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Relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Psychological Contract

Breach

Ahmed Wajahat
Email:[email protected]
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In the current stressful job environment the Emotional Intelligence (EI) plays an important role
almost in every kind of job across the organizations. It helps people to do their job and tasks with
an ease. EI gives self confident to different situations in different circumstances. Freshman &
Rubino (2002:1) wrote about the importance of the ³EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE (EI) is
currently a hot topic in management consulting and leadership training circles. As an example,
when the Harvard Business Review printed an article on EI in 1998, it gained a greater
percentage of readers than any previously published article in that journal for the last 40 years.´
On the other hand the term psychological contract (PC) depicts the employer- employment
relationship.
Psychological contract (PC) characterizes the employee-employer relationship and emphasizes
organizations attainment of favorable outcomes by understanding employee¶s expectations.
Simply put, psychological contract refers to what an employee owes to the organization and what
can be expected from organization in return. PC is a mental agreement in which both parties do
promises which ultimate purpose is to achieve organizational goals. But when these promises or
obligations are not fulfilling by any one party, breach occur. A breach of contract happens when
either employee or employer breaks one of the terms. Breach is cognitive assessment of contract
fulfillment that is based on an employee¶s perception of what each party has promised. So this
research purpose is by using EI we mitigate the perception of PC breach and employee makes
better relationship with the employer.

   c 
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³Investigate the significance of emotional intelligence that minimizes the effect of psychological
contract breach.´c

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To show that employee on high EI are productive, loyal to the employer and making strong
employment relationship with the employer or organization
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c There is no Relationship between high emotional intelligence and less psychological
contract breach.

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The scope of research is encompasses to the doctors of RMI and North West Hospital Peshawar
Pakistan. And the application of this research to improve the emotional intelligence skill in
professional life and giving them a idea that how can they tackle the stressful situations.
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The limitation is scarcity of financial resources and also time for conducting this research.c


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In response to changes in the nature of employment and work, a large body of literature focusing
on exchange relationships between employees and their organization has emerged in the past two
decades. Among the various employment relationship constructs that have emerged, research on
psychological contract has blossomed.

Psychological contracts are defined ³as a person¶s perceptions and expectations about the mutual
obligations in an employment exchange relationship´ (Rousseau, 1989). Concepts that have
attracted attention in research on psychological contracts include perceived breach and felt
violation. Jill kickull stated that ³unlike formal employee-employer contracts, the PC inherently
perceptual and therefore one¶s party interpretation of terms and conditions of obligations may
not be shared. (cf: McLean Parks and schmedemann, 1994; Rousseau 1995, 1998). And also
Rousseau (1997:521) explained it as ³Psychological contracts are beliefs individuals hold about
the exchange relationship between themselves and an employer, in essence, what people
understand the employment relationship to mean [e.g. a High-involvement relationship or
limited transactional employment (Rousseau 1995)].´

By definition psychological contract is a perceptual and idiosyncratic (Aggarwal & Bhargava,

2008). Idiosyncratic nature means that every individual relationship will be vary as they perceive
form the Organization obligations. So that why the organization gives the same thing to every
employee although, the perception could vary from employee to employee.( Aggarwal &
Bhargava, 2008).

In early researches the psychological contract assumed as unconscious thing in employment

relationship. The recent work has been done on the individual beliefs and employer in the form
of a agreement. After Argyris (1960) and Levinson (1962) the Rousseau (1990) took properly
initiative to work on psychological contract. This gained a scientific nature over a period of time.
Researcher found that psychological contract breach is quite different terminology from unmet
expectations. According to Robinson, Kraatz and Rousseau (1994) found that ³violated contract
terms evoked much more intensely negative responses than did unmet expectations, a finding
predicted by psychological contract theory´ (Rousseau, 1989; Rousseau and McLean Parks,
1993; Rousseau, 1995).
Research reveals that ³employees vary regarding whether they believe their psychological
contract is with their immediate supervisor, top management, or with a personication of the
itself´ (Rousseau, 1995; Rousseau, 1998).
According to Morrison and Robinson, ³Perceived breach refers to the cognition that one¶s
organization has failed to meet one or more obligations within one¶s psychological contract in a
manner commensurate with one¶s contributions . . . perceived breach represents a cognitive
assessment of contract fulfillment that is based on an employee¶s perception of what each party
has promised and provided to the other´ (1997: 230).
Morrison and Robinson (1997) defined `psychological contract breach' as ³the employee's
cognition that the organization has failed to meet one or more of its obligations and
psychological contract violation as the emotional or affective state that frequently follows such a
perception´ in Turnley and Feldman paper (2000:26).
The term emotional intelligence introduced in 1960s (Van Ghent, 1961) and psychiatry (Leuner,
1966). Mayor and solvey wrote two articles on EI to define what is EI, made a theory and
measurement tool for it.
To understand the concept of EI, once has to understand the other two concepts which are
considered the basis of EI. i.e., emotion and intelligence.
Roberts, Zeidner & Matthews (2001:P197) says that ³General intelligence refers to a person¶s
overall capacity for adaptation through effective cognition and information processing. It may be
seen as a general competence of the mind (mental ability) or of higher Order faculties such as
understanding, reasoning, problem solving, and learning, especially of complex, structured
material (cognitive ability; Brody, 1992).´
Tram, Hara and T.Sy investigated the significance of employees EI and manager EI with job
satisfaction and performance. They found that there is significant relationship of EI with the both
job satisfaction and performance. Tram et. al concluded that there is positive relationship
between them. They also checked and found that the interaction between managers¶ EI and
employees¶ EI on job satisfaction and job performance.
One of the interesting fact about EI cited by Jordan, Ashkanasy and Hartel (2002) is that EI
possess number of abilities, which includes one¶s own and other¶s emotions and able to
understand the relationship between the emotions and its likely transitions as well as able to
manage these emotions (Mayer & Salovey, 1997).
Jordan, Ashkanasy and Hartel (2002) state the argument of Mayer and Solvey, 1997 which
specified that EI is different term and construct from other forms of intelligences and personality.
Mayer and Solvey (1997) specified that EI is directly with the people specification and dealing
with emotional content and emotions. In particular research authors stated that ³The most recent
model of emotional intelligence (Mayer & Salovey, 1997) includes four components: perception,
assimilation, understanding, and management. In the multidimensional model, perception
provides a platform for assimilation, which, in turn, provides a foundation for understanding, and
understanding then contributes to emotional management. Although each of the factors can be
considered independently, in combination they contribute to emotional intelligence´. Jordan et.al
proposed that EI play as a moderate variable and makes a link between job insecurity and work
behavior. Study shows that negative behavior which affect the commitment can be cope by using
EI to decrease the job related tension and ultimately the job insecurity.

