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Why I am here matters: The effects of continuance and affective commitment on the organizational citizenship of private prison staff

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Abstract

While organizational citizenship behaviors (i.e., employee’s choosing to perform above and beyond work expectations) are beneficial for the success of any organization, there has been little research on this form of prosocial behavior in private correctional agencies. This study is the first to examine the relationship between two forms of organizational commitment (affective and continuance) and organizational citizenship behaviors for 160 correctional staff at a maximum security private US prison. Results of the Ordinary Least Squares regression analysis supported the predictions that affective commitment would have a positive association with organizational citizenship behaviors and continuance commitment would have a negative association. Possible interventions that private correctional organizations can undertake to encourage affective organizational commitment from their staff are discussed.

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Notes

  1. The survey was more than 15 pages long and had over 220 questions that tapped into a wide array of areas concerning the perceptions, views, attitudes, intentions and behaviors of working in a prison. Because of the wealth of information from the survey, other studies have been conducted using different parts of the survey. The full citations of these studies are available upon request. None of these previous studies examined the relationship of both affective and continuance with organizational citizenship behaviors; however, parts of the article, such as the Method section, may be similar to previous studies but the data results are unique.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Janet Lambert for proofreading the article. The authors also thank the anonymous reviewers, the editor and editorial staff for their comments and suggestions. These comments and suggestions improved the article.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Legal Studies, University of Mississippi, 202 Odom, 38677, Mississippi, MS, USA

    Eric G Lambert

  2. Department of Criminology, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Indiana, 15705, Pennsylvania, USA

    Bitna Kim

  3. School of Criminal Justice, 525 Bishop Hall, Ferris State University, Big Rapids, 49307, Michigan, USA

    Nancy L Hogan

  4. Department of Criminal Justice, 3255 Faculty Administration Building, Wayne State University, Detroit, 48202, Michigan, USA

    Thomas M Kelley

  5. Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Strong Hall 228, Missouri State University, 901 South National Avenue, Springfield, 65897, Missouri, USA

    Brett Garland

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  1. Eric G Lambert
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  2. Bitna Kim
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  3. Nancy L Hogan
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  4. Thomas M Kelley
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  5. Brett Garland
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Correspondence to Eric G Lambert.

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Lambert, E., Kim, B., Hogan, N. et al. Why I am here matters: The effects of continuance and affective commitment on the organizational citizenship of private prison staff. Secur J 30, 199–214 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1057/sj.2014.29

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