Human Communication Research

Vol. 11, No. 3,Spring 1985,365-386

SOCIAL INFORMATION
AND EMPLOYEE ANXIETY
ABOUT ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE

KATHERINE 1. MILLER
PETER R. MONGE
University of Southern California
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~~~ ~~~~

Studies of job attitudes hove traditionally been conducted on the correspondence

between individuol needs and objective job chorocterisiics. A recently developed
theory, however, suggests thotjob ottitudes may be ofunction ofsocialinformotion
received (Soloncik & Pfeffer, 1978). This investigation used social informotion
processing theory as the bosisfor ostudy of antecedents to employee onxiety about
o move to on open office environment. The structural equation model developed
from social information processing theoryprovedto be ogoodfit to the doto, and o
revised version of the modelprovided an even better occouniingfor the vorionce in
the doto. Anxiety about orgonizotionol change was determined by social in-
formotion, individuol needs, ond job characteristics, with need for privacy having
the lorgesi impact on onxieiy. The model is discussed in terms of its support for
informotion processing iheory, its individuol sign$cont linkages. and the im-
plications for need satisfaction models of job attitudes ond other reseorch on
outcomes in orgonizoiions.

Although it has thus far been applied sparingly by organizational

communication scholars, a theoretical framework that makes an
important link between communication and individual and organi-
zational outcomes is the social information processing theory of job
attitudes (Salancik & Pfeffer, 1978). This theory, a response to
weaknesses of the traditional need-satisfaction models, proposes that
job attitudes are a function of the communicative activities of employ-

Katherine I. Miller is a doctoral candidate, and Peter R. Monge (Ph. D., Michigan State
University, 1972) is Professor of Communication at the Annenberg School of Com-
munications, University of Southern California. We would like to thank Mary Zalesny
and Julia Crystler for assistance in the study and Vince Farace, Gerald Miller, Judee
Burgoon, and Jim Stiff for comments on earlier drafts of this article.
0 1985 International Communication Ass;.

365
366 HUMAN COMMUNICATION RESEARCH / Spring 1985

ees. This article describes a test of social information processing theory

in conjunction with the anxiety employees feel about organizational
change. First, social information processing theory will be discussed as
an alternative to traditional models of job attitudes. Next, a model will
be presented that proposes individual, job, and communicative an-
tecedents to anxiety about organizational change. Finally, a study
testing this model will be reported and the implications of the study for
organizational researchers and managers will be considered.

SOCIAL INFORMATION
PROCESSING THEORY

Salancik and Pfeffer ( 1978) proposed the social information pro-

cessing theory as a response to prevailing need theories of job attitudes
in organizational psychology. Need theories (e.g., Hackman & Lawler,
1971) are based on the three propositions that (1) people have basic,
stable, and identifiable attributes, including needs, (2) jobs have stable,
identifiable characteristics that are relevant to needs. and (3) job
attitudes result from the correspondence between individual needs and
job characteristics.
Need models of job attitudes have been criticized on several grounds
(Salancik & Pfeffer, 1977). First, needs are conceptualized as stable
characteristics of persons. However, theories attempting to delineate the
structure of human needs (e.g., Maslow, 1943), have received little
empirical support. Second, the definition of job characteristics in need
theories has been largely incumbent on the researcher, and character-
istics identified in early research have become the only ones used in more
recent research. Third, the survey methods typically used in studies of
job attitudes may be plagued by problems of consistency effects and
priming effects. Finally, despite the possible artifactual results of
consistency and priming, relatively small effect sizes have been obtained
for the relationship between job characteristics and absenteeism,
productivity, and attitudes such as job satisfaction and organizational
commitment.
To address these criticisms of need satisfaction models, Salancik and
Pfeffer (1978) proposed a theory of job attitudes that is largely
communicative in nature. The theory states that attitudes and needs of
an individual have three determinants: (1) the job or task environmental
characteristics, (2) social information, and (3) the individual’s own
behaviors. Needs are conceputalized as outcomes produced by a person
 Miller, Monge / INFORMATION AND ANXIETY 367

