“Well, I’m tired of tryin’!” Organizational citizenship behavior and citizenship fatigue.

Abstract

This study seeks to identify workplace conditions that influence the degree to which employees feel worn out, tired, or on edge attributed to engaging in organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) and also how this phenomenon, which we refer to as citizenship fatigue, is associated with future occurrences of OCB. Using data collected from 273 employees and their peers at multiple points in time, we found that the relationship between OCB and citizenship fatigue depends on levels of perceived organizational support, quality of team-member exchange relationships, and pressure to engage in OCB. Specifically, the relationship between OCB and citizenship fatigue is significantly stronger and positive when perceived organizational support is low, and it is significantly stronger and negative when the quality of team-member exchange is high and pressure to engage in OCB is low. Our results also indicate that citizenship fatigue is negatively related to subsequent acts of OCB. Finally, supplemental analyses reveal that the relationship between OCB and citizenship fatigue may vary as a function of the specific facet of OCB. We conclude with a discussion of the key theoretical and practical implications of our findings.