DOI
https://doi.org/10.25772/RC9Q-H877
Defense Date
2015
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy
Department
L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs
First Advisor
Dr. Myung Hun Jin
Second Advisor
Dr. Richard Huff
Third Advisor
Dr. Amber Hill
Fourth Advisor
Dr. Wenli Yan
Abstract
In spite of the increase in the number of the international academic workforce and their potential benefits, international status has been relatively under-studied in Public Management and Higher Education literature in comparison with studies of age, gender, and race. Given these realities, the present study identifies characteristics of internal and external variables that influence international and U.S. faculty turnover intentions in a large public South Eastern research university.
To understand the variations in short-term and long-term turnover levels while controlling for various demographic, structural, and external variables, eight Ordinary Least Square (OLS) regression analysis were performed using turnover intentions as the dependent variables. Distributive justice has the strongest negative effect on short-term turnover, and communication openness has the strongest negative effect on long-term turnover. After controlling for job satisfaction and organizational commitment, the effect of communication openness on short-term turnover and the effect of distributive justice on long-term turnover are not statistically significant. This suggests that communication openness and distributive justice might affect turnover through job satisfaction and/or organizational commitment. Job satisfaction has the strongest negative effect on short-term turnover and organizational commitment has the strongest negative effect on long-term turnover after controlling for internal and external variables.
In addition, this study aims to analyze the differences in internal and external factors that impact faculty turnover by international status. In achieving this aim, international faculty were compared to the U.S. faculty on the afore-mentioned internal and external factors that were shown in the literature to impact turnover. The result shows that structural variables such as autonomy, communication openness, and procedural justice play a bigger part in how international faculty evaluate their career with the current university than it does for U.S. faculty. On the contrary, kinship ties and job opportunity have stronger effects on U.S. faculty turnover than international faculty turnover. The implications of this study and areas of future opportunities are discussed.
Rights
© The Author
Is Part Of
VCU University Archives
Is Part Of
VCU Theses and Dissertations
Date of Submission
4-29-2015