rather than inherent properties of individuals. Characteristics of the job

are included in the model as a determinant of attitudes, but Salancik and
Pfeffer state that “individuals develop attitude or need statements as a
function of the information available to them at the time they express
the attitude or need. The form and content of that expression are
affected by the request for the attitude, the purpose for which it is
requested, and any other fact that might affect the relative saliency of
information relevant to the person deriving the attitude”(1978, p. 226).
Thus, the expression of an attitude will not be based on the corre-
spondence between needs and job characteristics, but will be based on
all available information-specifically, the characteristics of the job,
information received, and the individual’s own behavior.
Salancik and Pfeffer (1978) delineate four ways in which social
information can influence attitudes. First, evaluative statements re-
ceived can serve as an aid in interpreting complex cues or can suggest
ways in which an employee can conform to the work group. Second,
information can structure attentional processes by making aspects of
the environment more or less salient. Third, social information can aid
in the interpretation of environmental cues. Finally, social information
can influence attitudes by aiding workers in the interpretation of needs.
According to Salancik and Pfeffer, “the comment that a job does not
give a person a chance to think implies not only that the job has acertain
feature but that the presence or absence of that feature should be
important to the person” (p. 230).
Close to a dozen studies have been performed to test the validity of
social information processing theory (see Blau & Katerberg, 1982, and
Thomas & Griffin, 1983, for reviews of this research). The majority of
these studies were laboratory investigations in which job characteristics
and social cues were manipulated for students in ad hoc work groups
(e.g., O’Reilly & Caldwell, 1979;White & Mitchell, 1979). Only one field
experiment has been performed to date to investigate social information
processing theory (Griffin, 1983). Almost all research has concluded
that social information plays a substantial role in shaping employee
perceptions and attitudes.
In spite of this strong support for social information processing
theory, these studies exhibit several problems. Substantively, Blau and
Katerberg (1982) point out that researchers have consistently neglected
individual differences that could lead to differential impacts of social
information and the impact of source credibility. Two crucial meth-
odological weaknesses stand out. First, the experimental manipulations
368 HUMAN COMMUNICATION RESEARCH I Spring 1985

in the majority of studies possessed weak external validity in terms of

both tasks and coworkers. It seems likely that the formation of attitudes
about a two-hour task is the same process as the formation of attitudes
about an eight-hour a day job. Similarly, cues received from a stranger
should have a much different impact than those received from
coworkers or supervisors in the organization.
Second, these studies used the a priori task characteristics of the Job
Diagnqstic Survey (Hackman and Oldham, 1975) or the J o b Char-
acteristics Inventory (Sims, Szilagyi, & Keller, 1976) rather than those
appropriate to the experimental task. One of Salancik and Pfeffer’s
(1978) original criticisms of the need satisfaction model was the
somewhat arbitrary labeling of job dimensions that “should” be
important in influencing perceptions. Yet, in testing social information
processing theory, almost all investigations to date have fallen back on
the lists of characteristics typically used in the need satisfaction models.
According to Thomas and Griffin (1983, p. 681), “Theory and mea-
surement must begin to look beyond the traditional concepts of variety,
autonomy, feedback, identity, and significance if meaningful strides in
understanding . . . are to be made.”
There are four ways in which improvements could be made in testing
the theory. First, organizational employees should be studied, rather
than students in ad hoc work groups. Second, attitudes about real tasks
that are part of the job should be examined. Third, the social
information considered should come from coworkers or other or-
ganizational sources. Finally, an effort should be made to consider
characteristics of the job that are relevant to employees, rather than
those developed in past need satisfaction models.
One set ofjob attitudes that has received a great deal of attention in
industrial and organizational psychology is stress and anxiety (for full
review of research, see Cooper 8c Marshall, 1976; McGrath, 1976; and
Schuler, 1980). Like satisfaction, productivity, commitment, and other
outcome variables of interest to organizational researchers, stress has
typically been studied as a response to environmental characteristics or
as a function of personality type, but relationships found have generally
been weak. The research on job characteristics discussed above indicates
that a shift in stress research to considering social information as an
antecedent to occupational stress and anxiety would be appropriate.
Thus, the study discussed in this article examined the effect of different
types of information about a potentially stressful organizational event
on the degree of anxiety experienced by employees. In the next section, a
social information processing model of employee anxiety is presented.
 Miller, Monge / INFORMATIONAND ANXIETY 369

