Identification in organizational contexts: linking theory and research from social and organizational psychology

Transcription

1 December 2001 Identification in contexts: linking theory and research from social and psychology Rolf van Dick Research in psychology has shown that commitment to the organization correlates with different criteria of work effectiveness. This paper argues that social psychology and, particularly, the Social Identity Approach to intergroup relations extend the concept of commitment theoretically. Above that, it provides a broader conceptual framework for the understanding of underlying processes in the relation between identification and job-related attitudes and behaviours. This theoretical analysis is completed with a review of empirical findings in different fields of application (group performance, work-related attitudes, group norms). Rolf van Dick is from FB Psychologie, Gutenbergstr. 18, Marburg, Germany., 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA Overview and Theoretical Background Research of commitment has a long tradition in psychology (e.g. Becker 1960; Hrebeniak and Alutto 1972; Ritzer and Trice 1969). The concept of commitment was introduced to explore and understand employee organization linkages, especially on three dimensions: (1) identifying the nature of attachment between employee and organization and possible antecedents which increase or decrease this attachment; (2) understanding the establishment of the relationships; and (3) obtaining consequences and outcomes of this relationship on employees satisfaction, well-being, productivity as well as on effectiveness (cf. Meyer and Allen 1997). Commitment has been extensively defined, measured and studied (cf. Reichers 1985). Recent metaanalyses and reviews have shown that members of an organization who feel committed to their organization are better members in terms that they are more motivated, satisfied and productive (cf. Cohen 1992; Mathieu and Zajac 1990; Meyer and International Journal of Management Reviews Volume 3 Issue 4 pp

2 Identification in contexts: linking theory and research from social and psychology Allen 1997). Organizational research has undertaken different attempts to differentiate foci of commitment (Becker 1992; Becker et al. 1996; Clugston et al. 2000; Meyer and Allen 1997; Vandenberghe et al. in press) and dimensions of commitment (Meyer and Allen 1997). Beyond the research line of psychology, recent approaches to apply social identity theory in settings (Haslam, 2001; Hogg and Terry 2000; Ouwerkerk et al. 1999; van Knippenberg 2000; van Knippenberg and van Schie 2000) appear fruitful for two reasons. First, social identity theory specifies the components and determinants of identification more theoretically than the approach. Secondly, social identity theory offers a particularly fertile background for predictions of situational and contextual variability of identification. The present paper aims: (1) to summarize theory and research from the viewpoint of psychology; (2) to present the Social Identity Approach and its implications for research on identification; (3) to integrate both research traditions into a broader conceptual model; and (4) to review research available from different fields of application (group performance, group norms, work motivation) which present empirical evidence for the ideas of the Social Identity Approach. Finally, (5) it will be concluded that the integration of and social psychology is useful and has implications on managerial decisions and behaviours. Viewpoint of Organizational Psychology: Theory and Research on Commitment Following the literature of psychology, at least four dimensions of commitment can be distinguished (cf. Spieß and Winterstein 1999, 125): (1) Affective commitment: describes the integral attachment to the organization. That means an individual identifies with his or her organization because its goals and objectives are close to his or her own ones, the member feels as part of the organization as a family. Mael and Ashforth (1992; cf. also van Knippenberg and van Schie 2000; van Knippenberg 2000) assume that the more individuals identify with their organization, the more they think and act from the organization s perspective and expend more effort on behalf of the organization (cf. Dutton et al. 1994). (2) The term involvement mainly means identification with the job (cf. Moser 1996, 49). Work involvement means work as a central part of life-interest, whereas job involvement is used to describe effort readiness referred to the concrete job (Moser 1996, 50). (3) Normative commitment reflects a feeling of obligation to stay in the organization. It denotes to what extent a person feels committed to the organization because of moral values and normative beliefs (Meyer and Allen 1997). This type of commitment is developed on the basis of individuals general beliefs of morality on the one hand and investment of the organization made on behalf of the individual (e.g. for further education) on the other hand. (4) Continuance commitment refers to an awareness of the costs associated with leaving the organization. This type of commitment is determined through the interdependence between individual and organization (cf. Thibaut and Kelley 1959), and external variables, such as location factors (cf. side-bets, Becker 1960). An early attempt to measure commitment was undertaken by Porter et al. (1974), who developed the Organizational Commitment Questionnaire (OCQ). The questionnaire consists of 15 items measuring identification (belief and acceptance in the goals and values of the organization, e.g. I find my values and 266

