Global Issues: How Culture Can Influence Attributions
Summary: In intercultural interactions, the interpretations of behaviors are often more important than
the actual behaviors. Because Western cultures emphasize individualism, people prefer dispositional
explanations, whereas people from collectivist cultures prefer situational explanations. One study showed
American and Chinese participants a picture of a fish swimming in front of a group of fish. More
American than Chinese participants attributed the cause to be internal rather than external. This shows
how people with different cultural orientations perceive themselves in their environment. Westerners see
themselves as independent entities and therefore notice individual objects more than contextual details.
Understanding coworkers’ behaviors requires understanding of one’s subjective culture. Attributional
training can help us understand the appropriate attributions for the behaviors of diverse coworkers.
1. Distributive Fairness
Distributive fairness refers to the perceived fairness of the outcome received, including
resource distributions, promotions, hiring and layoff decisions, and raises. Distributive
fairness relates only to the outcome received, not to the fairness of the process that
generated the decision.
2. Procedural Fairness
Procedural fairness addresses the fairness of the procedures used to generate the outcome.
Why does procedural fairness matter so much?
There are two reasons.
First, employees use perceptions of the current decision-making procedures to predict how
they will likely fare in the organization in the future.
Second, fair procedures signal that employees are valued and accepted by the organization.
3. Interactional Fairness
Interactional fairness is whether the amount of information about the decision and the
process was adequate, and the perceived fairness of the interpersonal treatment and
explanations received during the decision-making process. Deception or abusive words or
actions can be seen as having low interactional fairness.
Interactional fairness describes two specific types of interpersonal treatment.
The first type is interpersonal fairness, which reflects the degree to which people are
treated with politeness, dignity, and respect by authorities or third parties involved in
executing procedures or determining outcomes.
The second type is informational fairness, which focuses on the extent to which
employees receive adequate information and explanations about decisions affecting
their working lives.
It is important that a high degree of interactional fairness exist in the relationship between a
supervisor and a subordinate. Low interactional fairness can lead to feelings of resentment
toward either the supervisor or the organization.
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4. Perception and Trust
Trust is the expectation that another person will not act to take advantage of us regardless
of our ability to monitor or control them. Trust is critical to long-term relationships and is
positively related to job performance.
Trusting work relationships enable employees to focus on their work and not waste time
and energy “watching their backs.” Trust is particularly important to the developmental
stages of relationships, and is positively related to a company’s financial performance.
CASE STUDY: What to Do When the Boss Releases His Inner Toddler
Summary: The case begins by outlining a scenario of VPs reporting monthly sales when the president of
the company throws a chair at a VP reporting low monthly sales results, stating: ‘Next time, I won’t miss.’
Consultant Lynn Taylor calls bosses like this Terrible Office Tyrants, or TOTs. Managers who can’t
control their power when they’re placed under stress. Taylor provides 20 common traits characterizing
TOTs, including bragging and bullying. Taylor offers some concrete coping techniques for subordinates
of TOTS including putting everything in writing and be a star performer.
1. According to some experts, the sort of behavior recorded here is more prevalent in the business
world than in the rest of society. Assuming that this is true, why do you suppose that’s the case?
Answers will vary but some possible arguments are that persons exhibiting this behavior likely would
exhibit the same behaviors in their private lives but are forced into unwanted confrontations in a
2. Are you something of a perfectionist? Are you easily frustrated? How well suited are you – at
this point in your life – to the task of managing other people?
Answers will vary of course but there should be some recognition that easily frustrated perfectionists
3. How might attitudes, values, and perceptions affect the behaviors illustrated in this case?
Attitudes are formed by a variety of forces, including the Big Five personality traits. The chair
throwing president likely is highly disagreeable and highly neurotic. The leader is letting emotions
4. How would stress come into play?
The president is obviously under stress and may be in the phase of burnout, hence the chair throwing.
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IV. STRESS IN ORGANIZATIONS
The finally element of individual behavior we will discuss in this chapter is stress. Many people
think of stress as a simple problem. In reality, however, stress is complex and often misunderstood.
A. The Nature of Stress
The text define stress as a person’s adaptive response to a stimulus that places excessive
psychological or physical demands on him or her.
Given the underlying complexities of this definition, we need to examine its components
carefully.