SOCIAL INFORMATIONPROCESSING
APPROACH TO EMPLOYEE ANXIETY

Salancik and Pfeffer’s (1978) social information processing theory

states that job attitudes are a function of the characteristics of the job,
the individual, and social information. The extension of this theory to
the area of occupational stress is straightforward. That is, it is not only
the characteristics of the job or the correspondence of these charac-
teristics to an individual’s needs that lead to stress, but also information
received from coworkers or other organizational sources. Expanding on
Salancik and Pfeffer, social information could influence the deve-
lopment of stress in several ways:

( 1 ) By aiding in the interpretation of needs for a worker (“Taking a break

twice a day shouldn’t be necessary in a job like yours”).
(2) By highlighting characteristics of the environment or work role (‘‘I’ve
never seen a person who has to deal with so many conflicting requests
from management”).
(3) By aiding in interpretation of and reaction to environmental or role cues
(“I’d be nervous as a cat if I had to work in the middle of all this noise and
confusion”).

This framework can also be extended to the explanation of the

anxiety employees feel about a coming event. Again, social information
serves as an influence on the interpretation of needs, environmental
characteristics, and proper reaction, but the information is about a
coming event rather than current work activities. In fact, social
information may well play a particularly crucial role in the formation of
anxiety because the information received cannot be compared to the
experiences of the individual. Figure 1 presents a model of the
development of anxiety from this perspective.
This model has four components: (1) social information (XI), (2)
individual needs (Yz), (3) job/ role characteristics (XZ), and (4)anxiety
about change (Y3). A key feature of this model is that it deals with
anxiety about aspecijkevent, and only variables relevant to that event are
considered as influencesof anxiety. Anxiety is directly influenced by needs
(regression of Y3 on Y2), and job characteristics (regression of Y3 on X2).
Anxiety is indirectly influenced by social information through em-
ployees’ perceptions of information helpfulness (Y I). Job characteristics
and social information (through perceived helpfulness) are also a cause
of perceived needs in this model, because Salancik and Pfeffer (1978)
370 HUMAN COMMUNICATION RESEARCH / Spring 1985

x1 \
\
x2
XI
l
= social information; X 2= job characteristics; Y 1 = perceived helpfulness of
information; Y p = employee needs; Y g = employee anxiety.

Figure 1: Theoretical model of employee anxiety.

suggest that need statements will be based on all inputs available to an

individual.
The three types of social information relevant t o the formulation of
anxiety are those involving (1) needs related to the change, ( 2 )
descriptions of the change, and (3) interpretations of descriptions in
terms of needs. In essence, the first tells people what they want, the
second tells people what they’re getti. 7, and the third tells people why
what they’re getting is (or is not; vhat they want. A message with
complex information should hat!. a greater influence on anxiety than
one that provides simpler information. Thus, interpretive information
should have a greater impact on anxiety than either descriptive or needs
information. The distinction between descriptive and needs information
is less clear. However, stress research has generally found a stronger
relationship between environmental/ job characteristics and stress than
between individual characteristics and stress (Cooper and Marshall,
1976), so it is hypothesized that descriptive information will have a
greater impact on anxiety than need information.

METHODS

The proposed model of anxiety was tested with a field experiment

examining employees anticipating a move to a new environment. The
 Miller, Monge / INFORMATION AND ANXIETY 371

employees were working in traditional offices but were planning to

move to a new building using “open landscaping.”The move represented
a shift in work environment that would radically alter processes for
geting work accomplished. Employees were expecting to move within
six weeks from the time this research was conducted. Thus, the move
was clearly a timely and salient issue to employees involved.

Subjects. Subjects were drawn from a state department of education

in the midwest. Three intact service areas (departments) were used for
the study, a financial aid area employing 90 people, a research area
employing 25 people, and a vocational-technical education area em-
ploying 65 people. There were a total of 180 potential participants; of
these, 146 completed useable questionnaires.

