Career Success and Personal Failure Experiences and Type A Behaviour

Author(s): Ronald J. Burke and Eugene Deszca

Source: Journal of Occupational Behaviour, Vol. 3, No. 2 (Apr., 1982), pp. 161-170
Published by: Wiley
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3000082
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 JOURNAL OF OCCUPATIONAL BEHAVIOUR, Vol. 3, 161-170 (1982)

Career success and personal failure experiences

and Type A behaviour1

RONALD J. BURKE
York University

and

EUGENE DESZCA
York University

SUMMARY

This study examines the relationship of Type A behaviour to career experiences associated
with feelings of personal failure (Korman and Korman, 1980). Seventy-five managers com-
pleted the Jenkins Activity Survey, a widely used paper-and-pencil index of Type A
behaviour, and measures of various career experiences. The data provided concurrent vali-
dation of the Korman's model and also showed Type A behaviour to be significantly related
to career outcomes reflecting disappointment, alienation and personal failure. A case is
made for the inclusion of Type A in career research. Implications for careerists and their
organizations are offered.

INTRODUCTION

The present investigation examines selected career experiences of individuals in

organizations in association with Type A behaviour (Friedman and Rosenman,
1974). Type A behaviour is learned through socialization and is behaviour which
allows an individual to cope with fears and anxieties generated by particular beliefs
individuals develop about their environment (Price, 1980). Type A behaviour is
characterized by: high achievement strivings or unbridled ambition, competitive-
ness, time-urgency, aggressiveness or free-floating hostility, undertaking two or
more activities simultaneously, rapid walking, talking, and eating, and the appear-
ance of tension. Type B behaviour is characterized by opposite qualities. Glass
(1977) has described Type A/B behaviour as alternative methods of coping with
one's environment, particularly challenge and stress.
Type A behaviour was implicated as a risk factor leading to death from coronary
heart disease over 20 years ago (Friedman and Rosenman, 1974). Since that time,
longitudinal investigations with large samples have shown that (1) Type A's are
three times as likely as their Type B counterparts to die from CHD, holding other
risk factors constant; (2) Type A's who survive their first heart attack are more
likely to have a second than are Type B's; (3) Type A's exhibit a greater severity of
coronary atherosclerosis than do Type B's; (4) Type A behaviour is predictive of
coronary heart disease but no other disease entity (e.g. ulcers, diabetes, rheuma-

'This research was supported by a research grant from Imperial Oil Limited.

0142-2774/82/020161-10$01.00 Received 9 June 1981

OC 1982 by John Wiley & Sons- Ltd. Revised 1 October 1981

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162 R. J. Burke and E. Deszca

tism) and; (5) more extreme or highly developed Type A behaviour is associated
with greater risk of coronary mortality (Jenkins, 1976a, b; Dembroski, Weiss,
Shields, Haynes and Feinleib, 1978).
Our own research (Burke, Weir and DuWors Jr., 1979; Burke and Weir, 1980)
has indicated that Type A behaviour has a negative impact on (1) marital satisfac-
tion, and (2) personal, home and family life of both job incumbents and their
spouses. In addition, other data (Howard, Cunningham and Rechnitzer, 1977)
indicated that Type A's work more hours per week and travel more days per year in
the conduct of their jobs. Burke and Weir (1980) found Type A's to be involved in
their jobs, more identified with their organization but not more satisfied with their
job than their Type B counterparts. Type A's reported greater feelings of compe-
tence, niastery and self-esteem in their occupational role than did Type B's. In
summary, the Type A manager invests more of himself in the occupational milieu
than does the Type B, and experiences less satisfaction in his private life than does
the Type B (Davidson and Cooper, 1980).
A quite separate body of research and writing has appeared during the past
decade on mid-life and mid-career distress and on the work-family interface.
Examples would include Grieff and Munter (1980), Bartolome and Evans (1980),
Feinberg (1980), Levinson (1969), Machlowitz (1980), and Korman and Korman
(1980). These writers highlight the dilemmas managers face in attempting to bal-
ance investments in personal and professional lives. They note that some managers,
typically in middle age, although successful at their careers often admit that they
have failed in their private lives.
This study bridges the Type A literature and the career and life experience area.
It considers the relationship of Type A behaviour to various career experiences,
some of which address the personal failure phenomenon. The general hypothesis
was that Type A individuals would be more susceptible to career success and
personal failure experiences than would their Type B counterparts. Type A indi-
viduals invest more in work, yet are not more satisfied in their jobs than Type B's;
Type A's are less satisfied with their marriages; Type A's are less open to the joys
available in everyday life experiences. As such, Type A's were hypothesized to be
more likely to have made career and life trade-offs which they would later come to
regret.

