Age As Moderator of The Relationship of Proactive Personality With Training Motivation Perceived Career Development

Journal of Organizational Behavior
J. Organiz. Behav. 32, 248–263 (2011)

Published online 4 January 2011 in Wiley Online Library
(wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/job.670
Age as moderator of the relationship of

proactive personality with training
motivation, perceived career development
from training, and training behavioral
intentions
MARILENA BERTOLINO1*, DONALD M. TRUXILLO2
AND FRANCO FRACCAROLI1
1
Department of Cognitive Science and Education, University of Trento, Trento, Italy
2
Department of Psychology, Portland State University, Portland, Oregon, U.S.A.
Summary Based on changes in motivation thought to occur across the lifespan, we investigated whether
age would moderate the relationship between proactive personality and three training-related
variables: training motivation, perceived career development from training, and training
behavioral intentions. A survey was completed by 252 municipal government employees.
As hypothesized, participants’ age moderated the relationship between proactive personality
and these outcomes. Specifically, there was generally a more positive relationship between
proactive personality and the outcomes for younger participants than for older participants.
Our discussion focuses on implications for training in organizations and recommendations for
practice. Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Introduction
Research into older workers has accelerated due to the aging population. For example, the number
of U.S. workers over age 55 is expected to grow at nearly four times the rate of the overall labor force by
2012 (Alley & Crimmins, 2007). Thus, it is useful to examine the factors that may influence older
workers to continue to contribute in the workplace and to understand how older workers’ skills,
interests, and motivations may differ from those of younger colleagues. As a result, research has begun
to examine how age may affect outcomes such as work attitudes (e.g., Gaillard & Desmette, 2008), goal
orientation (e.g., Ebner, Freund, & Baltes, 2006), work motivation (e.g., Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004),
personal initiative at work (e.g., Warr & Fay, 2001), and training and development activities
(e.g., Greller & Simpson, 1999; Maurer, Weiss, & Barbeite, 2003).
* Correspondence to: Marilena Bertolino, who is now at University of Nice Sophia-Antipolis, Laboratoire de Psychologie
Cognitive et Sociale, 24 avenue des Diables Bleus, 06357 Nice, France. E-mail: marilena.bertolino@unice.fr
Received 1 December 2008