3 the organization s values are very similar ), involvement (readiness for efforts and to work hard for the goals of the organization, e.g. I am willing to put in a great deal of effort beyond that expected in order to help this organization to be successful ), and turnover intentions (strong need to be a further member of the organization, e.g. It would take very little change in my present circumstances to cause me to leave this organization ). In most research, these three dimensions could not be separated, either in exploratory or in confirmatory factor analyses, which led to a unidimensional bipolar scale of general commitment. Although the OCQ is perhaps the most frequently used measure in commitment research (cf. Abrams et al. 1998), it was often criticized. One reason for criticism is that some items are formulated very close to possible criteria which should be predicted with this scale, particularly turnover. Another reason is that the uni-dimensionality of the concept does not represent the complex nature of commitment (cf. Allen and Meyer 1990). In answer to this criticism, Allen and Meyer (1990) constructed items to measure separate dimensions and finally could present scales for affective, normative and continuance commitment (Meyer and Allen 1997). Some authors (cf. Dunham et al. 1994) have suggested further differentiations of continuance commitment in the sub-dimensions personal sacrifices and absence of alternatives, but empirically those subdimensions are highly correlated and factor loadings are not always very clear. Accordingly, confirmatory factor analyses failed to differentiate between those sub-dimensions (cf. Vandenberghe 1996). Attempts to differentiate between affective commitment and another emotional component of commitment, internalization, have revealed strong relationships between these dimensions (r>0.80, Delobbe and Vandenberghe 2000). In general, therefore, the threefold concept of Meyer and Allen has proved to be reliable, valid and widely accepted (cf. Schmidt et al. 1998), as well as culturally invariant (Vandenberghe et al. 2001). Confirmatory factor analyses with all OCQ items and the Meyer and Allen items have shown significant relations between the OCQ and affective commitment but revealed distinctiveness of normative and continuance commitment (Dunham et al. 1994). Organizational psychological research on the consequences of commitment for the organization and the individual has analysed relationships with a large set of work-related behaviours, namely turnover, absenteeism, performance and extra-role behaviour. Turnover: The more members feel committed to their organization, the higher is their intention to stay in the organization and the lower are actual turnover rates (e.g. Allen and Meyer 1996; Mathieu and Zajac 1990; Tett and Meyer 1993). The relationship is especially high in the case of affective commitment, but also substantial for normative and continuance commitment. In the case of continuance commitment, it is an open question from the viewpoint of the organization whether it is adaptive or not when members stay only because they need to do so, e.g. because of their lack of alternatives. Absenteeism: In diverse studies and metaanalyses, negative correlations between affective commitment and absenteeism occurred (Gellatly 1995; Hacket et al. 1994; Mathieu and Zajac 1990; Meyer et al. 1993; Somers 1995). This is especially true for voluntary absenteeism (absence frequencies because one didn t feel like going to work, cf. Meyer and Allen 1997, 27), less for unvoluntary absenteeism (e.g. when total number of days absent were counted). In the case of normative commitment, empirical evidence is mixed: Meyer et al. (1993) found relationships in the expected directions; in the studies of Hackett et al. (1994) and Somers (1995), December

4 Identification in contexts: linking theory and research from social and psychology however, no correlations emerged. Continuance commitment and absenteeism seem to be unrelated (Gellatly 1995; Hackett et al. 1994; Meyer et al. 1993; Somers 1995). Performance: A series of studies demonstrated that individuals who are more affectively committed showed more effort and higher performance than individuals with lower affective commitment. This is true for self-reports of effort and productivity (Baugh and Roberts 1994; Bycio et al. 1995; Darden et al. 1989; Ingram et al. 1989; Johnston and Snizek 1991; Leong et al. 1994; Meyer et al. 1993; Randall et al. 1990; Sager and Johnston 1989; Saks 1995), for managers self-reported adherence to policy (Kim and Mauborgne 1993; Nouri 1994), as well as for different objective indicators (e.g. sales figures, Bashaw and Grant 1994). Finally, positive relations have been reported between employees affective commitment and their supervisors ratings for promotion (Meyer et al. 1989) or overall performance (Konovsky and Cropanzano 1991; Mayer and Schoorman 1992; Meyer et al. 1989; Moorman et al. 1993; Sager and Johnston 1989). Also in multilevel approaches, a connection between affective commitment and performance on group or organization level could be identified (Angle and Perry 1981; Mowday et al. 1974; Ostroff 1992). The relationship between performance and normative commitment is also a positive one but weaker than in the case of affective commitment (Ashforth and Saks 1996; Randall et al. 1990). In analyses of the correlations between continuance commitment and performance, either zero (Angle and Lawson 1994; Bycio et al. 1995; Moorman et al. 1993) or even negative relationships (Konovsky and Cropranzano 1991; Meyer et al. 1989) have been obtained. Extra-role behaviour. Extra-role behaviours, or citizenship behaviour (e.g. Organizational Citizenship Behaviour, OCB; Organ 1997), are those job-related behaviours not directly or formally forced by contracts or orders and not directly rewarded (or punished if absent). Nevertheless, this type of behaviour (such as civic virtue, altruism, conscientiousness, sportsmanship or courtesy) helps the organization to be better off and will, in the long run, also enlarge employees chances of being promoted (Organ 1997). Empirical analyses show that affective commitment is positively related to citizenship behaviours. This is demonstrated both in studies using selfreported measures (Meyer et al. 1993; Pearce 1993) as well as in studies involving independent measures of citizenship behaviours such as supervisors ratings (Gregersen 1993; Moorman et al. 1993; Munene 1995; Shore and Wayne 1993). Organ and Ryan (1995) conducted a meta-analysis and obtained consistent relationships between affective commitment on the one hand and altruism and following norms and rules on the other. There are also positive but weaker connections between citizenship behaviours and normative commitment (Meyer et al. 1993). For the case of continuance commitment, zero (Meyer et al. 1993) or even negative correlations (Shore and Wayne 1993) with citizenship behaviours have been found. Morrison (1994) could show that individuals high in affective or normative commitment perceive the described behaviours less as extra-role but more as part of their duties in the job. In addition, there is empirical evidence that members who feel affectively committed to their organizations more often make suggestions for improvement (Meyer et al. 1993). They also tend to take part in unethical behaviours on behalf of their organization because of their loyalty (Wahn 1993), a fact which gives a first insight 268

