The mediating effect of psychological capital on the relationship between professional tour guide's personality traits and occupational commitment

The aim of this thesis to examine whether the psychological capital plays a mediating role on the influence of the five factor personality traits on the sub-dimensions of occupational commitment. To this end, a survey was conducted among 426 active tour guides registered on the twelve professional chambers in Turkey. The survey was conducted via face-to-face interview, drop and collect survey technique and online survey through a survey platform website. For the personality traits measurement, the scale that is developed by John, Donahue & Kentle (1991) was used. For the psychological capital measurement, the psychological capital scale that is developed by Luthans, Avolio, Avey & Norman (2007) and adapted to Turkish language by Çetin and Basım (2012) was used. For occupational commitment measurement, the occupational commitment scale which is developed by Meyer, Allen & Smith (1993) and adapted to Turkish language by Tak and Çiftçioğlu (2009) was used. The results of the regression analysis reveal that openness to experience, extraversion and conscientiousness personality traits have positive meaningful effects on the affective commitment towards the occupation. Openness to experience and agreeableness effect continuance commitment positively and neuroticism effects continuance commitment negatively. On the normative occupational commitment, openness to experience and extraversion have positive effects. Additionally, openness to experience, neuroticism, extraversion and agreeableness effect psychological capital positively. It was also found that psychological capital has positive effects on affective commitment, continuance commitment and normative commitment. In terms of mediation effect, it was observed that the psychological capital has full mediation effect on the interaction between extraversion and affective commitment and normative commitment, between openness to experience and continuance commitment and normative commitment, between conscientiousness and affective commitment. Meanwhile, psychological capital has partial mediation effect in terms of the impact of openness to experience on affective commitment and the impact of agreeableness on continuance commitment. KEYWORDS: Five personality traits, personality, psychological capital, occupational commitment, tour guide