Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 2009, Vol. 14, No.

2, 193205

2009 American Psychological Association 1076-8998/09/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/a0014603

Job Insecurity and Employability in Fixed-Term Contractors, Agency Workers, and Permanent Workers: Associations With Job Satisfaction and Affective Organizational Commitment
Nele De Cuyper
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Guy Notelaers
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium; and University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway

Hans De Witte
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
This study investigates how job insecurity and employability relate to job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment in permanent workers, xed-term contract workers, and temporary agency workers. The authors hypothesized that (a) job insecurity relates negatively to job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment, and this relationship is strongest in permanent workers and weakest in temporary agency workers; and that (b) employability relates positively to job satisfaction and negatively to affective organizational commitment, and this relationship is strongest in temporary agency workers and weakest in permanent workers. Hypotheses were tested in workers (permanent: n 329; xed term; n 160; temporary agency: n 89) from 23 Belgian organizations. The results show that job insecurity related negatively to the outcomes for permanent workers and temporary agency workers. This relationship was not signicant for xed-term contract workers. Employability related negatively to the outcomes for xed-term contract workers and temporary agency workers, and this relationship was not signicant for permanent workers. The 3 groups had different interpretations of what constitutes a stressor and about what signals a good employment relationship. Keywords: temporary employment, job insecurity, employability

The growth in xed-term contracts and the increased outsourcing of work to temporary agencies have been a cause for concern among researchers in the broad domain of occupational health (Sparks, Faragher, & Cooper, 2001). The reason is that most benets are with the employer and most costs are with the employee: Temporary employment provides organizations with a oor of exibility, but it poses

Nele De Cuyper and Hans De Witte, Research Group for Work, Organizational and Personnel Psychology, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium. Guy Notelaers, Research Group for Work, Organizational and Personnel Psychology, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium; and Bergen Bullying Research Group, Faculty of Psychology, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway. This study was supported by Grant G.0395.05 from the FWO (Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek-Vlaanderen). We thank three anonymous reviewers and Lars Johan Hauge for their help in developing this article. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Nele De Cuyper, Research Group for Work, Organizational and Personnel Psychology, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Tiensestraat 102, 3000 Leuven, Belgium. E-mail: nele.decuyper@psy.kuleuven.be

demands on employees in the form of job insecurity (De Witte, 1999; Guest, 2004). In an attempt to protect their labor market position, many of these workers may have invested in employability (Forrier & Sels, 2003). This has spurred scholarly interest in job insecurity (see, e.g., Cheng & Chan, 2007; Sverke, Hellgren, & Naswall, 2002) and employabil ity (Berntson & Marklund, 2007). Surprisingly, most job insecurity and employability studies have targeted the total population, and some have excluded temporary workers (Connelly & Gallagher, 2004). Few other studies have investigated the association between job insecurity and psychological outcomes in temporary and permanent workers (De Cuyper & De Witte, 2006; Mauno, Kinnunen, Makikangas, & Natti, 2005). However, these studies failed to account for specic temporary contracts (for an exception, see Bernhard-Oettel, Sverke, & De Witte, 2005). Finally, to our knowledge, there exist no other studies about employability in relation to temporary and permanent workers experiences. In this study, we aim to address this void by investigating job insecurity and employability in

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relation to job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment in permanent workers, xed-term contract workers, and temporary agency workers. Our specic choices are worthy of further discussion. First, job insecurity concerns the employees perception about potential involuntary job loss (Sverke et al., 2002). Employability concerns the employees perception about his or her possibilities to achieve a new job (Berntson & Marklund, 2007). The common strand is the reference to future employment prospects. The difference is that job insecurity relates to the present job, whereas employability relates to future jobs. Second, xed-term contract and temporary agency work are common forms of temporary employment in Europe; that is, dependent employment of limited duration (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD], 2002, p. 170). This contrasts with the notion of open-ended employment that is present in permanent work. Temporary employment is similar to contingent employment, which is in prevailing usage in the United States (Kalleberg, 2000). According to some authors, contingent employment includes part-time work and specic forms of self-employment (De Cuyper, De Jong, et al., 2008). We do not focus upon these arrangements, which is why we prefer using temporary employment instead. Fixed-term contract workers, in particular, are directly hired by the organization. Temporary agency workers are involved in a tripartite employment relationship (Gallagher & McLean Parks, 2001): They are hired by the agency to perform work at the user organization. The difference between xed-term contracts and temporary agency contracts has implications for the workers experiences (Cranford, Vosko, & Zukewich, 2003; Feldman, 2005); this can be understood along theories of labor market use, as discussed in the next upcoming section. Third, we draw on insights from work stress theory and social exchange theory in addressing our research question. The focus in work stress research is on strain. One indicator of strain, for example, in studies in the tradition of the job demand control model (Karasek & Theorell, 1990; see also De Witte, Verhofstadt, & Omey, 2007; Taris & Kompier, 2004) and in the spill-over hypothesis (Spector, 1997) is job (dis)satisfaction. Social exchange research underlines outcomes related to the employment relationship (e.g., affective organizational commitment). Such outcomes are important from an occupational health perspective, too: When there are obvious organizational costs associated with strain, as when workers withdraw from the organization, this creates a plat-

