Loyalty, Love, and Investments: The Impact of Job Outcomes on the Organizational Commitment of Correctional Staff

In a time of restricted budgets, true recognition of staff as a resource calls for correctional institutions to be more prudent in developing an environment that promotes staff commitment. Although prior research has examined affective commitment, far fewer studies have modeled the relationship between critical workplace factors and continuance and normative commitment. This study uses three key organizational concepts (job stress, job involvement, and job satisfaction) to explore their differing impacts on the three types of organizational commitment (continuance, normative, and affective). The study found that key workplace and demographic variables had varying effects on each type of commitment. This supports and extends findings from prior correctional studies suggesting that organizational commitment is not only a multidimensional construct but also that the mechanisms responsible for the development of each type of commitment differ. With this in mind, correctional administrators should recognize the need for various strategies to increase different forms of commitment among correctional staff.