The Antecedent Role of Justice Perceptio

H. Nejat Basım ** Harun Şeşen ***

Abstract: Organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) is an important factor that promotes efficient, effective and high performance. OCB is affected by an individual’s attitudes, behaviors, and perceptions of the organization and in

this context; one might mention many antecedents of OCB. In the present study, the relation between OCB and organizational justice perception as an antecedent in a group of 116 public sector manager candidates who were studying in the public sector was examined and an attempt was made to close the gaps in variable dimensions of previous studies. The findings showed that organizational justice perceptions had positive and significant effects on OCBs toward the organization (conscientiousness, sportsmanship and civic virtue), but had no effect on OCBs toward individuals (altruism and courte- sy).

Key Words: Organizational justice perception, organizational citizenship be- havior, antecedent.

Introduction

Today, numerous studies focusing on different dimensions of the administrative/organizational field are conducted for the purpose of ensuring the efficient and effective functioning of organizations. The majority of these studies address organizational structure and organ- izational behavior. In this context, one of the main subjects of recent studies conducted on organizational behavior is organizational citi- zenship behavior (OCB). The reason is that organizational citizenship behavior aims to protect the organization from destructive and unfa- vorable behaviors that hinder the smooth functioning of the organiza- tion; improving employees’ skills and abilities; enhancing organiza-

tional performance via an effective coordination system.

ciate Professor, TODAİE.

88 TODAİE’s Review of Public Administration

Undoubtedly, organizational citizenship behavior is affected by the attitudes, behavior and organizational perceptions of individuals. The reason is that besides personal-related factors, individuals also form their organizational attitudes and behavior according to their perceptions of organizational dynamics. Such perceptions of organi- zational dynamics, which are highly influential on attitudes and be- havior, appear as subdimensions of organizational culture and organ- izational climate.

A common finding of previous studies on the relationship between OCB and organizational perception (e.g.. Blakely et al., 2005; Zellars et al., 2003; Williams et al., 2002; Moorman et al., 1998) is that OCB is affected by perceived organizational justice. However, some contra- dictory results relating to the abovementioned important finding, the reduction of organizational justice perception mostly to the dimen- sion of procedural justice and the employment of different OCB di- mensionalizations in different studies necessitate a cohesive study on the relationship between OCB and organizational perception. For this primary purpose, in this study, employees’ perceptions of organiza- tional justice were measured after being broken down into three di- mensions. Then, it was attempted to determine the antecedent role of these perceptions on OCB.

Organizational Citizenship Behavior

Discretionary (voluntary) employee behavior and actions benefi- cial for the organization are different from employees’ formal role behaviors. In the literature, such behavior, which is regarded as in- formal behavior, is called prosocial organizational behavior (Brief - Motowidlo, 1986; McNeely - Meglino, 1994), extra-role behavior (Van

Dyne et al., 1994), good soldier syndrome (Turnipseed - Murkison, 1996, 2000; Organ, 1988), contextual performance (Van Scotter - Mo- towidlo, 1996) and organizational citizenship behavior (Bateman - Organ, 1983; Organ, 1988; Smith et al., 1983). This type of behavior also involves social behaviors such as not being insensitive to

coworkers’ inappropriate behavior; discussing the issue with them; complaining about them to the management; fulfilling tasks in due time; being innovative, helping others and volunteering.

OCB refers to behavior, which is defined as willingness to coop- erate by Chester Barnard and the distinction between dependable role performance and innovative and spontaneous behaviors by Daniel Katz as a basis (Podsakoff et al., 2000). The concept of organi-

The Andecedent Role of Justice Perception in Organizational Citizenship Behavior

zenship behavior as individual behavior that is discretionary, not di- rectly or explicitly recognized by the formal reward system, and that in the aggregate promotes the effective functioning of the organiza-

tion . This type of behavior is rather a matter of personal choice, such that its omission is not generally understood as punishable (Pod-

sakoff et al., 2000: 513). Organizational citizenship behavior generally seems unimportant.

Nevertheless, as a whole, it improves the functioning of an organiza- tion. The expression the principle of voluntariness refers to em- ployee behavior performed without any expectations of reward or punishment with personal choice though not stipulated by his/her job definition. Organ states that such behavior not only facilitates the

functioning of the social mechanism and ensures the flexibility need-

ed to work in unpredictable situations, but also enables an organiza- tion to tackle problems arising from the interdependency of employ- ees (Tang - İbrahim, 1998: 529-551).