5 into possible negative aspects of commitment (cf. Moser 1996). In summary, it can be stated, that commitment is a well-established concept, and there have been diverse attempts to operationalize it with unidimensional as well as with more complex measures. Although operationalizations are not free of criticism, there seems to be a large amount of evidence that individuals with higher levels of affective commitment are lower in turnover, have lower rates of absenteeism, are more productive and show more extra-role behaviours than individuals who do not feel affectively committed to their organizations. Regarding normative commitment, the relationships are weaker but still substantial. For the case of continuance commitment, it can be stated that individuals who stay in their organizations because they feel that they need to do so have slightly higher absenteeism and lower productivity. In the following section of this paper, a very important social psychological theory, the Social Identity Approach, will be presented. This approach was originally developed to identify determinants of intergroup behaviour in the context of prejudice and hostility. More recently, Social Identity ideas are also considered in the context of work-related behaviour. This makes it useful for contexts and especially for the theoretical enlargement of the commitment concept. The Social Psychological Viewpoint: Social Identity Approach Social Identity Theory (SIT) was founded by Henri Tajfel and colleagues to describe and understand the psychological basis of intergroup behaviour and outgroup discrimination (Tajfel 1978; Tajfel and Turner 1979, 1986). Referring to the results of a series of minimal group experiments (Tajfel et al. 1971), Tajfel (1978) argues that the mere act of individuals categorizing themselves as members of a certain category is sufficient to discriminate against members of other categories. In these experiments, Tajfel and colleagues arbitrarily created groups by using meaningless distinctions such as preference for abstract paintings. After the group creation part of the experiment, subjects had to distribute small amounts of money or points to ingroup members and members of the other group. The group membership had powerful impact on the distribution: ingroup members generally were preferred and, above this, subjects strived for maximizing the distinctiveness between the two groups by distributing not only more money to ingroup members but by enhancing the difference between ingroup and outgroup even if this goes ahead with lower absolute gain for the ingroup member. In sum, these experiments demonstrated that it is not necessary to introduce realistic material conflicts but a mere categorization to find ingroup preference (cf. Tyler et al. 1999; Tyler and Smith 1999). The psychological core of SIT can be summarized as following (cf. Wagner and Zick 1990): (1) Individuals are motivated to achieve or maintain a positive self-esteem. (2) The individuals self-esteem is based partly on their social identity, which derives from group memberships. (3) The request for a positive social identity leads to the need for positive evaluations of the group in comparison with relevant other groups. These assumptions are valid under the two preconditions that (1) there must be a minimum of identification with a group and (2) the membership in a particular group is salient, i.e. psychologically relevant, in a given social context. In 1987, John Turner and colleagues presented Self-Categorization Theory (SCT, Turner et al. 1987), which adds to SIT assumptions about a group member s behaviour within the groups. Hogg and Terry (2000, 123) view SCT as that component of extended social identity theory... that details the social December

