Predicting organizational citizenship behavior in a multicultural environment: The role of cultural intelligence and cultural distance

Abstract

Cross-cultural research in organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) has primarily focused on testing the generalizability of various OCB dimensions in different cultures, while attempting to unearth any culture-specific OCB notions that may arise from the values of a particular culture. But with the contemporary workplace becoming increasingly multicultural, this research attempts to move beyond the study of OCB in culturally homogenous environments and investigates its manifestation in a multicultural context. This study proposes cultural intelligence (CQ) as one of the antecedents of OCB, which enables individuals in foreign cultures to understand the perceptions of OCB in that particular culture, and posits that individuals with high levels of CQ exhibit OCB in multicultural environments. Furthermore, this study investigates the moderating effect of cultural distance (CD) on the relationship between CQ and OCB to test whether culturally similar or different environments strengthen or weaken this relationship. The study draws upon the trait activation theory to test the hypotheses under investigation. Data for this study were collected from 513 expatriates of 31 different nationalities working in a multicultural environment and analyzed using structural equation modeling. The results indicated that CQ had a positive impact on OCB, but CD did not have any impact on the CQ-OCB relationship. The findings of this study have important implications for human resource managers managing a culturally diverse workforce.

Keywords

Cultural intelligence organizational citizenship behavior cultural distance multiculturalism expatriates UAE

Introduction

To sustain in an extremely competitive business environment, organizations depend on employees to go the extra mile at work that may positively contribute to organizational performance. Advocating innovative and spontaneous behavior on the part of the employees that goes beyond their role description, Katz (1964) stated that such behavior helps the organization in achieving its objectives and enhances employee performance. One such behavior is organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), defined as “individual behavior that is discretionary, not directly or explicitly recognized by the formal reward system, and that in the aggregate promotes the effective functioning of the organization” (Organ, 1988: 4). By going beyond their scope of work, OCB is one of the ways by which employees enrich and add value to their work environment (Marinova et al., 2015). It is well documented in literature that OCB has a positive influence on a variety of individual-level and organizational-level outcomes, such as customer satisfaction, reduced absenteeism, managerial ratings, increased productivity and efficiency, reduced costs, and unit-level turnover and so on (Podsakoff et al., 2009). But the study by Farh et al. (1997) first brought into prominence the cultural aspect where OCB was studied in the Chinese context. Their study uncovered two new OCB dimensions specific to the Chinese culture, namely, interpersonal harmony and protecting company resources. This study established the significant impact of culture on the interpretation and expression of OCB by employees and gave an impetus to cross-cultural research within OCB. This resulted in a plethora of studies where researchers worldwide have investigated the notion of OCB within different national cultures, such as Dutch (Lievens and Anseel, 2004), French (Paille, 2009), Mexican (Baeza and Wang, 2015), Saudi Arabian (Al-Dossary, 2016), Sri Lankan (Rauf and Kumar, 2015), Turkish (Sahin et al., 2013), South Korea (Daly et al., 2015), Japanese (Wang, 2015), Thailand (Charoensukmongkol, 2021), and collectivist cultures (Rurkkhum and Bartlett, 2018). The majority of cross-cultural research in OCB has been carried out in a homogenous work context where employees come from a single national culture, and this research uses cultural frameworks such as the one developed by Hofstede (1980). However, with the contemporary workplaces dramatically changing, organizations today have become multiethnic and multilingual. So how does OCB manifest in multicultural work environments where employees come from a variety of different national backgrounds? This study aims to understand the capabilities that an individual requires to exhibit OCB in multicultural environments, where individuals from different nationalities work together.

Though extant research has identified different predictors of OCB, Paine and Organ (2000) caution that different cultural, historical, economic, and social backgrounds can cause different interpretations of OCB amongst employees, and thus create barriers to exhibiting OCB in the workplace. A typical good citizen, who consistently displays OCB in one cultural environment, may fail in other cultural environments since they may not be able to understand the notions of OCB in that particular culture. Rurkkhum and Bartlett (2018: 108) state, “despite the significance of OCBs to organizational effectiveness, the encouragement of employee expressions of OCBs remains a challenge for HR managers.” Furthermore, if the work environment is culturally different, HR managers face the additional challenge of finding appropriate ways to stimulate and encourage culturally apt citizenship behaviors. Hence, it becomes important to identify antecedents that enable employees to recognize and in turn, exhibit OCB in different cultural contexts. Karam and Kwantes (2011) remarked that though extant research has identified a number of antecedents of OCB, very limited research exists that identifies “culture as an individual difference” as an antecedent of OCB. The study of “culture as an individual difference” is especially important in a multicultural work setting where individuals from different national backgrounds work together. In such a scenario, studying the intercultural capabilities of individuals that help predict OCB become important, rather than the national values of the country to which the individual belongs to. This study posits cultural intelligence (CQ) as a critical human resource capability that needs to be developed amongst employees functioning in multicultural environments that enables them to exhibit OCB. Defined as the ability to function competently in cross-cultural situations (Earley and Ang, 2003), CQ enables one to correctly interpret the cultural nuances of an environment and thus, understand the notions of OCB. Thus, the first objective of this study is to investigate the relationship between CQ and OCB.

Furthermore, Ang and Van Dyne (2008) first discussed the importance of contextual moderators in the nomological network of CQ, stating that the relationship between CQ and its outcomes will depend upon the strength of the situation. They state, “depending on whether the situations are weak or strong, the four factors of CQ would have a stronger or weaker effect on subjective perception of the intercultural environment and participation in intercultural activities” (Ang and Van Dyne, 2008: 12). In case of strong situations, the task environment is well defined, and individuals rely less on CQ to guide them. However, in weak situations, which are typically characterized by vagueness and uncertainty, individuals would rely more on CQ to make sense of the environment and guide their actions. Ott and Michailova (2016) further reiterated the need to consider the contextual boundaries of CQ to better comprehend how the cultural context makes adaptation challenging, even for individuals high in CQ. They question whether “there are certain cultural contexts where CQ has more (or less) influence on the effectiveness of individuals’ intercultural interactions or does being from a specific cultural context and interacting with members of another specific culture change the relationships between CQ and its outcomes?” (Ott and Michailova, 2016: 15). On similar lines, Rockstuhl and Van Dyne (2018) highlight the need to theorize the boundary conditions of CQ effects to account for the significant between-study variance in the relationship between CQ and its outcomes. Whetten (1989) describes boundary conditions as conditions that “place limitations on the propositions generated from a theoretical model. These temporal and contextual factors set the boundaries of generalizability, and as such constitute the range of the theory” (p. 492).