Organizational citizenship behavior is individual behaviors be- yond role requirements that aim to increase organizational effective- ness (Hunt, 1999: 3). Greenberg and Baron (2000: 212) define organ- izational citizenship behavior as employee performance going be- yond designated job task specifications. In this framework, OCB in- volves helping new coworkers, respecting the rights of others, not taking unnecessary breaks, regularly attending to the organiza tion’s activities and assisting others with difficult tasks (Kidwell et al., 1997: 777), which thus minimizes the need for processing scarce or- ganizational resources required to sustain the activities of the organi- zation (Organ, 1988; Organ - Ryan 1995; Smith et al., 1983: 658).

Analysis of the literature shows that OCB is basically divided into two types (Baron, 2000). The first OCB type manifest itself as active participation in organizational structure, objectives and practices, and contribution, while the second OCB type involves avoiding all kinds of behavior that might harm the structure, practices and objec- tives. There is a significant difference between the two OCB types. With respect to the first OCB type that emerges as a contribution to the organization, individuals should actively participate in organiza- tional life. Employees, who display this type of behavior, are active, productive and hardworking. In the second type of behavior that ap- pears as avoiding harmful behavior, the basic mentality of the em- ployee is not to contribute to the organization, but not to harm it. Even though there is such a conceptual difference between them, in

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important is to display behavior that will improve organizational effi- ciency and effectiveness Özdevecioğlu,

Behavioral Dimension of Organizational Citizenship

When the literature on the subject is examined, it is seen that there is not a complete consensus on the dimensions of organization- al citizenship behavior. For instance, Podsakoff et al (2000: 514) found 30 different definitions of citizenship behavior at the end of their comprehensive review of the literature. In their survey, con- ducted by structured interview, Smith et al, another group conducting studies on the subject, (1983) asked supervisors the behaviors, which they deemed extra-role behavior. Then supervisors were requested to appraise their subordinates with a questionnaire prepared for this purpose. The factor analyses conducted on the data revealed the ex- istence of two separate factors. The first factor was called the dimen- sion of altruism or the deliberate pursuit of the interests or welfare of others and the second one, the dimension of generalized compli- ance .

Organ : coined the concept organizational citizenship behavior by developing the definition of extra-role behavior and suggested a five-dimension structure. He named these dimensions as altruism (caring about others), courtesy, conscientiousness, civic vir- tue (supporting organizational development) and sportsmanship. Podsakoff et al (1990) developed a scale for the dimensions defined by Organ, which they employed in numerous studies.

In some of the studies, other different OCB dimensions were de- fined such as loyalty (commitment to the organization), obedience (compliance with rules and management), partial participation (in- novative behavior and willingness to engage in OCB), functional par- ticipation (personal participation and voluntariness), social partici- pation (attending meetings and group activities), being interested, accommodating change, interpersonal assistance (sacrifice behavior), personal initiative (civic virtue and partiality behavior) and personal effort (Van Dyne et al., 1994; Morrison, 1994; Moorman and Blakely, 1995). Van Scotter and Motowidlo (1996) divided performance into task performance and contextual performance. Besides, they suggest-

ed a two-dimension structure for contextual performance. Here, con- textual performance displays similarities to OCB. In another study, asserting that the altruism and courtesy defined by Organ refer to OCB towards individuals, while civic virtue and sportsmanship in-

The Andecedent Role of Justice Perception in Organizational Citizenship Behavior

suggested a two-dimension structure as OCB-I (OCB towards individ- uals) OCB-O (OCB towards the organization).

Many studies conducted recently addressed the problem of the dimensionalization of OCB. For instance, Podsakoff et al (2000) based their study on Organ’s

dimensionalization and in this frame- work; they analyzed OCB in seven different dimensions. However,

they stated that the result of their analysis indicated the similarity of these dimensions with a basic five-dimension structure. Again, at the end of their detailed study, Lepine et al (2002) said that all the differ-

ent OCB dimensionalizations were very similar to Organ’s definition. It was maintained in the study conducted by Hoffman et al (2007),

which can be considered the most recent study on this subject, that OCB dimensions were in fact not much different from one another and instead of different dimensionalizations, it would be more ap- propriate to mention a single OCB. When the literature relating to the subject was reviewed, it was considered that the adoption of Or gan’s (1988) definition would better serve the purpose of this study due to its holistic approach to the concept. Thus, OCB was investigated with its five-dimension structure. These dimensions are briefly described below:

Altruism involves discretionary behavior directed at helping oth- ers or preventing work-related problems (Graham, 1989; Organ - Konovsky, 1989: 157; George - Jones, 1997: 154; Podsakoff et al., 2000: 514). Podsakoff et al (1990: 111) define altruism as employee behavior aimed at helping specialist coworkers when a problem oc- curs, thus helping coworkers become more efficient. Specialist em- ployees’ e.g.: foremen or senior employees’ willingness to assist

new colleagues without expecting any reward falls within the scope of altruism. Likewise, doing tasks for others when they are sick or ab- sent is among the examples for altruism (Kidwell et al., 1997: 777). This type of behavior contributes to group efficiency by enhancing indi viduals’ performance.