Research design and procedures. In order to assess the impact of

information on employee attitudes, six informational conditions were
considered: (1) negative needs, ( 2 ) positive needs, ( 3 ) negative des-
cription, (4) positive description, (5) negative interpretation, and (6)
positive interpretation. A control condition of no information about the
move was also used.
Because of organizational constraints, only quasi-random assign-
ment to information conditions was possible. A contact person in each
service area set up a schedule, and employees could sign up for a
convenient research session. Because this study was part of a series of
research projects, employees were cooperative about signing up for and
attending research sessions.
At the research session, the researcher gave a brief presentation about
previous results from the research project. The presentation included six
information manipulations; the control group did not receive any
information relevant to the move. Employees were told before the
presentation that management was considering the information for an
upcoming newsletter and that they would be asked their opinion of the
information’s helpfulness in the questionnaire. After the presentation,
questionnaires were distributed. The cover sheet of the questionnaire
contained a brief version of the information given in the presentation.
Employees were asked to fill out the questionnaire and were thanked for
their cooperation.

INSTRUMENTATION

The proposed model includes four components: information, needs,

job characteristics, and anxiety. The operationalization of these vari-
372 HUMAN COMMUNICATION RESEARCH / Spring 1985

ables will be discussed in this section. The questionnaire items used are
included in the Appendix'.

Information. The information component of the model was included

in the research design with two variables. Information about the move
was manipulated through the research presentation and questionnaire
cover letter described in the procedures section. Also, a measure was
included in the instrument to assess the adequacy of information already
received about the move.
The manipulation of information required two forms each of six
messages: positive needs, negative needs, positive description, negative
description, positive interpretation, and negative interpretation. Several
dimensions of these messages had to be controlled. The most important
of these was topic area. The topic had to be relevant, salient, and capable
of both positive and negative treatment.
The topic area chosen was access. It was clear from previous phases of
the study that access to others (and by others) in the organization was
salient to employees and related to open-scape offices. This topic area
has also received theoretical attention in recent years (for example, see
Oldham & Rotchford, 1983). In addition, it is possible to emphasize
either positive (more open lines of communication) or negative (less
privacy) issues of access in open-scape offices.
A second dimension of the manipulation that had to be taken into
consideration was the perceived source of the information. The message
received had to be perceived as originating (at least in part) with
employees of the organization. To do this, each message included
references to results from previous stages of the study. Although it
would have been preferable to use messages more directly attributable
to coworkers, restraints of the organizational setting and experimental
design prohibited this. The length and wording of the manipulations
were also controlled. Each written message consisted of a single
paragraph. The oral messages were each approximately four minutes
long with similar topic ordering and word choice. Three items were also
included in the questionnaire to assess the adequacy of previous
information received about the move. This scale had been used in an
earlier study (N = 450) at the same organization and had proved to be
reliable (a = .86). A nine-point response format ranging from strongly
agree to strongly disagree was used.

Individual needs. Individual needs were operationalized through

items asking about the level of privacy needed and the level of
 Miller, Monge / INFORMATION AND ANXIETY 373

interdependence needed on the job. These needs are directly related to

the information provided and the organizational change. Forms of these
3-item scales were used in a previous study at the organization and were
shown to be quite reliable (privacy, Q! = .86; interdependence, a = .75).

Job characteristics. Many job characteristics might influence anxiety

about open offices. The most general of these is whether the job will be
changed a great deal by the move. For many lower level employees (i.e.,
clerks and secretaries) the move would not involve much adjustment in
work procedures. However, educational consultants would move from
plush offices to midsized cubicles, and would have to make major
changes in work processes. The same held true for managers and
supervisors. Thus, job characteristics (as they impact on the move) were
operationalized as job level (civil service classification). Interviews with
a wide range of employees at the organization clearly suggested that civil
service level was a good indicator of qualitative job differences.

Anxiety. As questions about anxiety must deal with a specific event,

no standard items were available for this variable. Previous stress
research (Kahn, Wolfe, Quinn, Snoek, & Rosenthal, 1964; French
Caplan, & Van Harrison, 1982) was used as a basis for the development
of questions tapping anxiety about the move. A three-question scale was
developed using the keywords “anxious,” “worry,” and “concern.”

information helpfulness. Three items were developed to measure the

perceived helpfulness of information. Employees were asked whether
information about the move was positive, favorable, and appropriate
for publication in a newsletter. Information helpfulness items followed
all other items to guard against consistency and priming effects. These
items were intended in part as a manipulation check. Bagozzi (1980) has
suggested the use of such a variable in causal modeling of experimental
designs.

