Positive psychological capital

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Positive psychological capital is defined as the positive developmental state of an individual as characterized by high self-efficacy, optimism, hope and resiliency. [1]

Contents

Introduction

For decades psychology has been associated as dealing mainly with the treatment of mental illness, although other areas of research and application have existed since its origins. At the very end of the twentieth century a new approach in psychology gained popularity: positive psychology.

Positive psychology, the study of optimal human functioning, is an attempt to respond to the systematic bias inherent in psychology's historical emphasis on mental illness rather than on mental wellness (Seligman, 2002), mainly by focusing on two, forgotten but classical psychological goals:

Since Martin Seligman, a former head of American Psychological Association, chose positive psychology as the theme of his presidency term, more empirical research and theoretic development emerged in this field.

Two new branches of positive psychology are being implemented into the industrial-organizational world.

Drawing from positive psychology constructs and empirical research, four psychological resources were determined to best meet the POB scientific inclusion criteria: Hope, Efficacy, Resilience, and Optimism and were termed by Luthans and colleagues as psychological Capital or PsyCap [4] Positive [5] [6] [7] In combination, the four constructs making up PsyCap were empirically determined to be a second-order, core construct that had a stronger relationship with satisfaction and performance than each of the components by itself. [8] The four components are defined as follows:

Luthans (2014) refers to these four criteria-meeting positive psychological resources which comprise psychological capital as the "HERO Within".

Relationship with different organizational outcomes

PsyCap has positive correlation with desired employee attitudes, behaviors and performance. [9]

A meta-analysis of 51 independent samples found strong, significant, positive relationship between PsyCap and desirable attitudes (e.g., satisfaction, commitment, and well-being), behaviors (e.g., citizenship) and performance (self, supervisor rated, and objective) and a negative relationship with undesirable attitudes (e.g., cynicism, stress, anxiety, and turnover intentions) and behaviors (e.g., deviance).

PsyCap mediates between supportive climate and employee performance [10] - Psycap

PsyCap and positive supportive climate are necessary for human resources in order to achieve stable organizational growth. Supportive climate is defined as the total support that an employee receives from their coworkers, other departments and their supervisors which helps them with their job demands.

High PsyCap Employees supports effective organizational change [11]

Organizational change is defined as a lack of fit with the environment which intensifies as a result of a gap between the organizational goals and its present outcomes. The employees have the responsibility to adjust and behave according to the new strategy dictated by the management, mostly with fewer resources. During change, different aspects of employees’ PsyCap is put to the test – they have to learn new ways of behavior and be confident to do so, recover from the crisis, be motivated to cope efficiently and to believe in a better future. PsyCap and positive emotions are examples of how personal factors facilitate organizational change. Positive change is defined as every change that the organization undergoes for its own benefit and has more positive psychological and behavioral consequences than negative ones. The role of positive emotions is that they help workers cope with the organizational change by broadening their point of view, encourage open decision making and giving them essential vitality for their coping. This interaction means that PsyCap, through positive emotions, influences the worker's attitudes and behavior, which in turn, influences the organizational change.

PsyCap can be developed [12]

Both experimental [13] [14] and longitudinal [15] research indicates the state-like nature of PsyCap and that it can be developed and cause performance to improve.

PsyCap can be extended beyond work into other life domains such as relationships and health [16]

Recent research has found that measures of "Relationship PsyCap" and "Health PsyCap" are related to both individual's respective satisfaction appraisals and desired objective outcomes such as time spent with family and friend in the cases of relationships and cholesterol and BMI in the case of health. When combined with work satisfaction, these three are related to overall well-being.

Now after almost a decade of theory building [17] and research, PsyCap is widely recognized throughout the world and is being applied in positive leadership [18] [19] and human resource development and performance management programs in all types of organizations - businesses, health, education, military and athletics.

Related Research Articles

Industrial and organizational psychology "focuses the lens of psychological science on a key aspect of human life, namely, their work lives. In general, the goals of I-O psychology are to better understand and optimize the effectiveness, health, and well-being of both individuals and organizations." It is an applied discipline within psychology and is an international profession. I-O psychology is also known as occupational psychology in the United Kingdom, organisational psychology in Australia and New Zealand, and work and organizational (WO) psychology throughout Europe and Brazil. Industrial, work, and organizational (IWO) psychology is the broader, more global term for the science and profession.

In organizational behavior and industrial and organizational psychology, organizational commitment is an individual's psychological attachment to the organization. Organizational scientists have also developed many nuanced definitions of organizational commitment, and numerous scales to measure them. Exemplary of this work is Meyer and Allen's model of commitment, which was developed to integrate numerous definitions of commitment that had been proliferated in the literature. Meyer and Allen's model has also been critiqued because the model is not consistent with empirical findings. It may also not be fully applicable in domains such as customer behavior. There has also been debate surrounding what Meyers and Allen's model was trying to achieve.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Job satisfaction</span> Attitude of a person towards work

Job satisfaction, employee satisfaction or work satisfaction is a measure of workers' contentment with their job, whether they like the job or individual aspects or facets of jobs, such as nature of work or supervision. Job satisfaction can be measured in cognitive (evaluative), affective, and behavioral components. Researchers have also noted that job satisfaction measures vary in the extent to which they measure feelings about the job. or cognitions about the job.