form to introduce occupational health issues in the organizations strategy.

Theories of Labor Market Use

Many writings in the realm of temporary work research build on theories of labor market use, such as the exible rm model (Atkinson, 1984), internal labor market theory (Doeringer & Piore, 1971), and segmentation theory (Amuedo-Dorantes, 2000), the general assumption being the existence of a core periphery labor market structure along economic, psychological, and health dimensions. Workers in the core labor market are crucial to the organizations functioning, and they are assigned the most stable and desirable jobs, mostly in the form of a permanent contract. Conversely, workers in the periphery are mostly hired on an as-needed basis in the form of temporary contracts. The jobs of these workers are designed to allow easy transfer from one worker to the next, with minimal investments on the part of the employer. However, temporary employment comes in many guises, which urges a further coreperiphery structuring (Aronsson, Gustafsson, & Dallner, 2002). A plausible argument in this respect is that xedterm contract workers are closer to the core of permanent workers than temporary agency workers. This argument is based on the assumed stability of xed-term contracts, compared with temporary agency contracts (Aronsson et al., 2002). First, temporary agency contracts are, on average, of shorter duration (OECD, 2002). One implication is that temporary agency work increases the risk that workers alternate between spells of employment in different jobs and organizations and unemployment. Second, the particular tripartite employment relationship may cause employers to feel less responsible for temporary agency workers: These workers are not part of the organizations workforce or payroll, and organizations have only minimal obligations regarding the provision of training and health and safety issues (OECD, 2002). Third, temporary agency workers may see conicting demands on the part of the user rm and the agency, and they may perceive their relationship with the user organization as transitory (Connelly, Gallagher, & Gilley, 2007; Gallagher & Sverke, 2005).

Work Stress: Job Satisfaction

Scholars in the realm of work stress research have portrayed job insecurity as a stressor, hence causing strain (Van Vuuren, 1990). This strain develops from

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uncontrollability and unpredictability (De Witte, 1999). Uncontrollability implies a sense of powerlessness vis-a-vis the stressor (Dekker & Schaufeli, ` 1995; Greenhalgh & Rosenblatt, 1984): Workers perceive few options to inuence the situation. Unpredictability means that it is unclear what will happen in the future and, thus, what constitutes an appropriate response. The idea that there are few possibilities to prevent or cope with an anticipated stressful situation has been associated with strain in the vitamin model that was proposed by Warr (1994). A reasonable assumption is that unpredictability and uncontrollability contribute more to the experience of job insecurity in permanent workers compared with temporary workers. The probability of job loss is near unity for most temporary workers (Beard & Edwards, 1995), and the expiration date of many temporary contracts is set in advance. One implication is that job insecurity in temporary workers is not grounded in feelings of unpredictability. Furthermore, likely job loss in the near future, as is the case for temporary workers, may stimulate the search for alternatives. This enhances control. When job loss is uncertain, as for permanent workers, possibilities to regain control are few. This leads to the assumption that the relationship between job insecurity and job satisfaction is more negative in permanent, compared with temporary, workers. Along similar lines, the negative relationship between job insecurity and job satisfaction may be stronger for xed-term contract workers than for temporary agency workers. We see two arguments. First, theories on labor market use underline similarities between xed-term contract workers and permanent workers that are absent in temporary agency workers. Second, temporary agency workers may rely on the agency to secure gainful employment upon job loss. This presents a form of control and social support that is lacking in xed-term contract workers. Accordingly, Hypothesis 1 (H1) is as follows: H1: The negative relationship between job insecurity and job satisfaction is stronger in permanent workers than in xed-term contract workers (H1a) and stronger in xed-term contract workers than in temporary agency workers (H1b). Employability is assumed to reduce strain; that is, to relate positively to job satisfaction, which has been established in some studies (Berntson & Marklund, 2007; De Cuyper, Bernhard-Oettel, Berntson, De Witte, & Alarco, 2008). The idea is that employabil-

