This dissertation examined the relationship between the antecedents and consequences of employee engagement in a defense acquisition organization. The objective of this study as to determine whether or not the eight satisfaction facets of the Index of Organizational Reactions (IOR) (1976) could be used as antecedents, engagement and consequences constructs in place of the antecedents, engagement and consequences constructs of the Saks (2006) model of employee engagement. This study used the following three research questions: 1) Are the antecedents of the IOR (kind of work, amount of work, physical work conditions, supervision and financial rewards) related to employee engagement constructs (company identification and co-workers)? 2) Are the antecedents of the IOR model (kind of work, amount of work, physical work conditions, supervision and financial rewards) related to consequences (career future)? 3) Are the employee engagement constructs (company identification and co-workers) related to consequences (career future)? This study utilized the Index of Organizational Reactions (1976) to sample a defense acquisition organization (N = 177) to assess the proposed empirical model. The quantitative data from the study was used to perform Pearson correlation on 17 hypotheses. All hypotheses were supported and indicated positive relationships were present among the variables representing the antecedents, engagement and consequences constructs of the empirical model. In addition, confirmatory factor analysis was utilized as was done in previous studies performed by Dunham, Smith and Blackburn (1977) and Lee (1984). After the initial component matrix was obtained, a varimax rotation with Kaiser normalization was applied and indicated that the same factors that were found in the Dunham et al. and Lee studies were found in this research, providing additional confirmation for the original validation of the IOR. Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was also used in this research and the results indicated that gender was a significant effect on the results of this study. This study also utilized qualitative responses to the survey items to provide additional data to determine whether or not there were common themes amongst the comments and whether or not the comments were in agreement with the quantitative responses. Results indicated that further study is needed in the areas of supervision, kind of work, co-workers, physical work conditions and career future.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Although interviews are a widely used and popular selection technique, when they lack clear structure and a predetermined set of questions, bias can permeate the interview selection process. In particular, illegal interview questions (i.e., questions that cannot legally be asked, such as marital status or children) may be particularly threatening for female applicants. Justice and social identity theory were used to explain the applicant reactions to illegal interview questions in this study. Participants were randomly assigned to one of four hypothetical interview conditions – a control of four low face-valid interview questions, four non-gender relevant illegal interview questions, or four gender-relevant illegal interview questions. There was a significant gender by condition interaction on all outcome measures. Illegal interview questions had a significant negative effect on women’s organizational reactions (job pursuit intentions, organizational attractiveness, belonging, trust & comfort) but not on men’s organizational reactions. In contrast both women and men had significantly lower procedural justice perceptions of the gender-relevant illegal interview condition compared to the two other conditions. However, women perceived the illegal interview questions (both the gender relevant and gender non-relevant questions) as lower in face validity (i.e., were less relevant to the job), whereas men perceived all the interview questions as equally face-valid. Thus, although men believed the illegal interview questions were low in procedural justice and unfair, men still perceived these questions as valid and job-relevant. Overall, an indirect effect of procedural justice perceptions on organizational reactions was significant for both men and women, indicating that lower procedural justice did have a significant negative effect on applicants’ organizational reactions. Taken together, the following study demonstrates that illegal interview questions (both those related to gender and unrelated to gender) act as a social identity threat for women and harm women’s attraction to the organization, whereas men are primarily unaffected by these illegal interview questions in their reactions.