Organizational change and thepsychological contract

How change influences the perceivedfulfillment of obligations

Sjoerd van der Smissen, Rene Schalk and Charissa FreeseTilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands

Abstract

Purpose – This study aims to examine how organizational change and attitude towards changeaffects the fulfillment of the psychological contract. The influence of type of change, impact of change,former change experiences and frequency of change on fulfillment of the psychological contract isassessed, as well as the influence on the employee’s attitude towards change.

Design/methodology/approach – Regression analyses were carried out to test the effects of thechange antecedents and the attitude towards change on the fulfillment of the psychological contractand to test the effects of the change determinants on the attitude towards change. The data used in thisstudy are from 161 respondents working for different organizations who completed an onlinequestionnaire.

Findings – The results show that type of change, impact and former experience with organizationalchange influence attitude towards change. With respect to the fulfillment of the psychological contract,only frequency, former experiences and the attitude towards change had an impact.

Research limitations/implications – A limitation is the cross-sectional design of the study. Arecommendation for future research is to further explore the results by using case studies orlongitudinal research.

Practical implications – This study contributes to managers’, HR professionals’ and changeprofessionals’ understanding of the change factors that have the highest impact for employees.

Originality/value – This study highlights the effects of organizational changes on the psychologicalcontract and includes the role of attitude towards change. Empirical research in this area is scarce.

Keywords Attitude towards change, Fulfillment of obligations, Organizational change,Psychological contracts

Paper type Research paper

IntroductionOrganizational change is an inherent part of daily life in contemporaryorganizations. Combined with the recent economic downturn, it is likely that thenew workplace reality will significantly redefine employment relationships and havean impact on individuals’ psychological contracts (Guest, 2004; Freese, 2007; vanden Heuvel and Schalk, 2009; Chaudry et al., 2011). A lot has been written about theconsequences of organizational change (Bouckenooghe, 2010). Numerous studieshave explored the positive consequences of change, such as readiness for change(Holt et al., 2007), commitment to change (Chen and Wang, 2007) and the positiveaspects of resistance to change (Ford et al., 2008) as well as negative consequencessuch as increased levels of employee stress (Korunka et al., 2003). However, itremains unclear how organizational change affects the psychological contract and

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Received 10 August 2012Revised 4 March 2013Accepted 10 June 2013

Journal of Organizational ChangeManagement

Vol. 26 No. 6, 2013pp. 1071-1090

q Emerald Group Publishing Limited0953-4814

DOI 10.1108/JOCM-08-2012-0118

which factors really matter. In this article we provide new insights in howorganizational change affects psychological contracts. There are several ways tostudy psychological contracts, e.g. the content-oriented approach that examines thespecific terms of the contract, or the evaluation-oriented approach (Rousseau andTijoriwala, 1998), which this paper focuses on. This entails studying the effects oforganizational change on the perceived fulfillment of employer obligations. In short,the general research question addressed in this study is: Do organizational changefactors affect psychological contract fulfillment and the employees’ attitude towardschange? This study differs from earlier work; first, it takes antecedents of changeinto account that have been neglected in previous studies. This yields more in-depthinformation on the dynamics of organizational change. Second, by studying thecombined effects of antecedents of change we add to current research, which mostlyfocuses on the effects of a single change event. Third, this study addresses the roleof the employee’s attitude towards change as a variable that may influence theeffects of organizational change on the psychological contract.

Theoretical backgroundPsychological contractsA widely accepted definition of the psychological contract is by Rousseau (1990, p. 391):“The individual’s beliefs about mutual obligations, in the context of the relationshipbetween employer and employee”. Psychological contracts consist of organizationalobligations (to be fulfilled by the organization) and employee obligations (to be fulfilled bythe employees), based on promises made by the employer and employee, respectively.Psychological contracts can be studied in several ways, and there is currently noconsensus on the most appropriate approach (Freese, 2007). For example, thecontent-oriented approach examines the specific terms of the contract, such as theprovision of opportunities for training, security, challenging tasks, flexible working hours,confidentiality, working overtime when needed, and delivering good services (Guest, 2004).Another way of studying the psychological contract is the evaluation-oriented approach,which assesses the degree of fulfillment and possible violations of the psychologicalcontract (Morrison and Robinson, 1997). This study takes the latter approach.

Psychological contracts are violated more often during change processes (Freese,2007), as perceived organizational obligations are fulfilled to a lesser extent duringorganizational transformations, especially with regard to rewards, social atmosphereat work, career opportunities, job security, compensation, communication and HRpractices (Turnley and Feldman, 1998; Pate et al., 2000). Longitudinal research byFreese et al. (2008) has demonstrated that violation of the psychological contractincreases during organizational transformations. Freese et al. (2011) also found thatorganizational change does affect the fulfillment of perceived organizationalobligations. Other research (Beaumont and Harris, 2002; Ghoshal and Bartlett, 2000)has found that the introduction of programs such as downsizing and outsourcing andthe growing use of contingent work arrangements result in employee perceptions thatthe organization is failing to meet its obligations to employees. Psychological contractfulfillment is furthermore an important indicator for the quality of the employmentrelationship. It is related to job satisfaction (e.g. Turnley and Feldman, 2000), in-roleperformance (e.g. Dabos and Rousseau, 2004), organizational citizenship behaviors(Hui et al., 2004), and employee performance (Conway and Coyle-Shapiro, 2012).

