Summary Psychology in the workplace Chapter 9

Chapter 9 -Attitudes, Emotions, and Work

MODULE 9.1 Work Attitudes

Job Satisfaction: Some History

 The Early Period of Job Satisfaction Research

Job satisfaction Positive attitude or emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one’s job or
job experience.

The findings suggested that the perceptions of workers had a greater effect on productivity than
the actual physical working conditions

Job satisfaction is a positive emotional state that can result from positive interactions with one’s
coworkers

Hawthorne effect .A change in behavior or attitudes that was the simple result of increased
attention->gives input to attitues

Attitudes Relatively stable feelings or beliefs that are directed toward specific persons, groups,
ideas, jobs, or other objects

years between 1935 and 1955
-if an employer could keep worker morale high, the company would be strike ‐free and profitablefree and profitable
-the greater the extent to which important needs were met, the greater would be worker
satisfaction
-Social psychologists became very interested in attitudes of all sorts, and attitudes toward work
represented a good integration of the theories of social psychologists with the interests of
industrial psychologists

In the late 1950s
-Brayfield and Crockett (1955) concluded that there was little evidence of any substantial
connection between satisfaction and performance
-In contrast, concluded that there was a connection between satisfaction and at least some work
behaviors, particularly absenteeism and turnoverled to the two factor theory (Herzberg)
-Herzberg’s 2 factor theory
 job satisfaction was the result of intrinsic job characteristics (e.g., interesting work,
challenge),
 whereas job dissatisfaction was the result of extrinsic characteristics (e.g., pay, working
conditions)

Herzberg proposed that extrinsic factors satisfied “hygiene” needs and intrinsic factors satisfied
“motivator” needs. This theory resulted in a flurry of activity, but eventually the theory was
rejected on both logical and empirical grounds


 Antecedents and Consequences of Job Satisfaction

, The Measurement of Job Satisfaction

 Overall versus Facet Satisfaction

-When is a overall score vs facet score more useful?
Overall satisfactionOverall assessment of job satisfaction that results either from
mathematically combining scores based on satisfaction with specific important aspects of work or
a single overall evaluative rating of the job

-simple five‐free and profitableitem scale that appears to work well as a measure of overall satisfaction 

Respondents use an agree–disagree format to reflect their attitude

 overall score will work just finee.g., comparing one plant or division of an
organization to another
 facet information might be more useful e.g., trying to identify which aspects of the
work environment might play a central role in recruiting new employees


Facet satisfaction Information related to specific facets or elements of job satisfaction
The construction of a new type of attitude measure




a critical issue in recent discussions of job satisfaction is not whether overall or facet satisfaction
should be measured, but whether research needs to be redirected to look at moods and emotions
at work rather than focusing exclusively on cognitions