6 Identification in contexts: linking theory and research from social and psychology cognitive processes that generate social identity effects. Following the basic assumptions of SCT, individuals can categorize and compare themselves on different levels: as unique individuals (personal level), as group members distinct from members of other groups (intermediate or group level), or as a human being in comparison with other species (superordinate level). Levels of selfcategorization become salient through contextual changes, as e.g. through comparisons between relevant comparison objects on the same level of abstraction. SIT and SCT together, sometimes are described as the Social Identity Approach (Hogg and Abrams 1988; Wagner and Zick 1990). SCT particularly specifies whether people define themselves in terms of personal and social identity and, in case of salient social identities, which particular group becomes relevant for behaviour. Tajfel (1978, 63) distinguishes between personal and social identity. He defines social identity as that part of an individual s selfconcept which derives from his knowledge of his membership of a social group (or groups) together with the value and emotional significance attached to that membership. Within this definition, Tajfel describes three components of identification with a group (cf. also Tajfel 1981, 229): (1) a cognitive component, which is the knowledge of a certain group membership (2) an affective component, which describes the emotional attachment to this group, and (3) an evaluative component which is the value connotation assigned to that group. Research on ethnic identification has shown that a person s identification is also indicated by his or her participation in (ethnic) ingroup behaviours (cf. Phinney 1991). Therefore it could be fruitful to add a fourth component, namely (4) a conative (i.e. a behavioural) component. In general, identification means the classification of an object to a class of similar objects (a person wearing glasses belongs to the group of glass-wearing people, a man to the group of men etc.). Such a classification can be made from outside or through the individual him- or herself. The cognitive component of identification refers to the individual s self-classification (or selfcategorization, cf. Turner et al. 1987; or selfidentification, cf. Phinney 1991) to a category, i.e. the acceptance of being seen as the member of a certain group (identification as a group member). With the observation that an individual self-identifies as a member of a specific category or group, nothing is said about whether this fact is important or not for the individual s self-concept. This importance is introduced as identification with the category and incorporates primarily the second component of identification: it is the emotional attachment to that category, the individual s assignment of positive feelings with the group membership in question. The third component incorporates the perception of positive and negative assessments from outside (group self-esteem, cf. Ellemers et al. 1999, 372). This mostly consists of cognitions, i.e. putative knowledge. The fourth component of identification, conative identification, is used to describe participation in actions which are relevant for the group, such as participation in normative behaviours. Social psychologists have made diverse attempts to operationalize the different components of identification (Brown et al. 1986; Hinkle et al. 1989; Karasawa 1991). Up to now there are no attempts in basic research outside the ethnic identification studies to include conative commitment. Social Identity Theory assumes that individuals strive for a positive self-concept (Aberson et al. 2000; Abrams and Hogg 1988; Rubin and Hewstone 1998): One part of this self-concept is based on their social identity, which is based on group memberships. To varying degrees, organizations are important groups with which individuals can identify. 270

7 Hogg and Terry (2000) argue that, for many people, identity is more important than any other category they belong to, such as gender, age or ethnicity. How well one s group or parts of it (work-groups, teams, organization as a whole etc., cf. Wagner, 2001) comes off in comparison with relevant other groups depends also on the personal efforts of every single member. This means that, in order to gain a positive self-concept from membership in an organization, one has to help the organization to be better off. From this point of view, members of organizations should be forced to show engagement, in-role and extrarole behaviour, low absenteeism etc. to establish or enhance their own self-esteem. Integration The application of Social Identity Theory to processes is not totally new. Ashforth and Mael (1989) were among the first who systematically attempted to apply this theory to contexts. According to them, SIT and its description of identification gives a partial answer to the question of Who am I? Following van Knippenberg (2000), this cognitive aspect of identification is crucial to distinguish it from commitment or involvement. Accordingly, commitment reflects more affective, involvement more behavioural aspects. In some studies, identification has been proven as distinct from commitment on the basis of confirmatory factor analyses (cf. Mael 1988, after Ashforth and Mael 1989; Mael and Tetrick 1992; van Dick et al. in press; van Knippenberg and Sleebos, personal communication, 1999). Organizational identification in this sense means, in terms of SCT, depersonalization, i.e. values and goals become part of the individual s self-concept (cf. Hogg and Terry 2000) and in that way normative for the group member. But, and this is a main point of critique of the first attempts to incorporate social identity processes into settings, Ashforth and Mael (1989) and subsequent researchers following this tradition (Mael and Ashforth 1992; Mael and Tetrick 1992; Dutton et al. 1994), only touched the surface of the broader Social Identity Approach (cf. Pratt 1998, for a conceptual distinction between commitment and identification). Ashforth and Mael and others mainly focused on the cognitive aspect of social identity in their theoretical analyses and largely neglected the other components of identification described above. For example, Ashforth and Mael (1989, 21) defined social identification as the perception of oneness with or belongingness to some human aggregates. Then the authors gave some examples which perfectly fit the cognitive self-categorization approach of cognitive identification as a member of a certain group. With this notion, Ashforth and Mael (1989) explicitly are in contrast with some literature on SIT, which includes affective and evaluative dimensions in the conceptualizations of identity (p. 21). On the other hand, in their own research Mael and Ashforth (1992, 1995) used a six-item scale measuring identification, which consists of four items tapping evaluative and two items clearly asking for affective identification. This shows that, in their empirical work, the cognitive aspect of self-categorization is totally neglected (cf. for a critique on these measures Bergami and Bagozzi 2000). Similarly, in a study of Smidts et al. (2000) on effects of employee communication and perceived external prestige on identification, only the affective component of identification is considered. The concepts of psychology, commitment and involvement are in good accordance with some assumptions of the Social Identity Approach: commitment best reflects affective identification with the organization or parts of it. Involvement focuses on the personal identity and on the individual s profit out of his or her job and can be seen as conative (i.e. behavioural) identification. The December

