Impression management (IM) involves the behaviors people exhibit in order to create and maintain desired impressions. A considerable amount of theoretical and empirical attention has been devoted to the study of IM within the field of social psychology (Goffman, 1959; Jones, 1964; Jones & Wortman, 1973; Schlenker, 1980; Snyder, 1979; Tedeschi, 1981). With few exceptions (Allen, Madison, Porter, Renwick, & Mayes, 1979; Caldwell & O'Reilly, 1982; Kipnis, Schmidt, & Wilkinson, 1980; Wood & Mitchell, 1981), however, management researchers have devoted little attention to the IM behaviors of managers. The purpose of this dissertation is fourfold: (1) to provide a comprehensive review of IM research and relevant management literature which illustrates the importance of IM to the study of organizational behavior; (2) to present a social learning theory model of the IM process; (3) to generate research questions for investigating IM in organizational settings; and (4) to present the results of a preliminary investigation of the research questions. / A unique mixture of data collection techniques as well as quantitative and qualitative analyses were employed to investigate the research questions generated. The primary data collection process involved the coding of observational protocols collected for 34 school principals who participated in the Principal Competency Study (Martinko & Gardner, 1984a) in terms of verbal self-presentational (VSP) behaviors. In addition, the Self-Monitoring Scale (Snyder, 1974), the Social Desirability Scale (Crowne & Marlowe, 1964), and an Influence Questionnaire were administered to 36 principals. The quantitative analyses involved the application of descriptive and inferential statistical methods such as cross-tabulations, t-tests, one-way ANOVAS, and profile analysis. The qualitative analysis involved the development of case examples of IM behaviors from the rich narrative descriptions provided by the observational protocols. / The results indicate that the pincipals' IM behaviors are related to the audience characteristics of status/power and novelty/familiarity. Few differences in IM behaviors related to performance level or environmental variables were identified. Specific propositions about the IM behaviors of principals are advanced and directions for future research are proposed. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 45-05, Section: A, page: 1506. / Thesis (D.B.A.)--The Florida State University, 1984.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_75330 |
| Contributors | GARDNER, WILLIAM LANSING., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 360 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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