Organizations continue to develop different strategies to maximize production efficiency and enhance the employee’s experiences. While efficiency is key when strategizing the utilization of tools, processes, and human capital, Tyler and Blader (2003) suggest that employee experience of organizational may better influence work outcomes. Specifically, the group engagement model that suggests that high procedural justice can indirectly increase organizational citizenship behaviors through organizational identification (Tyler & Blader, 2003). In other words, within the framework of the group engagement model, Blader and Tyler (2009) suggest that organizational identification mediates the association between procedural justice and organizational citizenship behavior (Evans & Davis, 2014). These organizational citizenship behaviors include extra-role performances, pro-social organizational behaviors, and organizational spontaneity (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Paine, & Bachrach, 2000).
While the group engagement model suggests interactional justice is a component of procedural justice (Tyler & Blader, 2003; Blader & Tyler, 2009), Wang and Jiang (2015) proposed the integration of interactional justice as a separate predictor variable within the model given cultural differences between eastern and western cultures. By considering interactional justice as a separate predictor variable, Wang and Jiang (2015) found that interactional justice is more important that procedural justice within the group engagement model for civil servants in China (eastern culture). Yang (2009) suggests that the influence and perception of interactional justice differs depending on culture, therefore, it would be benefit to examine the reliability of Wang and Jiang (2015) in a western culture.
Group Engagement Model
Tyler and Blader (2003) propose the group engagement model that suggests high organizational justice facilitates positive organizational outcomes such as organizational citizenship behavior. This model demonstrates the importance of procedural justice because it affects both self-identities (organizational identification) and positive organizational outcomes (Tyler & Blader, 2003). This model expands the insights of the group-value model of procedural justice and the relational model of authority into an explanation for why procedural justice shapes cooperation in groups, organizations, and societies (Tyler & Lind, 1992; Blader & Tyler, 2009). However, in the group engagement model, interactional justice is considered a component of procedural justice. Tyler and Blader (2003) hypothesize that procedures are important because they shape people’s social identity within groups, and social identity in turn influences attitudes, values, and behaviors.
Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Paine, and Bachrach (2000) defined organizational citizenship behavior as roles that are outside of contractual obligation such as extra-role performances, pro-social organizational behaviors, and organizational spontaneity. Within the context of the group engagement model, organizational citizenship behavior is the outcome variable. Wang and Jiang (2015) explored how organizational citizenship differed between behaviors directed toward their supervisor and their organization. The organization-focused outcome is defined as organizational citizenship behaviors directed at the organization (OCBO), whereas supervisor-focused outcomes are defined as supervisor evaluation and organizational citizenship behaviors directed at the supervisor (OCBS) (Wang & Jiang, 2015).
The group engagement model further hypothesizes that resource judgments exercise their influence indirectly through organizational identification (Tyler & Blader, 2003). Mael and Ashforth (1992) suggest that organizational identification refers to people’s self-definition deriving from their group membership with a specific group, which has its theoretical foundation in social identity theory (Taijfel, 1978). This social identity mediation within the group engagement model explains why people focus on procedural justice, and, in particular, on procedural elements related to the quality of their interpersonal treatment (Tyler & Blader, 2003; Edwards & Peccei, 2010). Thereby suggesting that those elements carry the most social identity-relevant information (Mael & Ashforth, 1992; Blader & Tyler, 2009).
Similarly, Newman, Maio, Hofman, and Zhu (2016) suggest that organizational identification mediates the relationship between social responsible human resource management (procedural justice) and organizational citizenship behaviors. This further supports the assumption of the group engagement model that identification mediates the relationship between organizational justice and organizational citizenship behavior.
Organizational Justice
Procedural justice. Procedural justice has been studied in various capacities; however, we operationalize procedural justice as the fairness in the process of resolving disputes and determining the allocating of resources (Tyler & Blader, 2003; Blader & Tyler, 2009; Cho & Treadway, 2011, Wang & Jiang, 2015). Within the framework of the group engagement model, procedural justice is observed as a predictor variable (Tyler & Blader, 2003; Blader & Tyler, 2009). Since procedural justice has been extensively explored within the group engagement model, Wang and Jang (2015) controlled for procedural justice and explored it as a covariate with interactional justice. They utilized this strategy because their integration of interactional justice in an eastern country is a novel idea.
Interactional Justice. Within the framework of the group engagement model, Tyler and Blader (2003) refer to interactional justice as a component of procedural justice. However, Blader and Tyler (2009) suggest that interactional justice is more closely related to the employee’s relational identities than to their social identities. For this reason, Wang and Jiang (2015) treat interactional justice as an interpersonal cue in organizational context because it delivers information about interpersonal treatment (Tyler & Blader, 2003). By adjusting the group engagement model by separating interactional justice from procedural justice, Wang and Jiang (2015) found that interactional justice influences organizational citizenship behavior indirectly through organizational identification.
Wang and Jiang (2015) found that interactional justice is more important to civil servants in China than procedural justice in accounting for OCB behavior. They suggest that the reason may be that eastern cultures are more interpersonally oriented than western cultures (Yang, 2009; Abrams, Ando, & Hikle, 1997), and the personal interactions that influence perceived procedural justice may be more salient than the procedural justice that employees may encounter. Previous research suggests that organizational justice differs by culture (Yang, 2009). Therefore, I propose to incorporate Wang and Jiang’s (2015) modifications to the group engagement model and study the new approach within western cultures.
