A review of organizational research on acculturation from a nonwork–work spillover perspective: Content analysis and future research guidelines

Abstract

Acculturation has played an important role in understanding the behaviours, intergroup relations and adjustment of cultural minorities in their mainstream national culture. Additionally, organizational research has shown that acculturation is associated with a range of work‐related variables. Prior reviews on acculturation have not approached the literature from this angle, which we termed a nonwork–work spillover perspective on acculturation. To fill this gap, we conducted a content analysis of quantitative empirical research to examine how acculturation from a nonwork–work spillover perspective has been studied in terms of its conceptualization and operationalization and what has been studied per its association with work‐related variables. This review is especially important given the complexity associated with the conceptualization and operationalization of acculturation, which may affect the validity of the interpretation of research results in this area. We also offer recommendations for addressing the extant research limitations and provide guidance for future research on acculturation in organizational settings.

Being specific: Exploring acculturation in work and private settings.

“…Adopting a more comprehensive approach to acculturation (Valenzuela et al, 2021), we concurrently explored immigrants’ actual and ideal acculturation, and HCNs’ perceived and preferred immigrant acculturation, in terms of behaviors, values, and identities in both work and private settings. Furthermore, we examined differences within and across settings.…”

“…Despite extensive research on the topic, concerns regarding the lack of specificity in acculturation research have been raised. For example, Valenzuela et al (2021) identified several aspects of immigrant acculturation and HCN acculturation expectations based on prior work (Navas et al, 2005; Schwartz et al, 2010), including domain specificity, setting specificity, and actual–ideal specificity.…”