Nonwork role importance as a moderator to the congruence-satisfaction relation

Individuals are attracted to occupational environments that align with their interests and personality characteristics (Holland, 1985, 1997). When an individual's attributes (i.e., needs, abilities, values and/or interests) align with the occupational environment's characteristics an individual is more satisfied. Past research suggests this relation is modest at best, hovering between .20 and .30 (Meyer et al., 2001, c.f. Wilkins & Tracey, 2014), with slightly higher estimates (ranging from .24 to .35) depending on how the variables of person and environment were measured (Kristof-Brown, Zimmerman, & Johnson, 2005). Several factors contribute to such low estimates, most notably the role of moderator variables in suppressing or exacerbating the true magnitude of this relation. A moderator that has yet to be explored is that of nonwork role priority, or the degree to which an individual's work identity is valued relative to other role identities. In the current study, three hypotheses were posited to investigate nonwork role priorities as a potential moderator to the congruence-satisfaction relation. Latent class analysis was used to apply a person-centered approach to understanding response patterns and differences in these roles. The sample was differentiated best by a two-class solution and the class variable in all three hierarchical regression models explained about five percent of the variance in job satisfaction, which suggests that work and nonwork role priority are meaningful to understanding individual career happiness. Class was not identified as a significant moderator to the congruence-satisfaction relation. Discussion of limitations to the current study and recommendations for future work in this area are presented.