Theses supervised by Prof. Dr. Zeynep Aycan
17 theses · Koç University
Turning pain into gain: The effect of downward mobbing on employees' stress-related growth
The present thesis investigates the effect of downward mobbing on employee's stress-related growth with the mediator role of burnout, and the moderator role of personality hardiness and coworker support. Data were collected from 367 employees (177 females, 186 males) through Amazon Mturk. Self-report measures were administered to participants who have been exposed to mobbing by their supervisor/ manager in at least one of their previous work experiences. Moderated mediation analysis suggested that burnout mediates the relationship between mobbing and stress-related growth where burnout and growth were negatively associated. Co-worker support appeared as a significant but inadequate moderator to promote growth. Post hoc analysis suggested that there is a curvilinear relationship between burnout and growth, and hardiness is a significant – but insufficient – moderator in the direct relationship. Implications for science and practice will be discussed.
An overlooked connection: Work design quality and leadership intention
The present study investigated whether there is a connection between employees' perceived work design quality and their intention for a particular leadership position at their current organization. Mediator role of worries about leadership (WAL) and the moderator role of motivation to lead (MTL) were also examined. 350 white-collar employees (58% male, 41.4% female, and 0.6% other) in the US participated in the survey study through the Amazon MTurk. The results showed that there is a positive relationship between work design and leadership intention: as employees' work design quality increases, their intention to be a leader at the current organization increases. However, the mediation effect of WAL and the moderation effect of MTL were not significant. Post-hoc analyses were run to see if the mediation and moderation effects can be observed at the subdimensions of these two multidimensional constructs (i.e., WAL and MTL). The results of post-hoc analyses showed that none of WAL's subdimensions (failure, work-life balance, and harm) had a significant mediation effect and none of MTL's subdimensions (affective, normative, and non-calculative) had a significant moderation effect. Theoretical and practical implications, and future directions are discussed.
The Participatory Theater Framework of Leadership
The traditional conceptualization of leadership can be understood as the leader occupying centerstage whilst the audience of 'followers' remains largely in the dark. Furthermore, as an actor on stage would perceive a booing member of the audience as malevolent or ignorant, the extant literature mainly depicts non-followers as obstacles, inefficiencies, or irritants that should be corrected so that they can become productive members of the group (Ford & Harding, 2018). Yet, leadership does not only revolve around the leader and his/her ability to create 'good followers' (Collinson, 2006). It is the compilation of cooperating and clashing individual agencies of the group members that results in more than mere aggregation. Through their support, opposition, and even apathy, every group member is a participant of the leadership phenomenon and they individually and collectively influence the group goal and to what extent it is actualized. As such, this dissertation is dedicated to understanding who the constituents of leadership really are and how leadership as a multilevel social phenomenon that is co-created by all group members actually works. In this dissertation, I introduce the participatory theater framework (PTF) of leadership as a novel and holistic theoretical approach that can enable us to answer the questions above. The participatory theater framework recognizes everyone in the group, including the leader and all forms of followers and non-followers, individually and collectively, as agentic performers of leadership. Deriving its foundations from various research areas such as social and cognitive psychology, moral philosophy, and game theory, this dissertation (i) establishes the theoretical foundation of the PTF and proposes a typology of roles people adopt in leadership situations, (ii) demonstrates that even those who are most commonly thought to be passive (i.e., devoted followers of toxic leaders; frequently called 'sheep' ) are indeed willful co-creators of the leadership phenomenon, and (iii) presents empirical evidence for the existence of the proposed typology of roles.
Gender and gendered personality traits of the leader: Role of need for leadership
The landscape of leadership is often dominated by gender stereotypes, where men are predominantly preferred for leadership roles. This study delves into the tangled dynamics of leadership preferences, specifically examining the impact of gender, gendered personality traits and the individual's need for leadership. Drawing on the framework proposed by de Vries (1998) on the "Need for Leadership," this research investigates the preferences among four leader profiles: masculine-male, masculine-female, feminine-male, and feminine-female. The study, conducted with 248 participants from Amazon's MTurk, utilized a two-by-two design to present these profiles and evaluate their suitability as leaders. Results challenge conventional gender norms, suggesting that the preference for leaders is not solely determined by traditional gender stereotypes but is influenced by individual needs for leadership. Furthermore, the research underscores the importance of aligning leadership styles with followers' needs, emphasizing the potential for enhanced work engagement and performance. This study offers significant contributions to the literature on gender and leadership, suggesting a more inclusive understanding of leadership dynamics that goes beyond traditional gendered expectations. Keywords: gender, gendered personality traits, need for leadership
Be mindful of the mindfulness interventions! Does mindfulness increase leader moral action through unveiling organizational politics?