ity prompts feelings of being in control over ones career (Fugate, Kinicki, & Ashforth, 2004), particularly in temporary workers (Forrier & Sels, 2003). The careers of temporary workers involve a sequence of jobs in different organizations, meaning that control is oriented toward other organizations. High employability leads temporary workers to see more alternatives from which to choose. Conversely, low-employable temporary workers are forced to accept any job that is available to them, which may lead these workers to develop feelings of uncontrollability, and hence strain. Permanent workers seek control over their career rst in job or promotion opportunities in the present company and not in employability. Thus, the relationship between employability and job satisfaction is probably stronger in temporary than in permanent workers. Accounting for the heterogeneity within the temporary workforce, a further assumption is that the association between employability and job satisfaction is stronger in temporary agency workers than in xed-term contract workers. Fixed-term contract workers are part of the organizations workforce in much the same way as permanent workers, whereas temporary agency workers are not. One interpretation could be that xed-term contract workers, compared with temporary agency workers, are more inclined to see their arrangement as a stepping stone that leads to permanent employment with the current organization; the focus is relatively more on intraorganizational careers. This leads to Hypothesis 2 (H2): H2: The positive relationship between employability and job satisfaction is weaker in permanent workers than in xed-term contract workers (H2a) and weaker in xed-term contract workers than in temporary agency workers (H2b).

Social Exchange: Affective Organizational Commitment

Researchers have recently introduced social exchange models, particularly insights from psychological contract literature, in job insecurity research. The psychological contract refers to the idiosyncratic set of reciprocal expectations held by employees concerning their obligations and their entitlements (McLean Parks, Kidder, & Gallagher, 1998, p. 698). The idea is that job insecurity is problematic when it presents a psychological contract breach (King, 2000; Pearce, 1998), which has been demonstrated by De Cuyper and De Witte (2006,

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2007a). Psychological contract breach is likely when permanent workers experience job insecurity. Permanent workers psychological contracts are described as relational and with a long-term focus (Kalleberg & Rognes, 2000; McDonald & Makin, 2000; Millward & Brewerton, 1999; Rousseau & McLean Parks, 1993): This is established through the provision of job security on the part of employers and through loyalty and commitment on the part of employees. Job insecurity may lead permanent workers to feel a sense of betrayal. They may respond with reduced loyalty and commitment (Conway & Briner, 2005). By way of contrast, temporary workers do not feel entitled to job security; rather to the contrary, job insecurity is expected and agreed upon (Cavanough & Noe, 1999; Sverke, Gallagher, & Hellgren, 2000). Job insecurity does not signal a weakened relationship; thus, it does not relate that strongly to affective organizational commitment in temporary workers. However, this picture may be too general in view of the heterogeneity of the temporary workforce. Some temporary workers but not others may see elements with a relational and long-term focus as part of their psychological contract. One factor that may encourage the development of such psychological contract entitlements is tenure: Rousseau (1995; Rousseau & Wade-Benzoni, 1995) argued that relational elements are added with increased tenure. Fixed-term contract workers generally have longer tenure than temporary agency workers (OECD, 2002). Accordingly, they may interpret job insecurity relatively more than temporary agency workers would as a breach of the psychological contract. Another factor could be that temporary agency workers do not hold the user organization responsible. They may instead turn to the agency when confronted with job insecurity. This leads to the assumption that job insecurity contributes less to affective organizational commitment in temporary agency workers compared with xed-term contract workers. Thus, Hypothesis 3 (H3) is as follows: H3: The negative relationship between job insecurity and affective organizational commitment is stronger in permanent workers than in xed-term contract workers (H3a) and stronger in xed-term contract workers than in temporary agency workers (H3b). The psychological contract perspective provides useful avenues to think about employability too. Psychological contracts with economic and short-term exchanges are typical for temporary workers (Mill-

