Who wants to work remotely? Personality and attitudes about remote and in-person work in a post-COVID-19 workforce

Restricted (Penn State Only)
- Author:
- Ivory, Susannah
- Graduate Program:
- Psychology
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- May 01, 2024
- Committee Members:
- Kristin Buss, Program Head/Chair
Rustin Meyer, Chair & Dissertation Advisor
Alicia Grandey, Major Field Member
James LeBreton, Major Field Member
Kevin Kinser, Outside Unit & Field Member - Keywords:
- Remote work
Extraversion
Affiliation motive - Abstract:
- As remote work becomes normalized in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, organizations must make sense of the needs of their workforce regarding in-person and remote work. This includes why workers might choose remote work over in-person work, and vis versa. The popular and scientific presses have focused on the role of extraversion, but research has generally failed to find support for extraversion as an important factor in understanding attitudes about remote work (e.g., Arora, 2012; Clark et al., 2012; Langvik et al., 2021; O’Neill et al., 2009; Tomohiro, 2022). There are multiple theoretical and conceptual reasons why the research might not support extraversion as a driving factor, one of which is the exclusion of implicit personality in the models testing this. In this dissertation, I explored work as a social space, and tested how socially relevant aspects of personality – extraversion and implicit affiliation motive – are related to attitudes about remote work, and whether one’s desire for friendship at work explains this relationship. In Study 1, I tested this model in a college sample and found no relationship between affiliation motive and desire for friendship at work or attraction to remote work. However, I did find a significant negative relationship between extraversion and attraction to remote work, which was mediated by desire for friendship at work. In Study 2, I tested this model in a sample of remote and in-person workers. In this study, affiliation motive was positively related to satisfaction with in-person work (but not remote work) via desire for friendship at work, but the effect of extraversion was still stronger. I also found that one’s social connection outside of work moderated the relationship between extraversion and desire for friendship at work, such that the effect of extraversion was stronger for those with strong social connections outside of work. Finally, I compared the role of personality in explaining satisfaction with remote and in-person work to various demographics. This research provides valuable insights into the drivers of workers’ attitudes about remote working models.