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However, empirical evidence supporting the anecdotal argument for the effects oforganizational change on psychological contracts is scant. So despite some attempts toexplain the effects of change on the psychological contracts (McLean Parks and Kidder,1994; Shore et al., 2004), research on the topic of change and psychological contractsremains on the periphery. This study addresses this shortcoming by examining theeffects of organizational change on the fulfillment of the employer’s obligations of thepsychological contract. That is to say, we study the effects of organizational change onthe individual worker’s beliefs regarding the extent to which the employer fulfills itsobligations to the worker (fulfillment of the perceived obligations of the organization).

Antecedents of changeAccording to Rafferty and Griffin (2006), most existing research on organizationalchange focuses on the effects of specific changes such as downsizing, but do notidentify the properties of change events that lead to negative employee outcomes. Andalthough longitudinal research by for example Freese et al. (2008, 2011) does contributeto the understanding of the effects of organizational change on the psychologicalcontract, it does not differentiate between antecedents of change that may cause thenegative employee outcomes. This is a critical limitation of existing work because,without knowing which antecedents of change are perceived negatively and areassociated with poor outcomes, it is difficult to manage the implementation of change.This study adds to the literature by examining the effects of several determinants ofchange on the fulfillment of the psychological contract. Given the wide variety offeatures of organizational change, we made a selection of variables to include in thisstudy. To identify relevant variables we used the literature review of studies of changerecipients’ reactions to organizational change by Oreg et al.’s (2011). They define fiveprimary antecedent categories that are linked to individuals’ reactions to change:

(1) change content (what was the change about);

(2) perceived benefit/harm (impact on change recipient);

(3) internal context (e.g. organizational conditions and circumstances);

(4) change process (how the change was implemented); and

(5) change recipients’ characteristics (personal traits, circumstances).

Four of the five categories identified by Oreg et al. (2011) are included in our study. Thechange content is represented by looking at the type of change. Several authors havehighlighted the importance of type of change (e.g. Bouckenooghe, 2010; McNamara,2006; Rousseau, 1995). The perceived benefit/harm is taken into account by lookinginto the personal impact of change. For instance, Lau and Woodman (1995) andCaldwell et al. (2004) have indicated that the impact on daily work and the perceivedfuture within the organization determine the impact of organizational change. Theinternal context is taken into account by looking at the change history and thefrequency of change. The change history refers to the extent to which an employeeperceives that past changes were successful. Several authors state the importance ofthe change history (e.g. Wanous et al., 2000; Bouckenooghe and Devos, 2007) and thefrequency of change (e.g. Smollan et al., 2010; Rafferty and Griffin, 2006). Finally, thechange recipients’ characteristics are taken into account as control variables (age, workexperience, level of education, organization, etc.).

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The eventual success and effects of organizational change on employee outcomes,such as intention to quit or commitment, at least partly depend on an individual’sresistance or attitude towards change (Oreg, 2006; van den Heuvel and Schalk, 2009).According to Piderit (2000), the employee’s attitude towards change is an importantdeterminant of the success or failure of organizational change. Employees feel, thinkand behave either in a positive or a negative manner about organizational change, inline with their overall attitude (Arnold et al., 1995). The employee’s attitude towardschange may influence the effects of organizational change on the psychologicalcontract. Therefore, attitude towards change is incorporated in this study. First, westudy whether the attitude towards change affects psychological contract fulfillmentand whether the attitude towards change mediates the relationship between the fourchange antecedents of change and the fulfillment of the psychological contract. Second,we study whether the attitude towards change itself is affected by the change variablesmentioned before. The latter is relevant, since the change determinants incorporated inour research may also lead to explicit change reactions regarding the individual’sattitude towards change. In conclusion, the mediating effect of attitude towards changeon the relationship between the change characteristics and the fulfillment of thepsychological contract is taken into account.

The relationship between the antecedents of organizational change and thepsychological contractEvery organizational change process is different. The characteristics of the changeevents affect the way employees react. Employees may moreover be confronted withseveral change events within a certain amount of time. As stated in the introduction,this research takes account of four antecedent categories of change, as defined by Oreget al.’s (2011). A conceptualization of the change content, of the perceived benefit orharm, and of the internal context is provided in the following section.

Type of changeThe first category identified by Oreg et al.’s (2011), change content, was taken intoaccount by looking at the type of change. Organizational change may haveconsequences for the work situation of employees if their role and tasks are affectedand they need to adapt to new circumstances and different demands (Lau andWoodman, 1995; Caldwell et al., 2004; Sims, 1994; Freese, 2007). Research shows thatemployees in an organization undergoing downsizing or restructuring experiencepsychological contract violations with regard to job security (Turnley and Feldman,1998), compensation and advancement opportunities (Pate et al., 2000), andcommunication and HR practices (Pate et al., 2000). Bellou (2007) found that,following mergers and acquisitions, employees’ overall perception of the extent towhich organizational obligations are fulfilled has diminished.

