How ethnic dissimilarity influences perceived organizational support and organizational citizenship behaviors?

PurposeThis study examines the mediating effect of self-efficacy between perceived organizational support (POS) and organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) organization (OCBO); and POS and OCB individual (OCBI) in a cross-cultural context.Design/methodology/approachData were collected from 207 full-time academics from the private universities in Malaysia and Mainland China using a questionnaire survey.FindingsThe results indicate that self-efficacy is a salient mediator linking POS with OCBI and OCBO. Additionally, ethnic dissimilarity is found to have a contextual influence on the research model as the results reveal that self-efficacy only mediates the relationship between POS and OCBO but not between POS and OCBI in a heterogeneous society. In contrast, self-efficacy is found to mediate the relationships between POS and OCBO and between POS and OCBI in a homogeneous society.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the literature by being one of the first studies that examine the relationship between self-efficacy and two dimensions of OCB in two different cultural contexts.