Expectancy theory proposes that an individual will behave or act in a certain way because they are motivated to select a specific behavior over others due to what they expect the result of that selected behavior will be. In essence, the motivation of the behavior selection is determined by the desirability of the outcome. However, at the core of the theory is the cognitive process of how an individual processes the different motivational elements. This is done before making the ultimate choice. The outcome is not the sole determining factor in making the decision of how to behave.

In industrial and organizational psychology, organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) is a person's voluntary commitment within an organization or company that is not part of his or her contractual tasks. Organizational citizenship behavior has been studied since the late 1970s. Over the past three decades, interest in these behaviors has increased substantially.

Positive mental attitude (PMA) is a concept first introduced in 1937 by Napoleon Hill in the book Think and Grow Rich. The book never actually uses the term, but discusses the importance of positive thinking as a contributing factor of success. Napoleon, who along with W. Clement Stone, founder of Combined Insurance, later wrote Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude, defines positive mental attitude as comprising the 'plus' characteristics represented by words as faith, integrity, hope, optimism, courage, initiative, generosity, tolerance, tact, kindliness and good common sense.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Employee engagement</span> Relationship between an organization and its employees

Employee engagement is a fundamental concept in the effort to understand and describe, both qualitatively and quantitatively, the nature of the relationship between an organization and its employees. An "engaged employee" is defined as one who is fully absorbed by and enthusiastic about their work and so takes positive action to further the organization's reputation and interests. An engaged employee has a positive attitude towards the organization and its values. In contrast, a disengaged employee may range from someone doing the bare minimum at work, up to an employee who is actively damaging the company's work output and reputation.

The term eustress means "beneficial stress"—either psychological, physical, or biochemical/radiological (hormesis).

Positive organizational behavior (POB) is defined as "the study and application of positively oriented human resource strengths and psychological capacities that can be measured, developed, and effectively managed for performance improvement in today's workplace".

Fred Luthans is a management professor specializing in organizational behavior. He is the university and George Holmes Distinguished Professor of Management, emeritus at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.

Positive affectivity (PA) is a human characteristic that describes how much people experience positive affects ; and as a consequence how they interact with others and with their surroundings.

Job performance assesses whether a person performs a job well. Job performance, studied academically as part of industrial and organizational psychology, also forms a part of human resources management. Performance is an important criterion for organizational outcomes and success. John P. Campbell describes job performance as an individual-level variable, or something a single person does. This differentiates it from more encompassing constructs such as organizational performance or national performance, which are higher-level variables.

Despite a large body of positive psychological research into the relationship between happiness and productivity, happiness at work has traditionally been seen as a potential by-product of positive outcomes at work, rather than a pathway to business success. Happiness in the workplace is usually dependent on the work environment. During the past two decades, maintaining a level of happiness at work has become more significant and relevant due to the intensification of work caused by economic uncertainty and increase in competition. Nowadays, happiness is viewed by a growing number of scholars and senior executives as one of the major sources of positive outcomes in the workplace. In fact, companies with higher than average employee happiness exhibit better financial performance and customer satisfaction. It is thus beneficial for companies to create and maintain positive work environments and leadership that will contribute to the happiness of their employees.

Positive psychology is defined as a method of building on what is good and what is already working instead of attempting to stimulate improvement by focusing on the weak links in an individual, a group, or in this case, a company. Implementing positive psychology in the workplace means creating an environment that is more enjoyable, productive, and values individual employees. This also means creating a work schedule that does not lead to emotional and physical distress.

A job attitude is a set of evaluations of one's job that constitute one's feelings toward, beliefs about, and attachment to one's job. Overall job attitude can be conceptualized in two ways. Either as affective job satisfaction that constitutes a general or global subjective feeling about a job, or as a composite of objective cognitive assessments of specific job facets, such as pay, conditions, opportunities and other aspects of a particular job. Employees evaluate their advancement opportunities by observing their job, their occupation, and their employer.

In psychology, ownership is the feeling that something is yours. Psychological ownership is distinct from legal ownership: for example, one may feel that one's cubicle at work is theirs and no one else's, even though legal ownership of the cubicle is actually conferred on the organization.

Authentic leadership, while having no formal or unequivocal definition, is a growing field in academic research. The idea has also been embraced by leaders and leadership coaches, who view it as an alternative to leaders who emphasize profit and share price over people and ethics. There appears to be some consensus in the literature about the qualities an authentic leader must have. These include self-awareness, the ability to trust one's thoughts, feelings, motives and values, self reflection, responsiveness to feedback, and the ability to resolve conflict in honest and non-manipulative ways. An authentic leader is supposedly able to further the success of an organization within the confines of social and ethical values, even when that seems impossible. Authentic leadership is claimed to be a superior model due to the greater trust and motivation it invokes in subordinates. Much of the evidentiary basis for authentic leadership has been called into question and papers have been retracted.