Rousseau (1995) differentiates between two types of changes: accommodation andtransformation. Accommodation is an evolutionary process, enabling adjustmentswithin the framework of the existing psychological contract. Transformation is arevolutionary shift in the nature of the relationship between the parties, redefining itand the contract on which it is based. Accommodation is connected to organizationalchanges such as isolated changes in performance criteria, benefit packages, or workinghours, while transformations relate to systemic changes such as downsizing processes,

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restructuring, or the introduction of new HR policies. Large-scale organizationalchange processes (e.g. mergers, downsizing or restructuring) are more often associatedwith transformations than minor organizational changes are. In a similar vein,McNamara (2006) distinguishes between transformational and incremental change.Transformational changes can have a big impact on the structure and the culture of anorganization. He gives the example of a change in the hierarchical structure of anorganization from a traditional top-down to a bottom-up structure, with a large numberof employees and team autonomy at the bottom of the organization. An incrementalchange is a more stepwise and continuous form of change, for example the ongoingadjustments in a particular ICT-based knowledge-management system. Thedifferences between these two categories of changes are also highlighted by Dahl(2011), who refers to these categories as broad and extensive versus narrow and small.This leads to the following hypothesis:

H1. Transformational changes are related to lower fulfillment of organizationalobligations.

Impact of changeThe second category named by Oreg et al.’s (2011), perceived benefit/harm, was takeninto account by looking at the impact of the change on the individual. Lau andWoodman (1995) indicate that the impact on daily work and the perceived futurewithin the organization determine the impact of organizational change. The more achange is perceived as extensive, the more adaptation is needed and the more anemployee is influenced by it (Caldwell et al., 2004). This might lead to the introductionof new obligations (Sims, 1994) or to a lower fulfillment of obligations, possiblyfollowed by contract breach or violation (Freese, 2007). The impact of change not onlydepends on the type(s) of change(s), but also on the personal circumstances of theindividual and his perception and reaction patterns:

H2. Organizational change events that are perceived as high impact changes bythe employee are related to lower fulfillment of organizational obligations.

Successfulness of past changes or change historyFor the internal context, Oreg et al.’s (2011) fourth category, the variable“successfulness of past changes” was taken into account. An important determinantof organizational change is the change history. Employees will be less positive and lessmotivated about a new organizational change if they had negative experiences withchange processes in the past (Reichers et al., 1997; Wanous et al., 2000), and will bemore positive if they have a positive and successful change history (Schneider et al.,1996; Bouckenooghe and Devos, 2007). Bouckenooghe and Devos (2007) found thatparticipants in the low trust and poor history of change condition reportedsignificantly lower openness to change than individuals in any of the other conditions.Therefore we believe that an individual’s change history (perceived successfulness ofchanges in the past) will influence the effects of organizational changes on thefulfillment of the psychological contract:

H3. If employees have experienced successful changes in the past, the perceivedfulfillment of organizational obligations will be higher.

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For Oreg et al.’s (2011) fourth category, a second variable was taken into account,namely the frequency of change. Several authors (Smollan et al., 2010; Rafferty andGriffin, 2006) have argued that individuals are concerned about whether change occursvery frequently or infrequently. Rafferty and Griffin (2006) found that whenorganizational changes occur more frequently, employees are more likely to perceivechanges as unpredictable and to experience anxiety. Similarly, Smollan et al. (2010)conclude that most participants in their qualitative research on organizational changewere negative about change. Whether people claim to like change or not, they seem tobe overwhelmed by continual change. The more often employees are confronted withorganizational change, the more impact this will have on their psychological contract.This brings us to the following hypothesis:

H4. The higher the frequency of organizational change, the lower the perceivedfulfillment of the organizational obligations.

The eventual success and effects of organizational change on employee outcomes,such as intention to quit or commitment, at least partly depend on an individual’sresistance or attitude towards change (Oreg, 2006; van den Heuvel and Schalk,2009). This attitude towards change is taken into account in this study. It is likelythat an employee will perceive changes as threatening due to feelings ofdefenselessness and the fear of losing security (Saunders and Thornhill, 2003), aswell as the prospect of facing difficulties in accepting and adjusting to the newsettings (Panchal and Cartwright, 2001). On the other hand, it is conceivable thatchanges evoke positive employee responses (Gilmore et al., 1997). Weber and Weber(2001) therefore emphasize the importance of assessing both positive and negativeaspects of change on the employees. Piderit’s (2000) measure of attitude towardschange serves this purpose. In her view, employees’ attitudes towards change havecognitive, affective and behavioral components that can be either positive ornegative. The current study only measures the cognitive and affective attitudes. Thebehavioral component is disregarded as earlier research has not been able toconfirm the three-factor structure (van den Heuvel and Schalk, 2009). A theoreticalexplanation for the fact that the behavioral component was not confirmed is thatbehavioral action is trigged by the employee’s positive or negative thoughts andemotions, and is thus not an initial response.

