ABSTRACT
About 20 years ago Turner and Lawrence (1965) published their book, Industrial jobs and the worker: An investigation of response to task attributes. This study focused on characteristics of the job content as the determinant of behavior and attitudes of the work performer. Although the researchers were aware of the many possible intervening variables between task attributes and worker responses, they tried to make the “risky leap” between these two classes of variables. The definitions of the variables in this study, in particular regarding the task attributes, can be considered as the origins of the variables in the Job Characteristics Model (JCM). This model proposed by Hackman and Oldham (1975, 1976, 1980) has led to much empirical research. A set of measuring instruments, the Job Diagnostic Survey (JDS), is available to measure the variables in the model. The model states that motivation, satisfaction, and work performance are achieved when three “critical psychological states” (i.e., experienced mean-ingfulness of the work, experienced responsibility for outcomes of the work, and knowledge of the results) are present in the individual. Five “core job dimensions” (skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and job feedback) are supposed to influence these critical psychological states. Various individual-difference variables (e.g., growth need strength) are conceived as moderator variables of the relationships between job dimensions—critical psychological states and critical psychological states—personal and work outcomes. In addition, the five core job dimensions can also be combined by means of a multiplicative formula to a single score, called motivating potential score (MPS), which is an indication of job complexity. The JDS and the model are for the explicit purpose of task redesign.