Courtesy refers to behaviors designed to inform others before tak- ing action or making decision that will affect them (Deluga, 1995: 2). Therefore, courtesy plays an important role in preventing problems and facilitates the use of time in a constructive manner. A positive climate in an organization, which will lead to performance improve- ment, depends on communication among individuals and reciprocal altruism. Courteous behavior is mostly defined as future-focused be- havior. While altruistic behavior refers to the performance of actions

92 TODAİE’s Review of Public Administration

problems in the future (Burns - Collins, 2000: 1-4). In this context, while courtesy refers to helping others with probable problems, al- truism is helping others with current problems. Most of the studies reveal that employees prefer courteous behavior rather than altruis-

tic acts Basım - Şeşen,

Conscientiousness means that employees voluntarily perform their tasks beyond the minimum required levels (Organ, 1988). In a sense, it refers to an employee’s internalization and acceptance of an organization’s rules, regulations and procedures. The reason why this

behavior has been accepted as a type of organizational citizenship is that although every employee is expected to act in compliance with the organization’s rules, regulations and procedures, actually, most of

them do not act accordingly (Podsakoff et al., 2000: 528). Even though conscientiousness, which is used for defining basic categories of personality and which involves certain characteristics such as be- ing organized, trustworthiness and willingness to achieve, reflects

employee’s general obedience, what is actually important is that eve- ry employee should obey the organizational rules even when he/she

is not being watched (Barksdale - Werner, 2001: 148). Civic Virtue is responsible participation in the political life of the

organization (Organ, 1988). Civic virtue refers to the willingness of an employee to feel responsible against incidents affecting the organ- ization and to voluntarily and responsibly participates in decision- making (Schnake - Dumler, 1993: 352). Here, the exercise of individ- ual initiative is in question and it involves discussing organization- related issues, making constructive suggestions and participating in the decision-making process (Tompson - Werner, 1997: 590; Kidder, 2002: 637). Handling activities not required by the job but which help the organization’s overall image is a good example for civil vir- tue behavior (Bolino, 1999).

Sportsmanship is defined as a willingness to tolerate the inevita- ble inconveniences and impositions of work without complaining (Podsakoff et al., 2000: 639). If employees constantly complain and focus on the negative aspects of their job rather than its positive as- pects, and if they exaggerate even tiny problems, it is not possible to achieve organizational happiness and a positive organizational cli- mate. Sportsmanship requires loyalty to the leader of the organiza- tion and the organization as a whole (Netemeyer et al., 1997: 86). From another point of view, the non-display of such behavior may lead a decline in employee loyalty to the organization (Bommer and

The Andecedent Role of Justice Perception in Organizational Citizenship Behavior

The Antecedents of Organizational Citizenship Behavior

Studies indicate that the antecedents of OCB consist of the follow- ing main categories: employee characteristics, task characteristics, organizational characteristics and leadership behaviors (Podsakoff et al, 2000). Believing that employee characteristics affected OCB (Bateman - Organ,

; O’Reilly - Chatman, 1986; Smith et al., 1983), initial studies on OCB focused on two basic issues.

The first field, which was thoroughly investigated in respect of employee characteristics, was moral values (Organ - Ryan, 1995). In this framework, job satisfaction, perceived honesty, organizational commitment and perception of leader support become notable as the antecedents, whose relationships with OCB were investigated most. The studies on moral values found that OCB has a relationship with all these characteristics to some extent.

The second field, which was investigated with respect to employ-

ee characteristics, was behavioral tendency variables. The relation- ship of behavioral tendency variables such as agreeableness, consci- entiousness and positive affective with OCB was investigated and it was asserted on the basis of findings that these types of variables af- fected OCB (Podsakoff et al, 2000).