Attitude towards changeEmployees feel, think and behave in either a positive or a negative manner aboutchange, all of which characterizes their overall attitude (Arnold et al., 1995). Thisattitude not only influences the success or failure of organizational change itself(Piderit, 2000), but will most likely also influence the employee’s perception regardingthe fulfillment of perceived organizational obligations. This is in line with Barsade andGibson (2007), who describe negative affectivity in which negative emotions areconsistent across situations and time. If the latter is the case, it becomes more likelythat organizational obligations will be perceived as not being fulfilled when theattitude is more negative, and vice versa. Thus:

H5. The more positive the attitude towards change, the higher the perceivedfulfillment of organizational obligations.

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Organizational change is in many cases a stressful experience for individuals involved(e.g. Elrod and Tippett, 2002). Literature on organizational change sometimescompares emotions and responses to change with individual responses to traumaticchanges such as death and grief (Henderson-Loney, 1996; Grant, 1996). Theseresponses to change can be considered normal, since the change process involves goingfrom the known to the unknown (Bovey and Hede, 2001). Piderit (2000) identifiesvarious employees’ responses to an organizational change ranging from strongpositive attitudes (i.e. “this change is essential for the organization to succeed”) tostrong negative attitudes (i.e. “this change could ruin the company”). Therefore, changemay be received with excitement and happiness or anger and fear, while employees’responses may range from positive intentions to support the change to negativeintentions to oppose it. The question is thus how the attitude towards change isinfluenced by the characteristics of change described above (frequency, type of change,impact of change and successfulness of past changes). This results in the followinghypotheses:

H6. Exposure to transformational change is related to a more negative attitudetowards change.

H7. Employees that are confronted with impactful changes have a more negativeattitude towards change.

H8. Successful changes in the past are related to a more positive attitude towardschange.

H9. A higher frequency of change is related to a more negative attitude towardschange.

The effects of organizational changes on employee outcomes (e.g. intention to quit orcommitment) are expected to depend on an individual’s resistance or attitude towardschange (Oreg, 2006; van den Heuvel and Schalk, 2009). Therefore, it is important toexamine the mediating role of attitude towards change:

H10. The relationship between the change characteristics and the perceivedfulfillment of the psychological contract is mediated by the attitude towardschange.

Figure 1 gives an overview of the hypotheses.

MethodSample and procedureAn online survey was distributed to the respondents. An email with invitation toparticipate was sent to 134 employees in an agency, 122 working for a consulting firmand approximately 100 individuals in a variety of occupations and industries on themailing list of a management consulting firm. The agency and consulting firm wereselected because they had gone through one or more organizational change events overthe last two years. In addition, organizations from different industries were chosen. Tomake sure the questions were comprehensible and could be completed electronically, itwas decided to exclude blue collar workers from this research. This was also used as aselection criterion for the participating organizations. The people on the mailing list

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were only invited to fill out the questionnaire if they had in fact been confronted withchange events in the last two years. Respondent confidentiality was assured andinformed consent was obtained. A total of 161 respondents from the two sourcesdescribed above completed the questionnaire, yielding a response rate of 45 percent.All questions in the survey were available in English and in Dutch.

MeasurementsType of change. Type of change was measured by one question and eight responseoptions (more than one response possible). The scale items were partly adapted fromMorgan and Zeffane (2003), namely major new office technology (information), majornew plant, machinery or equipment (operations), and major reorganization ofworkplace (structure). Also downsizing (Turnley and Feldman, 2000; Morgan andZeffane, 2003), cost-cutting and organizational policies (Rousseau, 1995) and change inleadership and in organizational culture (Self et al., 2007; Smollan and Sayers, 2009)were incorporated. Respondents were asked to select the types of changes they hadbeen confronted with in the last two years. These eight changes were divided into twocategories, following Rousseau’s (1995) distinction between the two types oforganizational change that can influence psychological contracts: accommodationand transformation. Two changes, namely in technology and plant/machinery orequipment, were categorized as accommodative due to their incremental nature as anatural response to maintaining alignment with the external environment. Theremaining six changes (pertaining to structure, culture, leadership, organizational

Figure 1.Conceptual model andhypotheses

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policies, downsizing, and cost cutting) were categorized as transformational due totheir radical character. The changes in the two categories were used to compute twovariables representing either transformational or accommodative changes. All eightitems were answered using a nominal scale: “yes” ð¼ 1Þ and “no” ð¼ 0Þ; and the scalemeans were calculated by summing all the changes selected in each category anddividing the sum by the total amount of available options.

Personal impact. Personal impact was derived from Lau and Woodman (1995) andmeasured with three items. A sample question is: “The changes have importantconsequences for my future in the organization”. Answers were measured using afive-point Likert-type scale ranging from “1” (totally disagree) to “5” (totally agree).Cronbach’s alpha for the scale is 0.80.

The successfulness of past changes. The successfulness of past changes wasmeasured by using one item from the original scale by Metselaar (1997). Answers weremeasured using a five-point Likert-type scale ranging from “1” (totally disagree) to “5”(totally agree). The item used in this research was “Past changes generally weresuccessful”. This item best represents the success of past changes (literally).

Frequency of change. Frequency of change was measured with two items derivedfrom the work by Rafferty and Griffin (2006). These items measure the frequency of thechanges experienced by the employee. A sample question is: “Change frequentlyoccurs in my organization”. A five-point Likert-type scale, ranging from “1” (stronglydisagree) to “5” (strongly agree), was used. Cronbach’s alpha for the scale is 0.89.

