Content area
Full text
Although organizational research on age has largely focused on the age-performance relationship, the relationships between age and job attitudes have received less attention. Guided by socioemotional selectivity theory, this paper provides a comprehensive meta-analysis of the relationships of chronological age with the 35 job attitudes most frequently studied as its correlates. Results of meta-analyses from more than 800 articles indicate that the relationships between chronological age and favorable attitudes (and/or to less unfavorable attitudes) toward work tasks, colleagues and supervisors, and organizations are generally significant and weak to moderate in strength. Moderator analyses also revealed that organizational tenure, race, gender, education level, and publication year of study moderate the relationships between age and job attitudes. Based on these findings, we make recommendations for future theory development and empirical research on age in organizational settings. We also discuss the implications of our findings for practice.
Recent international labor statistics show that the average age of the workforce has been increasing, both in the United States and around the world. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the mean age of the American workforce has been increasing over the last few decades - 35 years old in 1980, 37 years old in 1990, 39 years old in 2000, and 41 years old in 2008. Today more than half (54%) of the U.S. workforce is between 40 and 75 years old. This trend toward an older workforce is also evident worldwide. For instance, International Labor Organization statistics indicate that the age 25-29 cohort was the largest segment of the working population in developed countries in 1980. However, today the largest segment of the working population in developed countries is the age 45-49 cohort.
Prompted by this changing age profile of the workforce, researchers have become increasingly interested in examining how age affects productivity. For instance, there have been multiple reviews of the relationship between age and job performance, most recently one conducted by Ng and Feldman (2008). These authors concluded that age was related to some (but not all) dimensions of job performance, with older workers being more likely to engage in extra-role behaviors and less likely to engage in counterproductive behaviors. Older workers, then, continue to matter to organizations beyond their sheer numbers; they contribute...