The Effect of Environmental Uncertainty on the Association of Expectancy Attitudes, Effort, and Performance

This study examined the impact of perceived environmental uncertainty on the relationship between expectancy attitudes, effort, and performance within certified public accounting firms. Professional auditors provided data on the degree of uncertainty existing in their job assignments and measurement...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Journal of social psychology 1985-10, Vol.125 (5), p.631-636
Main Authors: Anderson, Thomas N., Kida, Thomas E.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Behavior. Attitude
Biological and medical sciences
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Indexing in process
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Social psychology
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Summary:This study examined the impact of perceived environmental uncertainty on the relationship between expectancy attitudes, effort, and performance within certified public accounting firms. Professional auditors provided data on the degree of uncertainty existing in their job assignments and measurements of the expectancy model. The results indicated that as perceived uncertainty increased, the ability of the expectancy model to predict performance decreased significantly, implying that increased performance could result from positive effort and outcome associations if environmental uncertainty was reduced. These results also provided a possible explanation for the somewhat low and inconsistent results found when comparing prior expectancy studies and suggested that uncertainty is a boundary condition to be considered in future applications of the expectancy model.
ISSN:0022-4545
1940-1183
DOI:10.1080/00224545.1985.9712037