These change characteristics represent four of the five antecedents identified byOreg (change content, perceived benefit/harm, internal context and change recipients’characteristics). Information on perceptions of the change process (including topics likeparticipation, communication, procedural justice, etc.) was not available in this study.

The attitude towards change. The attitude towards change was measured with thescale developed by Oreg (2006). For this study we used the sub-scales measuring theaffective and cognitive dimension of an employee’s attitude towards change, leavingout the behavioral part. This rationale accords with Bouckenooghe et al. (2009), whostate that the individual perceptions are composed of the mental assessment of thecontext and processes of organizational change, and the emotions they generate. Thisis supported by current research (van den Heuvel and Schalk, 2009). A sample itemrelated to the cognitive element is: “I believe that the change would benefit theorganization”, and a sample question of the emotional dimension is: “I was afraid of thechange”. Again, a five-point Likert scale ranging from “1” (totally disagree) to “5”(totally agree) was used to measure answers.

A confirmatory factor analysis was performed to assess the two-dimensionalcomposition of the attitude towards change scales. Only one factor was stronglyconfirmed by the analyses. The original five items matching the affective dimensiondid match the first factor. Therefore, in further analyses only the affective scale istaken into account. Cronbach’s alpha for the scale is 0.743.

Fulfillment of the psychological contract. The fulfillment of the psychologicalcontract was measured using the Tilburg Psychological Contract Questionnaire(TPCQ), constructed by Freese et al. (2008). The TPCQ was constructed by applyingMorrison and Robinson’s (1997) recommendation to focus on measuring the terms orelements of the psychological contract, rather than contract types. The questionnaireconsists of a set of items assigned to six scales (work content, career development,

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social atmosphere, organizational policies, work life balance and rewards) to measurethe perceived obligations of the organization, and two scales to measure the perceivedemployee obligations (in-role and extra-role behavior). Each set of items on theobligations of the organization is introduced with a question, for example: “In theemployment relationship employees have expectations about what the organizationwill offer. To what extent is your organization obliged to offer you the following?” Allscale items are measured using a five-point Likert-type scale ranging between “1” (noobligation at all) and “5” (very strong obligation). In order to evaluate the extent towhich the obligations are fulfilled (the evaluation-oriented part is the only part used inthis research), after each scale addressing a distinct aspect of the psychologicalcontract content (so six times in total), the following question was included: “To whatextent did your employer fulfill the previous obligations?” The fulfillment of thepsychological contract on the employee side was measured likewise, but this is notused in this research. The fulfillment of the psychological contract was measured by afive-point Likert-type scale ranging from “1” (not at all) to “5” (to a very great extent).Cronbach’s alpha for the fulfillment scale is 0.79.

Control variables. Several control variables were included in this study. These areage, sex, education level and work experience. Two organizational characteristics thatwere included in this research were the perceived performance of the organization andthe perceived competitiveness. With the exception of age and work experience, whichwere measured on a continuous scale, these variables were measured using categoricalquestions. The variable ‘Education’ was measured on a six-point scale ranging from 1(“Primary Education”) to 6 (“PhD, Post-doc or similar”). The perceived performance ofthe organization and the level of competitiveness were measured on a five-point scale.Sex was included in the regression analyses as a nominal variable, education as anordinal variable, and age and work experience as ratio variables.

Respondents and control variablesThe mean age was 34 years ðs:d: ¼ 8:7 years). The majority of the respondents weremale with 56 percent (female 44 percent). In terms of the highest education obtained,the largest group holds a Master’s degree (51.6 percent), followed by second largestgroup of people that holds a Bachelor’s degree (36.6 percent). Only 4.3 percent followedvocational education (MBO), and an even smaller minority had either secondaryeducation or PhD (4.9 percent and 2.5 percent). As for the job level, 14 percent of therespondents were part of management or directors, 60 percent of the respondents wereupper white collar workers, 20 percent were intermediate and 5 percent were lowerlevel white collars, and 2 percent were skilled blue collar workers. The respondents hadan average overall working experience of 9.5 years ðs:d: ¼ 9:8Þ and the workexperience at the current employer was 4.7 ðs:d: ¼ 5:4Þ years. The overall score on theperformance of the organization was 3.47 ðs:d: ¼ 0:84Þ; which is between equal to andbetter than the competition and 1.81 ðs:d: ¼ 0:96Þ which is between rather competitiveand very competitive.

ResultsThe central question in this research is: “Do organizational change factors affectpsychological contract fulfillment and the employees’ attitude towards change?” Toanswer these questions hierarchical multiple regression analyses were carried out. The

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first regression analysis tests the effects of the change antecedents and the attitudetowards change on the fulfillment of the psychological contract (H1 to H5), and asecond regression analysis tests the effects of the change determinants on the attitudetowards change (H5 to H9). A Sobel test was carried out to test the mediating effect ofthe attitude towards change on the relationship between the change antecedents andthe fulfillment of the psychological contract. First means, standard deviations andcorrelations are presented in Table I.

