Commitment with or without a stick of paid work: Comparison of paid and unpaid workers in a nonprofit organization

Vuuren van, Mark and Jong de, Menno D.T. and Seydel, Erwin R. (2008) Commitment with or without a stick of paid work: Comparison of paid and unpaid workers in a nonprofit organization. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 17 (3). pp. 315-326. ISSN 1359-432X

PDF
Restricted to UT campus only: Request a copy
141Kb

Abstract:	The aim of this study is to investigate whether nonpaid volunteers have other reasons to be a member of an organization than paid workers. Volunteers are assumed to be hard to manage, because there is no “stick of a paid contract” to keep them in line. Therefore, we studied different dimensions (i.e., affective, normative, and continuance) of organizational commitment of volunteers and paid workers in a nonprofit organization. Further, we assessed whether the predictive power of the congruence between organizational and individual values for commitment differs between paid and unpaid workers. As expected, volunteers showed a significantly higher level of affective commitment to the organization, and lower levels of continuance commitment. Surprisingly, volunteers also showed a higher level of normative commitment than paid workers. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.
Item Type:	Article
Copyright:	© 2008 Psychology Press
Faculty:	Behavioural Sciences (BS)
Research Group:	Technical and Professional Communication (TPC) Psychology, Health & Technology (PHT)
Link to this item:	http://purl.utwente.nl/publications/61598
Official URL:	http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13594320701693175
Export this item as:	BibTeX EndNote HTML Citation Reference Manager

Show download statistics for this publication

Repository Staff Only: item control page

Metis ID: 252277