Conceptualizing and Measuring Organizational and Psychological Climate: Pitfalls in Multilevel Research

Organizational and psychological climate research has been afflicted by cross-level inference problems. Many of the natural pitfalls of multilevel research are still apparent in the inconsistencies among the units of theory, observation, and analysis. These are discussed in an attempt to develop an...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Academy of Management review 1985-07, Vol.10 (3), p.601
Main Author: Glick, William H
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Climates
Culture
Implications
Organization theory
Organizational
Psychological aspects
Reliability
Studies
Citations: Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Organizational and psychological climate research has been afflicted by cross-level inference problems. Many of the natural pitfalls of multilevel research are still apparent in the inconsistencies among the units of theory, observation, and analysis. These are discussed in an attempt to develop an internally consistent conceptualization of organizational climate as a class of organizational rather than psychological characteristics. Treating the organization as the unit of theory for organizational climate while preserving the individual as the unit of theory for psychological climate is advocated. Multilevel conceptual problems in climate research are investigated, and strategies for improving the validity and evaluating the reliability of measurement are discussed. Further multilevel research on climate and other areas of organizational science, particularly organizational culture, is recommended.
ISSN:0363-7425
1930-3807
DOI:10.2307/258140