Journal article
Social Context at Work: A Multilevel Analysis of Job Satisfaction
Sociological forum (Randolph, N.J.), Vol.15(1), pp.65-90
03/2000
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/122299
Abstract
Analyzing data on classified employees working in 18 departments in a university, this paper uses hierarchical linear models to explore the effects of social context on workers' job satisfaction. Drawing on organizational demographers' claims that satisfying social relations in the workplace have demographic sources and that workers are more satisfied in demographically homogeneous work units, we examine the effects of department-level sex and race heterogeneity on workers' feelings about their jobs. Our results show that satisfaction levels are lower in more sex- and race-heterogeneous departments, as hypothesized. In addition, we found that satisfaction is higher in departments with higher average levels of job tenure, though the individual-level effect of tenure on job satisfaction was not statistically significant. Our results provide support for a social-relational view of work and demonstrate the usefulness of multilevel models as an analytic strategy for examining these issues.
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Details
- Title
- Social Context at Work: A Multilevel Analysis of Job Satisfaction
- Creators
- Amy Wharton - Washington State UniversityThomas Rotolo - Washington State UniversitySharon Bird - Iowa State University
- Publication Details
- Sociological forum (Randolph, N.J.), Vol.15(1), pp.65-90
- Academic Unit
- Sociology, Department of
- Publisher
- Kluwer Academic Publishers-Plenum Publishers
- Identifiers
- 99900619653101842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Journal article