Date of Award

Spring 2017

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy in Industrial/Organizational Psychology (PhD)

Department

Industrial/Organizational Psychology

First Advisor/Committee Member

Paul R. Yost

Second Advisor/Committee Member

Denise Daniels

Third Advisor/Committee Member

Robert R. Drovdahl

Keywords

Christianity, Work, Faith, Integration, Measurement, Performance

Abstract

In recent years, concern for faith-work integration has evolved from a special interest to a sustained movement within workplace and ecclesiastical communities. This study’s purpose is to validate the Transformative Work in Society Index (TWSI) exploring Christian faith, work, and economics integration within the larger nomological net of workplace spirituality, organizational outcomes, and faith maturity measures. The TWSI incorporates the full affective, behavioral, and cognitive dimensions of what it means to be agentic human beings at work. A total of 405 participants who self-identified as Christians took part in this study (40.2% female; mean age = 46 years; mean as active Christian = 32 years).

Results indicated that the 51-item TWSI is best characterized as a reflective four-factor model, which demonstrated a moderately good fit to the data: (c2[1212; N = 405] = 2881.551, p < .001; CFI = .817; RMSEA = .058). Correlations between the more externally-oriented TWSI facets and the Faith at Work Scale (FWS) were more modest than the correlation between the TWSI Core (personal) dimension and the FWS, demonstrating that the TWSI taps broader themes than are often captured by existing faith-work measures.

The TWSI facets significantly predicted Ethical Behavior, accounting for an additional 6.6% in overall variance. The TWSI also predicted Ethical Behavior and Faith Maturity above and beyond the FWS, further demonstrating its unique construct characteristics. Moreover, the TWSI Core (personal) dimension predicted contextual performance, accounting for an additional 9.8% in overall variance; the TWSI Behavioral sub-facet was predictive of both task and contextual performance, accounting for an additional 3.8% and 14% in overall variance, respectively. Lastly, the TWSI Core (personal) facet was predictive of intentions to leave a job, as were two of the externally-oriented TWSI factors, accounting for an additional 13.7% and 6.6% in overall variance, respectively. However, contrary to expectations, organization/person values alignment did not moderate the TWSI and turnover intentions relationship.

Future research might further probe the TWSI’s multidimensionality, the unique expressions of integration across Christian traditions, other factors that might moderate and/or predict the faith-work and personal/organizational outcomes relationships, as well as effective pedagogical approaches for faith-work integration.

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Additional Rights Information

Copyright held by author.

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