ANALYSIS

The model of employee anxiety was tested using a two-step analytical

technique. First, the measurement models were analyzed using the
confirmatory factor analysis subroutine of the PACKAGE computer
program (Hunter, Cohen, & Nicol, 1982). After unidimensional measure-
ment models were confirmed, the structural equation model for the
factors was analyzed using the LISREL V computer program (Joreskog
374 HUMAN COMMUNICATIONRESEARCH / Spring 1985

& Sorbom, 1981). A two-step process of this sort is recommended by

McPhee and Babrow (1983).
The confirmatory factor analysis subroutine of PACKAGE allows
the researcher to specify an a priori factor structure. The program then
provides a matrix of correlations among and between cluster items,
correlations between factors, and factor loadings, using communalities
in the diagonal. The unidimensionality of the factors can then be
assessed using three criteria proposed by Hunter (1977): homogeneity of
item content, internal consistency, and parallelism with outside
variables.
The LISREL V computer program provides estimates of parameters
in linear structural equations through the method of maximum
likelihood. LISREL V also provides a goodness of fit test for models
that are overidentified. The model was considered both in terms of
difference from a null model of no relationship (see Bentler & Bonett,
1980), and in terms of fit to the data. Critical values for tests of
individual parameters and model tests were set at alpha = .05. The next
section describes the results of preliminary descriptive analyses, mea-
surement model analyses, and structural equation model tests and
revisions.

RESULTS

PRELIMINARY ANALYSES

Preliminary descriptive analyses were performed using the Statistical

Package for the Social Sciences (Nie, Hull, Jenkins, Steinbrenner, &
Bent, 1975). Of the 146 research participants, 16 received positive
interpretation, 24 received positive description, 21 received positive
needs, 21 received negative interpretation, 12 received negative descrip-
tion, 24 received negative needs, and 28 were in the control condition.
All levels of the organization were well represented in the sample.
Descriptive statistics revealed one anomaly in the data. Respondents
in the control situation did not respond neutrally to the information
helpfulness variable, but responded even more negatively than res-
pondents in the negative interpretation condition. It appeared that any
information about the move was perceived as being more helpful than
no information. To reflect this in the analyses,the seven conditions were
coded as follows: 1 = control, 2 = negative interpretation, 3 = negative
 Miller, Monge / INFORMATION AND ANXIETY 375

description, 4=negative needs, 5=positive needs, 6=positive description,

7 =positive interpretation.

MEASUREMENT MODELS

Five theoretical variables had multiple indicators (previous in-

formation, information helpfulness, privacy needs, interdependence
needs, and anxiety) and these variables were submitted to confirmatory
factor analysis. Criteria proposed by Hunter (1977) were used to
evaluate the proposed measurement models.
The first criterion for unidimensionality is homogeneity of item
content. Items within each factor were derived from standard scales or
written with the goal of tapping a single concept. The items in each
cluster appeared to be homogeneous in content. The second criterion for
unidimensionality is internal consistency, and the third is parallelism
with outside variables.’
The factor clusters for previous information, information helpful-
ness, privacy needs, and interdependence needs all had relatively high
and consistent factor loadings (average loading = .78). Also, the
deviations for internal consistency and parallelism were within a range
expected from sampling error.
However, the measurement model for the anxiety factor did not
appear to be unidimensional. Item 1 (“I feel anxious about the move to
the new building”) had a loading of only .19; the other two items (“I am
not concerned about working in open offices” and “The thought of
working in an open office worries me’? had loadings of .64 and .81. A
reexamination of item content provides a possible explanation for this
situation. Item 1 asked about “the move to the new building”; the other
two items asked about “working in an open office.” Aspects of the move
other than “openness” could explain the low loading of a move-specific
item.
Because of the low item loading, a second confirmatory factor
analysis was performed with only two items in the anxiety factor. A
two-item factor prohibited the examination of internal consistency.
When item 1 was removed, the other two items each had factor loadings
of .74, and the deviations for parallelism were all within a range that
would be expected from sampling error.
In summary, confirmatory factor analyses indicated that uni-
dimensional factors for privacy needs, interdependence needs, help-
378 HUMAN C0MMUNJCAT;ON RESEARCH / Spring 1985

