Personal and Work Related Factors as Antecedent of

Affective Commitment in Malaysian Higher Educational

Institutions

Rosafizah Mohamed Idrus

, Khairuddin Idris

, Zoharah Omar

, and

Mohd Ashraff Mohd Anuar

Registrar Office, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Malaysia

Department of Professional Development and Continuing Education,

Faculty of Education, Universiti Putra Malaysia, Malaysia

Abstract. Resilience, self-efficacy and organizational support are part of

personal and work-related factors that contribute to positive human resource

strengths that relates to affectively committed staffs in the workplace. For this

reason, by using the norm of reciprocity along with the social exchange theory,

this paper seeks to understand the relationship between resilience, self-efficacy

and organizational support with affective commitment among support staffs in

the context of Malaysian Research Universities. Data were gathered through

questionnaires from 306 staffs in five universities in Malaysia. The regression

result indicated that self-efficacy and organizational support had positively

correlated relationship with affective commitment but resilience did not pose any

substantial impact on this outcome. Implications of the finding and future

research on these personal and work related factors with affective commitment

in the context of Malaysian Higher Educational Institutions were also discussed.

Keywords: Resilience · Self-efficacy · Organizational support · Affective

commitment · Malaysia Higher Education Institutions

1 Introduction

Staffs working effectively and efficiently are a clear sign of good performance in an

organization.Affectively committed staffs whom placed their trust and sincerely believe

that the organization care about their well-being and value their contribution will then,

in exchange will willingly return by them towards the organization with stronger

emotional ties and identification with the organization and its goals [12,18]. To

committed staffs, work has meaning and purpose, thereby they are more willingly to do

more than their usual job duties, which in turn, provide performance that is beyond

expectations.

The literature has shown that personal and work-related factors that center on

staffs’ strength are important in generating skilled staffs that are desired in order to

achieve sustainable and comprehensive development of the respective organization [9,

12, 13]. Despite that, for the last two decades, most researchers studied either personal

factors or work-related factors as separately as antecedents of affective commitment

(10, 13). Therefore, this study responds to the need to examine in a single study the

140

Idrus, R., Idris, K., Omar, Z. and Anuar, M.

Personal and Work Related Factors as Antecedent of Affective Commitment in Malaysian Higher Educational Institutions.

DOI: 10.5220/0009839500002900

In Proceedings of the 20th Malaysia Indonesia International Conference on Economics, Management and Accounting (MIICEMA 2019), pages 140-147

ISBN: 978-989-758-582-1; ISSN: 2655-9064

relationship between personal factors (i.e. resilience, self-efficacy) and work-related

factor (i.e. organizational support) with affective commitment among support staffs in

Malaysian Higher Educational Institutions (MHEIs).

2 Literature Review

Affective commitment is defined as staffs’ positive emotional ties to, identification with

the organization, involvement in the organization and its goals [2, 10]. Previous studies

have shown positive correlation between affective commitment with personal and

work-related factors that influence staffs’ positive work attitude, behavior and outcome

such as self-efficacy [1, 9], organizational support [16, 18] and resilience [4, 14].

Resilience is one of important personal factor which refers to a process of adapting

well in the face of adversity or the adaptation to it in response to challenging situations

[4, 14, 17]. Tracey et al. (2017) posited that resilience focuses on positive organizational

behaviors that are open to development and have an impact on desired staffs’ attitude,

behavior and intention. Due to this reason, most researchers referred resilience as a

positive way of coping and adapting with adversity or challenges whereby resilience

exists when individuals develop psychological and behavioral capabilities that allow

them to remain calm during adversity or any hardship and move on [4, 13, 17].

Another important personal factor is self-efficacy which refers to self-reflecting,

self-organizing, and proactive individuals driven by inner impulses [3, 5, 7]. These

researchers perceived self-efficacy as self-confidence in individuals’ ability to utilize

control over their personal motivation and attitude which allow them to become

advocates for their own behaviors [3, 5, 7]. Similarly, Onn et al. (2017) also suggested

that organization should select individuals who has high level of self-efficacy as these

individuals will be motivated to emotionally commit to the organization.

Organizational support, in the other hand, refers to staffs’ awareness concerning

the extent in which the organizations value their contribution and cares about their well-

being [6, 7, 18]. Previous studies had showed that organizational support as possible

stimulating condition for the staffs to reciprocate by affectively committed to their

organization. These researchers posited that staffs who perceived a high level of support

from their organization will feel obligated to and respond in kind through their

willingness to affectively commit to their organization [7, 12, 16].

Based on suggestion of the above researchers on the relationship between

resilience, self-efficacy and organizational support with affective commitment, this

study assume that these personal and work-related factors are positively and

significantly related to affective commitment. Hence, the following hypotheses are

suggested:

- There is a positive and significant relationship between resilience and

affective commitment among support staffs in MHEIs.

- There is a positive and significant relationship between self-efficacy and

affective commitment among support staffs in MHEIs.

- There is a positive and significant relationship between organizational

support and affective commitment among support staffs in MHEIs.