Distressing trends and the destructive effects of leadership are widespread, yet the revival of morality in leaders' behaviors remains poorly understood. This study, drawing on behavioral integrity and dynamic (managerial) capabilities theory, investigates how leaders' moral actions are activated through personal resources while tapping into contextual factors. More specifically, employing a quasi-experimental research design with a waitlist control group (n = 30 in total), the current study examines the effects of an 8-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program on psychological well-being, proactive coping, awareness of organizational politics, and the subsequent enactment of moral actions among middle-level leaders from various multinational corporations in the service sector. The findings uncover a paradox: while mindfulness enhances psychological well-being, its translation into political awareness and moral action is complex. Increased personal resources do not directly result in improved political awareness or moral behavior among leaders, indicating a complex interplay between mindfulness and moral leader behavior. This study adds to the growing body of literature on mindfulness and leadership, advocating for further research into how mindfulness unveils morality in leadership while navigating the challenging dynamics of organizational politics.
The role of individuals' self-comparisons with existing leaders on negative leadership attitudes
Research shows that most people are not interested in taking on leadership roles, which hinders leadership diversity and effectiveness by narrowing talent pools. This dissertation explores how negative attitudes toward leadership develop, with particular emphasis on the role of individuals' self-comparisons with existing leaders. The central argument is that people may use existing leaders as reference points to infer whether they fit with leadership, and that the symbolic fit cues generated through these comparisons can shape their leadership attitudes. Chapter 2 presents the first empirical study in the organizational domain of leadership, which analyzed survey data from 335 employees across 38 organizations. Findings showed that a larger gap between the leadership styles employees reported they would use and the styles they perceived as common among their organizations' leaders was associated with higher worries about taking on leadership, a relationship fully mediated by lower levels of psychological safety. Chapter 3 reports the second empirical study conducted in the political context, using survey data from 344 local candidates of two competing parties during nationwide local elections. Path analyses demonstrated that perceiving oneself as more similar to the party leader was associated with lower leadership worries about holding office, an association fully mediated by greater participation in campaign activities. However, these significant paths were observed only among candidates from the ruling party and not the main opposition party, underscoring the importance of contextual factors. Chapter 4 introduces the Bottleneck Metaphor of Leadership Culture, which conceptualizes how reliance on existing leaders as reference points in leadership attitude formation may, over time, narrow and exclude the shared understanding of what leadership is and who can be a leader. Overall, the dissertation argues that negative leadership attitudes are not merely individual differences, but context-dependent responses shaped by symbolic fit cues drawn from comparisons with existing leaders.
Yabanci yoneticilere yonelik tutumlar : Bir ölçeğin geliştirilmesi
In this study a measure for assessment of host country nationals? attitudes towards expatriates (ATEX) was developed. The study consisted of four phases. In the first phase, in-depth interviews with 10 expatriates and 15 host country nationals (HCNs) were conducted and items of ATEX were generated based on the interview outcomes. In the second phase, the 60-item version of ATEX was filled out by 198 HCN participants for potential expatriate managers assigned from developed countries to developing countries. Following the analysis of results, item elimination was conducted. In the third phase, the remaining 34 items of ATEX were evaluated by 44 participants as positive or negative attributes of expatriates. In the main study, 228 participants filled out a questionnaire including 34-item version of ATEX. Personality, ethnocentrism, universal-diverse orientation, preference to work with expatriates and intention to provide social support to expatriates were also assessed through this questionnaire. After factor analyses, final version of ATEX was reduced to 24 items which loaded on to five factors. ATEX correlated significantly with openness to experience, extraversion, universal-diverse orientation and ethnocentrism. These correlations provided support for the convergent validity of ATEX. Discriminant validity of ATEX was supported by two findings. Having previous work experience with expatriates led to positive attitudes towards expatriates and quality of the experience correlated with ATEX. Criterion-related validity was supported by the findings that intention to provide social support to expatriates and preference to work with expatriate managers correlated with ATEX. Since there was lack of such a measure in expatriation literature, ATEX has the potential to be a reference point for further research on this issue and contribute to practitioners by providing them information about specific areas that require training for expatriates and HCNs.