The average score for frequency of change was 3.91 ðsd ¼ 0:84Þ; which is ratherhigh. The average score for transformational change was 0.54 ðsd ¼ 0:29Þ; just abovethe average score of 0.5, and the average score for accommodational changes was 0.45ðsd ¼ 0:37Þ: The score for personal impact was 3.47 ðsd ¼ 0:78Þ: The average score forthe successfulness of past changes was 3.04 ðsd ¼ 0:77Þ; slightly above the neutralscore of 3. The average fulfillment score was 3.13 ðsd ¼ 0:64Þ: The highest fulfillmentscore (3.33, sd ¼ 0:94Þ was for Social Atmosphere, whereas the lowest fulfillment scorewas on Rewards (3.00, sd ¼ 1:00Þ:

The correlations are mostly in line with what we expected. There are severalsignificant correlations between change characteristics and fulfillment (frequency andfulfillment ð20:171Þ; successfulness of past changes and fulfillment (0.363)), but alsobetween attitude towards change and fulfillment (0.331). Furthermore, severalsignificant correlations were found between change characteristics and attitudetowards change (frequency and attitude ð20:255Þ; transformational changes andattitude ð20:277Þ; impact and attitude ð20:362Þ and between the successfulness ofpast changes and attitude towards change (0.289)).

Regression analysesTo further test the hypotheses, regression analyses were carried out. The firstregression assessed whether the fulfillment of the psychological contract wassignificantly related to the four change variables included in this research (frequency,transformational change, impact of change and successfulness of past changes) and theattitude towards change. This was to test H1, H2, H3, H4 and H5. This modelaccounted for 33.3 percent of the variance in the fulfillment of the psychologicalcontract ðR 2 ¼ 0:333Þ: The results are presented in Table II.

Contrary to what we expected in H1, being confronted with transformationalchanges does not have a negative effect on the fulfillment of the psychological contract.The impact of organizational change also does not have a significant effect on thefulfillment of the psychological contract. This is contrary to what we expected in H2,where we theorized that being confronted with impactful changes affects thefulfillment of the psychological contract in a negative way. We do find support for ourthird hypothesis, in which we propose that success of changes in the past has a positiveeffect on the fulfillment of the psychological contract ðb ¼ 0:216; p , 0.001). Further,change frequency does have a significant effect on the fulfillment of the psychologicalcontract ð20:176Þ: This confirms H4, which proposes that frequency of change has anegative effect on the fulfillment of the psychological contract. Transformationalchanges do not have a significant effect on the fulfillment of the psychological contract.H5, which proposes that the more positive the attitude towards change, the morepositive the fulfillment of the psychological contract, was also confirmed by the resultsðb ¼ 0:270; p , 0.01). Furthermore, the control variable age does have a significant

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0.74

3*

*0.

490

**

0.55

5*

*1

11.

Org

aniz

atio

nal

pol

icie

s3.

070.

812

0.17

8*

20.

067

0.06

42

0.12

70.

387

**

0.25

6*

*0.

752

**

0.47

1*

*0.

508

**

0.51

7*

*1

12.

Wor

k2

life

bal

ance

3.09

0.95

20.

250

**

20.

198

*0.

068

20.

105

0.13

30.

339

**

0.48

9*

*0.

209

**

0.25

9*

*0.

148

0.29

9*

*1

13.

Rew

ard

s3.

001.

002

0.14

10.

019

0.00

82

0.09

90.

155

*0.

137

0.66

9*

*0.

283

**

0.50

7*

*0.

405

**

0.42

2*

*0.

125

1

Note:n¼

161

Table I.Mean, standarddeviations andcorrelations of changecharacteristics, attitudetowards change andfulfillment ofpsychological contractdimensions

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effect ðb ¼ 0:242; p , 0.01). This means that there is a positive relationship betweenage and the fulfillment of the psychological contract. Sex, education and workexperience do not influence the outcome variables.

Looking at the organizational control variables, it appears that only theperformance of the organization has a significant effect on the fulfillment of thepsychological contract ðb ¼ 0:219; p , 0.01), meaning that more positive perceptionson the performance of the organization are related to more fulfillment of thepsychological contract.

The second series of regression analyses assessed whether attitude towards changeis significantly related to the characteristics of organizational change that wereincluded in this study (transformational change, impact of change, successfulness ofpast changes and frequency). These analyses served to test H6, H7, H8 and H9. Thevariables included in the analyses accounted for 33.4 percent of the varianceðR 2 ¼ 0:334Þ in the attitude towards change. The results are presented in Table III.

