Perceived unemployment, psychological empowerment, affective and continuance commitment among non-standard workers in the Nigerian financial institutions

Abstract

The study investigated the relationships between perceived underemployment, psychological empowerment, affective and continuance commitment among non-standard workers in the Nigerian Financial institutions. The participants consisted of 181 employees sampled from 15 commercial banks in Nsukka urban and Enugu capital city, southeast Nigeria. They are casual workers or those on temporary employment. Underemployment was measured with a 13- item scale based on measures used in previous research on underemployment. Psychological Empowerment Scale (PES) was used to assess employees' psychological empowerment. Affective and continuance commitment were measured with the 8-item affective commitment Scale and the 7-item continuance commitment scale. The results of the study showed that perceived underemployment was not related with affective commitment. Perceived underemployment was negatively related with continuance commitment. The results also showed that psychological empowerment was positively related with affective and continuance commitment. The implications of the findings were discussed, limitations highlighted and suggestions for further studies were offered.