Lernmaterialien für Organizational Behaviour an der Universität Duisburg-Essen

▪ Importance

• Attitudes reflect our fundamental values, self-interest, or
identification with individuals or groups we value
• Strong relationship to our behavior
▪ Correspondence to behavior
• Specific attitudes tend to predict specific behavior
• General attitudes tend to best predict general behavior
Attitude

▪ Accessibility
▪ Presence of social pressures
▪ Direct experience with the attitude

▪ Single global rating 

• Response to one question 

• Captures the essence “How satisfied are you with your job?” 

▪ Summation of job facets 

• Identifies key elements in a job • May leave out some important data “Please rate the following statements. My job involves pleasant work…” 

▪ Both methods are helpful and applicable 

▪ Interesting job 

• Training, variety, independence, control, … 

▪ Social context of the workplace 

• Interdependence, feedback, social support 

▪ Personality 

• People who have positive core self-evaluations, who believe in their inner worth and basic competence are more satisfied with their jobs 

• Those with negative core self-evaluations set less ambitious goals and are more likely to give up when confronting difficulties 

▪ Pay 

▪ Exit 

• Behavior directed toward leaving the organization 

• Looking for a new position, resigning 

▪ Voice 

• Active and constructive attempts to improve conditions 

• Suggesting improvements, discussing problems, …

 ▪ Loyalty 

• Passively waiting for conditions to improve 

• Speaking up for the organization 

• Trusting the organization and its management 

▪ Neglect 

• Allowing conditions to worsen 

• Lateness, reduced effort, … 

▪ Managers can use personality tests because they are useful in hiring decisions and help managers forecast who is best for a job 

▪ Self-report surveys 

• Individuals evaluate themselves on a series of factors 

• Requires a well-constructed survey 

• Respondent might lie 

• Accuracy

▪ Observer-rating surveys 

• Provide an independent assessment of personality

▪ Implication: use both 

▪ Most used personality-assessment instrument in the world 

▪ 100-question personality test

▪ Taps four characteristics and classifies people into 1 of 16 personality types 

● Extroverted versus introverted. 

Extroverted individuals are outgoing, sociable and assertive. Introverts are quiet and shy.

● Sensing versus intuitive. 

Sensing types are practical and prefer routine and order. They focus on details. Intuitives rely on unconscious processes and look at the ‘big picture’.

● Thinking versus feeling. 

Thinking types use reason and logic to handle problems. Feeling types rely on their personal values and emotions.

● Judging versus perceiving. 

Judging types want control and prefer their world to be ordered and structured. Perceiving types are flexible and spontaneous.

▪ Extraversion 

• Captures our comfort level with relationships

• extraversion <=> introversion 

▪ Agreeable 

• Refers to an individual's propensity to defer to others 

• Cooperative, warm, trusting <=> Cold, disagreeable, antagonistic 

▪ Conscientiousness 

• Measure of reliability 

• Responsible, organized, dependable, persistent  Easily distracted, disorganized, unreliable 

▪ Emotional stability 

• Taps a person`s ability to withstand stress 

• calm, self-confident, secure <=> nervous, anxious, depressed, insecure

 ▪ Openness to experience 

• Addresses range of interests and fascination 

creative, curious, artistically sensitive <=> conventional, find comfort in the familiar 

▪ Lay the foundation for the understanding of attitudes and motivation 

▪ Influence attitudes and behaviors 

▪ We can predict people’s reactions based on understanding values 

Selective perception 

• Any characteristic that makes a person, object, or event stand out will increase the probability that it will be perceived 

• Since we can’t observe everything going on about us, we engage in selective perception 

Halo effect 

• The halo effect occurs when we draw a general impression on the basis of a single characteristic 

Stereotyping

• Judging someone on the basis of our perception of the group to which he or she belongs 

• A means of simplifying a complex world, and it permits us to maintain consistency 

Cognitive = evaluation
My supervisor gave a promotion to a
coworker who deserved it less than me.
My supervisor is unfair.

Affective = feeling
I dislike my supervisor!

Behavioral = action
I’m looking for other work; I’ve
complained about my supervisor to
anyone who would listen.