When analyzed in this context, employees’ perception of justice is

a very important factor, which has been investigated as an antecedent of OCB within the scope of moral values, one of employee characteris- tics. The findings obtained in previous studies conducted on the rela- tionship of this important factor with OCB will be thoroughly ana- lyzed in the next section of the study. The roles of task characteristics, organizational characteristics and leadership behaviors as the ante- cedents of OCB will not be examined as they do not fall within the scope of this study.

Organizational Justice Perception

Organizational justice perception is the individuals’ perception of fairness in organizations. Employees judge fairness of procedures and

mechanisms, tasks and rewards and behavior towards them in the organization and they develop an attitude towards the organization in view of their judgment (Greenberg, 1990: 399). Some studies prove that perceived organizational justice affects employees’ organi-

zational commitment, job satisfaction, satisfaction with wage, with- drawal behavior, identification with the organization and organiza-

94 TODAİE’s Review of Public Administration

2002; Lee, 2001; Zhang, 2006). In brief, fairness is a phenomenon, which employees value very much (Folger, 1998).

The review of management literature indicates that the concept of justice was among the basic subjects, which have been emphasized since Plato and Aristotle, and which has been researched by sociolo- gists since Marx, Durkheim and Weber (Wenzel, 2002). In the mean- time, organizational justice has been arousing the interest of research for the last 35 years (Ambrose, 2002: 803).

The studies on or ganizational justice are grounded on Adams’s Equity Theory . Research-based knowledge relating to the subject was developed via numerous studies in the course of time

(Thibaut and Walker, 1975; Bies - Moag, 1986; Greenberg, 1990, 1993; Colquitt, 2001; Cohen - Charash - Spector, 2001; Ambrose, 2002; Nowakovski - Conlon, 2005).

These studies were conducted according to different viewpoints on organizational justice and hence, different types of dimensionali- zations were suggested. While some of the dimensions were triple- structured consisting of distributive justice, procedural justice and in- teractional justice, (Cohen - Charash - Spector, 2001), some were four-dimension structures embodying distributive justice, procedural justice, inter-individual justice and cognitive justice (Colquit, 2001; Nowakovski - Conlon, 2005).

It can be said that despite the consensus on distributive justice and procedural justice in the studies conducted on organizational jus- tice, there are different point of views about interactional justice, in- ter-individual justice and cognitive justice. In this study, a three- dimension organizational justice model has been adopted in view of the consensuses in the literature. These dimensions are briefly de- scribed above:

Distributive Justice: Distributive justice refers to people's percep- tions of the fairness of outcomes (benefits or punishment) as well as their evaluations of the end state of the allocation process (Green- berg, 1990: 400). This perception is related with the fair distribution of outcomes for workers (Andersson-Str åberg et al., 2007: 433). Or- ganizational justice is closely associated with the employees’ organi- zational attitudes and behaviors such as the appraisal of authority, job satisfaction, organizational commitment and trust (Colquitt, et al., 2001). However, this concept was criticized due to the ambiguity of employees’ contributions to the organization; equity being the only standard (Nowakovski - Conlon, 2005); its inadequacy in explaining

The Andecedent Role of Justice Perception in Organizational Citizenship Behavior

the grounds for justice deci sions as well as predicting the employees’ reactions against unfairness (Cropanzano et al., 2001; Irak, 2004).

Procedural Justice: Employees’ high concern over the procedures used in reaching outcomes along with the outcomes themselves has indicated the inadequacy of distributive justice in explaining the per- ception of distributive justice in organizations: Therefore, the concept of procedural justice that defines the procedures used in reaching de- cisions was developed (Nowakovski - Conlon, 2005: 6).

P rocedural justice refers to employees’ perceptions of fair deci- sions by supervisors when it is believed that such decisions are the outcomes of a controlled process (Thibaut - Walker, 1975). In other words, it is related with the perception of fair procedures used in the distribution of outcomes (Irak, 2004). Similar to distributive justice,

procedural justice also affects employees’ organizational attitudes and behaviors (Ambrose, 2002).

Interactional Justice: Employees’ different reactions to different s upervisors’ various approaches to the operational procedures e.g. the different implementations of performance appraisal system by different supervisors in an organization) have become the starting point of studies on interactional justice (Bies - Moag, 1986).