ward & Brewerton, 1999; Rousseau, 1995): The employer and the employee expect a direct return on their investments. For example, the employer expects excellent performance in exchange for a market competitive pay. Under this psychological contract, the employee carries the sole responsibility for careerrelated issues. In this view, employability is a commodity for exchange that the employee brings into the employment relationship, and he or she expects to be rewarded accordingly, much in line with human capital considerations (Becker, 1993; Matusik & Hill, 1998). Such rewards may concern high earnings and possibly high-quality jobs. However, temporary jobs are often and sometimes literally referred to as bad jobs (cf. Kalleberg, Reskin, & Hudson, 2000), with low earnings (Nollen, 1996; OECD, 2002) and poor job quality (Beard & Edwards, 1995; Saloniemi, Virtanen, & Vahtera, 2004). This suggests that psychological contract exchange is evaluated as unfair by high-employable temporary workers, which in turn leads to reduced affective organizational commitment. In contrast, low-employable workers may not arrive at the conclusion of unfair treatment by the employer; instead, they may feel that their jobs match their proles, or that they should feel grateful for any job offer. Furthermore, employability may be less of an issue among permanent workers who do not usually see employability as an element of psychological contract exchange. This suggests that employability relates negatively to affective organizational commitment in temporary, but not permanent, workers. Again, it seems important to account for the particular situation of xed-term contract workers versus temporary agency workers. We portrayed temporary agency workers as workers at the utmost periphery of the organization, meaning that their jobs, even more than the jobs of xed-term contract workers, are of poor quality. The imbalance between investments in employability on the part of employees and investments in job quality on the part of organizations is likely greatest for temporary agency workers. Accordingly, the negative relationship between employability and affective organizational commitment is strongest for temporary agency workers. This is summarized in Hypothesis 4 (H4): H4: The negative relationship between employability and affective organizational commitment is weaker in permanent workers than in xedterm contract workers (H4a) and weaker in xed-term contract workers than in temporary agency workers (H4b).

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In summary, our set of hypotheses suggests that job insecurity contributes little in explaining the responses of temporary agency workers, and most in those of permanent workers, whereas employability contributes little in explaining the responses of permanent workers, and most in those of temporary workersin particular, temporary agency workers. The studies to date have supported our hypotheses concerning job insecurity (Bernhard-Oettel et al., 2005; De Cuyper & De Witte, 2006, 2007a; De Witte & Naswall, 2003; Mauno et al., 2005), although mostly in samples of xed-term contract workers and permanent workers. We include temporary agency workers, too. Studies concerning employability among employees with different types of contracts are virtually absent.

tional contexts: namely, 11 organizations from the food or car industry, or their respective supply companies (n 258, 41.4%), 7 service organizations or departments (e.g., sales and marketing; n 135, 21.7%), and 5 departments of public organizations in the domain of health care, education, and safety (n 230, 36.9%). Response rates were above 70% in 12 organizations and above 30% in 9 other organizations. They were below 30% in two organizations. The overall response rate equaled 51%. We did not have access to population gures; hence, no sample attrition analyses were performed. Given the aim of our study, a special effort was made to sample xed-term contract workers, who are overrepresented in the sample. This sample gured in two earlier publications (De Cuyper & De Witte, 2007b, 2008).

Method Setting
In 2005, 623 respondents from divisions of 23 Belgian organizations agreed to ll out a questionnaire on the quality of work life. They completed these questionnaires during working time or at home. Condentiality and anonymity were guaranteed. To maximize the possibility of generalizing ndings, respondents were sampled from different organiza-

Sample
After listwise deletion, the effective sample size equaled 578 respondents: 329 (56.9%) permanent workers, 160 (27.7%) xed-term contract workers, and 89 (15.4%) temporary agency workers. Table 1 summarizes the samples and subsamples characteristics. Most respondents worked in organizations from the industrial or the public sector. About as