İş-aile çatışmasının geçişi: Çift kazançlı ailelerde geçiş sürecinin önceli ve sonuçları
The present study aimed at investigating the crossover effect of an individual?s workfamilyconflict on the psychological well-being (i.e. life satisfaction, marital satisfaction andemployment-related guilt) of the corresponding partner. Support mechanisms, namelymanagerial and spousal support, and problem solving behavior were examined as moderators.Data were collected from 187 dual-earner couples with at least one child between the ages of0 and 6 years. It was revealed that woman?s family-to-work conflict was negatively related tothe marital satisfaction of her spouse. Regarding husband to wife model, man?s family-toworkconflict was negatively correlated with the life satisfaction and positively correlatedwith employment-related guilt of his spouse. Furthermore, work-to-family conflictexperienced by man was significantly correlated with marital satisfaction and employmentrelatedguilt of his spouse. Moderated multiple regression analyses revealed that problemsolving behavior of women moderated the relationship between family-to-work conflictexperienced by husband and the life satisfaction, as well as employment related guilt of wife.The present study provided an integrated model combining support mechanisms, work-familyconflict, and psychological well-being indicators in a single study.Key words: Work-to-family conflict, family-to-work conflict, crossover,psychological well-being.
Kişisel beğeni yanlılığının görüşmeci değerleri, kişilik özellikleri ve bilişsel tarzı ile ilişkisi üzerine deneysel bir çalışma
The aim of the present study was to investigate the relationship of personal liking bias with values, personality characteristics and cognitive style of the interviewers in employee selection decisions. In the present study, personal liking bias was defined as the bias that the interviewer is subject to in such a way that the final selection decision of the interviewer is made predominantly based on the personal liking/disliking of the interviewer towards the applicant rather than the technical competencies of the candidate and his potential performance. An experimental method was used and 176 undergraduate students from different departments taking psychology and sociology classes at Koç University were used as the sample. Results showed partial associations between personal liking bias and low performance-orientation, high collectivism, high extraversion, low rational thinking style. The current study attempts to inform the decision-makers in organizations about the characteristics of the interviewers who have the potential to make biased selection decisions and to contribute to the human resources management literature of decision-making based on technical vs. interpersonal competencies.Keywords: Personal liking bias, decision-making based on technical vs. interpersonal competencies, interviewer personality, interviewer values.
İş-aile-özel hayat çatışması: 3 boyutlu modelin test edilmesi
This study aimed at examining the conflict between work, family and personal life (WFPC). The concept of WFPC was generated by adding personal life domain to the concept of work-family conflict. It was proposed that if balance between work, family and personal life was not maintained, psychological well-being would be affected negatively. Work demands (i.e., work overload, job control, and schedule inflexibility) and family demands (i.e., age of the youngest child, family control, and family overload) were hypothesized to be the antecedents of WFPC in the model. The model proposed that psychological well-being was associated with WFPC. Survey data were collected from 448 white-collar employees with at least one child. Results revealed that prevalence of work interfering with personal life (WIP) was higher than other types of interferences. As hypothesized, work overload was associated with WIP and family overload was associated with family interfering with personal life (FIP). FIP was also found to be significantly correlated with all indicators of psychological well-being in this study. The study is expected to contribute to science by testing interferences among three domains of life; work, family and personal life which there is little research about. There are also practical implications of the study that can guide employees to understand the antecedents and consequences of WFPC, and motivate organizations to widen the ranges of their family-friendly policies to policies that consider personal life, too.Key Words: Work-family-personal life conflict, life balance, job demands, family demands, depression, anxiety, burnout, life satisfaction.