Interactional justice constitutes the social aspect of organizational justice studies and points to the quality of inter-individual relation- ships (Ambrose, 2002: 804). Interactional justice refers to the fact that employees’ perceptions of justice are affected both by the atti-

tudes of decision-makers and their explanations relating to the deci- sions made İşbaşı,

The Relationship Between Perceived Organizational Justice and OCB

The phenomenon that underlies the studies testing the effects of moral values, such as job satisfaction (Bateman - Organ, 1983; Organ - Ryan, 1995; Williams - Anderson, 1991), perception of honesty (Aquino, 1995; Konovsky - Folger, 1991; Konovsky - Organ, 1996; Moorman, 1991; Organ and Moorman, 1993) or perceived organiza- tional support (Moorman et al., 1998), on OCB is social exchange the- ory, which proposes that when an employee believes that the organi- zation is committed to him/her and values him/her, then in return, he/she feels commitment to the organization (Eisenberger et al., 1986).

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1959: 9). In this respect, the basic factor that determines the appeal or satisfactoriness of a relationship is the comparison level of the costs and benefits of a relationship. When employees perceive that their exchange with their supervisors or organization is unfair or un- just, they believe that social exchange is harmed. In other words, they think that they are at a loss. An employee, who deems that his/her social exchange is harmed, reevaluates the costs and benefits of sus- taining the relationship. When he/she judges that the relationship will cost him/her much more than it would benefit, he/she displays withdrawal behavior in order to minimize or end the relationship (Blakely et al., 2005). Withdrawal behavior manifests itself as low performance (Cowherd - Levine, 1992), increased lateness or absen- teeism (Hulin, 1991), abnormal behavior (Skarlicki et al., 1999), the decline in organizational commitment (Barling - Philips, 1993) or the decline in organizational citizenship behavior (Moorman, 1991; Moorman et al., 1998; Zellars, 2003).

On the contrary, if employees believe that they are treated fairly, they exhibit more organizational citizenship behaviors as suggested by social exchange theory.

A review of organizational literature indicates that among all jus- tice perception variables, procedural justice is the type of justice, whose relationship with OCB has been investigated the most (Zellars, 2003). The common finding of these studies conducted on procedural justice is that there is a significant positive relationship between pro- cedural justice and OCB (Ehrhart, 2004; Tepper - Taylor, 2003; Moorman et al., 1998; Zellars, 2003, Muhammad, 2004). Neverthe- less, the findings of some studies did not support the existence of such relationship and maintained that there was not a significant re- lationship between procedural justice and OCB (Rifai, 2005). In this sense, it is observed that there is not complete agreement on the ex- istence of a relationship between procedural justice and OCB.

Besides, the amount of research focused on the relationships of distributive justice and interactional justice with OCB is quite limited. The results of available studies confirm that OCB has a significant positive relationship both with distributive justice (Williams et al., 2002; Rifai, 2005; Zellars et al., 2003) and interactional justice (Wil- liams et al.,

; İşbaşı, . The common lacking point in all these studies, which focused on the relationships of employees’ per-

ceptions of justice, is that they focused on merely one or two types of perceptions of justice. In other words, they did not approach the sub-

The Andecedent Role of Justice Perception in Organizational Citizenship Behavior

The similar problem of lack of holistic approach seen in the stud- ies on perception of justice is observed in the dimensionalization of OCB as well. It is highly noteworthy that none of the studies conduct-

ed on the relationship of perception of justice with OCB, OCB were handled within the framework of the dimensions defined by Organ (1988). While some researchers used a four-dimension OCB struc- ture (individual initiative, personal industry, interpersonal helping and loyal boosterism) (e.g., Moorman et al., 1998; Blakely et al., 2005), others preferred to use a two-dimension structure. In this con- text, Muhammad (2004) suggested a two-dimension OCB, OCB-I and OCB-O, whereas Ehrhart (2004) preferred to make a distinction as OCB-Helping and OCB-Conscientiousness. On the other hand, Wil- liams et al (2002) defined two separate dimensions as Historical OCB and OCB Intentions. Meanwhile, some researchers did not consider OCB as a multi-dimension, but a single-dimension structure (e.g. Tepper - Taylor, 2003; Zellars et al., 2003; Rifai, 2005). When all these studies are examined as a whole, it is observed that the han- dling of OCB in different structures in different studies hinders a sound and reliable comparison among the findings, thus presenting some complex results with respect to the nature and direction of the relationship between OCB and organizational justice.

In the light of the findings of previous studies on the subject, the study aims to assess OCB on the basis of its five-dimension structure as defined by Organ (1988); to focus on the relationship between OCB and perceptions of organizational justice (distributive, proce- dural and interactional); thus, to attempt to fill a gap in the literature. In this framework, the hypothesis of the study has been identified as follows:

Hypothesis 1: There is a significant positive relationship between employees’ perceptions of distributive justice and or- ganizational citizenship behaviors.