This study aims to contribute to the recent calls that emphasize the contextualization of CQ (Stoermer et al., 2021) and proposes cultural distance (CD) (Kogut and Singh, 1988) as a contextual moderator for the CQ-OCB relationship. CD will define the strength of a culturally different environment or the degree of cultural novelty and serve as a boundary condition for the CQ-OCB relationship. A marker of national value differences, CD is basically a measure of the degree to which two national cultures are similar to or different from each other (Shenkar, 2001). Thus, when the CD is low, individuals are in a culture quite similar to their own and CQ plays a more reduced role, whereas when CD is high, individuals find themselves in drastically different cultural environments and rely more on CQ to make sense of the environment (Setti et al., 2020). We draw upon the trait activation theory (TAT) (Tett and Burnett, 2003; Tett and Guterman, 2000) to examine how CD acts as a contextual moderator that impacts the relationship between CQ and OCB. The TAT posits, “individuals express their traits when they are presented with trait-relevant situational cues” (Tett and Burnett, 2003: 502). Accordingly, we contend that CD will act as a situational cue that will activate the trait of CQ and enable individuals to engage in citizenship behaviors in the workplace. Thus, the second objective of this study is to test the moderating effect of CD on the CQ-OCB relationship. In the following section, we present our conceptual framework and state the hypotheses of this study.

Theoretical foundation and hypotheses development

We attempt to investigate the combined impact of CQ and its individual dimensions on OCB and test the moderating effect of CD. The need to study the individual dimensions of CQ along with the overall CQ has become critical given the recent findings in CQ literature. A meta-analysis by Rockstuhl and Van Dyne (2018) revealed that the four dimensions of CQ were differentially associated to the consequences within cross-cultural situations. For example, their study revealed that motivational CQ (MCQ) and behavioral CQ (BCQ) related more positively to cross-cultural adjustment rather than metacognitive CQ (MCCQ) or cognitive CQ (CCQ). MCQ was positively related with both socio-cultural adjustment and psychological well-being, but BCQ was not significantly related with either of them. In another meta-analysis on CQ and its work-related outcomes, namely, expatriation intention, cross-cultural adjustment job satisfaction, and job performance, Schlaegel et al. (2021) advocated further examination of the sub-dimensions of CQ. They state, “focusing on overall CQ does not uncover the unique effects of the individual CQ dimensions, considering that the effects of the individual dimensions can be weaker or stronger than the common, effect of overall CQ” (p. 101). Hence, it becomes necessary to understand how the four dimensions of CQ impact OCB and whether one or all dimensions are critical in a multicultural environment. Figure 1 represents the conceptual framework for the study.

Figure 1.

Conceptual model.

OCB and culture

OCB was conceptualized as a five-dimensional construct by Organ (1988). The five dimensions were defined as, altruism—helping behavior directed toward colleagues; conscientiousness–going above and beyond minimum guidelines set by the organization; sportsmanship—tolerating less than ideal circumstances; courtesy—taking extra efforts to prevent work-related problems and civic virtue—working toward the betterment of the organization. Highlighting the importance of context, Organ (1997: 91) defined OCB as “contributions to the maintenance and enhancement of the social and psychological context that supports task performance.” Furthermore, OCBs “lubricate the social machinery of the organization and increase the organization resilience and the flexibility needed to work through many unforeseen contingencies” (Smith et al., 1983: 654). Most studies in OCB during its initial phase were conducted within the North American context. Observing the trend in OCB studies, Farh et al. (1997: 421) stated that “despite the voluminous and fruitful literature stemming from Organ’s (1988) seminal work in this area, we know little about citizenship behavior in a global context.” Their study first brought to notice the impact of culture as a contextual influence on OCB. Paine and Organ (2000) urged researchers to take into consideration the context in which an organization operates that could impact the occurrence of OCB than the more commonly studied antecedents of OCB. In addition, they further suggested that making an endeavor to establish what constitutes citizenship behaviors in diverse cultures would be a valuable approach to examine the universality of the different OCB dimensions (i.e., etic) and develop a more robust categorization of the alternative types of OCBs (i.e., emic). Extant research has found support for the etic and emic dimensions of OCB. When OCB is measured in a single culture, or in a cross-cultural context, the behaviors exhibited are different and depend upon the cultures under study. Some etic dimensions are found to exist in almost all cultures, whereas as some emic dimensions are specific to the cultures under study. So, when we study OCB in a multicultural environment, it becomes important to understand which dimensions of OCB are supported in a multicultural environment. Given that a multicultural environment consists of individuals from different cultures, we posit that the etic dimensions of OCB that have found support in most cultures, would find support in a multicultural environment as well.

