The moderating effect of organizational commitment on burnout in information systems professionals
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The moderating effect of organizational commitment on burnout in information systems professionals RC King1 and V Sethi2 1 2
College of Commerce and Business Administration, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, IL 61820; and CIS Department, Southwest Missouri State University, Springfield, MO 65804, USA The study examines the moderating role of organizational commitment on the relationship between role stressors and burnout in information systems (IS) professionals. Two role stressors are examined in this study – role ambiguity and role conflict. In addition, two dimensions of organizational commitment – affective and continuance commitment – are examined for their moderating influence. The emotional exhaustion subscale of the Maslach Burnout Inventory is used to measure burnout in 312 IS professionals. Both role stressors were found to correlate positively with burnout. In addition, affective commitment was found to moderate the relationship between role stressors and burnout. Therefore, in employees with high affective commitment, role stressors had a lesser effect on burnout. This study, therefore, supports the argument that commitment acts as a buffer against stress and its antecedents.
Introduction Organizational commitment and job stress have been noted as factors that can affect the work performance and tenure of information systems (IS) professionals. Previous research has examined these variables in order to identify the consequences of commitment and job stress such as turnover and performance effectiveness. For example, Igbaria and Greenhaus (1992) found that committed employees are less likely to leave an organization than those who are less committed. Mathieu and Zajac (1990) determined in their meta-analysis that commitment is negatively related to withdrawal behaviour; i.e., intention to search for job alternatives and an intention to quit. Several practical consequences of stress and burnout have also been identified in the literature. Kahill (1988) grouped these consequences into five categories: physical, emotional, interpersonal, attitudinal, and behavioural. These categories include a variety of mental and physical health problems (Burke & Deszca, 1986); physiological strain (Kaldenberg & Becker, 1992); deterioration of personal relationships (Jackson & Maslach, 1982); the development of negative attitudes toward the job (Burke et al, 1984); and a decrease in the quality of job performance (Maslach & Jackson, 1985). While the antecedents and consequences of burnout and commitment are important, these variables must also be examined in the broader framework of organizational stress. Motowidlo et al (1986) proposed a model of occupational stress in which the subjective experience of stress is caused by specific work-related events and leads to negative effects such as anxiety, hostility, and
depression. These negative effects are often associated with lower job performance. In this model, the cumul
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