Hypothesis 2: There is a significant positive relationship between employees’ perceptions of procedural justice and or- ganizational citizenship behaviors.

Hypothesis 3: There is a significant positive relationship between employees’ perceptions of interactional justice and or- ganizational citizenship behaviors.

Method

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The survey was conducted with 116 prospective administrators studying for a master’s degree in public administration, justice ad- ministration, law enforcement and education management in the Public Administration Institute for Turkey and the Middle East

TODAİE in the -2008 Academic Year. The range of participants was 25-42 years (Mean age = 35.08, ss= 4.143). Their years of service ranged from 5 to 23 years (MeanOrt yrser = 12.05, ss= 4.61). 81.9 of the participants (n=95) had higher education and 18.1% (n=21) had master's degrees at the time of the survey. Survey data were obtained by applying two measurements on the respondents via face-to-face interviews and self-completed interviews under surveillance.

Measurement Tools The survey was conducted by face-to-face and self-completed in-

terviews. Questionnaire forms consisting of two separate scales were used in order to measure respondents’ organizational citizenship be- havior and perceptions of organization justice.

Organizational Citizenship Behavior Scale With a view to measuring employees’ organizational citizenship

behavior, the OCB scale was designed by making use of two separate surveys conducted by Vey-Campbell (2004) and Williams-Shiaw (1999). The questionnaire form, which was compiled on the basis of these two surveys, was designed to measure the five basic dimen- sions of organizational citizenship behavior suggested by Organ (1988).

The OCB scale consisting of 19 items aimed to measure the di- mensions of organizational citizenship behavior: altruism (5 items), conscientiousness (3 items), courtesy (4 items), sportsmanship (4 items) and civic virtue (4 items). The questionnaire included declara- tive sentences such as I help a coworker with a heavy workload , I don’t do anything personal during working hours , I don’t waste my time complaining about insignificant matters and I support struc- tural changes in the organization . The respondents were asked to

choose one option that best matched their view on a 6-point Likert scale ranging from never to always . The reliability alpha of the to- tal scale was (cronbach alpha) 0.87. The reliability values on dimen- sion basis ranged from 0.65 to 0.75.

The Scale for Perception of Organizational Justice

The Andecedent Role of Justice Perception in Organizational Citizenship Behavior

The scale for perception of organizational justice (SPOJ) was de- veloped by İşbaşı

. The scale consisted of items such as The rules for the functioning of the organization provide accurate in- formation to the supervisor for decision-making , We can equally use the resources of the organization in line with our needs or My super- visor respects my opinions . Participants were asked to choose one op-

tion that best matched their view on the 5-point Likter scale ranging from Strongly disagree to Strongly agree . The scale consisted of three subscales measuring distributive justice (7 items), distributive justice (7 items) and interactional justice (13 items).

In his study, İşbaşı 2001) identified the reliability alpha of the to- tal scale as (Cronbach alpha) .93. The OCB scale was later used in an- other study (Dilek, 2005). The findings of this survey were quite simi-

lar to those of İşbaşı’s 2001) survey results in respect of both factor

loadings and the reliability of the total scale ( α = .93). In the current study, the reliability of the total scale was calculated as .95.

The Validity of Scales The data were submitted to a maximum likelihood confirmatory

factor analysis to test the construct validity of the scales. In this fra- mework, the three-factor structure of SPOJ (distributive justice, dis- tributive justice and interactional justice) and five-subscale structure of the OCB scale (altruism, conscientiousness, courtesy, sportsman- ship, civic virtue) was tested. As the findings of the confirmatory fac- tor analysis given in Chart 1 indicate, the structures of both scales were confirmed.

100 TODAİE’s Review of Public Administration

Chart 1. The Results of Confirmatory Factor Analyses of the Scales Scale /

Model ∆χ²

CFI RFI IFI GFI OCB

df ∆χ²/df

Note: RMSEA = Root Mean Square Error of Approximation; CFI = Comparative Fit Index; RFI = Relative Fit Index; IFI = Incremental Fit Index; GFI = Goodness of Fit Index. *p<.001.

Findings

In the survey, firstly, the average values of variables and dimen- sions were calculated. The results given in the analysis in Chart 2 show that employees’ perceptions of organizational justice were low (distributive justice mean=2.28, ss=0.73; procedural justice mean=2.79, ss=0.80 and interactional justice mean=2.62, ss=0.92), while their organizational justice behavior was high (altruism mean=4.60, ss=0.74; courtesy mean =5.36, ss=0.58; conscientious- ness mean=4.50, ss=0.83; civic virtue mean=4.63, ss=0.82 and sportsmanship mean=4.57, ss=0.74).