Impact of CQ on OCB

CQ enables individuals to understand the nuances in other cultures and thus helps them adjust to culturally novel situations (Engle and Nash, 2015). Ang et al. (2007) conceptualized CQ as a four-dimensional model, where MCCQ refers to the level of awareness one has during cross-cultural situations about an inherent cultural difference (Ang and Van Dyne, 2008); CCQ refers to the actual knowledge an individual possesses about a culture, such as knowledge of different norms and practices, political, legal and social systems, and marriage laws; MCQ is the motivation one has to engage and succeed in cross-cultural situations (Ang and Van Dyne, 2008) and finally, BCQ reflects the capability for exhibiting suitable verbal and nonverbal behaviors specific to the particular culture. Employees with high levels of CQ are able to perform better in heterogeneous work environments since they possess the skills to learn about other cultures and understand and manage the expectations of culturally diverse individuals. While extant research examines national culture as a context in which OCB occurs, our research attempts to study OCB in a multicultural context and we posit that CQ predicts OCB in a multicultural context. Farh et al. (1997: 440) remark, “nature of social ties within a society influences the display of extra-role employee behavior.” This suggests that an individual needs to understand the cultural underpinnings of a society in order to display citizenship behavior. Rockstuhl et al. (2015: 466) further suggest, “individuals who can more accurately observe, interpret, and explain behaviors in intercultural situations are more likely to discern when culturally diverse others would appreciate the help and what kinds of help would be appropriate.” Earley and Calic (2016) argue that culturally intelligent employees are more capable of behaving in ways appropriate to the context of their work environment and are “successful architects of an environment (i.e., antecedents and outcomes) conducive to citizenship behavior” (p. 14). In a study of proactive behavior, Jiang et al. (2018) found that CQ impacted voice behavior (LePine and Van Dyne, 1998), which has been suggested as a citizenship behavior of employees. Furthermore, a study of school teachers by Mirarab and Dibaei (2018) provides support to the relationship between CQ and OCB. Also, McComas (2014) assessed the relationship between leader CQ and OCB, particularly helping and voice behaviors amongst peers, of the multicultural work group. Results indicated that a significant relationship existed between leader MCCQ and helping and voice OCB, as well as between leader BCQ and helping and voice OCB in a multicultural work group. In recent times, Shafieihassanabadi and Pourrashidi (2019) found support to the CQ-OCB relationship amongst the employees of the tourism organizations in Iran. Extending these theoretical views, we argue that employees with high levels of CQ will engage in higher citizenship behavior. Thus, we present the first set of hypotheses of our study.

Hypothesis 1a (H1a): CQ will have a positive impact on OCB.

Hypothesis 1b (H1b): The four sub-dimensions of CQ (MCCQ, CCQ, MCQ, and BCQ) will have a positive impact on OCB.

Moderating effect of cultural distance

One of the most popular constructs in international business studies, CD was conceptualized by Kogut and Singh in 1988. CD measures the extent to which two national cultures are similar to or different from each other (Shenkar, 2001). CD acts as a metaphor for “the collective differences between countries, playing as it does on the notions of both physical and cognitive separation” (Zaheer et al., 2012: 20). An interesting aspect of CD research, often referred to as the “national distance paradox” (Brouthers and Brouthers, 2001), is the conflicting set of findings that shows CD both as a catalyst as well as an inhibitor for positive outcomes. Reus and Lamont (2009: 1302) state, “cultural distance makes it more difficult for workforces to come together, interact and share ideas, and, as a result, impedes communication.” Whereas Zaheer et al. (2012: 21) argue that “greater distance and less similarity may raise awareness of meaningful differences” and, in fact, make individuals more conscious of displaying culturally appropriate behavior. Chen et al. (2010) reasoned that in an organization, CD acts as a “contextual boundary condition because it captures different aspects of the complexities and challenges” inherent to an environment characterized by cultural differences. Moreover, “national cultures should include trait-relevant cues that may trigger one’s expression of psychological traits because national cultures influence the formation of social norms and stipulate the kinds of values that are rewarded” (Miao et al., 2018: 466). From the above discussion, it is established that CD can act as a situational moderator and a boundary condition that can impact outcomes within an organization. We use CD as a moderator since the multicultural context under study, that is, the UAE has expatriates from different countries residing and working in different organizations.

Leung et al. (2014: 500) state that “very few studies have examined the boundary conditions of the effects of intercultural competence.” They suggest that the TAT “provides fertile ground for hypothesizing boundary conditions at task, social, and organizational levels” (p. 500). Tett and Guterman (2000) state that individual traits are covert tendencies to behave in particular ways and traits are expressed only when one is presented with trait-relevant situational cues. As Chen et al. (2010: 1111) state, “a trait is more likely to translate into meaningful differences in work behaviors, and hence performance, in situations that are more amenable to, and accepting of, the expression of the trait.” Tett and Burnett (2003) further state that trait-relevant situations cues may come from task, social, or organizational level, and “traits activated at the social and organizational levels will have a stronger impact on contextual performance” (p. 511). Thus, values associated with culture and the resulting cultural differences will serve as trait-relevant situational cues at a social level because “cultural values may shape social expectations directly by indicating the types of values that are valued and rewarded in a country as well as indirectly through their effects on organizational values and norms” (Choi et al., 2014: 5). Similarly, Stoermer et al. (2021) posit that TAT can be used to elucidate the influence of country level properties on CQ, and they used the theory to investigate the moderating effect of host countries’ informal openness toward foreigners on the relationship between expatriate CQ and organizational embeddedness. On similar lines, we apply the TAT and posit that the cultural differences existing around an individual, that is, CD, will provide opportunities for the individual and act as a situational cue that will activate CQ which will further lead to the individual displaying OCB. Based on the above discussion, we present our second hypothesis where we test the moderating effect of CD.

Hypothesis 2a (H2a): CD will moderate the relationship between CQ and OCB.

Hypothesis 2b (H2b): CD will moderate the relationship between the four sub-dimensions of CQ (MCCQ, CCQ, MCQ, and BCQ) and OCB.

Methods

Measures

Cultural intelligence

The 20-item Cultural Intelligence Scale (CQS) developed by Ang et al. (2007) was used to measure CQ. The scale contains 4 items for measuring metacognitive CQ, 6 items for cognitive CQ, 5 items for motivational CQ, and 5 items for behavioral CQ. The CQS has been validated across multiple samples and is found to have good reliability and validity (Ang et al., 2015). Participants are expected to respond to how much they agreed with each question on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree).

