Developing Normative Commitment as a Consequence of Receiving Help - The Moderated Mediating Roles of Team-Member Exchange and Individualism/Collectivism: A Multi-level Model

With increased market competition, organizations have devoted much effort to retaining talented employees. As a consequence, a considerable amount of research attention has been paid to investigating an employee's willingness to remain within a particular working environment through the lens of the three-dimensional organizational commitment framework (i.e. affective, continuance, and normative commitment). Unfortunately, little is known about factors contributing to the formation of employee normative commitment. Thus, we seek to develop a theoretical model describing how employees' normative commitment may be affected by receipt of helping behavior, the norm of reciprocity, team-member exchange, and individualism/collectivism. In particular, we propose that the degree of helping behavior received by an employee increases the employee's normative commitment through the norm of reciprocity. Additionally, we posit that team-member exchange and individual/collectivism moderate the relationship between the degree of helping behavior that an employee receives and normative commitment formed by the employee. By exploring these relationships, our theoretical model provides important insights into effective management of normative commitment.