Our study extends Wang and Jiang’s (2015) findings by replicating their study in a western organization. Wang and Jiang (2015) adapted the group engagement model by applying it to China civil servants and incorporating interactional justice. They found that identifications mediated the relationship between interaction justice and OCBO, which is consistent with the findings from previous research (Olkkonen and Lipponen, 2006). Yang (2009) suggests that the influence of interactional justice differs based on cultural differences. This in mind, the mediating effects of organizational identification on the relationship between interactional justice and organizational citizenship behavior may differ depending on culture.
By examining this new group engagement model in a western society, we can explore the generalizability of the mediation of organizational identification in the relationship between interactional justice and organizational citizenship behaviors. Based on the cultural differences proposed by Yang (2009) and Schrodt (2002), we expect slightly different variations between our study and Wang and Jiang (2015).
Interactional Justice and Working Outcomes
First, we anticipate that interactional justice will not influence organizational citizenship behavior as it did in Wang and Jiang (2015). Specifically, we believe that interactional justice will not positively affect supervisor evaluation since interactional justice differs based between cultures (Yang, 2009; Schrodt, 2002). Therefore, we put forward our hypotheses:
- Hypothesis 1a (H1a): Interactional justice will not positively affect supervisor evaluation.
- Hypothesis 1b (H1b): Interactional justice will not positively affect OCBS.
As previously mentioned, research suggests that interactional justice influences OCBO as well (Wang & Jiang, 2015; Colquitt, 2001). Therefore, we put forward our hypothesis:
- Hypothesis 2 (H2): Interactional justice will positively affect OCBO.
Since the group engagement model treats interactional justice as a component of procedural justice, the relationship between interactional justice and organizational identification has often gone neglected (Tyler & Bader, 2003). Fortunately, Wang and Jiang (2015) explore interactional justice as its own variable within the model. As expected, Wang and Jiang found that organizational identification mediated the organizational citizenship behavior towards the supervisor as well as the organizational citizenship behavior towards the organization. While this supports the inclusion of interactional justice as a separate predicator variable, there is little information on how the association between interactional justice and organizational citizenship within the model differs depending on culture.
While Yang (2009) and Schrodt (2002) suggest that interactional justice differs depending on culture, Cho and Treadway (2011) suggest that the process in which an individual forms their organizational identification does not differ by on culture. Cho and Treadway (2011) go on to suggest that though interactional justice is a component of organizational identification, the relationship will not differ by culture. Therefore, we put forth our hypothesis:
- Hypothesis 3 (H3): Interactional justice will positively affect organizational identification.
- Hypothesis 4 (H4): Interactional justice will positively affect supervisor identification
As mentioned above, we anticipate that interactional justice will not influence organizational citizenship behaviors. However, Wang and Jiang (2015) found support for organizational identification as the mediating variable within the group engagement model. Similarly, van Dick, Grojean, Christ, and Wieseke (2006) found that organizational identification mediates the effects of various predictor variables associated with organizational citizenship behaviors.
Therefore, we believe that organizational identification will mediate the association between interactional justice and organizational citizenship behavior. While Yang (2009) suggests that interactional justice will differ based on culture, Wang and Jiang (2015) suggest that organizational identification will mediate the association between interactional justice and organizational citizenship behavior regardless of the strength of the association. Therefore, we put forth our hypothesis:
- Hypothesis 5 (H5): Organizational identification will mediate the relationship between interactional justice and organization-focused outcome (OCBO).
- Hypothesis 6 (H6): Supervisor identification will mediate the relationship between interactional justice and supervisor-focused outcomes (supervisor evaluation and OCBS).
In order to adequately assess the generalizability of Wang and Jiang’s (2015) findings, we plan to recruit Chicago Transit Authority within the greater Chicago-area. This will provide a culturally western sample to assess the generalizability of the group engagement model with interactional justice as an independent variable. By considering previous sample sizes and balancing the results of a power analysis (Tyler & Blader, 2009; Wang & Jiang, 2015), we found that a sample of 300 would be an appropriate sample size for this study.
Additionally, the sample from Wang and Jiang (2015) was pretty normally distributed in age (22 to 55 years; mean of 36.2 years) and gender (52.2% males and 47.5% females). Therefore, we plan to maintain a comparable distribution while accepting small variations to the replication. A comparable sample will allow us to make pretty substantive claims about the generalizability of Wang and Jiang (2015). However, deviations from this plan will not limit the importance of the findings.
We plan to do a field study throughout the Chicago Transit Authority. Surveys will be administered via Qualtrics. Since the Illinois Institute of Technology provides Qualtircs to university members, we do not need funding for this process. The survey will be through the Qualtrics based survey links. We will have the supervisors pass the link to their direct subordinates via email. This will reduce the likelihood that either the email server or the employee will flag the recruitment email as spam.
We will utilize a raffle recruitment procedure: all participants that complete the survey will be placed in a drawing for one of five $100 Visa Gift Cards. There is no fee to purchase the gift cards; so all funding budgeted for recruitment will be used for compensation. Additionally, these gift cards can be used at all locations that accept Visa. This will ensure that the compensation methods are relevant and valuable to the potential participants.