The results illustrate that transformational changes do have a significant negativeeffect on attitude towards change ðb ¼ 20:210; p , 0.05). This is in line with H6,which proposes that being confronted with transformational changes results in a morenegative attitude towards change. The absence of a significant effect ofaccommodational changes on attitude towards change further supports thesefindings. Further, the impact of organizational change has a significant negative effectðb ¼ 20:264; p , 0.01) on attitude towards change. This supports H7, in which wetheorized that employees who are confronted with impactful changes in the (recent)past have a more negative attitude towards change. Our reasoning is also confirmedfor the effect of successfulness of past changes on attitude towards change. The

Model 1 Model 2 Model 3Variable b b b

Age 0.207 0.182 0.160Sex 20.001 20.008 0.039Education 20.012 0.022 0.026Work experience 0.170 0.144 0.177Organizational performance 0.292 * * * 0.234 * * 0.219 * *

Organizational competitiveness 0.041 20.002 20.026Job level 0.141 0.119 0.081Agency 0.048 0.043 0.086Consulting 20.077 20.084 20.080Frequency of change 20.183 * 20.176 *

Transformation 0.049 0.106Accommodation 0.073 0.056Impact of change 20.075 20.003Success of past changes 0.282 * * * 0.216 * *

Affective attitude 0.270 * *

R 2 0.161 0.284 0.333DR 2 0.161 0.123 0.049DF 3.215 * * 5.030 * * * 10.583 * *

Notes: n ¼ 161: The regression coefficients shown are standardized regression coefficients (b). *

p , 0.05; * *p , 0.01; * * *p , 0.001

Table II.Results of multiple

regression analysis ondependent PC fulfillment

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success of past changes has a significant positive effect ðb ¼ 0:243; p , 0.01) onattitude towards change. This confirms H8, which proposes that being confronted withsuccessful changes in the past results in a more positive attitude towards change.Finally, change frequency does not have a significant effect on the attitude towardschange. Contrary to what we expected this refutes H9, in which we hypothesized thatfrequency of change has a negative effect on the attitude towards change.

The only control variables that had a significant effect were sex and theorganization Agency. Sex has a negative significant effect ðb ¼ 20:176; p , 0.05) onattitude towards change. Women’s attitude towards change is less positive than men’sattitude towards change, among the sample used in this study. The variable Agencyalso had a negative effect ðb ¼ 20:162; p, 0.05), meaning that people working for theagency have a less positive score on the attitude towards change items.

H10 addressed the mediating effect of attitude towards change. A Sobel test wascarried out to test the mediating effect of attitude towards change on the significantrelationship between the dependent variable (fulfillment) and the independentvariables (the change antecedents). Since significant relationships were found only forthe successfulness of past changes, only for this variable a Sobel test was carried out.The results point out that attitude towards change does have a mediating role in therelationship between successfulness of past changes and fulfillment of thepsychological contract. (Sobel test: z-score is 2.365, p , 0.05). In summary, H10 ispartly confirmed by the results in this study.

DiscussionThe central question in this research was: “Do organizational change factors affectpsychological contract fulfillment and the employees’ attitude towards change?” The

Model 1 Model 2Variable b b

Age 0.106 0.084Sex 20.140 20.176 *

Education 20.040 20.017Work experience 20.109 20.123Organizational performance 0.079 0.053Organizational competitiveness 0.150 0.087Job level 0.154 0.141Agency 20.169 20.161 *

Consulting 0.039 20.015Frequency of change 20.026Transformation 20.210 *

Accommodation 0.065Impact of change 20.264 * *

Success of past changes 0.243 * *

R 2 0.108 0.334DR 2 0.108 0.226DF 2.040 * 9.904 * * *

Notes: n ¼ 161: The regression coefficients shown are standardized regression coefficients (b).*p , 0:05; * *p , 0.01; * * *p , 0.001

Table III.Results of multipleregression analysis ondependent Affectiveattitude

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effects of the change factors on both the fulfillment of the psychological contract andthe attitude towards change were considered. The mediating role of the attitudetowards change in the relationship between the change variables and the fulfillment ofthe psychological contract was examined. The results show that both the frequency ofchange and the individual’s change history have a significant (negative and positive)effect on the fulfillment of the psychological contract. Furthermore, the results confirmthe positive effect of the attitude towards change on the fulfillment of the psychologicalcontract. However, and contrary to what we expected, (see, e.g. Dahl, 2011), the type ofchange (transformational change) and the impact of the change had no significanteffect on the fulfillment of the psychological contract. A recommendation for futureresearch would be to collect more in-depth information on what type of change peoplewere confronted with and how this was perceived by the respondents. The lack ofempirical support for the effects of “impact of the change” on the fulfillment of thepsychological contract may lead to the conclusion that this variable is not relevant as apredictor of psychological contract fulfillment. However, given the strength of thetheoretical support for these variables, additional tests using other samples arerecommended before drawing any substantive conclusions. A strength of our study isthat we assessed several change antecedents. Since these antecedents are related,insignificant effects of some variables might be caused by the overlap betweenantecedents.

