Downloaded By: [University of South Florida] At: 20:38 29 November 2007 Emotional strain and organizational citizenship behaviours: A meta-analysis and review CHU-HSIANG CHANG 1 , RUSSELL E. JOHNSON 2 , & LIU-QIN YANG 2 1 Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, University of South Florida, USA & 2 Department of Psychology, University of South Florida, USA Abstract This paper provides a qualitative review and quantitative summary of the relationship between emotional strain and organizational citizenship behaviour (OCB), and discusses five potential moderators of the strain-OCB relationship. OCB refers to discretionary behaviours that benefit organizations and their members. Emotional strain is important to consider because it has a broad impact on employee behaviours and is possibly more fundamental than other forms of strain. However, it has received less attention than aspects of job-related strain, such as job dissatisfaction. Based on the results of 29 empirical studies with 52 unique effect sizes, meta-analytic results revealed a negative relationship between strain and OCB (corrected estimate of the population correlation coefficient, r .16). Furthermore, this relationship is moderated by the type of OCB (OCB directed at the organization vs. that directed at individuals), type of organization (private vs. public), publication status (published vs. unpublished), OCB rating source (self vs. other), and type of sample (full-time employees vs. employed students). We present theoretical and practical implications of these findings, including steps that could be taken by organizations to increase OCB and to reduce emotional strain, and suggest directions for future research. Keywords: Emotional strain, organizational citizenship behaviour, job performance, stress, meta-analysis Introduction An important dimension of performance in work organizations encompasses behaviours that are contextual in nature (Borman & Motowidlo, 1997), which are collectively known as organizational citizenship behaviour (OCB; Organ, 1997). OCBs are discretionary behaviours that benefit organizations and their members by improving the social and psychological context in which the technical core of the organization operates. Such behaviour is important at multiple levels. For example, OCBs are beneficial for individuals because employees who perform them tend to receive more favourable performance evaluations and rewards (Allen & Rush, 1998; Van Scotter, Motowidlo, & Cross, 2000). OCBs also contribute to organization-level performance and social capital because they Correspondence: Chu-Hsiang Chang, Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, University of South Florida, 13201 Bruce B. Downs Boulevard, MDC 56, Tampa, FL 33612-3805, USA. Tel: 813 396 9597. E-mail: cchang@health.usf.edu An abbreviated version of this paper was presented at the 22 nd Annual Conference of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, April 2007, New York City, NY, USA. ISSN 0267-8373 print/ISSN 1464-5335 online # 2007 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/02678370701758124 Work & Stress, OctoberDecember 2007; 21(4): 312332