TABLE OF CONTENT
Title page 1
Certification 2
Dedication 3
Acknowledgement 4
Table of content 5
List of table 6
Abstract 9
CHAPTER ONE:
1.1 Background to the study 11
1.2 Statement of problem 15
1.3 Purpose of study 16
1.4 Relevance of study 17
CHAPTER TWO: THEORETICAL FRAME WORK AND LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Theoretical Framework 18
Theories of motivation
Theories of Attitude
6
2.2 Related studies /Literature Review 47
2.3 Statement of Hypothesis 52
2.4 Operational Definition of terms 53
CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.1 Research Design 55
3.2 Setting 55
3.3 Sampling Technique 56
3.4 Population and Sample 58
3.5 Research instruments 59
3.6 Procedure 59
3.7 Statistical Tools \Technique\Method 59
CHAPTER FOUR: RESULTS 60
CHAPTER FIVE: DISCUSSION, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
5.1 Discussion 65
5.2 Conclusion 71
5.3 Recommendation 72
5.4 Limitation of Study 73
5.5 Contribution to knowledge 74
7
REFRENCES 75
APPENDIX
8
LIST OF TABLE
4.1 T-test for independent sample Showing Gender and organization commitment. 60
4.2 T-test for independent sample showing Gender and Attitude to work. 61
4.3 One –way Anovashowing work environment and Organizational Commitment 62
4.4 One –way Anova showing work environment and Attitude to work 62
4.5 T-test for independent sample Showing length of service and organization commitment 63
4.6 T-test for independent sample showing length of service and Attitude to work. 63
4.7 T -test for independent sample Showing age and organization commitment 64
4.8 T-test for independent sample showing age and Attitude to work 64
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ABSTRACT
Issue of occupational commitment and attitude to work among workers is a thing of
concern to all management of organization including the academic workers of Federal University
Oye- Ekiti and Ekiti State University in Ekiti State.The present study investigated the influence
of perceived demographical factors influencing attitudes to work and organizational commitment
among academic workers of Federal University Oye-Ekiti and Ekiti State University
Ado,Ekiti.The study adopted ex-post factor research design. A total number of 100 workers were
accidentally sampled in the study.These participantswere administered with Occupational
commitment scale and attitude to work scale together with demographic information. Six
hypotheses were testedin the study using independent samples t-test, two were confirmed and the
other two were tested with One-Way ANOVA and one was confirmed.The result of the tested
hypotheses showed that gender has significant influence on organizational
commitment(t=3.29.’df = 98; p<.05). Gender has no significant influence on attitude to work
(t=1.84;df=98;p>.05).work environment has significant influence on organizational
commitment(F(2,97)=3.21; p<.05). Work environment has no significant influence on attitude to
work (F(2,97)=0.55; p >.05). Age has no significant influence on organizational commitment (t=
0.90;df =78;p>.05). Age has no significant influence on attitude to work (t=-1.78; df=78;p>.05).
Length of service has significant influence on organizational commitment (t=-0.50;df=88;p>.05).
Length of service has no significant influence on attitude to work (t = 0.11;df=88;p>05).Based
on findings,it is concluded that demographic factors are important in understanding
organizational commitment and attitude to work of academic workers. Moreover, gender differs
in level of organizational commitment of workers. The findings show that gender, length of
10
service and work environment have significant influence on organizational commitment so
organizations should always pay great attentions to these factors for increment of productivity
Keywords: Organizational commitment, attitude to work, work environment, Federal University
Oye-Ekiti, Ekiti State University Ado-Ekiti State.
Word Count: 267.
11
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1. BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY
According to information provided by The United States Department of Labor,in 2009
employed persons worked an average of 7.5 hours on the days they worked, which were mostly
weekdays,84 percent of employed persons did some or all of their work at their
workplace.”Therefore, this indicates that the majority of the population is spending their waking
hours at work, outside their homes. Therefore employers must do their best to create a low stress
and inspiring work environment to yield greater productivity. Michelle T. Iaffaldano and Paul M.
Muchinsky were one of the first people to reignite interest in the connection between job
satisfaction and job performance. The meta-analytic research of these individuals impacted the
way in which later research on the topic was conducted, especially regarding sample sizes.