The second topic of this study concerns the effects of the change variables onattitude towards change. The results support our propositions that both high impactand being exposed to transformational changes have a negative effect on attitudetowards change. These relationships indicate that as the personal impact of changesincreases, the individual adjusts his or her attitude in a negative way. This also appliesto being exposed to transformational changes. Our propositions regarding one’schange history were also supported, meaning that positive experiences in the past havea positive effect on the attitude towards change. Contrary to what we expected, theresults indicate that change frequency does not have a significant effect on the attitudetowards change. The fact that the organizations included in this research were active inan industry in which change is common might be relevant here (supported by the highscore on frequency of the respondents). If employees get used to changes because theyare frequent, and they learn from the changes undergone, the frequency of changemight not matter anymore for attitude towards change. A suggestion for futureresearch would be to include organizations in which change is less frequent, forexample organizations operating in less turbulent environments (e.g. public sectororganizations). Including more organizations would also help gain further insight intodifferences between participating organizations and industries (and the negativeeffects of the Agency on attitude towards change). Increasing the sample size wouldprovide more grounded insights. Furthermore, Smollan et al. (2010) argue that whetherpeople claim to like change or not, they can be overwhelmed by continuous change andthat an accumulation of both positive and negative life changes can lead to stress. Thiscould be an explanation for the fact that significant relations between frequency ofchange and attitude towards change were not found, whereas at the same time therewas a significant relationship between frequency and fulfillment of the psychologicalcontract. In this case frequency does not influence attitude towards change as such, butdoes influence the perception of the actual effects of the change (on the fulfillment of

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the psychological contract) for the individual. People can still have a positive attitudetowards change as such, but can at the same time dislike some of the negativeoutcomes associated with it.

In conclusion, a topic for future studies to examine is why some changecharacteristics significantly affect individual reactions to the change, and others onlythe perceived change consequences (fulfillment of the psychological contract). Anadditional recommendation for future research is to design and conduct longitudinalstudies. This could be useful to further test the relationship between fulfillment of thepsychological and organizational change, and could provide more insight intodevelopments over time during organizational change. Another interesting researchdesign would be to explore some of the results found in this study by using casestudies or other forms of qualitative methodologies. This could result in more in-depthinformation about the context in which changes take. We also recommend to furthertest the results on a lager data set, with different types of respondents working indifferent organizations. In this study the respondents were all relatively young andhigh educated. Earlier research on the so called new psychological contract alreadyconcluded that this new psychological contracts only applied for high educatedprofessionals (Van den Brande et al., 2002). Although no significant effects of educationlevel were found, the general high level of education could also be of influence on theresults found in the present study.

Contributions and implicationsThe results of the study have implications for research on psychological contracts,organizational change and attitude towards change, as well as for organizational orchange management practice and society. First, in this study organizational changecharacteristics are considered as predictors. Most existing research on organizationalchange focuses on the effects of specific changes such as downsizing (Beaumont andHarris, 2002), but does not identify the properties of change events that lead to (negative)employee outcomes. No previous research on the (combined) effects of the changecharacteristics, to our knowledge, exists. The results of our study are particularlyinteresting and relevant for those working as change management practitioners ormanagers, as our study offers insights in which aspects of change really matter. As theresults show, the variables included in this research explain much of the variance in boththe fulfillment of the psychological contract and in attitude towards change, thushighlighting the importance of the antecedents. These insights can be helpful inimplementing change successfully. This applies even more so in business environmentswhere organizations are compelled to change with a frequency and pace never been seenbefore. In addition, practitioners need to understand the important role of attitudetowards change, especially when it comes to the effect on fulfillment of the psychologicalcontract. The results indicate that this is an even more relevant predictor of fulfillmentthan various change antecedents are. Understanding the importance of attitude towardschange can impact change management approaches and communication about change.

Second, research on the effects of organizational change on the psychologicalcontract is scarce, especially regarding the role of the individual’s attitude towardschange. This study focuses on the individual’s reactions to organizational change,whereas most of the work on organizational change aims to explain how organizationsprepare for and respond to organizational change (Oreg et al., 2011). This helps

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researchers and practitioners to acquire more insight into the individual reactions toorganizational change. The combined effects of changes in the business environmentand the necessity for organizations to implement changes quickly, significantlyredefine employment relationships and have an impact on individuals’ psychologicalcontracts (Frese, 2000; Guest, 2004; Freese, 2007; van den Heuvel and Schalk, 2009;Chaudry et al., 2011). These studies call for further research into the effects oforganizational change on the psychological contract. Also, because some of the changecharacteristics examined in this research did not have a significant effect, it would beinteresting to incorporate other characteristics of change that match the categoriesdefined by Oreg et al. (2011). Examples are the justification of changes, which is acognitive factor that influences how employees assign responsibility for theorganizational change event (Chaudry et al., 2011), communication (several authors,e.g. Amiot et al., 2006) and involvement in the change process (several authors,e.g. Brown and Cregan, 2008).

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About the authorsSjoerd van der Smissen is a PhD student at the Tilburg University. He studied psychology at theUtrecht University, Utrecht and Business Administration at the Nyenrode University, Breukelen.His research focuses on changes in the psychological contracts as a result of changes in thebusiness environment, organizational change processes and value shifts among employees.Sjoerd van der Smissen is the corresponding author and can be contacted at:a.i.m.vdrsmissen@uvt.nl

Rene Schalk is a full professor at Tilburg University and visiting professor at the North WestUniversity, South Africa. He gained his PhD in Social and Organizational Psychology fromRadboud University, Nijmegen. His research focuses on organizations and employees, with aspecial interest for psychological contracts, international differences, policy issues, and aging.

Charissa Freese is a faculty member of the Department of Human Resource Studies at TilburgUniversity. She gained her PhD in Psychology from Tilburg University, Tilburg. Her researchtopics include psychological contract, organizational change, new employment relationships andflexicurity.

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