Table 1 Sample Demographics

(1) Permanent workersa 47.4 18.2 34.3 48.9 51.1 53.4 46.6 65.0 35.0 37 (7) 10 (9) 37 (9) (2) Fixed-term workersb 14.4 25.0 60.6 71.4 28.6 39.0 61.0 55.6 44.4 35 (9) 2 (2) 27 (6) (3) Temporary agency workersc 62.9 30.3 6.7 25.0 75.0 48.9 51.1 75.3 24.7 35 (9) 1 (2) 29 (10) 93.84 71.58

Demographic Sector (%) Industry Service Public Occupational position (%) White-collar Blue-collar Gender (%) Male Female Education (%) No academic degree Academic degree M (SD) Weekly working hours Tenure Age
a

(N

Total 578) 40.7 22.0 37.4 51.3 48.7 48.7 51.3 64.0 36.0

Differences ( 2/t)

93.62 50.07 8.86 9.94 4.38 ,1 ,1 2, 3 2, 3

36 (8) 6 (8) 33 (10) n p 89. .001.

n p

329. .05.

n p

160. .01.

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DE CUYPER, NOTELAERS, AND DE WITTE

many blue-collar workers as white-collar workers, and about as many men as women, participated. About two in three respondents did not follow higher education. Mean tenure was 6 years, and mean age was 33 years. Respondents worked on average 36 hr/week. Except for weekly working hours, the groups differed signicantly on the background variables. About one in two permanent workers and the majority of temporary agency workers were employed in the industrial sector. The majority of xed-term contract workers were employed in the public sector. The share of blue-collar workers was highest in the sample of temporary agency workers and lowest in xedterm contract workers. There was a majority of female workers in the xed-term contract workers sample, but this was not the case in the other groups. More temporary agency workers than permanent workers and xed-term contract workers did not obtain an academic degree. Permanent workers were older and more tenured than xed-term contract workers and temporary agency workers.

Permanent contracts were coded 0, xed-term contracts were coded 1 and temporary agency contracts were coded 2. All Belgian agency workers have a temporary contract with their agency. Job insecurity and employability were measured with four items each (De Witte, 2000). A sample item for job insecurity is I feel insecure about the future of my job. Reliability (Cronbachs alpha) was 0.87 (M 2.44; SD 0.85). A sample item for employability is I could easily switch to another employer if I wanted to. Reliability was 0.87 (M 2.92; SD 0.88). Job satisfaction was measured with four items (Price, 1997); for example, I nd enjoyment in my job. Reliability was 0.87 (M 4.00; SD 0.75). Affective organizational commitment was measured with ve items from Cook and Wall (1980); for example, I am proud to be able to tell people who it is I work for. Reliability was 0.80 (M 3.82; SD 0.66).

Results Descriptive Results

Measures
The response format of all scale items ranged from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). Respondents were asked to answer all questions with reference to their present job and to the organization that currently employed them. Correlations between scales are shown in Table 2. Three issues are worthy of discussion. First, we found the following pattern regarding the association between contract type and the studys core variables: xed-term contract workers and temporary agency workers reported higher levels of job insecurity than

Table 2 Correlations Between Scales: Total Sample (N

Variable 1. Fixed term 2. Temporary agency 3. Job insecurity 4. Employability 5. Job satisfaction 6. Aff. OC 7. Industry 8. Service 9. White collar 10. Male 11. Academic degree 12. Working hours 13. Tenure 14. Age 1 .26 .26 .04 .11 .10 .33 .05 .25 .12 .11 .07 .33 .37 .09 .02 .05 .04 .19 .09 .23 .00 .10 .07 .27 .15 .23 .15 .10 .08 .13 .12 .04 .09 .02 .09 .13 2 3 4 5

578)
6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

.12 .10 .07 .17 .05 .07 .13 .04 .18 .18

.71 .11 .00 .03 .05 .06 .00 .03 .01

.12 .09 .04 .07 .06 .04 .05 .07

.44 .49 .22 .27 .13 .01 .07

.16 .18 .24 .20 .11 .01

.31 .57 .09 .02 .05

.13 .24 .19 .14 .13 .09 .06 .01 .02 .69

Note. Contract type was dummy coded with permanent workers as the reference group; sector was dummy coded with public organizations as the reference group; Aff. OC affective organizational commitment. p .05. p .01.