Sosyal problem çözme becerilerinin iş-aile-özel hayat çatışması ve psikolojik iyi olma durumu ilişkisi üzerindeki düzenleyici rolü
The present study aimed at examining the moderating effects of Social Problem Solving Skills (SPSS) in the relationship between Work-Family-Personal Life Conflict (WFPC) and psychological well-being (anxiety, burnout, depression and life satisfaction) in Turkish white collar employee sample. Gender differences in the moderating role of SPSS in the WFPC and psychological well-being relationship were also explored. Data were collected from 448 white-collar employees having at least one child. It was expected that Rational Problem Solving (RPS) style had a positive effect on the relationship between WFPC and psychological well-being, and Impulsivity Carelessness Style (ICS) and Avoidance Style (AS) had a negative effect on the relationship between WFPC and psychological well-being. Moderated multiple regression analyses revealed that RPS moderated the relationship between WFPC and burnout. As hypothesized, subjects who had high WFPC and used high RPS had less burnout compared to ones that used low RPS. Contrary to what was expected, people who had high WFPC and used high ICS experienced less anxiety. No gender differences were found. This study is expected to contribute to the literature by examining the moderating role of SPSS as a coping mechanism in WFPC and psychological well-being relationship by using Social Problem Solving Inventory-Revised (SPSI-R).Keywords: work-family-personal life conflict, work-family conflict, social problem solving, coping, anxiety, burnout, depression, life satisfaction, psychological well-being.
İş-aile çatışması ve çocuklarda içselleştirme ve dışsallaştırma davranışlarının ilişkisi: Ebeveyn davranışlarının rolü
The current research as the first scientific study examines whether work-family conflict is related to externalizing and internalizing problems of preschool children through maternal responsiveness and negative control. In literature, work-family conflict is defined as a form of inter-role conflict that arises due to incompatibility of role expectations in work and family domains. The sample was composed of 98 Turkish employed mothers with children from the ages of 3-6 years. Responsiveness and negative control were assessed not only by mothers? self-report but also by observational methods. This is an important methodological strength of the study. Data from mothers? self-report and observations were separately analyzed by path analyses. The findings of this study add to the previous literature by showing, first, that WFC of parents appears to be a detrimental experience for children. Second, despite high WFC, mothers? responsive parenting behavior may prevent children from developing externalizing problems. Third, mothers who experience WFC were perceived as exhibiting high negative control over children?s behavior. Fourth, maternal responsiveness and control cannot explain the association between WFC and internalizing problems. These results partially support the hypotheses of the current study that WFC is associated with externalizing and internalizing problems of preschool children by its relation to parenting behaviors.
İş-özel hayat dengesinin çalışanların örgütsel tutumları ve psikolojik iyilik halleri ile olan ilişkisi
The aim of the study is to examine the relationship between work-personal life interface and employees? organizational attitudes and psychological well-being. The secondary aim is to explore whether generational difference (i.e., Generation Y and Generation X) moderates this relationship or not. The data collected from 424 full-time employees with different occupations and analyzed through structural equation modeling. Findings indicated that work-to-personal life conflict (WPC) was positively associated with turnover intentions, burnout and negatively associated with affective commitment and life satisfaction, whereas personal life-to-work conflict (PWC) was not associated with any of the outcomes in the study. Regarding the positive spillover, results revealed that work-to-personal life enhancement (WPE) was positively associated with affective commitment and life satisfaction and negatively associated with turnover intention and burnout. Interestingly, personal life-to-work enhancement (PWE) was positively related to employees` turnover intentions only. Contrary to expectations, no generational difference was found. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.
Milenyum kuşağındaki çalışanların kariyer değiştirme niyetleri
Although career change has received little research attention compared to job turnover, it is an important part of career development process. The current study examined career change intentions of Millennial professionals, who are at the early stages of their career development. Using Theory of Planned Behavior (Ajzen, 1991) as the theoretical framework, the present research extended the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) framework to career-related issues to examine the effects of career satisfaction, career calling, job satisfaction and job stress on career change intention. Data were collected from 227 full-time employees. Results showed that controlling for the demographic and individual difference variables, presence of career calling, job satisfaction, subjective norms and perceived behavioral control predicted career change intention. Path analysis further revealed that career satisfaction, presence of and search for career calling and job ambiguity had indirect effects on career change intention through job satisfaction. We further conducted latent profile analysis and distinguished two career profiles, based on career satisfaction, career calling, job satisfaction, job stress and TPB variables. Higher levels of attitudes, beliefs, subjective norms and normative beliefs together with lower levels of satisfaction and higher levels of job stress and search for a calling created response patterns in latent profile analysis to distinguish a 'dissatisfied and searching' profile of people who had higher career change intention. In the 'satisfied' profile, lower levels of attitudes, beliefs, subjective norms and normative beliefs went along with higher levels of satisfaction, presence of career calling and lower levels of job stress and search for a calling. ANCOVA results showed that these two profiles differed in their career change intention, with 'dissatisfied and searching' profile having higher career change intention. These findings indicated that both within and outside individual factors play role in career change intention. Given the fact that Millennials will make up majority of work force in the coming decades., understanding their career change intentions has important policy implications with respect to organizational and career counseling and guidance practices.