Chart 2. Mean Values, Standard Deviations, Correlations and Reliability Relating to Variables

Dimension Mean.

SS

1. Distributive Justice 2,28 0,73

2. Procedural Justice 2,79 0,80

3. Interactional Justice 2,62 0,92

.30** .39** (.77) 7. Civic Virtue

Note: Reliability coefficients for the dimensions (Cronbach Alpha) are given in brack-

The Andecedent Role of Justice Perception in Organizational Citizenship Behavior 101

The analysis of interdimension correlations (Chart 2) demon- strates that there was a moderate and high correlation between the perception of organizational justice and the dimensions of organiza- tional citizenship behavior. As to the relationship between the per- ception of organizational justice and organizational citizenship be- havior, while there was no relationship between the dimensions of al- truism and courtesy and the perception of organizational justice, the dimensions of conscientiousness, civic virtue and sportmanship had a moderate relationship with all dimensions of perception of organiza- tional justice.

Hierarchical regression analysis was conducted in order to de- termine which of the dimensions of perceived organizational justice perception dimension (distributive, procedural, interactional) ex- plained the additional variance in predicting the dimensions of organ- izational citizenship behavior as well to find out the most effective dimension among them. The results of the analysis are provided in Chart 3. In the first step, the regression analysis was performed with

age and years of service as the independent variables. In the sec- ond step, the effects of the dimensions of organizational justice were investigated.

Chart 3. The Results of Hierarchical Regression Analysis

Altruism

Courtesy

Conscientiousness Civic Virtue Sportsmanship

-.02 -.03 Years of Service

.13 .12 Distributive Justice

-.04 .07 Procedural Justice

.23* .15* Interactional Justice -.02

***p<0,001 **p<0,01 *p<0,05

When demographic variables were controlled it was observed that the perception of organizational justice variables did not have a

102 TODAİE’s Review of Public Administration

dural justice had a positive effect on conscientiousness ( β = .25, p < .05; F = 2,457; Δ R ² = .10; p < .05), civic virtue ( β = .23, p < .05; F = 3,176; Δ R ² = .13; p < .01) and sportsmanship ( β = .15, p < .05; F =

3,018; Δ R ² = .12; p < .001). Two important results were derived

from regression analysis. The first was that distributive justice and interactional justice did not significantly impact on OCB. The second was that altruism and courtesy, the individual-oriented OCBs were not affected by perception of organizational justice. In conclusion, it

can be said that the increase particularly in employees’ perceptions of procedural justice multiply OCB-O.

Discussion and Conclusion

The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between the perception of organizational justice and OCB and to present the antecedent role of the perception of organizational justice in generat- ing OCB by highlighting the contradictory findings from some of the previous studies. The results of the simple correlation analysis indi- cated that all three dimensions of perception of organizational justice (distributive, procedural, interactional) had a significant and direct correlation between the OCB-O. Moreover, the findings of the hierar- chical regression analysis pointed to the dominant role of perception of procedural justice.

In this context, though the findings of this study generally support the assertion, the perception of organizational justice is an im- portant antecedent of OCB , the common finding of previous studies, which focused on the interaction between the perception of organiza- tional justice and OCB, it certainly differs from other studies in some

aspects and makes additional contributions to the literature. The theoretical structure that lies behind Equity Theory and So-

cial Exchange Theory indicates that the perception of organizational justice affects OCB. An employee, who believes that organizational practices are equally applied to everyone, positively responds to this perception of equality as suggested by Social Exchange Theory. The response in question may manifest itself either as an increase in job motivation and job performance or the individual might generate more extra-role behavior like OCB. In conclusion, the employee per- ception of organizational justice mechanisms becomes influential in the emergence or non-emergence of OCB.

Correlation analysis results indicated that each of the perceptions of distributive justice, procedural justice and interactional justice had

The Andecedent Role of Justice Perception in Organizational Citizenship Behavior 103

usness, civic virtue and sportsmanship, whereas they did not have a significant relationship between the dimensions of altruism and cour- tesy. In view of these findings, Hypothesis 1, 2 and 3 were partially accepted.