METHOD

Subjects

Seventy-five individuals participated in the research by completing a lengthy ques-

tionnaire. Data was collected from two samples during management development
seminars. The first sample consisted of 30 men in senior management positions
attending a two week residential seminar. The second sample consisted of 45
individuals, mostly male, in beginning (but in some cases middle management)
management positions. Ages ranged from 22 to 52 (X = 33.2, S.D. = 8.46); 86 per
cent were male; 70 per cent were married, 26 per cent were single, 4 per cent were
divorced; 52 per cent were college graduates and an additional 26 per cent had
taken post-graduate training; 87 per cent reported greater job responsibilities now,
than 5 years earlier; 53 per cent had 4 or more job title changes during the past 10

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 Type A Behaviour: Relationships 163

years; and 43 per cent of the sample were making in excess of $30 000 at the time
of the study. A wide range of functions and organizations were also observed. If
there is a potential bias in this sample, it might be that the respondents were more
motivated and successful in their careers than managers in general. The data were
collected anonymously.

Measures

Career success and personal failure

Several measures of career experiences were employed. All had been used pre-
viously (Korman and Korman, 1980). A total of 12 career experiences, some central
to the 'career success and personal failure' phenomenon, were examined. These
included:

(1) Workaholism (During most of my career, I have put almost all my energies
into my work to the exclusion of other things).
(2) Lack of growth (I have constantly learned new things on my job).
(3) Disconfirmed expectancies (I have found that going along with the system
has not brought as much satisfaction as I thought it would).
(4) External locus of control (Much of my work success has been due to fortu-
nate circumstances).
(5) Lack of affiliative satisfaction (As I have become increasingly successful, I
find that my relationships with my childhood family and friends have become
distant).
(6) Lack of equity (I have found good work to be recognized and rewarded).
(7) Contradictory role demands (I have often felt conflict between my career
goals and my religious values).
(8) Lack of work interest (Projection of men who are disinterested in working).
(9) Fear of failure (Projection of successful managers reporting difficulties with
anxiety).
(10) Social alienation (Projection of the divorce rate for executives and high level
professionals).
(11) Personal alienation (Projection of the number of executives who have 'drop-
ped out' of the business world during the last five years).
(12) Work experiences scale (Accuracy to respondent of paragraph-feeling that
life has passed them by-to description of their own experiences).

Type A behaviour

This concept was measured by the Jenkins Activity Survey (Jenkins, Rosenman and
Friedman, 1967), one of two widely used measures of Type A behaviour (the other
being the structured interview developed by Friedman and Rosenman (1974) that
have been validated using coronary heart disease criterion. When the structured
interview and the Jenkins Activity Survey have been used together, interview
behaviour pattern ratings and the Jenkins Activity Survey scores corresponded 73
per cent of the time (Jenkins, Zyzanski and Rosenman, 1979). The Jenkins Activity
Survey, form C, contains 52 items, and yields 4 scores: Type A, speed and impa-
tience, job involvement and hard driving. Research findings have shown that the

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164 R. J. Burke and E. Deszca

Type A score, but not the three sub-scale scores, are associated with coronary
morbidity (Jenkins, Zyzanski and Rosenman, 1979).