8 Identification in contexts: linking theory and research from social and psychology Figure 1. An integrated model of social psychological and psychological terms and processes. Note: The darkly shaded region indicates those aspects which flow from the Social Identity Approach. cognitive aspect of identification as well as the component of evaluative identification has been largely neglected by research up to now. In Figure 1, the terms used in research are combined and extended with the dimensions of identification given by the Social Identity Approach. The model includes normative commitment, based on investment and individual predispositions, as well as continuance commitment, which develops on the basis of side-bets and dependencies between the member and the organization. However, both commitment dimensions are not in the focus of Social Identity Approach. Therefore, the shaded regions of Figure 1 are of special interest for the present discussion. As described above in more detail, first an individual considers him- or herself as a member of an organization, which is a cognitive process. Only if this cognitive identification is given, the other dimensions described by Phinney (1991), Tajfel (1978) and others come into play and the individual can identify with the organization in terms of affective, evaluative and behavioural commitment. These latter three dimensions are interrelated: it is probable that an individual who feels affectively committed also shows more behavioural identification. When an individual feels that his or her organization is considered positively from outside, it is more likely that he or she also will be affectively committed and so on (cf. Harquail 1998). To what extent the selfcategorization as a member of an organization and the affective, emotional and conative identification with that particular group becomes relevant depends on the category salience in a given context. Following the theoretical and empirical work of and social psychologists (Becker 1992; Becker et al. 1996; Ellemers et al. 1998; Meyer and Allen 1997, 20 23; van Knippenberg and van Schie 2000), it makes sense to distinguish different foci of identification. According to this literature, at 272

9 least four foci can be distinguished, namely (1) identification with the own career, (2) identification with one s working unit or group, (3) identification with the organization as a whole, and (4) identification with the occupation or occupational group. Of course there are other possible foci of identification, e.g. union commitment (Snape et al. 2000) or identification with certain supervisors (e.g. top management or unit leaders, cf. Meyer and Allen 1997) or several others (clients or customers, public service ethics etc., cf. Snape et al. 2000). Here, the analysis focuses on the four probably most prominent examples, which are also already considered in empirical research (e.g. Ellemers et al. 1998; van Knippenberg and van Schie 2000). Related to levels of abstraction of SCT, career identification can be seen as corresponding to the personal level of categorization, whereas the other three fall into the group level of identification. As a first general hypothesis, it can be proposed that especially those aspects of group performance that correspond to the focus of identification will be influenced by a person s identification. For example, if a person s focus of his or her identification is on his or her own career, one would expect this person to concentrate on behaviours that promote individual competences. On the other hand, if the person is highly identified with his or her working unit, the prediction is that this person will prohibit trouble for the group and show high levels of citizenship behaviour and a low absence rate. Identification with different foci can also lead to conflict (cf. Meyer and Allen 1997, 99f.) and, as a result, to decreases in performance. Imagine, for example, a person who simultaneously identifies strongly with his or her own career and with the organization. The first identification may imply quitting the job in order to take promising promotion opportunities, the second identification implies staying in the organization. Similar conflicts may emerge in the case of simultaneous identification with working unit and organization. Following SCT and SIT, a second general hypothesis can be drawn, i.e. that the salience of categories will determine which of the potential foci will become relevant for behaviour. When work context and/or task structure focus on an individual level (e.g. working alone or under individual reward structures), the personal level of selfcategorization is activated and the person will act on behalf of individual benefits. If, on the other hand, the context activates a salient social categorization (e.g. when working in a team and especially in a group comparison context), the person at hand will act on behalf of his or her group. Fields of Application In this section, three examples for the applicability of the ideas described above are presented. These examples are not intended to be exhaustive but they should give an idea of the role SIT and SCT can play in contexts. In the final conclusion of this paper, however, other fields of application are discussed. Because of space limitations, especially those topics were considered here in more detail which (1) particularly fit the proposed theoretical ideas and which (2) have been validated empirically. First, research on the relation between group identification and group performance will be provided. In the second part, connections between identification and work-related attitudes are considered. Finally, implications for group norms are briefly summarized. Group Identification and Performance A number of studies have shown that, under certain conditions, group performance falls short of mean individual group members performance. This holds true for physical tasks such as rope-pulling (Ingham et al. 1974) or shouting (Latané et al. 1979), as well as for cognitive tasks such as brainstorming (Diehl and Stroebe 1987; Stroebe and Diehl 1994). The effect is most prominent in additive tasks. Further research (Steiner 1972; cf. Stroebe and December