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199 .66 Job insecurity Employability Job satisfaction Aff. OC 1. 2. 3. 4. Note. Aff. OC p .05. p affective organizational commitment. .01. 2.22 2.95 3.92 3.79 0.76 0.92 0.72 0.63 .13 .32 .29 .03 .01 2.80 2.86 4.14 3.93 0.89 0.84 0.78 0.66 .41 .04 .17 .22 .28 .77 2.62 2.88 4.08 3.76 0.83 0.86 0.77 0.76 .26 .28 .19 .27 .17 .77 4

Table 3 Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations Between Scales for Permanent, Fixed-Term, and Temporary Agency Workers

Multiple Group Analyses

Hypotheses were tested with multiple-group structural equation modeling (SEM) based on maximum likelihood estimators (Bollen, 1989) and using LISREL (Joreskog & Sorbom, 1996). Figure 1 por trays the model to be tested in the permanent workers, xed-term contract workers, and temporary agency workers. The scale scores were used owing to

Variable

SD

permanent workers. No signicant associations were found between contract type and employability. Furthermore, xed-term contract workers were more satised with their job and more committed to their organizations, compared with workers on other contract types. There was no signicant correlation between temporary agency work versus other work arrangements and job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment. Second, job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment were highly correlated and potentially overlapping. Conrmatory factor analyses showed better t for the four-factor model (including job insecurity, employability, job satisfaction, and affective organizational commitment; 2[113] 281.09, p .001; root mean square error of approximation [RMSEA] .05) as compared with the three-factor model in which job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment loaded on one factor, 2(116) 272.07, p .001; RMSEA .06; 2 (3) 9.02, p .05. Third, except for industry membership, the background variables were not signicantly correlated with job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment. Therefore, we did not include them as control variables in our analyses. Table 3 shows the means, standard deviations, and correlations between scales for permanent workers, xed-term contract workers, and temporary agency workers, respectively. Some correlations were clearly different in the three groups: Job insecurity correlated negatively with job satisfaction in permanent and temporary agency workers, whereas the correlation was not signicant in xed-term contract workers. Furthermore, the correlation between job insecurity and affective organizational commitment was negative in the sample of permanent workers, positive in the sample of xed-term contract workers, and not signicant in the sample of temporary agency workers. Finally, employability was not signicantly associated with job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment. These correlations were negative in the temporary workers samples.

Temporary agency workers (n 89) Fixed-term contract workers (n 160) Permanent workers (n 329)

SD

SD

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DE CUYPER, NOTELAERS, AND DE WITTE

-.36***; 0 ; -.46***

Job insecurity -.26 -.34***; 0; -.38*** 0; -.29*** ; -.46*** Employability *** p < .001 0; -.37***; -.36***

Job satisfaction .71***

Affective organizational commitment

Figure 1. The relationship between job insecurity and employability, and between job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment, in (a) permanent workers (roman type), (b) xed-term contract workers (italics), and (c) temporary agency workers (boldface type).

the small size of the subsamples that did not allow testing a model with latent factors. We corrected for random measurement error in accordance with the recommendations by Bollen (1989): (a) The unstandardized factor loading of each indicator was xed to 1, and (b) the error variance equaled the scales variance multiplied by 1 minus the scales reliability. This was done separately in each group in view of correcting for nonnormality by using a covariance matrix and an asymptotic covariance matrix. We compared three nested models by inspecting the chi-square, the goodness of t index (GFI), the comparative t index (CFI), the nonnormed t index (NNFI), and the RMSEA. A nonsignicant chisquare value; GFI, CFI, and NNFI values larger than .90; and RMSEA values smaller than .08 indicated good t (Bollen, 1989). The models were as follows: In Model 1, we constrained all relationships equal across groups. Note, however, that we xed the factor variances to be equal to those in the group of permanent workers. Next, the covariance between job insecurity and employability was set equal to the value in the group of permanent workers; that is, to the covariance in the measurement model, to reach convergent estimates in LISREL. This model assumed

no signicant differences across group, except for the covariance between the dependent variables. This model did not yield a satisfactory t (see Table 4). In Model 2, we freed the constraints put on the gamma coefcients, in line with Joreskog and Sorbom (1996). This model was signicantly better than Model 1, and the t indices were satisfactory. In Model 3, we xed all nonsignicant paths equal to 0, which yielded an acceptable t too. The 2 difference test and the descriptive t statistics RMSEA and NNFI furthermore suggested that Model 3 was the best model. The standardized path coefcients for the three groups are shown in Figure 1. Job insecurity related negatively to job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment in permanent workers and temporary agency workers, whereas these relationships were not signicant in xed-term contract workers. Furthermore, employability was not signicantly related to job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment in permanent workers. It was negatively related to job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment in xed-term contract workers and temporary agency workers. This pattern of results showed some support for