RESULTS

Reliability of career experiences measures

Although data from the measures of career experiences have been reported else-
where (Korman and Korman, 1980), estimates of the reliabilities of the measures
have only recently been presented (Korman, Wittig-Berman and Lang, 1981).
Table 1 shows the number of items and the internal consistency reliabilities (coeffi-
cient alpha) for each of the 12 measures. In general, these results were disappoint-
ing. In only two cases (disconfirmed expectancies, social alienation) did the
reliabilities approach 0.70; only half were above 0.50. Korman, Wittig-Berman and
Lang (1981), also obtained low reliabilities.

Intercorrelations among the career experiences measures

Table 2 presents the intercorrelations among the career experiences measures.

Forty of these correlations (67 per cent) reached statistical significance at the 0.05
level of confidence. All were positive in sign. Thus career experiences of workahol-
ism were positively associated with career experience of disconfirmed expectancies,
high external locus of control, and high fear of failure.

Table 1. Reliabilities of measures and career success and personal failure and the JAS

Reliability
Number of items Mean S.D. coefficieni

Workaholism 6 17.6 3.21 0.14

Lack of growth 2 4.2 1.60 0.50
Disconfirmed expectancies 5 13.4 3.53 0.66
External locus of control 12 28.6 3.90 0.20
Lack of affiliative satisfaction 10 26.7 4.75 0.41
Lack of equity 3 8.1 1.92 0.19
Contradictory role demands 5 11.2 3.59 0.44
Lack of work interest 5 0.94 1.70 0.51
Fear of failure 4 10.3 1.90 0.50
Social alienation 20 56.6 7.68 0.69
Personal alienation 16 36.6 5.45 0.54
Negative work experience 5 11.4 2.36 0.24

Jenkins Activity Survey

Type A 21 2.7 8.10

Speed and impatience 21 0.3 8.48
Job involvement 24 7.1 6.66
Hard driving 20 -3.5 8.70

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 Type A Behaviour: Relationships 165

tp<0.5 tp<0.1
*p<0.1

inters
demans
aliento ofcntrl

exprincs
satifcon
expctanis

(12)Negativwork

Table2.Intrcoimgsufaexprnc

(1)Personal0.36* (10)Socialent.4*36 (9)Fearofilu0.4*13t (8)Losfwrk0.912t- (7)Contribuyle0.14-32 (6)Lackofequity0.27-94*31 (5)Lackofitve0.21*9837 (4)Externalocus0.2165*384t (3)Disconfrmed0.5*418-27t30. (2)Lackofgrwth0.47*93128640.
(1)Workahlism0.2t-643* 10.95
(2)345678910

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166 R. J. Burke and E. Deszca

Considering the last three career experiences as important outcomes (soci

ation, personal alienation, negative work experiences) the data indicated that
several other career experiences were related to these. Thus, lack of growth was
related to personal alienation; disconfirmed expectancies to all three; external
locus of control to two of the three; lack of affiliative satisfaction to all three; lack
of equity to all three; contradictory role demands to personal alienation; and fear of
failure to personal alienation.

Career experience and Type A behaviour

Table 3 shows the relationships between the four scales of the Jenkins Activity
Survey (Type A, speed and impatience, job involvement, hard driving) and t
various measures of career experience. Individuals scoring higher on the Type A
measure also reported greater workaholism, greater lack of affiliative satisfaction,
greater fear of failure, greater social alienation and more negative work experi-
ences.
Individuals scoring higher on the speed and impatience scale also reported
greater workaholism, greater lack of growth, greater disconfirmed expectancies,
greater lack of affiliative satisfaction, greater fear of failure, greater social aliena-
tion, greater personal alienation, and more negative experiences.
Individuals scoring higher on job involvement also reported more workaholism,
but this was accompanied by less lack of growth, and less sense of external locus of
control. Finally, individuals scoring higher on hard driving also displayed greater
workaholism but less lack of growth and less sense of external locus of control.
Interestingly the direction of some of the relationships between the Type A and
speed and impatience scales of the JAS produced relationships with several of the