Organizational citizenship behavior

OCB was measured using a 24-item scale developed by Podsakoff et al. (1990). The scale contains 24 items that measure the 5 dimensions of OCB, namely, altruism, courtesy, civic virtue, conscientiousness, and sportsmanship. This scale has been extensively validated and remains one of the most popular operationalization of OCB (Podsakoff et al., 2009). Participants are expected to respond to how much they agreed with each question on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree).

Cultural distance

CD was computed using the Kogut and Singh (1988) index. The CD measure is calculated as

{CD}_{i} = \sum_{i = 1}^{4} [{(I_{ij} - I_{ih})}^{2} / V_{i}] / 4

where,

CD_j stands for the cultural distance between the j^th country and the host country (UAE), I_ij is the index of the i^th cultural dimension of the host country (UAE), I_ih is the cultural dimension index for the individual’s home country, and V_i is the variance of the index in the i^th dimension.

Research setting

The United Arab Emirates (UAE), with an expatriate population of 89% and people of more than 200 nationalities residing in the country, is a highly multicultural society (Government of UAE, 2019). Workplaces in UAE are highly multicultural due to the influx of foreign workers from diverse cultural and religious backgrounds. Professionals in UAE not only need to adjust to the culture of the host country, but also need to be able to simultaneously function with coworkers from different cultural backgrounds. The multicultural environment necessitates individuals to possess such skills that would enable them to function efficiently in not just one culture but many cultures concurrently. “Multiculturalism can be defined as the experience of having been exposed to and having internalized two or more cultures” (Korzilius et al., 2017: 14). Though UAE is a prominent hub for international organizations that bring their global values and code of conduct, yet the values and beliefs of the Emirati culture are strongly embedded in its workplaces and regulate the laws and regulations in the country. The combination of Western schooling and Middle Eastern cultural heritage, while intermixing with a unique blend of Indian, European, African, and New World cultures, has created a unique social structure with no mirror images worldwide (Zaidan, 2016). These values such as openness, worldwide acceptance, and limited corruption are demonstrated every day by the people of the UAE, including at work, whether they are Emiratis or foreign residents (Zaidan, 2016). The UAE is a melting pot of different cultures and has adopted the values of diversity and tolerance, while preserving the identity of their own culture. Thus, the country becomes a perfect research setting to study the manifestation of CQ and its outcomes.

Sampling and data collection procedure

A combination of purposive and snowball sampling procedure was employed in the study (Hair et al., 2015; Saunders et al., 2009). Purposive sampling is a type of non-probability sampling method in which the researcher relies on his or her own judgment when choosing members of population to participate in the study. In snowball sampling technique, the researcher picks the first few participants of the study and asks them to recommend or recruit other individuals who might fit the sample characteristics that the researcher is looking for. The main reason for using this combination of non-probability sampling approaches was to obtain a more representative sample consisting of individuals from different demographical and biographical backgrounds such as national cultures, age groups, gender, industries, etc.

However, in questionnaire-based survey research, social desirability bias is a potential concern. Social desirability bias is a type of response bias in which people tend to answer questions according to how their answers will be viewed by others instead of answering truthfully (Leary et al., 2015). However, in prior anticipation of this potential threat, before and during data collection, several procedural remedies were taken to minimize social desirability bias. The wording of the survey questions was carefully framed to ensure the questions are perceived in neutral light and not lead the respondent to a certain answer. Also, a short description was provided at the start of the survey, which explained the purpose of the survey and re-assuring respondents about the data confidentiality and anonymity to prompt them to answer as honestly as possible (Ananthram, 2016). Further, since the survey is self-administrated and conducted online, the social desirability bias caused by the presence of a researcher is eliminated (Dillman et al., 2014). The respondents could fill them out at their own time and convenience.

Of the 562 respondents identified and questionnaires distributed, 513 usable questionnaires were returned, indicating a response rate of 91%. A single reminder for completing the questionnaires was sent to participants after a period of 1 month. The demographic characteristics of the final responses are shown in Table 1.

Table 1.

Sample characteristics.

Gender		Age (in years)
Male	319	21–30	86
Female	194	31–40	311
		41–50	73
Education		51–60	33
Diploma	29	61 and above	10
Bachelors	238
Masters	243	Nationality
Doctorate	3	American	4
		Bangladeshi	14
Total job tenure (in years)		Belgium	4
1–5	55	British	12
6–10	134	Bulgarian	2
11–15	178	Canadian	2
16–20	58	Chinese	5
21–25	31	Egyptian	31
26–30	31	Filipino	24
31–35	12	French	3
36–40	9	German	11
41–45	3	Indian	252
46 and above	2	Indonesia	3
		Iraqi	4
Industry		Irish	11
Advertising	4	Italian	7
Automotive	9	Jordanian	17
Aviation	6	Lebanese	13
Banking and financial ser.	37	Malaysian	5
Construction	55	Nepali	7
Consulting	26	Pakistani	18
Engineering	28	Romanian	8
FMCG	9	Saudi Arabia	5
Food and beverages	15	South African	1
Healthcare	52	South Korean	8
Hospitality	5	Sri Lankan	17
Information technology	59	Swedish	2
Manufacturing	45	Syrian	9
Media and entertainment	9	Thai	2
Oil and gas	37	Turkish	3
Power and infrastructure	9	Vietnamese	9
Real estate	6
Retail	33	Stay in UAE (in years)
Services	36	1–5	134
Telecommunications	12	6–10	135
Tourism	6	11–15	115
Trade and logistics	15	16–20	52
		21–25	48
		26–30	17
		31 and above	12

Analysis and findings

Before proceeding with the main analysis, it was important to ensure that the data collected were free from non-response and common method bias.

