INPUT-BASED AND TIME-BASED MODELS OF INTERNATIONAL ADJUSTMENT: META-ANALYTIC EVIDENCE AND THEORETICAL EXTENSIONS PURNIMA BHASKAR-SHRINIVAS DAVID A. HARRISON Pennsylvania State University MARGARET A. SHAFFER Hong Kong Baptist University DORA M. LUK City University of Hong Kong Integrating work on international assignments and domestic stress, we conducted meta-analyses of over 50 determinants and consequences of expatriate adjustment using data from 8,474 expatriates in 66 studies. We also examined the trajectory of adjustment over time, and time as a moderator of adjustment effects. Results empha- size the centrality, criticality, and complexity of adjustment, strongly supporting Black, Mendenhall, and Oddou’s (1991) model. Structural modeling of proposed model extensions showed that adjustment uniquely affects job satisfaction, withdrawal cog- nitions, and performance. Research on international assignments highlights psychological or sociocultural adjustment as the vital construct underlying the rewards and costs of expatriate experiences to individuals, their fami- lies, and their firms. Attempts to understand this phenomenon typically have been based on a stres- sor-stress-strain formulation (Harrison, Shaffer, & Bhaskar-Shrinivas, 2004; Spector, Chen, & O’Connell, 2000). Drawing upon the domestic stress literature (see Jex & Beehr, 1991), scholars have cast stressors as uncertainties and demands in a foreign environment that are mismatched with an expatriate’s personal resources (Black & Gregersen, 1991). When employees fail to cope with these stressors in an adaptive manner, stress emerges (Beehr & Newman, 1978). In expatriate research, the experience of stress follows a response pattern that is expressed in adjustment or maladjustment to various aspects of international assignments (Jex & Beehr, 1991). Strains are reactions to the experi- ence of stress (Kahn & Byosiere, 1990) that, for expatriates, include affective, cognitive, and behav- ioral outcomes such as job dissatisfaction, psycho- logical withdrawal cognitions, early return, and poor performance. According to recent reviews (e.g., Hechanova, Beehr, & Christiansen, 2003; Mendenhall, Kuhl- mann, Stahl, & Osland, 2002), the adjustment model proposed by Black, Mendenhall, and Oddou (1991) has instigated and galvanized a large body of evidence. It is the most influential and often-cited theoretical treatment of expatriate experiences, and it can be considered a context-specific reflection of the stressor-stress-strain sequence. One contribu- tion of this model is its multifaceted conceptualiza- tion of adjustment. Defined as the degree of comfort or absence of stress associated with being an expa- triate, adjustment comprises three main dimen- sions: general or cultural (comfort associated with various nonwork factors such as general living con- ditions, local food, transportation, entertainment, facilities, and health care services in the host coun- try; hereafter we use the term “cultural”); interac- tion (comfort associated with interacting with host country nationals both inside and outside of work); and work (comfort associated with the assignment job or tasks). This tripartite definition has been clearly “operationalized” (Black & Stephens, 1989) and consistently validated (e.g., Shaffer, Harrison, & Gilley, 1999). Another contribution of Black and colleagues’ (1991) model is its consideration of a wide scope of We are grateful to Don Hambrick, Chuck Snow, Denny Gioia, Karen Jansen, Ann Echols, and Jim Detert for their helpful feedback and recommendations concerning drafts of this article. Partial support for this work was generously provided by a grant from the eBusiness Re- search Center: http://www.smeal.psu.edu/ebrc/index. html.  Academy of Management Journal 2005, Vol. 48, No. 2, 257–281. 257