Positive psychology in the workplace is about shifting attention away from negative
aspects such as work violence, stress, burnout, and job insecurity. Positive psychology can help
create a working environment goal of promoting positive affect in its employees. Fun should not
be looked at as something that cannot be achieved during work but rather as a motivation factor
for the staff. Along these same lines, it is important to examine the role of: helping behaviors,
team building exercises, job resources, job security and work support. The new emerging field of
Positive Psychology also helps to creatively manage organizational behaviors and to increase
productivity in the workplace through applying positive organizational forces.In the broad sense
traditional psychology has not specifically focused on the implementation of positive psychology
methods in the workplace. The recent research on job satisfaction and employee retention has
12
created a greater need to focus on implementing positive psychology in the workplace.Research
demonstrates that interrelationships and complexities underlie what would seem to be the simply
defined term job attitudes. The long history of research into job attitudes suggests there is no
commonly agreed upon definition. There are both cognitive and affective aspects, which need
not be considered.For the past many decades, Nigerian Governments has recorded and
experienced poor attitude from both public and private corporations. This sad experience took a
mounting turn to nowadays. Government has done a lot in their effort to revive this culture but
all was to no avail.There is a wide spread interest in improving the level of poor attitude to work
in corporations. Apart from the economic benefits of better preparing workers for unprecedented
demands of modern workplace, there are also social benefits tied to improving performance
International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences/journals and access
for larger number of workers to post-organizational learning, Training and Development
opportunities and laying stronger foundation to skills for life-long learning.
Guerreror and Sire, (2000) if the worker have negative attitude towards work, the
consequence can create problem in applying the prescribed job design, which means there will
be failure in accomplishing organizational goals. The good things in raising the level of attitude
has led to a focus on identifying the range of causes that shape poor attitude as well as
understanding how these causes operate to limit or enhance the performance of workers.
Attitudes are developed as a result of some kind of learning experiences, or Attitude can also be
formed simply by adapting the example and opinion of co-employees, friends and managers.
This is mimicry or imitation, which also has a vital to play in developing negative attitude at
workplace.Poor attitude according to Aremu (2003) is a performance that is adjudge by the
owners/customers and some other significant as fallen below an expected standard. Poor attitude
13
of workers has been observed among employees in both public and private own entities. The
poor attitude among workers has been and is still a source of concern to the owners, customers
and members of the community as a whole. This is because of the great importance that workers
have on the organizational development of any formal entity. All over the world there is
unanimity of opinion about the fallen standard of workers attitude (Adebule, 2004). Shareholders
are in total agreement that their huge investment on organization is not yielding the desired
dividend. Customers also complain of workers poor attitude at both within and outside the
organizations.Aremu (2010) stressed that poor attitude is not only frustrating to the owners and
the customers, its effects are equally grave on the society in terms of dearth of manpower in all
spheres of the economy and politics.
Attitude as a concept is all about individual way of thinking, acting and behaving. It has a
very serious effect on work/employee performance.Positive attitude at work place is supposed to
be the bedrock and foundation toward higher performance in established settings. It is an
investment as well as resources that can be used to achieve a higher profit, good reputation and
overall organizational goals.The role of worker attitude is to lay the foundation for further
performance and if a good foundation is laid at worker level there are likely to be improvement
at other level. However different organizations at different times have passed the blame of poor
attitude in organization to the workers, because of their low achievement, low motivation and the
likes. DeSimione and Harris (1998) concurred that the possible influences on worker’s behavior
are internal factors such as motivation, ability, attitude, knowledge and skills.Morakinyo (2003)
stated that the fallen level of worker performance is attributable to owner’s nonuse of
supervisory strategies. Others found out that the attitude of some owners to their organization is
reflected in their poor attendance to office, lateness, unsavory comments about worker’s
14
performance that could damage their ego, poor method of on-job training and the likes affect
worker’s performance. Organizations are faced with poor level of attitudes such as Erratic
provision of services has become an increasing persistent problem facing the corporation and
seriously affecting the general public, Careless and casual handling of the existing tools and
machines and General nonchalant attitude of staff in the discharge of their correspondence with
each other. Job attitude should also not be confused with the broader term attitude, because
attitude is defined as a psychological tendency that is expressed by evaluating a particular entity
with some degree of favor or disfavor, whereas job attitude is a particular instance as an entity.