Non-response bias is a concern and can affect the generalizability of the results in survey research. Non-response bias results when the response of the survey participants differs from the theoretical non-participants (Armstrong and Overton, 1977). Non-response analysis gives vital information regarding the representativeness of the sample (Werner et al., 2007). The non-response bias analysis compared early and late respondents. The underlying assumption in this test is that late respondents are likely to behave in the same manner as non-respondents (Lambert and Harrington, 1990). The independent sample t-test showed no significant difference between early and late respondents (Armstrong and Overton, 1977), indicating that non-response bias is not a problem in this study.

Common method bias is concern in questionnaire-based survey research where one respondent is answering all of the self-reported questionnaire involving multiple constructs (Podsakoff et al., 2003). Common method bias (CMB) was assessed in three different ways using SmartPLS 3.2.4 (Ringle et al., 2015). First, we used Harman’s one factor test by performing exploratory factor analysis in which all the items of all the latent variables are constrained to load with one factor with no rotation. The test produced eight factors with the first factor showing only 15.6% (< 50%) of variance (Podsakoff et al., 2012). Next, we performed a marker variable test (Lindell and Whitney, 2001). We identified a marker variable (ratio of respondents’ age to the CD value), which is theoretically unrelated to the constructs used in our conceptual model. The marker variable’s correlation with other constructs of the research model was found to be in the range between 0.02 and 0.08 and the correlations among other constructs did not change when the marker variable was included. The highest amount of squared correlation was found to be 0.008, which shows that the maximum-shared variance is less than 1%. The findings of the marker variable approach suggest no serious issue of common method bias in the data. Finally, we also performed a full collinearity test suggested by Kock (2015). Through this test, variance inflation factors (VIFs) are generated for all latent variables in a model. The results of this test are shown in Table 2. The highest VIF obtained between any pair of constructs was well below the threshold value of 3.3 (Kock, 2015). The above findings confirm that the CMB does not have any serious impact on our study.

Table 2.

Full collinearity test among the latent variables—variance inflation factor (VIF) values.

Latent Variables	BCQ	CCQ	MCCQ	MCQ	ALT	CIVIC	CONSC	COURT	SPORT
Cultural intelligence
Behavioral (BCQ)	—	1.11	1.11	1.08	1.12	1.11	1.11	1.12	1.10
Cognitive (CCQ)	1.08	—	1.07	1.08	1.09	1.07	1.09	1.09	1.09
Meta cognitive (MCCQ)	1.10	1.10	—	1.09	1.10	1.10	1.11	1.11	1.10
Motivational (MCQ)	1.09	1.12	1.11	—	1.11	1.13	1.12	1.13	1.13
Organizational citizenship behavior
Altruism (ALT)	1.20	1.19	1.18	1.17	—	1.18	1.19	1.15	1.18
Civic virtue (CIVIC)	1.21	1.20	1.21	1.22	1.20	—	1.19	1.20	1.19
Conscientiousness (CONSC)	1.22	1.23	1.23	1.22	1.23	1.20	—	1.20	1.17
Courtesy (COURT)	1.23	1.23	1.22	1.23	1.19	1.21	1.20	—	1.19
Sportsmanship (SPORT)	1.23	1.26	1.25	1.26	1.24	1.23	1.19	1.29	—

Exploratory factor analysis

Paine and Organ (2000: 58) contented that “the challenge lies not so much in debating whether OCB exists around the world, but in understanding and defining what constitutes OCB in various cultures and countries.” Individuals in diverse cultures may even define organizational concepts differently, so the first stage of cross-cultural research is to explore the construct under study within the local context and develop culture-specific instruments that are representative of the local context (Tsui et al., 2007). On similar lines, we first tested the five dimensions of OCB within the multicultural context using exploratory factor analysis (EFA). The results of the EFA are depicted in Table 3, which displays a clear factor structure for OCB and thus its validity in a multicultural environment. The cumulative percentage variance for OCB is 51.18%.

Table 3.

Exploratory factor analysis for OCB.

	Component
	1	2	3	4	5
ALT1					0.532
ALT2					0.723
ALT3					0.629
ALT4					0.587
ALT5					0.510
COURT1	0.611
COURT2	0.639
COURT3	0.723
COURT4	0.548
COURT5	0.564
CIVIC1			0.526
CIVIC2			0.696
CIVIC3			0.699
CIVIC4			0.701
SPORT1				0.624
SPORT2				0.687
SPORT3				0.604
SPORT4				0.611
SPORT5				0.512
CONSC1		0.526
CONSC2		0.503
CONSC3		0.697
CONSC4		0.701
CONSC5		0.724

Validity, reliability, and hypotheses testing

We used partial least squares-structural equations modeling (PLS-SEM) to test the proposed model. Our proposed model included two second-order factors, CQ and OCB and these second-order factor models in PLS-SEM were assessed by the procedure suggested by Wetzels et al. (2009). In this procedure, the second-order factors were created with the indicators of their first-order factors (Lohmöller, 1989; Wetzels et al., 2009). First, we checked the validity and reliability of the latent variables proposed in our study and later we tested the hypotheses proposed in the study. Table 4 provides the factor loadings and its cross loadings. Each item was found to satisfactorily load with its respective factor in comparison to its loading with other factors, which establishes satisfactory convergent validity of the first-order measures of the study (Hair et al., 2012).

Table 4.

Confirmatory factor loadings of first-order constructs.