Table 3. Career experiences and Type A behaviour

Jenkins Activity Survey

Speed and Job Hard

Career experiences Type A impatience involvement driving

Workaholism 0.36* 0.20t 0.26t 0.20t

Lack of growth -0.13 0.32t -0.28t -0.32t
Disconfirmed expectancies -0.05 0.23t -0.14 0.00
External locus of control -0.09 0.17 -0.26t -0.20t
Lack of affiliative -0.28t 0.40* -0.05 -0.08
satisfaction
Lack of equity 0.15 0.17 -0.06 0.07
Contradictory role demands -0.05 0.11 -0.17 -0.09
Loss of work interest 0.05 0.12 0.07 -0.05
Fear of failure 0.33t 0.32t 0.14 -0.09
Social alienation 0.31t 0.21t -0.08 0.12
Personal alienation 0.16 0.35t -0.18 -0.09
Negative work experiences 0.25t 0.27t -0.18 0.02

*p <0.001.
tp <0.01.
tp <0.05.

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 Type A Behaviour: Relationships 167

Table 4. Result of multiple regression analyses

R 2 B

Workaholism
Type A 0.12 0.34

Lack of growth
Speed and impatience 0.14 0.59
Type A 0.32 -0.40
Job involvement 0.38 -0.25

External locus of control

Job involvement 0.06 -0.25

Lack of affiliative satisfaction

Speed and impatience 0.14 0.37

Fear of failure
Type A 0.08 0.28
Social alienation
Type A 0.12 0.34
Personal alienation
Speed and impatience 0.15 0.38

career experiences measures that were opposite to those found between the job
involvement and hard driving scales.
Table 4 shows the results when the four scales of the Jenkins Activity Survey
were regressed (used as multiple regression predictors) on the various career
experience and career outcome measures. No significant and independent corre-
lates were found for five of the career measures. The Type A scale was significantly
and positively related to: workaholism, fear of failure and social alienation and
significantly negatively related to lack of growth. The speed and impatience scale
was significantly and positively related to lack of growth, lack of affiliative satisfac-
tion and personal alienation. The job involvement scale was significantly related
to lack of growth and external locus of control. Finally, the hard driving scale
produced no significant and independent correlates with the measure of career
experiences.

DISCUSSION

Although the measures of career experiences had minimal reliabilities (Table 1),
they produced predictable relationships with each other (Table 2) and with some of
the scales from the Jenkins Activity Survey (Table 3).
The data provided fairly convincing concurrent support for the model of career
success and personal failure developed by Korman and Korman (1980). Consider-
ing both personal and social alienation, and the negative work experiences meas-
ures as important career outcomes, several other career experiences were found to
be significantly related to these. In particular disconfirmed expectancies, external
locus of control, loss of affiliative satisfaction, lack of equity, and fear of failure (a
measure of anxiety) produced strong relationships.

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168 R. J. Burke and E. Deszca