In the definition above, the term “job” involves one’s current position, one’s work or one’s
occupation, and one’s employer as its entity. However, one’s attitude towards his/her work does
not necessarily have to be equal with one’s attitudes towards his/her employer, and these two
factors often diverge duties.Organizational commitment is an important area of study to many
researchers and organizations because the outcomes of this behavior or value may help to
determine many work related interaction of the employees. It is mainly related to the employee’s
desire to continueworking with the particular organization. As such, researchers and practitioners
are ever so keen and interested to understand the factors that may influence an individual’s
decision to stay or leave the organization. Here, affective commitment most often tends to be the
most highly related to the desire to leave an organization.Studies have shown that Organizational
Commitment have received considerable attention due to the importance that managers place on
retaining personnel (Johnston, Parasuraman, Futrell, and Black, 1990; Mathieu, Bruvold and
Ritchey, 2000; Boles, Madupalli, Rutherford and Wood, 2007).However, the importance of
retaining employees or personnel is not only confined to any single industry, as many employers
place great importance to employee retention and to reduce employee turnover as this may
15
involve high costs in terms of induction, training and productivity (Firth, Mellor, Moore and
Loquet(2004).In today’s world, we see an increase in the use of knowledge in organizations in
various industries. This is the era of k-economy where knowledge is deemed an important factor
that may contribute to the success of an individual as well as the organization. As such, these
individuals whose work primarily consists of having the updated knowledge within their area of
specialty and apply it to bring benefits for the organization (Amar, 2002), are called knowledge
workers. The behavior and attitudes of a knowledge worker is very different from an average
white collar worker and as such, the behavioral outcomes will also be different.Organizational
commitment has been referred to as a “person’s belief in and acceptance of the value in his or her
chosen occupation in the line with work and willingness to maintain membership in that
organization.Cortarelli;and Bishop (1989) defined organizational commitment as the attachment
to identification with and involvement in personally develop those organizational goals.It is
widely accepted that for organizational effectiveness, there is a need for strengthening
employee’s commitment to their jobs.
1.2. STATMENT OF PROBLEM
According to C.O. Ajila (2012) a study was carried out on the various aspects of demographical
factors leading to generalization of one sort or the other on the possible effect it could pose on
several dimensions.Previous studies on demographic factors as it relates to Attitude to work and
organizational commitment had yielded conflicting result.Therefore, scholars hold conflicting
views with regard to the influence of demographical factors on Attitude to work and
organizational commitment of workers. While some believe it leads to poor attitude and low
organizational commitment,others advocate that it has nothing to do with poor attitude and low
16
organizational commitment. This study, therefore, intends to look into these two
positions.Thus,the present study pays particular attention to the following questions:
iDoes the demographic factor Age influence attitude to work and organizational commitment
among academic workers in Federal university Oye-Ekiti and Ekiti state University Ado?
ii. Does Gender influence attitude to work and organizational commitment among academic
workers in Federal university Oye-Ekiti and Ekiti state university Ado?
iii. Will the length of service influence attitude to work and organizational commitment among
academic workers in Federal university Oye-ekiti and Ekiti state university Ado?
iv. Will the perceived demographic factor work environment influence levels of organizational
commitment and attitude to work among academic workers in Federal university Oye-Ekiti and
Ekiti state university Ado?
1.3. PURPOSE OF STUDY.
The specific objectives of this study are to:
i. Examine the influence ofage on academic workers’ attitude to work and organizational
commitment
ii.Examine the influence of Gender on academic workers’ attitude and organizational
commitment.
iii.Examine the influence of length of service on academic workers’ attitude and organizational
commitment.
17
iv. To examine the influence of work environment on academic workers’ attitude and
organizational commitment.
1.4 RELEVANCE OF STUDY
In its broadest sense, the study is aimed at improving on the existing data and
contribution to the growing body of knowledge, on issues relating to the interaction between
psychological wellbeing, attitude and commitment. Finding from this study are expected to
provide insight into the extent to which various demographical factor can influence academic
workers attitude and organizational commitment.The outcome could also serve as empirical basis
that provide important insight for government, policy makers ,business leaders and even workers
themselves to become familiar with how different demographical factor influence workers who
are males and females and those who are married to who are single as it relates to their level of
commitment and attitude they portray on job.
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