TABLE 2
Model Comparisons

Model Comparison
xzd df P a

Null minus Model 1 2 13.56" .941 .963

Null minus Model 2 212.98" ,958 .961
Null minus Model 3 2 12.92" .974 ,961
Null minus Model 4 211.28" ,972 ,953
Null minus Model 5 217.03" 1.013 ,979
Model 2 minus Model 1 58 .017 ,003
Model 3 minus Model 2 .06 .O16 ,000
Model 4 minus Model 3 1 .64 -.002 ,007
Model 4 minus Model 5 5.75' ,041 ,026

NOTE: Model 1 = Original theoretical structural equation model: Model 2 = Model 1

minus insignificant link between information helpfulness and Privacy needs: Model
3 = Moael 2 minus insignificant link between job level and anxiety; Model 4 = Model
3 minus insignificant link between manipulated information and anxiety; Model 5 =
Model 4 plus link between previous information and Privacy needs.
*Significant value at p < .05.

that was still conceptually consistent with the theoretical framework

provided by social information processing theory.
The revised models considered were tested with a procedure designed
by Bentler and Bonett (1980; see also Fink & Monge, in press) for testing
hierarchically arranged structural equation models with x 2 d values.
Revisions to the model were made in two ways. First, the insignificant
links in the original model were removed in a step-by-step process in
order t o make the model more parsimonious yet retain a good fit to the
data. The links were removed in the following order: (1) information
helpfulness and need for privacy, (2) job status and anxiety, and (3)
manipulation and anxiety. An effort was also made to add any links that
were theoretically consistent and would improve the fit of the model.
The modification indices produced by the LISREL V program indicated
that adding a link between previous information and need for privacy
might significantly improve the fit of the model. As this link is
conceptually consistent with social information processing theory, it
was added in one revised model. A comparison of the four revised
models and the original in terms of goodness of fit, increment of fit, and
difference between models is presented in Table 2.
The original model (Model 1) is not a significantly better fit to the
data than any of the hierarchically arranged revised models, so it is
 Miller, Monge / INFORMATION AND ANXIETY 379

(.076)

See Figure 2 for symbols.

*All coefficients are significant at p < .05 ;standard errors are in parentheses.
Figure 3: Revised model with structural coefficients.

reasonable to choose the model that is most parsimonious. This is

Model 4. However, an addition of the link between previous informa-
tion and need for information does provide a significant improvement in
fit for the model. Thus, the model that provides a good fit to the data in
the most parsimonious manner is Model 5. This model, along with
structural coefficients, is presented in Figure 3.
All of the structural coefficients for Model 5 are significant. The
increment of fit indices indicate that this model provides an excellent fit
to the data (p = 1.013; 6 = .979). However, this model should be tested
and validated with new data before it is fully accepted.

DISCUSSION

The study described in this article extended social information

processing theory (Salancik and Pfeffer, 1978) to the study of employee
anxiety about organizational change. Anxiety (job attitude) was
hypothesized to be a function of individual needs, job characteristics,
and social information. The structural equation model proposed was
significantly different from the null model and provided agood fit to the
data. However, there were three insignificant links, and after modi-
fication a better model was obtained. This model will be explored
380 HUMAN COMMUNICATION RESEARCH / Spring 1985

further by examining three areas: the relative impact of the determinants

of anxiety, the determinants of privacy needs, and the determinants of
information helpfulness. Then, two issues not directly related to the
model will be considered. The first of these is the impact of inter-
dependence needs, the second is the impact of the manipulation.

Determinants of anxiety: relative impact. Information, needs, and

job level (mediated by need for privacy) all influence anxiety. However,
an examination of the structural coefficients in the model indicates that
the three factors did not have an equal impact on anxiety-need for
privacy had a much greater impact than social information.
There are several possible explanations for the importance of needs
over information. First, it’s possible that needs are a more important
determinant of job attitudes than Salancik and Pfeffer (1978) would
suggest. Perhaps the need satisfaction model should not be rejected
whole-heartedly but should be modified to consider only the most
pertinent needs. Second, the organizational situation could also account
for this result. Privacy was clearly a central issue in the move. Finally,
the discrepancy in effect size could be a function of the strength of
manipulation.