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3 Methodology

This study fell under correlational study that utilized a quantitative method of research

whereby it was used to analyze the relationship between or among variables in a single

study [8]. A cross sectional survey data was used based on responses from 306

respondents which consisted of support staffs from MHEIs. Data analysis was

performed by using SPSS version 25 which was used to screen the collected data and

SEM AMOS to examine the relationship between the research variables. Resilience

was measured by using a short version of the Resilience Scale developed by Smith et

al (2008). Self-efficacy was measured by using the New General Self-Efficacy Scale

developed by Chen, Gully and Eden in 2001. Organizational support was measured by

using a short version of the Survey of Perceived Organizational Support Survey (SPOS)

developed by Eisenberger et al. (1997) whilst affective commitment was measured by

using 6-items developed by Allen and Meyer in 1990.

4 Analysis and Results

4.1 Demographic Profile

Out of 306 staffs who participated in the study, 177 (57.8%) respondents were female

and 129 (42.2%) respondents were male. The age varied from 19 to 60 years old,

whereby age ranged of 30 years and below constituted 21.6% (66 respondents), 31 to

40 years represented 50.0% (153 respondents) followed by 41 – 46 years (15.0%) and

50 years and above (41, 13.4%). The respondents’ working experiences varied from 2

to more than 30 years of experience. Almost half 48.7% or 149 of the respondents have

worked between 11 to 20 years. While the remaining of 33.0% (101 respondents) have

worked between 2 to 10 years and 18.3% (56 respondents) have worked more than 20

years. In term of academic qualification, 3.3% (10 respondents) had at least a primary

school degree (SRP/PMR/LCE), 41.2% (126 respondents) had upper school degree

(SPM/SPMV/GCE), 43.8% (134 respondents) had a Diploma/STPM/HSC and 11.8%

(36 respondents) had a Bachelor’s degree.

4.2 Assumption Test, Convergent Validity and Construct Reliability

In this study, the skewness of the variable ranged between -.059 to -1.193 while kurtosis

ranged between -.735 to 1.752 which implied that all variables were normally

distributed. The study’s variables were also linearly related as the dots in the scatterplot

were oval-shaped rather than square. The Normal P-P plot of Regression Standardized

Residual showed a straight line which suggested that there was no violation of the

linearity assumption. The result also showed that the VIF values ranged from 1.246 to

1.766 which were found to be less than 10, therefore, there was no issues of

multicollinearity. This study also used standard deviation analysis to identify univariate

outliers whereby the result showed that the standardized (z) score of the imputed

variables ranged from -2.315 to 2. 0527, therefore, no case of univariate outliers was

identified which exceeded the threshold of ±4.0 as suggested by Hair et al. (2013).

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Convergent validity was tested by using factor loading in which factor loading of

these constructs were resilience (.649 to .749), self-efficacy (.663 to .803),

organizational support (.737 to .912) and affective commitment (.810 to .878). The

result of constructs reliability indicated good reliability, thus, the measurement

instrument was valid for the results to be accurately applied and interpreted.

Table 1. Construct Reliability, AVE and Squared Correlation Coefficient.

Variable CR

AVE and r

Resilience

Self-

Efficacy

Organizational

Support

Affective

Commitment

Resilience .858 .501

Self-Efficacy .910 .225 .560

Orga Support .955 .140 .436 .726

Affective Comm .940 .091 .297 .483 .725

Note: CR= Construct Reliability, AVE = Average Variance Extracted (on the diagonal), r

=coefficient determination (on the off-diagonal)

4.3 Measurement Model

The measurement model assessment of standardized factor loading that consists of 28

items obtained from the individual CFAs indicated that all items had positive values

which ranged between .649 to .907. The fit indices values were Relative Chi-Square =

2.117, RMSEA = .061, CFI = .941, IFI = .941 and TLI = .935. Therefore, in this study

the measurement model was testified as a good fit model based on factor loading of

each revised individual CFAs and fit indices.

The discriminant validity, was tested by comparing the AVE for two constructs

against the square of the correction estimation (r

) between the two constructs. For the

present study, the variables’ AVEs ranged from .501 to .726, which showed that the

values of r

were less than AVEs’. The correlation between variables ranged from .302

to .695, which was less than .9, indicating that there was no multicollinearity issue,

therefore, the constructs were discriminant from each other.

4.5 Structural Model

The testing of structural model was used to examine research objective through three

hypotheses. The result showed that two variables were significantly related to affective

commitment whereby the relationship between self-efficacy and affective commitment

was β =.150, p<.05, organizational support and affective commitment was β =.593,

p<.05. Whilst, relationship between resilience and affective commitment was β =.009,

p>05 which signified that resilience was not significantly related to affective

commitment, thus, the hypothesized relationship was not supported. In combination

these three constructs explained 49.7% variances in affective commitment or R

= .497

which signified a moderate relationship.

