SIOP Organizational Behavior & Performance 4 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Which concept from social identity theory BEST explains why employees show in-group favoritism toward colleagues from their own department?
- Social loafing
- Intergroup bias driven by group membership identification (Correct answer)
- Conformity to organizational norms
- Groupthink from cohesive teams
Correct answer: Intergroup bias driven by group membership identification
Social identity theory explains that people categorize themselves as group members and favor in-group members to maintain a positive social identity.
Question 2: A cross-functional team repeatedly fails to perform well despite talented members. The MOST likely explanation from a team effectiveness perspective is:
- Individual skill deficiencies in technical domains
- Poor process: inadequate coordination, communication, and role clarity (Correct answer)
- Insufficient external rewards for team performance
- Overly diverse membership reducing social cohesion
Correct answer: Poor process: inadequate coordination, communication, and role clarity
Team performance failures in skilled teams typically stem from process losses — poor coordination, unclear roles, and ineffective communication — rather than individual capability gaps.
Question 3: Affective commitment to an organization is BEST defined as:
- Staying because leaving would be too costly
- An emotional attachment and sense of belonging to the organization (Correct answer)
- Feeling obligated to remain out of loyalty
- Normative pressure from colleagues to stay
Correct answer: An emotional attachment and sense of belonging to the organization
Affective commitment reflects employees' emotional attachment to and identification with their organization, representing the 'want to stay' component of Meyer and Allen's three-component model.
Question 4: In Lewin's force field analysis, organizational change is facilitated by:
- Increasing only the driving forces toward change
- Reducing restraining forces or increasing driving forces, or both (Correct answer)
- Eliminating all resistance through authority
- Standardizing processes before introducing change
Correct answer: Reducing restraining forces or increasing driving forces, or both
Lewin's model suggests change occurs when the balance of forces shifts — either by strengthening drivers, weakening resistors, or both simultaneously.
Question 5: Which theory of motivation proposes that individuals compare their output-to-input ratio to that of a referent other, and act to restore balance when inequity is perceived?
- Self-determination theory
- Equity theory (Correct answer)
- Goal-setting theory
- Two-factor theory
Correct answer: Equity theory
Adams' Equity Theory posits that perceived unfairness in the ratio of one's contributions to outcomes (compared to a referent) motivates corrective behavior.
Question 6: An organization's espoused values conflict with its enacted values — what employees actually experience daily. This gap MOST directly undermines:
- Task performance through reduced skill utilization
- Organizational trust and psychological safety (Correct answer)
- Formal authority structures and reporting lines
- External stakeholder relations and brand equity
Correct answer: Organizational trust and psychological safety
When stated values differ from lived experience, employees perceive hypocrisy, which erodes trust and psychological safety within the organization.
Question 7: Research on transformational leadership consistently shows its strongest effect on which of the following outcomes?
- Employee compliance with routine procedures
- Followers' extra-role performance and motivation beyond expectations (Correct answer)
- Reduction of voluntary turnover through transactional exchange
- Objective sales metrics in short-term performance windows
Correct answer: Followers' extra-role performance and motivation beyond expectations
Transformational leadership is most strongly linked to followers' intrinsic motivation, extra-role behaviors, and performance beyond contractual expectations.
SIOP Organizational Behavior & Performance 4
Which concept from social identity theory BEST explains why employees show in-group favoritism toward colleagues from their own department?