Hazir olun, yol-amaç kurami geri döndü!
Path-goal theory's main idea is that there is no one best style of leadership, leaders should have different behaviors in their toolbox, and they should use them according to the nature of the situation and the followers (House, 1971). Although this theory has intuitive appeal for practitioners, it has not been tested rigorously. Limited research evidence questions its validity for 21st century follower outcomes. Thus, this study investigates whether path-goal theory leads to the three important outcomes of contemporary work organizations; creative and innovative performance (CIP), adaptive performance (AP) and organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB). The present study focuses on one mediator (i.e. psychological safety) and two moderators (i.e. core self-evaluation and task structure) in order to reveal the intricate relationship between leader behaviors and follower outcomes. The data were collected from 664 employees from different occupations using Amazon's Mechanical Turk platform. The findings support; (1) the mediating effect of psychological safety between leadership behaviors and AP and OCB, (2) interaction among leadership, task structure and core selfevaluation on OCB, (3) and negative moderation of task structure and core self-evaluation on the relationship between leadership and follower outcomes.
İstismarci yönetimin hedefe ulaşmada engellenmislik - iritasyon modeli: Sosyal problem-çözme becerisinin moderatör rolü
Drawing upon the Stressor-emotion model (Spector & Fox, 2005), we developed and tested a model that examines the effect of a leader's goal blockage perception as an identity-threatening factor on his/her abusive supervision through the leader's irritation. The data were collected from 217 participants who hold leadership positions in different industries in the United States. Results of the survey study support that a leader's goal blockage perception is associated with his/her abusive supervision through the leader's increased irritation. Moreover, the leader's social problem-solving skills attenuates the effects of perceived goal blockage and irritation on abusive supervision. Leaders with higher social problem-solving skills are less likely to abuse their subordinates even when they perceive goal blockage and they are irritated. In order to provide more robust evidence for the internal validity of the effect of leaders' goal blockage on abusive supervision, we attempted to conduct an experimental study as Study 2. However, our attempt was not successful; we elaborated on the reasons why it was not. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings, and future research directions.
Babamın işiyle ilgili deneyimleri benim ileride ne iş yapacağımı belirler mi? babanın algılanmış iş güvencesizliğinin, kariyer seçimi sırasında risk alma eğilimindeki rolü
Perceived paternal job insecurity is one of the family variables that influences career choice process of adolescents. However, so far, extant studies have not examined its role in career development. The main goal of the study was to examine the association between perceived paternal job insecurity and adolescents' risk-taking tendency in career choice (RIC). Thus, we developed and tested a model which investigates the role of perceived paternal job insecurity on adolescents' RIC through core self-evaluation (CSE). We administered self-report measures to 528 Turkish high school students (278 girls and 250 boys) to assess their level of perceived paternal job insecurity, RIC, CSE and intolerance of uncertainty (IU). The results indicated gender specific mediation effect of CSE on the relationship of perceived paternal job insecurity with RIC such that perceived paternal job insecurity was negatively associated with CSE, which in turn, associated with lower levels of RIC only for girls. Contrary to girls, perceived paternal job insecurity had a direct negative association with RIC for boys. Moreover, although the results indicated an insignificant moderating role of IU in the association between perceived paternal job insecurity and CSE for both girls and boys, IU moderated the relationship between CSE and RIC among girls. Girls with low and mean level of IU were more willing to take risk in their career choice if they had high CSE whereas they were more reluctant to take risk in their career choice if they had low CSE. These gender specific findings were discussed in the light of gender role socialization in Turkey and similar research findings.