Carmeli (2003) found that EI has relationship with positive work attitude, altruistic behavior and
work outcomes. And moderates the effect of work-family conflict on career commitment but not
on the effect of job satisfaction. He discussed in managerial context and said that managerial
skills should require in general. This study enhances the literature of EI for developing positive
work related attitude and the contextual and task performance. And examined the level to which
severe component of managerial skill, EI and augments positive work related behavior of senior
manager employed. Another finding of this research was that highly EI senior managers tend to
be more satisfied with their work. Another aspect which author discussed in paper is work family
conflict and EI. Results shows that people on high EI can adjust their family matters very
effectively.

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Taking the sample of 250 doctors¶ from RMI and North West Hospital .Applying the regression
and correlation to check the relationship and impact of EI on PC breach. Sampling technique will
non probability because the respondents are not as much active.

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Questionnaire (EI Goleman, 1995; Psyochological contract breach of Sandra L. Robinson;
Elizabeth Wolfe Morrison, 2000)

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`c Academy of management review
`c Journal of vocational Behavior
`c Journal of European industrial
`c Journal of Organizational Behavior
`c Journal of Managerial Psychology
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Abraham Carmeli, 2003. µThe relationship between emotional intelligence and work attitudes,
behavior and outcomes. An examination among senior managers)
Journal of Managerial
Psychology Vol. 18 No. 8, 2003 and Rights Journal, 2: 121±139.

Emotional Intelligence: Theory, Findings, and Implications

Fatima Ali Junaid SMA_2008_Proceedings-Page0140

„

  
  
 
   
  !

Morrison, E.W & Robinson, S. L. 1997. When employees feel betrayed: A model of how
psychological. Presented at Society for Industrial Organizational Psychology, April, San Diego.

Peter J. Jordan Neal M. Ashkanasy & Charmine E. J. Hartel, (2002) µEmotional Intelligence As
A Moderator Of Emotional And Behavioral Reactions To Job Insecurity¶ - Academy of
Management Review 2002, Vol. 27, No. 3, 361-372.

Psychological Contracts: A Review of Literature Psychological Inquiry 2004, Vol. 15, No. 3,
197-215

Richard D. Roberts, Moshe Zeidner, Gerald Matthews, 2001. µDoes Emotional Intelligence Meet
Traditional Standards for an Intelligence? Some New Data and Conclusions¶. Vol. 1, No. 3, 196±
231

Rousseau, D. M. (1995). Psychological Contracts in Organizations, Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA.

Rousseau, D. M. (1997). µOrganizational Behavior In the New organizational Era¶. i
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Rousseau, D. M. 1989. Psychological and implied contracts in organizations. Employee
Responsibilities and Rights Journal, 2: 121±139.

Rousseau, D. M. and Tijoriwala, S. (1996). It Takes a Good Reason to Change a Psychological

Contract.
Thomas Sy , Susanna Tram, Linda A. O¶Hara,19 May 2005 µRelation of employee and manager
emotional intelligence to job satisfaction and performance¶. Journal of Vocational Behavior 68
(2006) 461±473
Upasana Aggarwal and Shivganesh Bhargava, (August 2008) µReviewing the relationship
between human resource practices and psychological contract and their impact on employee
attitude and behaviours A conceptual model¶. Journal of European Industrial

William h. Turnley1 and Daniel c. Feldman (2000). ³Re-examining the effects of psychological
contract violations: unmet expectations and job dissatisfaction as mediators´ Journal of
Organizational Behavior J. Organiz. Behav. 21, 25±42 (2000)

Cross reference:

Emotional Intelligence: Theory, Findings, and Implications
Fatima Ali Junaid SMA_2008_Proceedings-Page0140

McLean Parks, J., and D. Schmedemann: 1994, µWhen Promises become Contracts: implied
contracts and handbook provisions on job security¶, Human Resource Management 33, 403-424

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