Constructs/Indicators	CQB	CBC	CQM	CQMO	ALT	CIVIC	CONSC	COURT	SPORT
Cultural intelligence
Behavioral CQ (BCQ)
BEH1	0.70
BEH2	0.79
BEH3	0.75
BEH4	0.74
BEH5	0.72
Cognitive CQ (CCQ)
COG1		0.77
COG2		0.77
COG3		0.74
COG4		0.75
COG5		0.78
COG6		0.78
Metacognitive CQ (MCCQ)
MC1			0.71
MC2			0.74
MC3			0.77
MC4			0.72
Motivational CQ (MCQ)
MOT1				0.68
MOT2				0.70
MOT3				0.71
MOT4				0.76
MOT5				0.69
Organizational citizenship behavior
Altruism (ALT)
ALT1					0.57
ALT2					0.75
ALT3					0.58
ALT4					0.69
ALT5					0.56
Civic virtue (CIVIC)
CIVIC1						0.67
CIVIC2						0.76
CIVIC3						0.69
CIVIC4						0.71
Conscientiousness (CONSC)
CONSC1							0.64
CONSC2							0.64
CONSC3							0.73
CONSC4							0.66
CONSC5							0.69
Courtesy (COURT)
COURT1								0.67
COURT2								0.70
COURT3								0.67
COURT4								0.68
COURT5								0.65
Sportsmanship (SPORT)
SPORT1									0.66
SPORT2									0.71
SPORT3									0.63
SPORT4									0.66
SPORT5									0.59

Table 5 provides details of convergent validity and reliability assessment methods such as average variance extracted (AVE), Cronbach’s Alpha, and composite reliability. The value for AVE should ideally be above 0.50, but values above 0.40 are also acceptable, provided the composite reliability is greater than 0.60 (Hair et al., 2012; Fornell and Larcker, 1981). As shown in Table 5, the AVE of all the first-order CQ factors and the civic virtue dimension of OCB was found to be above the cut-off point of 0.50, and for the other dimensions of OCB, the AVE obtained was above 0.40. This establishes the convergent validity of all the first-order constructs of the study. Table 5 also provides second-order factor loadings of CQ and OCB. All the second-order factor loadings of both the variables were found to be significant at p < 0.01 level. In PLS-SEM, the reliability of the measures was assessed by both Cronbach’s Alpha and composite reliability. All the measures of the study were found to have a composite reliability value more than the cut-off value of 0.70, which suggests satisfactory reliability of the measures of the study (Hair et al., 2012). Table 6 provides the mean and standard deviation for CQ and OCB nationality-wise.

Table 5.

Construct reliability and convergent validity.

Constructs	Mean	Standard deviation	Cronbach Alpha	Composite reliability	Second order loadings	AVE
Cultural intelligence
Behavioral (BCQ)	4.15	0.65	0.79	0.86	0.37	0.55
Cognitive (CCQ)	3.82	0.77	0.86	0.89	0.52	0.59
Metacognitive (MCCQ)	4.28	0.63	0.72	0.83	0.23	0.55
Motivational (MCQ)	4.18	0.68	0.76	0.84	0.32	0.51
Organizational citizenship behavior
Altruism (ALT)	4.23	0.67	0.63	0.77	0.71	0.41
Civic virtue (CIVIC)	4.14	0.73	0.68	0.81	0.64	0.51
Conscientiousness (CONSC)	4.23	0.69	0.70	0.81	0.73	0.46
Courtesy (COURT)	4.23	0.69	0.70	0.80	0.77	0.46
Sportsmanship (SPORT)	4.22	0.69	0.67	0.79	0.71	0.43

Table 6.

Major nationalities.

Nationality	Mean		Standard deviation
Nationality	CQ	OCB	CQ	OCB
Indian	4.02	4.21	0.40	0.35
Egyptian	4.18	4.22	0.22	0.38
Filipino	4.01	4.10	0.37	0.38
Pakistani	4.24	4.16	0.30	0.26
Sri Lankan	4.13	4.20	0.17	0.31
Jordanian	4.15	4.01	0.26	0.30
Bangladeshi	4.19	4.19	0.24	0.32
Lebanese	4.11	4.04	0.20	0.40
British	4.25	4.34	0.20	0.22
German	4.28	4.35	0.20	0.21
Irish	4.29	4.32	0.27	0.17

Table 7 provides details of the Heterotrait–Monotrait ratio (HTMT85) method to test for discriminant validity (Hair et al., 2017). In the HTMT85 method, the ratio derived should be less than 0.85 to establish discriminant validity. The HTMT ratios between all constructs were less than 0.85, which further establishes the discriminant validity of the constructs used in our study.

Table 7.

Heterotrait–Monotrait ratio (HTMT) test for discriminant validity.

Constructs	BCQ	CCQ	MCQ	ALT	CIVIC	CONSC	COURT
Cultural intelligence
Behavioral (BCQ)
Cognitive (CCQ)	0.32
Metacognitive (MCCQ)	0.34	0.36
Motivational (MCQ)	0.52	0.301	0.34
Organizational citizenship behavior
Atruism (ALT)
Civic virtue (CIVIC)				0.55
Conscientiousness (CONSC)				0.59	0.44
Courtesy (COURT)				0.65	0.56	0.61
Sportsmanship (SPORT)				0.54	0.50	0.63	0.59

Heterotrait–Monotrait ratio (HTMT)—Off-diagonal elements are the correlations among constructs which are < 0.90, establishing discriminant validity.

The results of the hypotheses testing that include the validation of the structural paths proposed in our study are presented in Table 8. We performed two PLS-SEM analyses. The first included only the total effects of CQ on OCB. The second additionally included the moderation effect of CD. In PLS-SEM, predictive power is explained by the significance of the structural paths (Hair et al., 2012). In PLS-SEM, the significance of the path coefficient was performed by the bootstrapping procedure (with the number of cases equivalent to sample size, and with minimum samples of 5000) included in SmartPLS 3.2.4 (Hair et al., 2012). The total effect model (path coefficient = 0.276 with p-value < 0.001 level) showed a significant effect on OCB. The path coefficients along with the corresponding p-values as shown in Table 8 indicate that the main hypothesis H1a, along with the sub-hypothesis H1b of this study are supported. This indicates that CQ, as well as its sub-dimensions have a positive impact on OCB. However, in the moderation effect (full) model, the impact of CD on the relationship between CQ-OCB (H2a) was found to be non-significant. We also assessed the moderation effect of CD on the relationships between the individual dimensions of CQ and OCB, that is, H2b, and that also was found to be non-significant.