Job characteristics theory is a theory of work design. It provides “a set of implementing principles for enriching jobs in organizational settings”. The original version of job characteristics theory proposed a model of five “core” job characteristics that affect five work-related outcomes through three psychological states.

Alex Stajkovic is an Organizational Behavior (OB) professor who has conducted research on confidence and goal priming. He holds the Dean's Professorship in Business at the Wisconsin School of Business at the University of Wisconsin - Madison. His research bears on self-efficacy, confidence, and primed goals. Stajkovic co-authored papers with Albert Bandura, Edwin Locke, and Fred Luthans. Stajkovic is a contributing editor to the Journal of Applied Psychology, as well as a member of the Midwestern Psychological Association and Society for Science of Motivation.

The Psychological Capital Questionnaire (PCQ) is an introspective psychological inventory consisting of 24 items pertaining to an individual's Psychological Capital (PsyCap), or positive psychological state of development. The PCQ was constructed by Fred Luthans, Bruce J. Avolio, and James B. Avey with the goal to assess the dimensions of PsyCap. The PCQ measures four dimensions of PsyCap: hope, efficacy, resiliency, and optimism. The PCQ takes between 10–15 minutes to complete and can be administered to individuals or groups. The PCQ is protected by copyright law and published by Mind Garden, Inc.

References

  1. ↑ Luthans F., & Youssef, C.M. (2004). Human, social, and now positive psychological capital management: Investing in people for competitive advantage, Organizational Dynamics, 33(2), 143-160.
  2. ↑ Cameron K., Dutton, J., & Quinn, R. (Eds.).(2003). Positive organizational scholarship. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler.
  3. ↑ Luthans F.(2002). The need for and meaning of positive organizational behavior. Journal of Organizational behavior, 23, 695-706. Fred Luthans
  4. ↑ Luthans F., Luthans, K., & Luthans, B. (2004)
  5. ↑ Positive psychological capital : Going beyond human and social capital. Business Horizons, 47(1), 45-50.
  6. ↑ Luthans F., & Youssef, C.M. (2004). Human, social, and now positive psychological capital management: Investing in people for competitive advantage, Organizational Dynamics, 33(2), 143-160.
  7. ↑ Luthans F., Youssef, C.M., & Avolio, B. J. (2007) Psychological capital. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
  8. ↑ Luthans F., Avolio, B.J., Avey, J.B., & Norman, S. M. (2007). Psychological capital: Measurement and relationship with performance and job satisfaction. Personnel Psychology, 60, 541-572.
  9. ↑ Avey, J.B., Reichard, R.J., Luthans, F., & Mhatre, K.H. (2011). Meta-analysis of the impact of positive psychological capital on employee attitudes, behaviors, and performance. Human Resource Development Quarterly, 22, 127-152.
  10. ↑ Luthans F, Norman S., Avolio B. & Avey J.. (2008). The mediating role of psychological capital in the supportive organizational climate - employee performance relation-ship. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 29(2), 219.
  11. ↑ James B. Avey, Luthans F. & Wernsing S. (2008) Can Positive Employees Help Positive Organizational Change? Impact of Psychological Capital and Emotions on Relevant Attitudes and Behaviors, The Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, Vol. 44, 1, 48-70
  12. ↑ Luthans, F. (2012). Psychological capital development: Background, retrospective analysis and future directions. Human Resource Development Quarterly, 23, 1-8.
  13. ↑ Luthans, F., Avey, J.B., Avolio, B.J., & Peterson, S.J. (2010). The development and resulting performance impact of positive psychological capital. Human Resource Development Quarterly, 21, 41-67
  14. ↑ Luthans, F., Avey, J.B., & Patera, J.L. (2008). Experimental analysis of a web-based training intervention to develop psychological capital. Academy of Management Learning and Education, 7, 208-221.
  15. ↑ Peterson, S.J., Luthans, F., Avolio, B.J., Walumbwa, F. O., & Zhang, Z. (2011). Psychological capital and employee performance: A latent growth modeling approach. Personnel Psychology, 64, 427-450.
  16. ↑ Luthans, F., Youssef, C. M., Sweetman, D. S., & Harms, P. D. (2013). Meeting the leadership challenge of employee well-being through relationship PsyCap and health PsyCap. Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies, 20(1), 118-133.
  17. ↑ Youssef-Morgan, C.M., & Luthans, f. (2013) psychological capital theory: Toward a positive holistic model. In A.B. Bakker (Ed.). Advances in positive organizational psychology, Vol. 1 (pp. 145-166). bingley, UK: Emerald.
  18. ↑ Youssef, C. M., & Luthans, F. (2012). Positive global leadership. Journal of World Business, 47(4), 539-547.
  19. ↑ Youssef-Morgan, C. M., & Luthans, F. (2013). Positive leadership: Meaning and application across cultures. Organizational Dynamics, 42(3), 198-208.
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