Table 4 Multiple Group Analysis: Indices of Overall Fit for the Alternative Models
Model Model 1: Equal Model 2: Gammas freed Model 3: Nonsignicant paths set to 0
2

df 18 10 14

p .000 .004 .005

GFI .95 .96 .96

CFI .92 .96 .96

NNFI .92 .93 .95

RMSEA .101 .09 .081

Comparison 2 vs. 1 3 vs. 1

df 8 4

52.97 25.49 31.40

27.48 6.09

Note. GFI goodness of t index; CFI square error of approximation. p .001.

comparative t index; NNFI

nonnormed t index; RMSEA

root mean

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H1 and H3: As expected, the association between job insecurity and the outcomes was strongest in permanent workers (H1a, H3a). Contrary to expectations, however, the relationships were not weakest in temporary agency workers, rather to the contrary (H1b, H3b). Hypothesis 2 was supported to the extent that employability was weakly and not signicantly associated with job satisfaction in permanent workers (H2a). However, we predicted a positive relationship between employability and job satisfaction in xedterm contract workers and temporary agency workers. Instead, a negative relationship was found (H2b). Finally, we found some support for H4: Employability related negatively to affective organizational commitment in temporary workers, whereas this relationship was not signicant in the sample of permanent workers (H4a). The relationship was about as strong in xed-term contract workers and temporary agency workers (H4b).

Discussion Job Insecurity

On the basis of work stress theory and social exchange theory, we hypothesized that job insecurity associates negatively with job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment in the sample of permanent workers and that this relationship is less strong in the samples of temporary workers, particularly in the sample of temporary agency workers. We established that job insecurity related negatively to the outcomes in permanent workers but not in xedterm contract workers for whom the relationships were nonsignicant. This replicated the ndings of other studies (De Cuyper & De Witte, 2006, 2007a; De Witte & Naswall, 2003; Mauno et al., 2005). The results for temporary agency workers showed a negative relationship between job insecurity and the outcomes. This was unexpected from a work stress perspective (temporary agency workers are unlikely to see job insecurity as unpredictable and uncontrollable), as well as from a social exchange perspective (temporary agency workers expect little investment from the organization when job security is concerned). This nding may call for some explanation and comment. Perhaps the most obvious explanation relates to the triangular employment relationship that is characteristic for temporary agency workers (Cranford et al., 2003; Feldman, 2005; Gallagher & McLean Parks, 2001). An argument in the realm of work stress research could be that such a relationship

induces unpredictability and uncontrollability: Temporary agency workers may have little voice or little room for negotiation in the selection of the specic assignment, the duration of assignments, and possible renewalsan argument that underlines their precarious position, as outlined in theories of labor market use. They may feel they rely heavily on the efforts of the agency when issues related to job search or job keeping are concerned. Another argument relates to social exchange models. Some authors have argued that temporary agency workers have different foci of commitment (i.e., the agency and the user rm) that are nested within each other (Connelly et al., 2007; Gallagher & McLean Parks, 2001; Gallagher & Sverke, 2005). One implication is that attitudes toward the agency may affect attitudes toward the user organization and vice versa, which has been demonstrated in some studies (Benson, 1998; Coyle-Shapiro & Morrow, 2006; CoyleShapiro, Morrow, & Kessler, 2006; Van Breugel, Van Olffen, & Olie, 2005). Temporary agency workers commitment to the agency may be particularly strong when the agency successfully assists in job search activities or in establishing a minimum level of job security. This implies a notion of exchange of commitment on the part of the workers for job security on the part of the agency, an exchange that is off balance in the presence of job insecurity. This, in turn, may affect commitment to the agency, and eventually, to the user rm. Accordingly, an important avenue for future research is to investigate the consequences of a tripartite employment relationship, much in line with the insights from Gallagher and colleagues (Connelly et al., 2007; Gallagher & McLean Parks, 2001; Gallagher & Sverke, 2001; McLean Parks et al., 1998).