The most noteworthy finding derived from the correlated results was that the perception of organizational justice affected OCB’s or- ganization-directed dimensions. While altruism and courtesy refer to

individual-directed OCB, conscientiousness, civic virtue and sports- manship involve behaviors towards the management system of an organization. The survey findings revealed that although the percep-

tion of organizational justice affects employees’ behavior towards the functioning of the organization, it has no effect on their individual OCB. This finding is dissimilar to the findings reached by Ehrhart (2004) and Muhammad (2004).

The writers of the study think that the ineffectiveness of perceived organizational justice on individual OCB complies with Equity Theory and Social Exchange Theory. Hence, the main factors that comprise

employees’ perceptions of organizational justice are believed to be organizational practices, structures and procedures. When employees experience a problem with the perception of organizational justice, in other words, when they perceive unfairness, they show their reaction by objecting to organizational procedures or by not participating in such procedures as asserted by Social Exchange Theory. Again, com- pliant with the same theory, they do not hold other employees re- sponsible for perceived unfairness of the organization's procedures and policies. Thus, they continue to display OCB to coworkers.

However, whether this finding was specific to the sample of the study or not, should be investigated by different studies. The reason is that the participants of this study were future administrators em- ployed in various public institutions and establishments. As can be understood from the findings of the survey, the participants do not act with their feelings, but act professionally in the work life. As a re- sult, they do not reflect perceived unfairness arising from organiza- tional reasons on their coworkers. In other words, they can make the necessary distinction between these two phenomena. At this point, different studies with different samplings will be able to provide more reliable and valid results, thus opening up the subject to discus- sion.

One of the factors that should be considered while evaluating the results of the survey is the characteristic of Turkish public admin-

104 TODAİE’s Review of Public Administration

istra tion culture, Özen stated that the administrative values in Turkish bureaucracy have been shaped within certain dimensions,

which he defined as authoritarianism, self-centrism, dedication and pragmatism. Even though the Turkish public administration culture was not the focus of this study, it is a fact that it constituted the fun- damental context of the sampling used in the survey. From this view- point, focusing on the impacts of the environmental characteristics of Turkish public administration (promotion and the systems of per- formance appraisal, wage reward, favoritism, political corruption, etc.), on the relationship between organizational citizenship behavior and the perception of organizational justice in future studies will al- low better comprehension of the subject.

The results of the hierarchical regression analysis indicated the dominant predictory power of procedural justice on OCB compared to other dimensions. When demographic and environmental varia- bles such as age and years of service were considered, procedural jus- tice itself explained a significant variance in predicting the organiza- tion-directed OCB. While this finding overlaps with the findings of the studies conducted by Ehrhart (2004), Muhammad (2004), Tepper and Taylor (2003) and Zellars et al (2003), it contradicts the results

reached by Rifai

and İşbaşı

With a contextual approach to these findings, it is believed that the reason why the perception of procedural justice affects OCB more than the other two types of perceived organizational justice is the Turkish public administration gives importance to outcomes rather than procedures. Nevertheless, this assumption can only be rein- forced by future studies to be conducted on the effects of the percep- tion of procedural justice on different variables (such as job satisfac- tion, organizational achievement and performance appraisal) with different samples. Meanwhile, one of the reasons why perceptions of distributive and interactional justice were less effective on OCB than procedural justice was absolute obedience to supervisors as the re- flection of the Turkish bureaucratic culture.

The results of the survey indicated that rather than the distribu- tion of outcomes or their interaction with other employees, the par-

ticipants’ OCBs were mainly affected by their perceptions of organiza- tional justice. This finding reveals an important fact in respect of su- pervisors. Today, supervisors should give more importance to organ-

izational procedures to ensure the emergence of OCB of a higher lev- el, which is an important factor for the improvement in organization-

The Andecedent Role of Justice Perception in Organizational Citizenship Behavior 105

face-to-face conversation or communication. The reason is that the survey revealed that participants attached more importance to the fairness of procedures used in making decisions than the decisions themselves and their OCBs are shaped as to their perceptions of these procedures.

Along with these findings, this study had some limitations. It was already mentioned that the survey sample led to a restriction to some extent. Another limitation was that the survey was conducted by cross-sectiona l data. The participants’ OCB is not based on observa- tions, but their own expressions. Therefore, the probable role of so- cial desirability in the findings should be kept in mind. Apart from the limitation in question, the fact that providing dependent and predic- tor variables from only one source might lead to common method variance can be regarded as another limitation to the study. There- fore, if OCB behavior is based on observations, or if data is obtained from multiple sources in future studies, the findings of those studies will be more helpful in explaining and comprehending the subject.

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