Determinants of needs. Perceived need for privacy was strongly

influenced by job level in the model, and was also influenced by previous
information. Salancik and Pfeffer suggest that needs are a function of
social information, and the obtained model provides partial support for
this contention. However, the informational variable with an impact on
needs was previous information, not the manipulation itself or the
helpfulness of information variable. It appears that an accumulation of
information over time is needed to influence perceptions of needs that
might be strongly held. This model also suggests that researchers pay
close attention to the role that “objective” job characteristics play in
creating individual needs.

Determinants of information helpfulness. The variable o f infor-

mation helpfulness was designed as a quasi-manipulation check.
Because the study was dealing with a “real” situation, previous
information received was also included as a cause of this variable.
Salancik and Pfeffer (1978) state that the most salient information
available will be used in formulating attitude statements. They also
suggest that recency will in large part determine the salience of
information.
 Miller, Monge / INFORMATION AND ANXIETY 381

The results of this study contradict that portion of social information

processing theory. The manipulation and previous information had
virtually equal impact on information helpfulness, the manipulation did
not have a direct impact on anxiety, and previous information did have
a direct impact on perceived privacy needs. The negative coefficient in
this latter relationship indicates that an increase in information, in this
case about the move to an open office environment, leads to a decrease
in perceived need for privacy. This finding suggests that recently
obtained information (at least of the strength used in this study) will not
have an overriding impact on statements of job attitudes. The ac-
cumulation of information appears to be as important a determinant of
attitudes as recent information, a position recently articulated by
Woelfel and Fink (1980). Moreover, in the statement of needs, the
accumulation of information seems to be more important than recently
obtained information.

Impact of interdependence needs. Perceived need for interdepen-

dence was originally proposed as one of two individual needs that would
be affected by social information and in turn would positively influence
anxiety about open offices. Because the zero-order correlations of this
factor with all other variables were so low, the variable was dropped
from the model. The lack of impact of interdependence needs has an
interesting implication.
Interdependence is one of the job characteristics originally identified
by Hackman and Lawler (1971) as a determinant ofjob attitudes. The
failure of this factor to fit into the model points to the inadequacy of
these traditional variables. One possible explanation is that all of the
traditional job characteristics as measured by the Job Description
Survey (JDS; Hackman & Oldham, 1975) are general indicators of job
satisfaction. Hunter (1983) in a reanalysis of the data used to develop the
JDS found that there was a second-order factor model in which all of the
subscales were indicators of one general factor. This could explain why
one subscale variable of the J D S was not effective in predicting a specific
job attitude such as anxiety.

Impact of manipulation. A second issue outside the model that is

worth considering is one raised during preliminary data analysis.
Individuals receiving no move-related information had perceptions of
the information that were even more negative than the negative
interpretation condition. The implications of this result are clear. It
appears that individuals felt that any information, even information
382 HUMAN COMMUNICATION RESEARCH / Spring 1985

that emphasized the negative aspects of the move, was more helpful than
no information about the move. This emphasizes the strong need
employees apparently felt to reduce uncertainty about the move to the
new building. This result, then, could be limited to attitudes that, like
anxiety, deal with reactions to the unknown. When dealing with
attitudes about the current work environment, negative information
could well be perceived more negatively than no information, as there is
less need to reduce uncertainty about the unknown.
It should also be noted that the impact of the manipulation was
relatively small. There are several possible explanations for this. First, it
is possible that employees had already learned as much about the move
as they needed to, and the additional information had little impact.
Second, it is possible that the information was perceived as coming from
an unknown source, the researcher, rather than from coworkers or
management. This could have mitigated the impact of the manipulation,
possibly because the credibility of the researcher was lower than that of
organizational sources.

MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS

The results of this study have several implications for organizational

managers interested in improving employees’ attitudes toward work or
the organization or helping them adjust to organizational change. First,
managers should be cognizant of the multiple determinants of job
attitudes. The traditional remedy for dissatisfaction with work is job
enrichment. However, this study indicates that change in the task may
not be enough. Rather, managers should also be aware of employee
interaction and consider information a means of reducing anxiety and
stress, improving worker satisfaction, or influencing other job attitudes.
Second, this research indicates that any information is better than no
information, so managers facing change should try to provide em-
ployees with as much information as possible. Third, this study showed
a very strong influence of privacy needs on anxiety. Managers should
attempt to isolate needs relevant to the change and see that the needs are
being met in the new situation and help employees to know that their
needs are being considered.
These suggestions may also apply to situations beyond the general
organizational change situation. On the individual level, organizational
entry represents a time of maximal uncertainty. This study and social
information processing theory suggest that reducing this uncertainty
through information on needs, objective characteristics of the job, and
 Miller, Monge / INFORMATION AND ANXIETY 383

the interpretation of new experiences could ease the trauma of

organizational entry. Louis (1980) makes a similar suggestion in her
discussion of organizational entry as a “sense-making” activity.

DIRECTIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH

This research suggests several avenues for future research that should
be of interest to organizational communication scholars studying the
impact of communicative activities on the formation of job attitudes.
First, the social information processing theory should be tested with a
variety of outcome variables to determine if the theory provides a viable
explanation for the formation of a wide range of job-related attitudes.
Work with traditional outcome variables such as job satisfaction,
organizational commitment, and job involvement could provide further
support for Salancik and Pfeffer’s (1978) theory. An extension of the
model to the area of job stress and organizational socialization could
also be valuable.
In future studies of all outcome attitude variables, care should be
taken to insure the external validity of the research. The formation of
work stress should be studied with employees facing the challenges of
their every day work, not with college sophomores receiving conflicting
or overloading work assignments in a two-hour task. Future research in
this area should also strive to consider elements of the work environment
that are most relevant to the outcome under investigation. The high cost
of doing research in organizations has made scholars wary of collecting
any data using untried measurement instruments. This is good;
researchers should strive for valid and reliable measures of the variables
in their theories and models. However, organizational research has
almost reached a point where the phrase “job characteristics” is
synonymous with “autonomy, variety, task identity, interdependence,
and feedback.” This has proved to be a hindrance in the study of job
attitudes, as there has been little search beyond these variables for
factors relevant in the production of specific job attitudes.
Two final areas of research could be very useful in developing and
testing Salancik and Pfeffer’s (1978) social information processing
theory ofjob attitudes. First, this study pointed to the contrast between
accumulated and recently received information. Salancik and Pfeffer
suggest that recent information will be most salient in influencing job
attitudes, but this study and the work of Woelfel and Fink (1980) casts
some doubt on that position. Valuable insight could be drawn from a
study that simultaneously tracked the introduction of information and
384 HUMAN COMMUNICATION RESEARCH / Spring 1985

the formation of job attitudes in an organization. Such research could

address the critical questions of how much accumulated information is
necessary to influence attitudes, how lasting the effects of social
information are, and whether or not there is a lag time between the
provision of information and a change in job attitudes.
Finally, future research should attempt to explore the difference in
the impact of formal and informal information. Salancik and Pfeffer’s
(1978) theory emphasizes the importance of the informal commu-
nication among coworkers in influencing attitudes and gives little
consideration to formal information provided t o employees by
management in an organization. Research comparing these two
information sources could help to isolate the qualities of information
that make the largest impact on employees, and provide further insight
into the process of job attitude formation in organizations.

NOTES

1. The informational manipulations used in the research can be obtained from the
authors at the Annenberg School of Communications, University of Southern California,
University Park, Los Angeles, CA 900894281,
2. Tables for factor loadings, deviations for internal consistency, deviations for
parallelism, and all correlation matrices are available from the authors upon request.

APPENDIX: QUESTIONNAIRE ITEMS

ANXIETY

(1) I feel anxious about the move to the new building.

(2) I am not concerned about working in open offices.
(3) The thought of working in an open office worries me.

NEED FOR PRIVACY

(1) I often have to discuss private matters at work without being overheard.
(2) It is not important that I have privacy to get my job done.
(3) I need a quiet work area to get my job done.

NEED FOR INTERDEPENDENCE

( I ) I often have to meet or check with other people in the department in

order to d o my job.
 Miller, Monge / INFORMATION AND ANXIETY 385

(2) I often have to cooperate directly with other people in the department in
order t o d o my job.
(3) My job requires me to work closely with others employed here.

PREVIOUS INFORMATION

( I ) The information I have received about the Street Building

has:
(a) been timely
(b) been useful
(c) adequately answered my questions about the move

INFORMATION HELPFULNESS

(1) The information provided was:

(a) positive
(b) favorable
(c) appropriate for publication in our newsletter.

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