipt of new relevant information, the participants had to decide what to do with the trainee, whether he/she should be retained, transferred or dismissed.
The measure of escalating commitment in the planned experiment was the length of time the trainee retained his or her employment despite his or her obvious incompetence. Statistical analysis was performed by means of event analysis (Blossfeld, Hamerle & Mayer, 1984; Singer & Willet, 1993). In addition, it was tested whether the dimension of narcissism had a mediating role in this process.
Involved:
Contributing FAU Organisations:
Lehrstuhl für Psychologie, insbesondere Wirtschafts- und Sozialpsychologie
Fachbereich Wirtschaftswissenschaften