First is the notion of adaptation. People may adapt to stressful circumstances in any of several
ways.
Second is the role of the stimulus. This stimulus, generally called a stressor, is anything that
induces stress.
Third, stressors can be either psychological or physical.
Finally, the demands the stressor places on the individual must be excessive for stress to
actually result.
1. The Stress Process
Much of what we know about stress today can be traced to the pioneering work of Hans
Selye whose most important contributions were his identification of the general adaptation
syndrome and the concepts of eustress and distress.
Figure 4.6 offers a graphical representation of the general adaptation syndrome (GAS)
which identifies three stages of response to a stressor: alarm, resistance, and exhaustion.
The first stage is called “alarm.” At this point, the person may feel some degree of panic
and begin to wonder how to cope.
If the stressor is too extreme, the person may simply be unable to cope with it. In most
cases, however, the individual gathers his or her strength (physical or emotional) and
begins to resist the negative effects of the stressor, stage two.
Prolonged exposure to a stressor without resolution may bring on phase three of the GAS:
exhaustion. At this stage, the person literally gives up and can no longer fight the stressor.
2. Distress and Eustress
One type of stress, eustress, is the pleasurable stress that accompanies position events, such
as a bonus or a promotion.
Of course, there is also negative stress. Called distress, the unpleasant stress that
accompanies negative events, what most people think of when they hear the word stress.
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Remember that stress can be either good or bad. It can motivate and stimulate us, or it can
lead to any number of dangerous side effects.
B. Common Causes of Stress
Many things can cause stress. Figure 4.7 shows two broad categories: organizational stressors
and life stressors. It also shows three categories of stress consequences: individual
consequences, organizational consequences, and burnout.
1. Organizational Stressors
Organizational stressors are various factors in the workplace that can cause stress.
Four general sets of organizational stressors are task demands, physical demands, role
demands, and interpersonal demands.
Task demands are stressors associated with the specific job a person performs. Some
occupations are by nature more stressful than others, or have unhealthy conditions, lack of
job security, or even job overload.
We should note that the opposite of overload may also be undesirable. As Figure 4.8 shows,
low task demands can result in boredom and apathy just as overload can cause tension and
anxiety.
The physical demands of a job are its physical requirements on the worker; these demands
are a function of the physical characteristics of the setting and the physical tasks the job
involves. One important element is temperature. Others include whether the job requires
strenuous labor, the design of the office, amount of social interaction, poor lighting, or shift
work.
Role demands can also be stressful to people in organizations. A role is a set of expected
behaviors associated with a particular position in a group or organization. As such, it has
both formal (i.e., job-related and explicit) and informal (i.e., social and implicit)
requirements. Individuals perceive role expectations with varying degrees of accuracy and
then attempt to enact that role.
A final set of organizational stressors consists of three interpersonal demands: group
pressures, leadership, and interpersonal conflict. Group pressures may include pressure to
restrict output, pressure to conform to the group’s norms, and so forth.
Leadership style also may cause stress. Suppose an employee needs a great deal of social
support from his leader. The leader, however, is quite brusque and shows no concern or
compassion for him. This employee will probably feel stressed.
Conflicting personalities and behaviors may also cause stress. Conflict can occur when two
or more people must work together even though their personalities, attitudes, and behaviors
differ.
Finally, we should also note that in today’s world many job holders experience stress from
a variety of sources simultaneously. It is also the case that stress in organizational settings
can be influenced by events that take place outside the organization. An individual dealing
with financial problems, a sick child, or the death of a close family member will
undoubtedly experience stress from those events.
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C. Consequences of Stress
Referring back to Figure 4.7, stress can produce individual consequences, organizational
consequences, and burnout. The authors note that many of the factors listed are obviously
interrelated.
1. Individual Consequences
The individual consequences of stress, then, are the outcomes that mainly affect the
individual, and may produce behavioral, psychological, and medical consequences.
The behavioral consequences of stress may harm the person under stress or others. One
such behavior is smoking.
The psychological consequences of stress relate to a person’s mental health and well-being.
When people experience too much stress at work, they may become depressed or find
themselves sleeping too much or not enough.
The medical consequences of stress affect a person’s physical well-being. Heart disease and
stroke, among other illnesses, have been linked to stress.
