The effect of organizational cynicism perception of research assistants on leave of employment intention

This study aims to determine the organizational cynism perceptions of research assistats, and its effect on leave of employment if present. Study also examines if there is a significanct difference between the level of cynism and intention of leave for research assistants, based on their demographics. Concordantly, the study uses a rational screening model as the research method. Research population consists of 340 research assistants, 323 from public universities, 17 from private universities, worked in 2015-2016 school year. 191 public university research assistants and 15 private university research assistants (206 in total) are raeched in this context. Data collection tool of research consists of three sections. The first section involves participants' personal data. Second section is the scale developed by Dharwadkar and Dean (1999), improved successor of Brandes' (1997) 14 section organizational cynism scale. The scale is first examined by Erdost et al in Turkey (2007). The third and last section uses the intention of leave scale, developed by Wayne et al (1997), translated into Turkish by Küçükusta (2007). Alpha coefficient for "Cronbach's intention of leave" was found r = 0,839, whereas calculated r is 0,928 based on the "organizational cynism scale". In the research, data was collected via e-mail or face to face meetings from research assistants working at state and private universities. Firstly, gathered data collection tools from research assistants were passed to SPSS 20.0 program. During analysis, tests of percent, frequency, arithmetical mean, standard deviation, Pearson correlation coefficient were used. Also, t-test for independent samples, t-test for dependent samples, one-way analysis of variance and Mann Whitney U and Kruskal Wallis tests which are non-parametric tests used when premises of parametric tests are not met. In conclusion, it is determined that there is a positive correlation and moderate relation between resignation tendency of research assistants and organizational cynicism levels. It is determined that there are positive correlations between resignation tendency and cognitive, affective behavioral cynicism levels of research assistants. On the bases of subfields, affective cynicism is determined to be the most important reason of the resignation tendency of research assistants. It is followed in order by cognitive cynicism and behavioral cynicism. These positive relations show that resignation tendency of research assistants increase as organizational cynicism levels increase. Key Words: Research Assistant, Cynicsm, Organizational Cynicism, Resignation Tendency