Is the job satisfaction-job performance relationship spurious? A meta-analytic examination

The job satisfaction-job performance relationship has attracted much attention throughout the history of industrial and organizational psychology. Many researchers and most lay people believe that a causal relationship exists between satisfaction and performance. In the current study, however, analyses using meta-analytic data suggested that the satisfaction-performance relationship is largely spurious. More specifically, the satisfaction-performance relationship was partially eliminated after controlling for either general personality traits (e.g., Five Factor Model traits and core self-evaluations) or for work locus of control and was almost completely eliminated after controlling for organization-based self-esteem. The practical and theoretical implications of these findings are discussed. (C) 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.