2. Organizational Consequences
Other results of stress have even more direct consequences for organizations. These include
decline in performance, withdrawal, and negative changes in attitudes. Employee violence
is a potential individual consequence of stress.
Another direct organizational consequence of employee stress relates to attitudes. As we
just noted, job satisfaction, morale, and organizational commitment can all suffer, along
with motivation to perform at high levels.
Burnout, another consequence of stress, has clear implications for both people and
organizations. Burnout is a general feeling of exhaustion that develops when a person
simultaneously experiences too much pressure and has too few sources of satisfaction.
D. Managing and Controlling Stress
Many strategies have been developed to help manage stress in the workplace. Some are for
individuals, and others are geared toward organizations.
1. Individual Coping Strategies
Many strategies for helping individuals manage stress have been proposed. Exercise is one
method of managing stress. A related method of managing stress is relaxation. Time
management is often recommended for managing stress.
Somewhat related to time management is the idea of role management, in which the
individual actively works to avoid overload, ambiguity, and conflict.
A final method for managing stress is to develop and maintain support groups. A support
group is simply a group of family members or friends with whom a person can spend time.
2. Organizational Coping Strategies
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Organizations are also increasingly realizing that they should be involved in managing their
employees’ stress.
Two basic organizational strategies for helping employees manage stress are institutional
programs and collateral programs.
Institutional programs for managing stress are undertaken through established
organizational mechanisms. The organization’s culture also can be used to help manage
stress. Finally, supervision can play an important institutional role in managing stress. A
supervisor can be a major source of overload.
A collateral stress program is an organizational program specifically created to help
employees deal with stress. More and more companies are developing their own programs
or adopting existing programs of this type. These programs attack stress indirectly by
encouraging employees to exercise, which is presumed to reduce stress. On the negative
side, this kind of effort costs considerably more than stress management programs because
the firm must invest in physical facilities.
Finally, organizations try to help employees cope with stress through other kinds of
programs. For example, existing career development programs or programs promoting
everything from humor to massage to yoga as antidotes for stress.
E. Work-Life Balance
1. Fundamental Work-Life Relationships
Work-life relationships can be characterized in any number of ways.
Common dimensions would include such things as an individual’s current job (including
working hours, job satisfaction, and so forth), his or her career goals (the person’s
aspirations, career trajectory, and so forth), interpersonal relations at work (with the
supervisor, subordinates, coworkers, and others), and job security.
Work-life relationships, then, include any relationships between dimensions of the person’s
work life and the person’s personal life.
Stress will occur when there is a basic inconsistency or incompatibility between a person’s
work and life dimensions.
2. Balancing Work-Life Linkages
Balancing work-life linkages is, of course, no easy thing to do. The important thing is to
recognize the potential trade-offs in advance so that they can be carefully weighed and a
comfortable decision made.
Individuals must also recognize the importance of long-term versus short-term perspectives
in balancing their work and personal lives.
People also have to decide for themselves what they value and what tradeoffs they are
willing to make.
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Summary and Application
Attitudes, values and emotions, perception, and stress are all important factors that influence
organizational behavior. The three most important job-related attitudes are job satisfaction, organizational
commitment, and employee engagement.
There are many different kinds of values that can be held by people. Not surprisingly, then, it is somewhat
common for an individual to have conflicting values. Values also differ across cultures in different parts
of the globe. Emotions, affect, and mood are also important contributors to behavior.
Perception is the set of processes by which a person becomes aware of and interprets information about
the environment. Basic perceptual processes include selective perception and stereotyping. Perception
and attribution are also closely related. Internal attributions include ability and effort. External attributions
include luck, not having sufficient resources, and the interference or help of other people.
Stress is an individual’s response to a strong stimulus. Functional stress is the experience of a
manageable level of stress for a reasonable period of time that generates positive emotions including
satisfaction, excitement, and enjoyment. Dysfunctional stress is an overload of stress from a situation of
either under– or over-arousal that continues for too long.
The General Adaptation Syndrome outlines the basic stress process. Stress can be caused by task,
physical, role, and interpersonal demands. Consequences of stress include organizational and individual
outcomes, as well as burnout. Several things can be done to manage stress.