The Mediating Role of Psychological Need Thwarting in the Relationship Between Compulsory Citizenship Behavior and Psychological Withdrawal

Mohsin Bashir; Kanwal Shaheen; Sharjeel Saleem; Mohammed Khurrum Bhutta; Muhammad Abrar; Zhao Jun

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02595

The Mediating Role of Psychological Need Thwarting in the Relationship Between Compulsory Citizenship Behavior and Psychological Withdrawal

Front Psychol. 2019 Nov 26:10:2595. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02595. eCollection 2019.

Authors

Mohsin Bashir¹, Kanwal Shaheen², Sharjeel Saleem¹, Mohammed Khurrum Bhutta³, Muhammad Abrar¹, Zhao Jun⁴

Affiliations

¹ Lyallpur Business School, Government College University Faisalabad, Faisalabad, Pakistan.
² Department of Business Administration, Government College Women University Faisalabad, Faisalabad, Pakistan.
³ College of Business, Ohio University, Athens, OH, United States.
⁴ School of Public Administration, Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, Wuhan, China.

Abstract

This study examined a novel process underlying the relationship between compulsory citizenship behavior and psychological withdrawal. Specifically, based on basic psychological needs theory, thwarting of autonomy and relatedness needs were expected to explain the association between compulsory citizenship behavior and psychological withdrawal. The PROCESS macro was used to analyze the data collected from 368 clerical staff working in public universities in Pakistan. The results confirmed that thwarting of autonomy and relatedness need mediated the relationship between compulsory citizenship behavior and psychological withdrawal. This study makes a significant contribution to the unexplored domain of the process employees use to cope with compulsory citizenship behavior. It also highlights the role of an understudied construct, i.e., psychological need thwarting as a crucial motivational mechanism for elucidating the relationship between compulsory citizenship behavior and psychological withdrawal. The findings of this study provide recommendations for future researchers, along with its implications for practitioners.

Keywords: autonomy need thwarting; basic psychological needs theory; compulsory citizenship behavior; psychological withdrawal; relatedness need thwarting.