Psychological entitlement and organizational citizenship behaviors: the roles of employee involvement climate and affective organizational commitment

Abstract

The present study develops and tests an overreaching theoretical framework based on social exchange theory to examine the situations under which individuals with high levels of psychological entitlement are more or less likely to exhibit positive work attitudes and behaviors. In particular, we integrate perspectives from the team climate literature to analyze the moderating effects of employee involvement climate at the workgroup level on the relationship between psychological entitlement and organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs) through the mediating mechanism of affective commitment (a first-stage moderated mediation model). To test our hypotheses, we collected data from 231 supervisor-subordinate dyads across 41 work teams at a large Chinese automobile manufacturer. We find that when the employee involvement climate level is high, the effects of psychological entitlement on OCBs through affective commitment are positive and significant. In contrast, when the employee involvement climate level is low, the relationship is negative and significant. The present study makes a theoretical contribution to the literature by examining the frequently neglected positive side of psychological entitlement. It demonstrates that a high employee involvement climate helps to engage psychologically entitled employees by circumventing previously unbalanced social exchange relationships. We also discuss the practical implications of our findings and provide suggestions for human resource managers to maximize the contributions of entitled employees and foster their organizational commitment and OCBs.