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Table 2. Results of Hypotheses Testing (H

to H

Hypotheses Causal Path b SE Beta C.R p

R -----> AC .011 .069 .009 .165 .869

SE -----> AC .200 .092 .150 2.170 .030

OS -----> AC .549 .065 .593 8.479 .000

AC  R = .705

AC  R

= .497

5 Discussions

This study was crystallized in order to forecast the relationship between resilience, self-

efficacy and organizational support with affective commitment. The result showed that

resilience did not contribute significantly towards affective commitment. This result

contradicted with previous researchers such as Cho et al. (2017), Jin and Hahm (2017)

as well as Paul et al. (2016). These researchers verified resilience as positive response

to difficult situation in which these staffs maintained positive emotions that can further

translated into an affective attachment to the organization. However, the finding from

this study exerted that staff’s perseverance in facing and adapting to adversity did not

contributed to their affective attachment and commitment to their universities. This may

due to the fact that resilience staffs develop psychological capabilities that allow them

to remain calm during adversity or any hardship and move on that may not related to

their emotionally ties to and identification with the universities.

Conversely, the result from this current study indicated that self-efficacy

contributed positively and significantly toward affective commitment. This showed that

MHEIs staffs believed that their capabilities will empowered in their career pathways

which in turn will give positive implication towards their commitment to their

universities. This result was in line with Mukhtar and Sujanto (2018) findings that self-

efficacy was a valid predictor of individuals’ positive behavior whereby individuals

decided on how to behave based on their belief in their own capabilities which was also

correlated with their commitment to the organization. Gupta et al. (2016), Jin and Hahm

(2017) as well as Onn et al. (2017) also suggested that individuals who had high level

of self-efficacy will make them feel emotionally ties to, identification with and

involvement in the organization and its goals.

Finding from this study showed that organization support also contributed

positively and significantly toward affective commitment. Paramaartha et al. (2019)

pointed out that organizational support inculcated sense of responsibility and

commitment in employer which will then reflect on staffs’ belief that their employer

values their contributions and cares about their well-being. These perceived

organizational support were reported to have strong positive relationship with affective

commitment [12, 16]. Similarly, Stinglhamber et al. (2015) and Vanderberghe et al.

(2019) also found that perceived organizational support had a direct impact on affective

commitment whereby staffs who perceived better organizational support were more

likely to reciprocate with greater positive attitudes such as higher levels of affective

commitment towards the organization.

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Finally yet importantly, this study fulfilled two out of three theorized hypotheses

whereby self-efficacy and organizational support contributed positively and

significantly toward affective commitment. This finding conceptualized the important

of social exchange theory in which the staffs had high level of self-belief over their

capability in achieving an outcome or reaching a goal in the workplace combined with

organizational support vested by the organization captured the staffs’ beliefs in their

universities’ commitment to support them, will then in exchange to be repaid by the

staffs towards the universities with stronger affective commitment. On the other hand,

resilience did not contribute significantly towards affective commitment whereby

staffs’ ability to experience adversity and adaptation were not a significant factor that

make them more willing to commit to their universities.

6 Implication of the Study

To date, insufficient focus and not enough attention were given to personal and work

related factors in cultivating staff’s strength through affective commitment. This is

because, for the last two decades, most researchers studied either resilience, self-

efficacy or organizational support as independent topic in different area of studies in

organizational behavior [4, 7, 10, 13, 16]. Although there were models of affective

commitment, these models did not empirically test in a single study both personal and

work related factors with affective commitment. Due to this, this present study added

to the body of knowledge by providing a new insight empirically by examining in a

single study on the contribution of personal factors (resilience, self-efficacy) and work

related factor (organizational support) on attitudinal outcome (affective commitment).

Moreover, most of the studies pertaining to affective commitment were done mostly

in western context and in the industry that was different from educational industry.

Besides, in Malaysia, the study of affective commitment was still an open field whereby

the study that was conducted in educational setting among support staffs in a non-

western culture such as Malaysia was minimal. As support staffs were the heart of any

organization, therefore, this study added value to the body of knowledge in the context

of MHEIs by identifying personal and work-related factors that will drive them to

strengthen their emotional bond with the university and voluntary acts in undertaking

tasks towards particular commitment targets, goals and values of the universities.

7 Suggestion for Future Research and Conclusion

Although the present research has some merits, it was not free from limitations that

suggested directions for future research. First, this study used cross-sectional data

which were collected from individual staffs at the same point of time. Future research

could employ longitudinal study which able to provide better insight about the causality

among study variables. Second, the study was conducted in public MHEIs, thus, it

would be recommended to replicate the same study in private universities so that the

findings can be generalized to support staffs working in higher education institutions

context. Third, the result indicated that resilience was not significantly related to

affective commitment, therefore, future study need to add an intervening variable that

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may improve this relationship. Finally, it was also recommended for future studies to

test these relationships with other organizational theory than social exchange theory to

examine this three ways interaction between personal factors, work-related factors and

affective commitment.

In the nut shell, this study verified previous researcher findings that affective

commitment is beneficial to organization including in MHEIs. By establishing the

importance of affective commitment among staff in MHEIs, it will propel top

management in the MHEI to design suitable interventions which aims to foster staffs’

emotional attachment, involvement, and identification with the universities that

combines specific measure at the university and individual level.

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