10 Identification in contexts: linking theory and research from social and psychology Frey 1982) demonstrated that losses in group performance can be traced back to problems of co-ordination between group members and decrease in their motivation. Motivational losses emerge because group members cannot identify their individual inputs (social loafing; Latané et al. 1979) or consider individual contributions as not really needed (free riding; Dawes 1980). Stroebe et al. (1996) have shown that the elimination of motivational losses results in motivation gains in group productivity. In addition, Harkins and Szymanski (1989) have argued that social loafing and free riding in groups mainly occur because the groups used in most of the empirical paradigms are of no or very limited meaning for subjects. These authors expect increased performance, i.e. social facilitation (greater effort in the presence of others; cf. Zajonc 1965) or social labouring effects (greater effort on group tasks; cf. Brown 2000), if group membership becomes meaningful and important for the subject. Meta-analyses confirm these assumptions (Karau and Williams 1993; Williams et al. 1993). Up to now it is unclear which psychological variables are affected by making group membership more meaningful. The explanation proposed here is that (1) individuals feel a higher degree of identification with natural groups compared with artificial groups (cf. Jehn and Shah 1997), and (2) group performance should be influenced by group members identification with their group (cf. also Haslam, 2001, 272). If this hypothesis holds true, this would also imply that social loafing or free riding effects can be modified and compensated by heightening group members identifications. It depends on the certain task at hand which focus of identification is relevant here. If it is, for example, the working unit which constitutes the relevant group for production, then a heightening of identification with this focus will increase performance. In addition, it can be assumed that especially affective identification with the working unit will have such an effect. For behaviour in groups, SIT and SCT propose that an increase in identification (given a certain degree of category salience) or an increase in category salience (given a certain degree of identification) will increase attraction to the group, attraction between group members and the assumed attitudinal similarity between the group members (Wagner and Ward 1993). It can also be proposed that for groups whose goal is the preparation of some group product, such as working groups or groups, an increase in identification and salience will heighten group members productivity. There is empirical evidence which is in accordance with this assumption (for overviews see Brown 2000; Haslam, 2001; Ouwerkerk et al. 1999). All of these studies concentrate on group identification, i.e. the medium level of self-categorization in terms of SCT. A number of studies have shown that making intergroup comparisons salient increases group productivity and related behaviours. James and Greenberg (1989) conducted two experiments with university students. In study 1, a comparison between universities was made implicit by the notion that the study would be realized both in participants own and in a related university. Salience of university affiliation was manipulated by using written instructions either on neutral paper or on paper in university colours (see also Worchel et al. 1998, study 3). In study 2, the comparison between the participants own university and a comparison university was either implicit or explicit. In both experiments, participants showed an increase in individual performance on an anagram-solving task in the ingroupsalience compared with the non-salience condition. Other studies have increased ingroup salience even further in that they brought groups to conflict for limited resources. Worchel et al. (1998, experiment 1) showed that, under these conditions, group performance even outperforms mean individual performance. Similar results were found by Erev et al. (1993), who showed that fruit pickers reduce their performance when paid on the basis of mean group productivity. 274

11 This loss in performance will be compensated, however, when working groups compete against each other for an extra bonus (see also Bornstein and Erev 1997). These studies are in good accordance with the hypothesis that ingroup salience and ingroup identification influence the productivity of group members. However, evidence is at best indirect if we assume that the described experimental manipulations in fact heighten ingroup salience or ingroup identification. None of them contained the appropriate manipulation controls. Other studies have related measures of ingroup identification to group performance. Jehn and Shah (1997) found that friendship groups of business students outperformed acquaintance groups in group cognitive and motor performance because of a higher degree of group commitment in the friendship groups. In a similar manner, Arnscheid (1999, study 5) compared groups of high versus low cohesiveness built on the basis of interpersonal preferences. Overall, high cohesive groups outperformed low cohesive groups in brainstorming tasks. James and Cropanzano (1994, study 4) discovered positive correlations between loyalty and involvement in university activities among university students. In two further studies (1 and 2), the same authors found that dispositional group loyalty of group members leads to better individual performance in anagram-solving tasks when the intergroup context was made salient through intergroup comparisons. The strongest empirical support for the influence of group identification and salience on group performance was found in an experiment conducted by Karau and Hart (1998). These authors manipulated group cohesiveness through bogus feedback of mutual attitude similarity within groups and let their participants work either under co-actively (individual performance will be compared with other individuals) or collectively working instructions (comparisons between groups): social loafing occurred under collective comparison and low cohesiveness, whereas participants in high cohesive collective conditions performed as well as participants in the co-active conditions. In another series of studies, Tyler et al. (1996) revealed correlations between a measure of group pride and extra-role behaviours in family, work and university contexts. In sum, most of available research cited above supports our hypothesis that it is identification with a group together with situational salience of group membership that mediates the described effects on group productivity. However, many of the studies presented analysed artificial groups in laboratory contexts. The transfer of their results to contexts still has to be proved. Work-related Attitudes Research of psychology has demonstrated that individuals who feel emotionally attached to their organizations show more job satisfaction and work motivation, better job performance, less search intentions and actual turnover (see for an overview Matthieu and Zajac 1990). These relationships hold especially for affective commitment (Meyer and Allen 1997). Correlations between job-related antecedents and consequences on the one hand and normative and continuance commitment on the other hand are less strong. Affective commitment is defined as the employee s emotional attachment to, identification with, and involvement in the organization (Meyer and Allen 1991, 67). Thus, a close relationship between affective commitment as used in literature and identification as proposed by SIT and SCT can be assumed. But although different researchers from social psychology have attempted to bring SIT into the context (Haslam, 2001; Hogg and Terry 2000; Ouwerkerk et al ), psychologists rarely take theoretical advances and empirical findings of the Social Identity Approach into account. December