Table 8.

Results of the PLS structural models.

Hypothesized relationship	Path coefficients	t-value	p-value
H1a: CQ → OCB	0.276	5.764	0.000*
H1b: MCCQ → OCB	0.142	2.954	0.003**
H1b: CCQ → OCB	0.026	1.991	0.046**
H1b: MCQ → OCB	0.113	2.354	0.019**
H1b: BCQ → OCB	0.133	2.788	0.006**
H2a: CQ * CD → OCB	−0.022	−0.276	0.782 ⁺
H2b: MCCQ * CD → OCB	0.031	0.572	0.568
H2b: CCQ * CD → OCB	−0.079	1.707	0.088
H2b: MCQ * CD → OCB	−0.064	1.321	0.187
H2b: BCQ * CD → OCB	−0.029	0.804	0.422

^*Significant at p < 0.001, ** Significant at p < 0.05.

Post-hoc analysis

Since the moderation effect of CD was found to be non-significant, we did two further analyses to get more insights from the study. First was concerning the non-significant effects of CD and second was concerning the individual dimensions of OCB. Amongst the respondents, Indians consisted majority of the sample. Though sample of this study is skewed, Indians are the largest expat group in the UAE (Gulf News, 2015). So, to further analyze, we divided the respondents into two groups—Indians and non-Indians and tested the moderation model. We also did a second test, where we divided the respondents into two groups—those from individualistic and collectivistic cultures, and then we tested the moderation model. Both the analysis gave us non-significant results suggesting that the group-wise moderation effect is also non-significant. Furthermore, since the impact of CQ and its individual dimensions on overall OCB was found to be significant, we also wanted to investigate whether CQ has an equal or differential impact on the sub-dimensions of OCB. We tested the same using SEM. The path coefficients along with the corresponding p-values are shown in Table 9. The results indicate that CQ has a significant impact on each of the sub-dimensions of OCB. We next discuss the findings of this study.

Table 9.

Post-hoc analysis.

Hypothesized relationship	Path coefficients	t-value
CQ → ALT	0.258	6.143
CQ → CIVIC	0.244	5.225
CQ → CONSC	0.173	4.527
CQ → COURT	0.193	4.145
CQ → SPORT	0.187	4.599

^*Significant at p < 0.001.

Discussion

The results indicate that hypothesis H1a of this study, that is, CQ will have a positive impact on OCB is supported. Extant literature in OCB has shown that the perceptions of OCB and at times even its dimensions have changed in different cultures. What might be valued as a citizenship behavior in one culture may not be appreciated in another culture. An individual who consistently displays OCB may fault in another culture because they may not be able to understand the cultural underpinnings or context of citizenship behaviors in that particular culture. Thus, when one is in a cultural environment different than their own, it is critical that the individual is able to pinpoint citizenship behaviors acceptable in that culture. This is where CQ comes into picture. CQ provides one with the skills to identify and understand what constitutes OCB in different cultures. This in turn enables individuals to display those valued behaviors. Furthermore, the sub-hypothesis pertaining to the four dimensions of CQ, namely, H1b was found to be significant. Gelfand et al. (2008: 380) stated, “although CQ facets were originally purported to act in concert in influencing behavior, very little research has examined how the dimensions interact in predicting outcomes.” The four dimensions taken together have a positive impact on OCB and enable individuals to succeed in a multicultural environment. The results indicated that individual impact of each of the sub-dimensions is lower but collectively the overall impact is higher. The four CQ sub-dimensions work collectively and enable individuals to comprehend, assimilate, and balance information and ideas from different cultures (Korzilius et al., 2017). The various facets of CQ enhance an individual’s “ability to identify simultaneously with multiple cultures and the resulting capacity for complex thinking” (Korzilius et al., 2017: 16) such as appropriate identification of citizenship behaviors. Our findings validate this assumption that the individual CQ dimensions work together to provide a higher overall CQ effect.

The second hypothesis of this study H2a, that is, CD will positively moderate the relationship between CQ and OCB, is not supported. Fang et al. (2018: 18) suggested that “future research could pay more attention to the specifics of such cultural diversity and examine more closely situational and contextual factors that trigger CQ to function in such settings.” On similar lines, we use CD as a situational moderator that would impact the outcomes of CQ. In order to succeed in a highly multicultural environment, trying to adjust to the host culture is not sufficient, as one needs to gain the competence to function effectively with multiple cultures simultaneously. But findings of the study indicated that the moderation effect of CD was non-significant. This is in line with the null hypothesis of CD stated by Hemmasi and Downes (2013) which asserts that CD “will not be a significant determinant in outcomes” (p. 77). Results of this study concur with some previous studies in literature (e.g., Hemmasi and Downes, 2013; Selmer et al., 2007) that the null hypothesis holds true. The null hypothesis is the assertion that CD will not be a significant determinant in outcomes. It basically means that when one exists in a multicultural environment, the nationality of the individual does not matter, which would impact the kind of outcomes an individual exhibits.

Furthermore, the findings of the post-hoc analysis suggested that CQ had a significant impact on each of the dimensions of OCB. This indicates that CQ has the ability to predict the etic (universal) dimensions of OCB in a multicultural environment. CQ as a capability, enables individuals to exhibit these etic dimensions and be a good citizen whether it is a multicultural environment, a single culture, or even a cross-cultural environment. Thus, CQ is a critical ability to succeed in complex cross-cultural environments through knowledge or cognition, motivation, and behaviors (Yari et al., 2020).