Thus, managers who expected particular outcomes or experiences to be associ-

ated with successful pursuit of their careers and who did not have these expecta-
tions confirmed were more likely to be alienated and disappointed. Similarly mana-
gers who conclude that several aspects of their work and personal lives were con-
trolled by agents or events beyond their control also registered greater alienation
and disappointment. The same pattern was present for managers who felt that the
pursuit of their careers was accompanied by the drifting apart from their spouses,
children and extended family and friends. Finally, managers who felt that rewards
were not always meted out fairly were more likely to report alienation and disap-
pointing work experiences.
The general hypothesis underlying the present investigation was that Type A
behaviour would be related to various career experiences, particularly those illus-
trative of personal failure. These expectations were borne out by both the Type A
scale and the speed and impatience scale (Table 3). Managers displaying greater
Type A behaviour were more anxious (fear of failure) and reported sacrificing and
losing friendships and family more than Type B's and were more alienated socially
and more disappointed with their work experiences. An even more dramatic pat-
tern was evident when the speed and impatience scale was considered. This scale is
similar to the 'hurry sickness' or extreme time urgency that Friedman and Rosen-
man (1974) implicate as a key defining characteristic of Type A's. Individuals
characterized by more extreme speed and impatience (hurry sickness) exhibited
stronger workaholic tendencies, greater sense of stagnation and lack of growth,
greater realization of disconfirmed expectancies, greater admission to loss of inti-
mate relationships and friendships, and greater anxiety as embodied in the fear of
failure construct. In addition these individuals also reported greater personal fail-
ure experiences (personal and social alienation) and were more prone to describing
disappointing work experiences as fitting their own realities.
The Job Involvement and Hard Driving scales of the Jenkins Activity Survey
revealed fewer significant relationships with the career experiences measures and
some of these were in the opposite direction to those present on the Type A and
speed and impatience scales. Thus individuals who were more involved with their
jobs and were characterized as more hard driving reported more growth in their
work and a diminished sense of being controlled by agents or events outside their
control. All four scales of the JAS were related to the workaholism measure in the
same way.
In summary, the findings indicated a number of significant relationships between
both the Type A and speed and impatience measures and career outcomes charac-
teristic of personal failure. These relationships were always indicative of more
undesirable career experiences and outcomes.
The 1970's witnessed an increased interest in the area of careers in general, and
the 'costs' or 'prices' associated in some cases with careerism. The workaholic has
been both damned (Oates, 1978) and praised (Machlowitz, 1980). Difficulties in
balancing one's commitments and investments in both professional and private
lives have been examined (Bartolome and Evans, 1979). Identification of factors
associated with the career success and personal failure syndrome undertaken
(Korman and Korman, 1980). Trade-offs which managers are often forced to m
have been identified (Greiff and Munter, 1980). The present study adds to t
growing literature by showing the relationship of Type A behaviour to adverse

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 Type A Behaviour: Relationships 169

career experiences. But several questions remain. What is the relationship between
Type A behaviour, workaholism and personal failure? Are they essentially over-
lapping concepts or are they conceptually distinct? In addition, although a relation-
ship was found between Type A behaviour and particular career experiences and
outcomes, the underlying mechanisms or processes through which one influenced
the other were not identified or assessed. Why would a manager ignore early
warning signs that particular career and home and family outcomes are not satisfy-
ing and continue to push ahead in a singular fashion with his career? The social
learning model developed by Price (1980) to explain the acquisition and mainten-
ance of Type A behaviour sheds light on the latter question.
The Type A behaviour construct appears to be a useful one for consideration in
career-research. It represents a relatively stable individual difference variable about
which much is known. It has been found to influence non-work experiences or
personal lives of both job incumbents and their partners in an adverse way. Type A
behaviour is usually valued positively by organizations, and has been found to be
related to several work variables such as job involvement, occupational self-esteem,
organizational identification, and number of hours worked per week and number of
days travelled per year. Payne (1975) has even proposed the existence of what he
calls Type A work. Finally the results of the present study indicated that Type A
behaviour related systematically to particular career experiences.
There is at least one practical implication which derives from this research. Type
A behaviour can be modified although the process is a difficult one given the
reluctance of Type A's to consider changing their behaviour. But the prospect of
enhancing mid-career experiences of personal success through reducing one's
harmful Type A habits during an earlier career stage is present.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

We would like to thank Richard DuWors for help in analysis of the data and Leona
Burns for preparing the manuscript.

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Author's address:
Professor R. J. Burke, Faculty of Administrative Studies, York University, 4700 Keele
Street, Downsview, Ontario M3J 1P3, Canada.

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