Attitudinal ambivalence during the organizational change: Response amplification and individual difference

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of social pressure on ambivalent attitude holders' loyalty towards and participation in organizational change. Thereby, response amplification hypothesis was used. The secondary purpose of this study was to examine whether the effects of social pressure on loyalty towards and participation in change are differentiated by individual differences. Individual differences were categorized by the level of internal and external locus of control. The subjects of this research consisted of 230 employees in a middle-sized Korean company. The results show that ambivalent attitude holders were more loyal towards change but actually less participated in change. This study also found that individuals experiencing ambivalence were less loyal towards change but more participated in change in the presence of social pressure. Different from expectation, ambivalent attitude holders with higher level of external locus of control were more loyal towards change and more participated in change in the absence of social pressure. There were no significant differences in individuals with higher level of internal locus of control. Practical implications were discussed.