12 Identification in contexts: linking theory and research from social and psychology There are only few exceptions in very recent research that measured the co-variation of ingroup identification, work-related attitudes (e.g. satisfaction and motivation), and group productivity in work contexts. In this research, different foci of identification were also considered. Van Knippenberg and van Schie (2000) found correlations in two samples (university faculty members and local government employees) between identification on the one hand and job satisfaction, job motivation, turnover intentions and job involvement on the other. For both samples, work group identification, as the closer focus, was the better predictor for the different criteria compared with the broader focus of identification with the organization as a whole. Ellemers and colleagues (1998) assessed commitment regarding three different foci, i.e. career commitment, team commitment and commitment among a representative sample of the Dutch population and found that these three foci of commitment are distinct constructs. Measuring workrelated behaviours (e.g. working hours, satisfaction, absenteeism, overtime) one year later, Ellemers and colleagues showed that there is a differential impact of the foci of commitment on specific behaviours. For example, team-oriented commitment is the best predictor for overtime, career-oriented commitment predicts voluntary job change, commitment correlates positively with work satisfaction and negatively with applications for other jobs. The results were cross-validated in a second study among employees of a financial service organization in Belgium. Van Dick and Wagner (2000) conducted two questionnaire studies among school teachers and found relationships between general identification with the occupational group and motivation, and job satisfaction in study 1. In study 2, different dimensions and foci could be separated and strongest relations were found between affective identification with the occupational group and with the team on the one hand and self-reported citizenship behaviour and retirement intentions on the other. In sum, this research from the social psychological perspective shows that different dimensions and foci of identification can be distinguished in settings. Individuals identifying with their organizations show more engagement for their organization (e.g. overtime), report more satisfaction and lower turnover intentions. When considering different foci, relations between identification with smaller sub-units (team or work group) and work-related attitudes are usually stronger than relations between work-related attitudes and broader foci, such as the organization as a whole. Above this, affective identification seems to be the best predictor for work-related attitudes compared with the other dimensions of identification proposed by SIT (cf. Ouwerkerk et al. 1999). Group Norms Up to now, increases in identification with a category and/or increases in category salience were assumed to determine increases in productivity. This holds true, however, only as long as productivity is a relevant ingroup norm (cf. Hackman 1987). SCT predicts a change of attitudes and behaviours in the direction of the prototypical category position when identification or the category s salience increase (Wetherell 1987). That means, if it is not productivity but another goal which is supported by category norms, an increase in identification (or salience) will be followed by a better attempt to realize this goal. For example, for workers on a go-slow strike, working slowly is a dominant norm. It can be assumed that increasing union membership identification/salience will have the effect of decreased group productivity. Concerning group performance, the general hypothesis is therefore that an increase in productivity can be proposed for groups as long as productivity is a relevant ingroup norm; this can switch to the opposite as soon as other 276

