Does the Bad Outweigh the Good? An Examination of the Effects of Team Member Citizenship Behavior and Deviance on Team Performance

Open Access
- Author:
- Hohenstein, Jesse
- Graduate Program:
- Psychology
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- December 18, 2006
- Committee Members:
- Susan Mohammed, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
James Lewis Farr, Committee Member
Jan Cleveland, Committee Member
Steve Sawyer, Committee Member - Keywords:
- teams
citizenship behavior
deviance
personality - Abstract:
- Little research has considered team functioning, citizenship behavior, and deviance simultaneously or attempted to integrate these streams of research to better understand how to promote team effectiveness. Therefore, the purpose of the research was to examine organizational citizenship behavior and deviance in a nomological net of antecedents (personality) and outcomes (performance, satisfaction, and viability) at the team-level. Specifically, team member deviance and citizenship behavior were examined as both configural (aggregated via minimum, maximum, variance, mean) and shared (norms demonstrating within group agreement) properties in their relationship to team outcomes. By examining both constructs in the same study, the relative effects of citizenship and deviance could be explored. In addition, deviance was explored as a multidimensional construct at the team-level and found to have two dimensions: lack of effort and interpersonal deviance. Results from a study of 56 student teams provided evidence that team member deviance and team member citizenship behavior are distinct constructs. Lack of effort (mean, maximum, variance) was negatively related to team grades, but only citizenship behaviors operationalized as the lowest scorer in the team was related to task performance. In contrast, citizenship behaviors (mean, maximum, minimum) demonstrated consistent positive relationships with both team satisfaction and viability, whereas team satisfaction was only found to relate to maximum lack of effort. Overall, team member deviance outweighed citizenship behavior as a predictor of task performance, but citizenship behavior outweighed deviance as a predictor of team satisfaction and viability. Citizenship norms were positively related and deviance norms were negatively related to team grade, team satisfaction and team viability. With the exception of a positive relationship between extraversion and minimum citizenship behavior, relationships between hypothesized Big Five personality traits and deviance, as well as citizenship behaviors, were not significant.