Employability
Some authors speculate that employability presents an alternative means to secure the labor market position of temporary workers (Forrier & Sels, 2003), which leads to the hypothesis that employability is more strongly related to the responses of temporary workersin particular, temporary agency workers compared with permanent workers. This relationship is positive when job satisfaction is concerned in line with work stress arguments and negative when affective organizational commitment is concerned in line with social exchange arguments. The pattern of results supported our assumption that employability contributed little in explaining the responses of permanent workers and that it was negatively associated

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with affective organizational commitment in xed-term contract workers and temporary agency workers. However, employability was negatively rather than positively related to job satisfaction, and there were only minor differences regarding the strength of relationships in the sample of xed-term contract workers and temporary agency workers. It is most challenging to seek explanations for the negative relationship between employability and job satisfaction in temporary workers. One explanation could be that we failed to account for withinparticipant differences owing to the cross-sectional design. It could be that within-participant rather than between-participants differences are critical in the specic case of employability. For example, when temporary workers perceive an increase in employability in the course of a specic assignment, they may respond with increased job satisfaction: employability, in this case, may signal learning opportunities or satisfactory skill utilization, which are known to cause job satisfaction (Taris & Kompier, 2004). Thus, it may be premature to reject the assumption of a positive relationship between employability and job satisfaction on the basis of this study. Instead, an important route for future research is to investigate our hypotheses with a within-participant design; that is, with longitudinal data. Another explanation could be that high-employable temporary workers are likely to see job opportunities elsewhere that are more attractive than the present job; for example, in terms of job quality or earnings. The employee may interpret such job opportunities as a signal that the current employers investments or engagements fall short. This may lead the workers to develop a sense of relative deprivation, which causes strain. Accordingly, it seems important to differentiate between perceptions of employability in which the employee sees opportunities to nd jobs of equal quality and those in which the employee sees better job opportunities. This is another important topic to be addressed in future research.

cause employees job satisfaction than vice versa (Ferrie, Shipley, Marmot, Staneld, & Smith, 1998; Hellgren & Sverke, 2003; Nelson, Cooper, & Jackson, 1990). Similarly, the study by Berntson and Marklund (2007) showed that employability relates to subsequent health. Possibly, this holds for the relationship between employability, job satisfaction, and affective organizational commitment. Second, we relied on self-reported data. This presents some threats related to common method variance. However, there is considerable debate about the magnitude of possible ination owing to common method variance (Podsakoff, Mackenzie, Lee, & Podsakoff, 2003). Furthermore, one of the central variables (i.e., contract type) was descriptive in nature. This may reduce common method variance. Third, there were some sample limitations. The response rate of 51% may mean that some workers were more likely to respond than others. However, we could not test the extent to which this may have inuenced the results as we could not access population gures.

Conclusion
Most innovative and inspiring for future theoretical development was our nding that workers in different contracts may have different interpretations about what constitutes a stressor or about what signals a weakened employment relationship. Job insecurity was negatively related to job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment in permanent workers, whereas employability was negatively related to job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment in xed-term contract workers. A special case was temporary agency work: Both job insecurity and employability were related to perceptions of job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment in temporary agency workers. This challenges an assumption made in theories on labor market use: Although temporary agency workers are at the organizations periphery and permanent workers are at the organizations core, they may display similar reactions. This study contributed to the literature in three different ways. First, to our knowledge, this was one of the rst studies that investigated earlier speculations about the importance of employability in temporary and permanent workers. Second, few studies to date have probed differences between xed-term contract workers and temporary agency workers. Our study suggests that this could be

Limitations
There were some limitations inherent to this study. First, the design of this study was cross-sectional. This implies that we could not investigate withinparticipant differences, although this could be important in the realm of employability research, as outlined earlier. Another implication is that we could not make causal inferences. However, earlier studies demonstrated that job insecurity is more likely to

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important: Temporary agency workers responses vis-a-vis job insecurity were clearly different from ` the responses of xed-term contract workers. Third, social exchange theory has dominated thinking about the relationship between job insecurity/ employability and psychological outcomes in temporary and permanent workers. We added a work stress perspective to this debate.

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Received November 12, 2007 Revision received July 6, 2008 Accepted September 22, 2008 y

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