13 (non-productive) norms become more relevant (see also Haslam et al. 2000). Above this, identification with different foci could also lead to conflict because of different underlying norms: If an individual identifies strongly with his working unit but not as much with his organization as a whole, norms in the working unit who partly contradict the goals of the organization will be more easily followed. Brown and colleagues, for example, have demonstrated in industrial contexts that perceived conflicts between sub-units led to more negative evaluations of the other units: In an investigation among paper mill employees, Brown et al. (1986) could show that the members of other departments were liked more when they were perceived as working together with the own group on behalf of the company s goal (identical norm). Less liking occurred when they were perceived as working against these goals (conflicting norms). Another example of conflicting norms is provided by Yorges (1999), who compared participants performing individual tasks in the presence of others with participants performing the same tasks in a group context in the presence of another group. In this laboratory experiment, participants in the group conditions provided less citizenship behaviour (helping to find lost contact lenses, showing the way to a restroom etc.) on behalf of individuals of the other groups compared with the participants in the individualized condition. Conclusions and Implications This paper has presented overlap and distinctions between and social psychological theory and research. The Social Identity Approach as presented here has certain advantages compared with traditional research on commitment from the perspective of psychology: (1) It provides a strong theoretical basis for predicting, measuring, and analysing different dimensions of identification. (2) SIT and especially SCT serve as a theoretical foundation for different foci of identification. (3) This approach takes into account, that there is a large influence of situational and contextual change: identification with an organization or its sub-units is not a static and fixed phenomenon, but it can increase or decrease quickly when context changes ingroup salience, e.g. when introducing intergroup comparisons. As the applications in the fields of group performance, group norms and work motivation have shown, to consider both sub-disciplines of psychology could provide a fruitful ground for further work. Of course, there are also other fields of application, for which has already been shown the usefulness of the Social Identity Approach: Hogg and Terry (2000) have given examples of involving SIT and SCT in research on group cohesion and deviance, group structure and mergers and acquisitions. Haslam (2001) extended Social Identity predictions on processes and phenomena such as communication and information management, group decision making, intergroup negotiation and conflict management, power and industrial protest. Above this, there is some work dealing with leadership from a social identity perspective (Haslam and Platow, in press; Haslam et al. 2001; Turner and Haslam, 2001). Another example of applying Social Identity is the field of mergers and acquisitions, van Knippenberg and his colleagues have conducted several studies in the field (van Knippenberg et al. in press) as well as in the laboratory (van Leeuwen et al. 2000). These studies show, for example, that members of the dominated group (i.e. the acquired organization) identify less with the postmerger organization than members of the dominating group (i.e. the acquiring organization). Regarding all these contributions, it becomes clear that it is extremely useful to have a broad theoretical basis, such as SIT and December

14 Identification in contexts: linking theory and research from social and psychology SCT incorporate, to explain very different results in a huge diversity of fields of application. What can managers gain from this knowledge? As we have shown in the context of group identification and performance, increasing group salience can enhance identification which in turn leads to increased performance. These effects can be directly applied by managers when dealing with work teams and when structuring teams, setting reward structures and so on (cf. Hackman 1987). It seems to be of particular importance to consider matters of identity and identification when restructuring departments or when teamwork is introduced for the first time. In these cases, the identification with a newly built department or new work teams could be increased, for example, if comparisons with relevant other teams are introduced. On the other hand, identification can have negative consequences for the organization, too. These can be caused by conflicting identities between different foci and prototypical ingroup norms. This aspect should lead managers to be careful when introducing intergroup comparisons or when forcing extremely high identification or commitment of employees. Finally, there is another negative aspect of identification when it comes to an over-identification with the organization which results in employees becoming blind followers of rules even if they are to some extent unethical or at least destroy attempts for innovation when the status quo is fully accepted. Acknowledgements I am very grateful to Ulrich Wagner for his helpful comments and guidance in structuring this paper. I also would like to thank Alex Haslam, Andreas Homburg and Cornelius Koch for their detailed suggestions on earlier versions. Finally, I express my appreciation to Tania Lincoln for her assistance on language and style of the text. References Aberson, C.L., Healy, M. and Romero, V. (2000). Ingroup bias and self-esteem: a meta-analysis. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 4, Abrams, D. and Hogg, M.A. (1988). Comments on the motivational status of self esteem in social identity and intergroup discrimination. European Journal of Social Psychology, 18, Abrams, D., Ando, K. and Hinkle, S. (1998). Psychological attachment to the group: crosscultural differences in identification and subjective norms as predictors of workers turnover intentions. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 24, Allen, N.J. and Meyer, J.P. (1990). The measurement and antecedents of affective, continuance and normative commitment to the organization. Journal of Occupational Psychology, 63, Allen, N.J. and Meyer, J.P. (1996). Affective, continuance, and normative commitment to the organization: an examination of construct validity. Journal of Vocational Behaviour, 49, Angle, H.L. and Lawson, M.B. (1994). Organizational commitment and employees performance ratings: both type of commitment and type of performance count. Psychological Reports, 75, Angle, H.L. and Perry, J.L. (1981). An empirical assessment of commitment and effectiveness. Administrative Science Quarterly, 27, Arnscheid, R. (1999). Gemeinsam sind wir stark? Zum Zusammenhang zwischen Gruppenkohäsion und Gruppenleistung (Together we are strong: relations between group cohesion and group performance). Münster, Germany: Waxmann. Ashforth, B.E. and Mael, F. (1989). Social Identity Theory and the organization. Academy of Management Journal, 14, Ashforth, B.E. and Saks, A.M. (1996). Socialization tactics: longitudinal effects on newcomer adjustment. Academy of Management Journal, 39, Bashaw, E.R. and Grant, S.E. (1994). Exploring the distinctive nature of work commitments: their relationships with personal characteristics, job performance, and propensity to leave. Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management, 14, Baugh, S.G. and Roberts, R.M. (1994). Professional and commitment among engineers: 278