Trust and Breach of the Psychological Contract

Abstract

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.. four anonymous reviewers for their helpful assistance with this manuscript. 574/Administrative Science Quarterly, 41 (1996): 574~-599 Trust and Breach son, 1995). A fundamental and important unanswered question is what role trust plays in the experience and effects of psychological contract breach. Rare is the theoretical paper on psychological contracts that does not mention the word trust or note its central role in psychological contracts (e.g., Rousseau, 1989; Rousseau and McLean Parks, 1994; Morrison and Robinson, 1997). Despite the repeated mention of trust in the psychological contract literature, however, there has been virtually no theoretical explication or empirical examination of trust in relation to the experience of psychological contract breach. This lapse of systematic attention to the function of trust is found not only in the study of psychological contracts but in organizational science in general (Mayer, Davis, and Schoorman, 1995). As Gambetta (1988: unnumbered foreward) suggested, "scholars tend to mention (trust) in passing, to allude to it as a fundamental ingredient or lubricant, an unavoidable dimension of social interaction, only to move on to deal with. less intractable matters." The purpose of this study is to develop and test a relatively parsimonious theoretical model of the role of trust in the psychological contract breach experience by exploring the multiple roles played by past and current trust in influencing the detection, interpretation, and impact of psychological contract breach. Psychological Contracts Defined The psychological contract is defined as an individual's beliefs about the terms and conditions of a reciprocal exchange agreement between that person and another party (Rousseau, 1989). Although the psychological contract was originally defined by Argyris (1960), Levinson (1962), and Schein (1980) to characterize the subjective nature of employment relationships, the present conceptualization focuses on individuals' beliefs in and interpretation of a promissory contract.Unlike formal or implied contracts, the psychological contract is inherently perceptual, and thus one party's understanding of the contract may not be shared by the other.Psychological contracts, comprising perceived obligations, must be distinguished from expectations, which are general beliefs held by employees about what they will find in their job and the organization. For example, a new manager may expect to receive a high salary, to be promoted, to like his job, or to find the walls of his office painted a neutral color. These expectations emanate from a wide variety of sources, including past experience,. social norms, observations by friends, and so forth. Ps...

Exchange Relationships: Examining Psychological Contracts and Perceived Organizational Support.

“…These items capture aspects of the employment relationship studied in the majority of previous research (Robinson, 1996;Rousseau, 1990;Turnley & Feldman, 1999) such as pay, job security and career prospects.…”

“…Psychological contract theory would also suggest that POS should influence psychological contract fulfillment (Rousseau, 1995;Morrison & Robinson, 1997;Robinson, 1996). In other words, there should be a reciprocal relationship between POS and psychological contract fulfillment.…”

“…A prominent strand of psychological contract research has explored reciprocity by investigating the consequences of perceived contract fulfillment/breach (i.e., the extent to which the employee believes the other party has fulfilled or failed to fulfill one or more of its promised obligations) on employee attitudes and behavior. Empirical evidence supports a positive relationship between perceived contract fulfillment and employees' commitment to the organization (Coyle-Shapiro & Kessler, 2000), organizational trust (Robinson, 1996), organizational citizenship behavior (Robinson & Morrison, 1995;Tekleab & Taylor, 2000) and a negative association with neglect of in-role job duties (Turnley & Feldman, 2000) and turnover intentions (Turnley & Feldman, 1999).…”

An extension of uncertainty management theory to the self: The relationship between justice, social comparison orientation, and antisocial work behaviors.

“…We aimed to evaluate our hypothesis about self-related uncertainty on constant levels of this variable. We measured this construct with Robinson's (1996) seven-item measure of trust in organization on a 5-point Likert scale (1 ϭ strongly disagree, 5 ϭ strongly agree, ␣ ϭ .82). Sample items were "I believe my employer has high integrity," and "My employer is open and upfront with me."…”

Employee Maintenance: Examining Employment Relationships from the Perspective of Managerial Leaders

“…Psychological contract research centers on individual employees' beliefs regarding what they are owed and owe in return and how they respond when their employer has failed to meet its obligations (i.e., breached the terms of the psychological contract; Robinson, 1996). Studies from this domain suggest that psychological contract breach is negatively associated with attitudes toward the job and organization and the execution of both in-role and extra-role performance contributions (Zhao, Wayne, Glibkowski, & Bravo, 2007).…”