To adjust or not to adjust in the host country? Perspective of interactionism
| Published date | 12 February 2018 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/ER-12-2016-0237 |
| Date | 12 February 2018 |
| Pages | 329-345 |
| Author | Chao-Chih Hung,Tzung-Cheng Huan,Chun-Han Lee,Hsin-Mei Lin,Wen-Long Zhuang |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Industrial/labour relations,Employment law |
To adjust or not to adjust in the
host country? Perspective of
interactionism
Chao-Chih Hung
Boarke Machine Company Limited, Taichung City, Taiwan
Tzung-Cheng Huan
Graduate Institute of Sports and Health Management,
National Chung Hsing University, Taichung, Taiwan
Chun-Han Lee
PhD Program in Strategy and Development of Emerging Industries,
National Chi Nan University, Nantao, Taiwan
Hsin-Mei Lin
Department of International Business Studies, National Chi Nan University,
Nantou, Taiwan, and
Wen-Long Zhuang
PhD Program in Strategy and Development of Emerging Industries,
National Chi Nan University, Nantao, Taiwan
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship of regulatory foci (promotion focus and
prevention focus) to expatriate adjustments (general, interaction, and work adjustments) and explore whether
mentoring functions (psychosocial support, role modeling, and career development) moderate the
aforementioned relationship.
Design/methodology/approach –Using 141 questionnaired primary data (response rate 32.25 percent)
gathered from at least six months experienced expatiates of multinational companies in six industries, this
study adopts regression method to examine the moderating effect.
Findings –This study found that promotion focus was positively related to the interaction and work
adjustment, respectively; prevention focus was positively related to the general, interaction, and work
adjustment, respectively. Psychosocial support function moderates the relationship between promotion focus
and general adjustment. Career development function moderates the relationships between promotion/
prevention foci and work adjustment.
Originality/value –According to the interactionism perspective, behavior is a result of the interaction
between personality and situational influences, has a long history in social and personality psychology.
This study extends this perspective to the interactive effects of mentorship (situational factor) and
expatriates’regulatory foci (personality factor) on expatriate adjustment.
Keywords Promotion focus, Prevention focus, General adjustment,Work adjustment, Interaction adjustment
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
In an increasingly globalized world, an important component of international human
resource (HR) management in multinational companies (MNCs) is the expatriation of
employees to foreign countries (Froesea and Peltokorpi, 2011). As is pointed by Templer
(2010), the expatriation is rather challenging. The cost is very high both for expatriates and
the organization. As many as one out of four managers leave, or intend to leave their
employer within one year of repatriation (Black et al., 1999; Selmer, 1999). Therefore,
international enterprises should confront the issue of failed expatriation.
Employee Relations
Vol. 40 No. 2, 2018
pp. 329-345
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0142-5455
DOI 10.1108/ER-12-2016-0237
Received 12 December 2016
Revised 21 August 2017
Accepted 30 August 2017
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0142-5455.htm
329
Perspective of
interactionism
In the estimation of some researchers, 20-40 percent of expatriates return to the home
country prematurely (Black and Mendenhall, 1989; Kim and Slocum, 2008). Regarding the
influential factor of failed expatriation, Tung (1987) believed that the main cause lies in the
failure in adjusting to the host country culture. To broaden the research scope of expatriate
adjustment and enhance our understanding of expatriate adjustment, previous research
highlights the importance of expatriate studies of non-western countries since most related
studies were done in western countries (Okpara and Kabongo, 2011).
Black (1988) proposed three facets of expatriate adjustment: general adjustment
(non-work activities), interaction adjustment with host country nationals (HCNs), and work
adjustment (essentials roles related to work). Hence, if expatriates adjust well in the host
country, they would be able to accomplish the assigned task from parent company. Thus,
MNCs must consider the qualities the employees are supposed to have to be selected for
expatriate assignments. The study believes that the regulatory focus theory (RFT) might be
helpful in exploring expatriates’adjustment issues in the host country.
The RFT (Higgins, 1996, 1997) proposes two strategies to attain the goals, promotion focus,
and prevention focus. Individuals with promotion focus view hope and eagerness as goals, and
those with prevention focus view responsibility and obligation as goals. The two foci assume
that individuals adopt separately eager strategy or vigilant strategy in pursuing their goals.
Eager strategy involves ensuring the presence of positive outcomes, and avoiding the lack of
positive outcomes whereas vigilant strategy involves ensuring the absence of negative
outcomes, and ensuring against the presence of negative outcomes (Higgins et al., 2001).
The above-mentioned statements suggest that expatriates’promotion focus drives them to hope
to complete expatriate assignments, while expatriates’prevention focus makes them consider
the assigned task as responsibility and obligation. Therefore, it seems that both expatriates’
promotion focus and prevention focus are beneficial for them to mentally prepare themselves to
adjust to the host country. However, in the expatriate literature, expatriates’regulatory foci are
rarely explored (e.g. Lee et al., 2017). Therefore, the researchers believe that examining the effect
of expatriates’regulatory foci on host country adjustment can enrich the expatriate literature.
It is worth noting that some scholars have recently been paying attention to
expatriates’ties with others in the host country –network ties, as well as the roles played
by these ties, such as the key support resources that facilitate expatriate adjustment. (e.g.
Chiu et al., 2009; Farh et al., 2010; Johnson et al., 2003; Manev and Stevenson, 2001; Wang
and Kanungo, 2004). Mentorship is a special form of social network. Mentorship offers
three functions: psychosocial support, role modeling, and career development (Scandura,
1992). Nonetheless, the specific role of mentors in the international context remains
theoretically underdeveloped (Allen et al., 2004). Meanwhile, mentorship has been proven
to be an effective mechanism to facilitate expatriate adjustment. For example, Feldman
and Thomas (1992) found that international mentoring helped the socialization,
development, and retention of junior expatriates. Other studies echoed this finding
(Crocitto et al., 2005; Harvey and Wiese, 1998). This study responds to a call by Lee et al.
(2017) for more study on the situational factors affecting the relationship between
regulatory foci and expatriate adjustment. According to the interactionism perspective,
behavior is a result of the interaction between personality and situational influences, has
a long history in social and personality psychology (Diener et al., 1984; Endler and
Edwards, 1986). This study extends this perspective to the interactive effects of
mentorship (situational factor) and expatriates’regulatory foci (personality factor) on
expatriate adjustment.
According to the above, this study presents two research questions:
RQ1. Do promotion focus and prevention focus affect expatriates’general adjustment,
interaction adjustment, and work adjustment in the host country?
330
ER
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