Theoretical contributions

This study contributes to three different streams of research, namely, CQ, OCB, and TAT. It is an asset that the sample of the study is from the UAE, a non-western, educated, industrialized, rich, and democratic (WEIRD) society (Henrich et al., 2010). Furthermore, in a recent meta-analysis of CQ, Rockstuhl and Van Dyne (2018) encourage researchers to include extra-role outcomes such as citizenship performance in CQ research, which is very limited and also theorize the boundary conditions of CQ effects to account for the significant between-study variance in the relationship between CQ and its outcomes. They posit that novelty of cultural situations could be an important boundary condition of CQ effects that could be tested by researchers. This study augments literature on CQ by addressing these gaps in literature within the CQ framework. The study of OCB as a consequence of CQ, to the best of our knowledge, has not been empirically tested in the CQ literature. The findings of this study suggest the ability of CQ to predict not only in-role behaviors but also extra-role behaviors.

The study also explores the impact of context, which is operationalized as CD, and how it affects the relationship between CQ and OCB. Rockstuhl and Van Dyne (2018) state, “more novel cultural situations are likely to pose greater adaptation challenges and will moderate relationships between CQ and intercultural effectiveness” (p. 138). By using CD as a metaphor for cultural novelty, for the context in which the individual functions, this study answers call by researchers (e.g., Ott and Michailova, 2016; Rockstuhl and Van Dyne, 2018; Stoermer et al., 2021) to study the contextual moderators of the relationship between CQ and its outcomes. Furthermore, Ott and Michailova (2016: 14) suggested “theorizing about the interplay among the facets and empirically examining links between the facets and their development or impact on outcomes are needed to deepen the understanding of the CQ construct.” Our study indicates that in a multicultural environment, all the four CQ factors are critical and together they contribute to the display of OCB. This study also contributes to the debate about whether CQ should be represented as a single-factor or a four-factor model (Rockstuhl and Van Dyne, 2018) and recommends that in a multicultural environment, representing CQ as a second-order model would be the most appropriate.

The next stream of research that the study contributes to is that of OCB. Podsakoff et al. (2000) urged researchers to consider the potential impact of culture on citizenship behavior. This study attempts to deviate from the traditional cross-cultural research in OCB by studying the impact of an individual’s cross-cultural capabilities, that is, CQ on OCB rather than the impact of their national culture values. Earley and Calic (2016: 17) suggest that “as scholars move forward to understand the nature of OCB across cultural boundaries, it’s critical for us to look at a person’s capability to understand cultural situations and to engage them proactively and effectively.” Also, prior research in the antecedents of OCB has predominantly focused on job-related attitudes or primarily on individual psychological characteristics (Chou, 2018). Job situations are modifiable by organizations and they can be used to encourage citizenship behaviors. However, individual characteristics or personality traits are relatively stable and quite difficult to modify. On the other hand, a predictor such as CQ can be developed by organizations amongst its employees so that it enhances the display of citizenship behaviors.

Finally, this study contributes to the research on TAT. The current study uses the TAT, a theory traditionally used to study personality traits, to study knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs). This study extends the application of TAT to KSAs, which is very limited (Tett et al., 2013). By using TAT within the ambit of KSAs, the study contributes to a small subset of studies that aim to establish TAT as a unifying model for studying individual differences at work.

Managerial implications

The findings of this study suggest that CQ is important for enhancing the employees’ citizenship behaviors. This further contributes to research in the antecedents of OCB that has predominantly focused individual characteristics (e.g., Chou, 2018). As Rurkkhum and Bartlett (2018: 119) state, “with culturally appropriate identification of OCBs, an organization can articulate specific behaviors that employees and supervisors/managers perceived as extra-role.” This would help HR managers seeking to encourage and facilitate display of culturally appropriate citizenship behaviors at the workplace. Including CQ training as part of an employee’s development plan would enable one to better understand the dynamics and notions of OCB in a culturally diverse workspace. Furthermore, not only the employees, but also managers/supervisors need to undergo CQ training to recognize whether the citizenship behaviors displayed by employees are suitable to the context and contribute positively to performance. Cultural novelty has been used as one of the factors for gauging the appropriateness of job candidates, and the literature on expatriate retention is predominantly based on the notion of cultural novelty (Allen and Vardaman, 2017). In this study, CD did not have any impact on the CQ-OCB relationship, which suggests that the nationality of the expatriate is not contributing to their display of OCB. Organizations do not need to hire individuals from specific nationalities assuming that they would fit well in this environment. Rather than expecting individuals from certain nationalities to exhibit OCB more than others, HR managers and organizations could focus more on CQ training that would further enhance the outcomes of the employees. Also, Khan et al. (2020) posited that OCB exhibited by employees is critical for leaders to attain their common targets and objectives. Hence, developing competencies such as CQ that enhance citizenship behaviors is very critical for organizations.

Limitations and future research

The primary limitation of this study is the self-report nature of the survey. To mitigate this limitation, obtaining work outcome measures from the supervisors or peers would be an optimal study design approach in future research. CQ measure can be obtained from one’s peers and OCB measures could be obtained from the supervisors or vice-versa. Another limitation is that of the study being cross-sectional in nature, which may raise concerns about common method bias. However, statistical results indicated that this potential bias did not significantly affect the findings of this study. Furthermore, the changes in the environment over the period of time that can affect the CQ-OCB relationship have not been taken into consideration. A longitudinal study would mitigate this limitation. Also, data were collected from the UAE. Further study could test this model in other multicultural environments that would further validate the results or provide newer insights in other contexts. Finally, the use of convenience and snowball sampling limits the generalization of the study.

Future research could work on the findings of this study and expand the current study to make it even more comprehensive. The CQ-OCB relationship could be tested by differentiating between corporate expatriation and self-initiated expatriation, where the motivational aspect would be different and might lead to new findings. Also, CQ profiles could be investigated for different groups such as locals, migrants, students, etc., and see what factors affect the development of CQ amongst these different groups. Future research could validate the theoretical extensions, in particular, the sub-dimensions of CQ (Van Dyne et al., 2012) as well as organizational-level conceptualizations of CQ (Ang and Inkpen, 2008). Also, since CD was found to be non-significant, other cultural moderators such as “time spent in a culture” could be tested.

Footnotes

ORCID iD

Raavee Kadam

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