Revised 21 September 2009
Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Accepted 29 September 2009
AGE AND PROACTIVE PERSONALITY 249
Today many training programs are being offered to employees in addition to the many types of
training offered outside of the employment setting. Given this range of choices, employees now have
greater opportunities for learning and development, but also have increased responsibility for getting
the training that will enhance their careers. Indeed, today’s workers can be ‘‘free agents’’ in their own
careers (Major, Turner, & Fletcher, 2006), implying that they must actively pursue training and
development opportunities to be successful. Further, several studies have pointed out the importance of
training and development activities for the organization and individuals (e.g., Maurer & Tarulli, 1994;
Maurer et al., 2003).
Research has also shown that individual differences may be important predictors of engagement in
training and development activities, especially when the activities are voluntary (e.g., Major et al.,
2006; Maurer & Tarulli, 1994; Warr & Birdi, 1998). People participate in these training and
development activities in order to learn new job skills, extend existing skills, or grow their careers.
Major et al. (2006) demonstrated the importance of proactive personality (e.g., Seibert, Crant, &
Kraimer, 1999) in training and development. Specifically, Major et al. found that proactive personality
predicted motivation to learn and that it was indirectly linked to development activity.
Maurer et al. (2003) presented a comprehensive model to explain the main effects of age in work-
related development activities, examining the effect of age on development-related variables such as
training motivation and training behavioral intentions. However, no research to date has explicitly
examined how age differences may moderate the relationship between personality variables and
training and development activity, that is, how age may moderate the effects of personality on training-
related variables. Because motivation appears to mediate the effects of personality on work-related
outcomes (e.g., Barrick, Stewart, & Piotrowski, 2002), and because there may be differences in types of
work motivation due to age (Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004), it is important to see if personality variables
such as proactive personality are differentially related to training-related variables for older and
younger workers. Examining the moderating effects of age on the relationship between proactivity and
training-related outcomes is also important in light of meta-analytic evidence that age differentially
affects work outcomes (Ng & Feldman, 2008).
The present study fills this gap by investigating whether age moderates the relationships between
proactive personality and three development variables: training motivation, perceived career
development opportunity, and behavioral intentions (cf., Maurer et al., 2003). Specifically, we
examined whether proactive personality has a differential relationship with these development-related
variables for younger workers and older workers, perhaps due to differences in what motivates younger
and older workers (e.g., Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004). Our specific point is not that older and younger
workers differ in terms of proactive personality, but that proactive personality will result in different
motivational mechanisms and thus different outcomes for older and younger workers. As such, this
study integrates models of work motivation and aging (e.g., Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004) with research
on the role of proactive personality in training motivation and outcomes (e.g., Major et al., 2006) and
research on the role of age in development activity (e.g., Maurer et al., 2003).
Proactive personality, motivation, and age
Bateman and Crant (1993) developed the concept of proactive personality, which is defined as a
relatively stable tendency to effect environmental changes. Individuals with a prototypical proactive
personality take action to influence their environments, or ‘‘identify opportunities and act on them,
show initiative, take action, and persevere until meaningful change occurs’’ (Crant, 2000, p. 439).
Proactive individuals show a willingness and determination to pursue a course of action, characteristics
that are central to models of self-development (Antonacopoulou, 2000). Proactive personality has been
Copyright # 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. J. Organiz. Behav. 32, 248–263 (2011)
DOI: 10.1002/job
250 M. BERTOLINO ET AL.
linked to objective (salary and promotions) and subjective (career satisfaction) indicators of career
success (e.g., Erdogan & Bauer, 2005; Rauch & Frese, 2007; Seibert et al., 1999). Moreover, proactive
personality has been shown to explain additional variance in both objective and subjective career
success even after accounting for other predictors such as demographics, motivation, type of
organization, and type of industry (Seibert et al., 1999).
Importantly, Major et al. (2006) found that proactive personality was related to training outcomes
such as motivation and behavioral intentions, although they did not examine moderator variables such
as age which may affect the relationship between proactive personality and training-related outcomes.
However, there is reason to believe that age may moderate the relationship between proactive
personality and training-related outcomes, as research suggests that people focus on different types of
motivation across the adult lifespan. Kanfer and Ackerman (2004) argue that the motivational
structures of older and younger employees may differ due to changes across the life span in terms of
certain individual differences (e.g., fluid intelligence), organizational rewards, and career situations.
Thus, older workers may focus less on training at work than their younger counterparts. Accordingly,
Ebner et al. (2006) found that while younger individuals were more focused on growth in their goal
orientations, older individuals were more focused on maintenance. Similarly, Freund (2006) found that
younger adults were more likely to persist in optimizing performance, while older adults persisted in
minimizing losses. Given these effects of age on motivation, and given evidence that motivation
variables such as goals mediate the effects of personality on job behaviors (e.g., Barrick et al., 2002), it
seems likely that age may moderate the relationship between proactive personality and training
motivation and training behavioral intentions. Specifically, we expected that proactivity would be more
strongly associated with training-related outcomes for younger workers than for older workers.
Taken together, this research on differences in the motivation of younger and older adults (e.g., Ebner
et al., 2006) and motivational differences between older and younger workers (e.g., Kanfer &
Ackerman, 2004) suggests that older and younger workers may manifest proactivity differently in
organizational settings, and that the meaning of being ‘‘proactive’’ may be different for older and
younger workers. In other words, older and younger workers do not necessarily differ in their levels of
proactivity; in fact, research has generally found non-significant correlations between age and
proactivity (e.g., Erdogan & Bauer, 2005; Harvey, Blouin, & Stout, 2006; Seibert et al., 1999). Rather,
we argue that older and younger workers may manifest proactivity on the job in different ways.
Whereas younger workers may focus on career development activity, older workers may hold more
generative motives (e.g., Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004), and thus focus on activities such as mentoring,
group processes, and organizational citizenship behavior. For these reasons, proactive personality
should have a differential relationship with training motivation, perceived career development
opportunity, and intentions to participate in training and development activities for younger and older
workers. Specifically, proactive personality should be positively related to these training-related
outcomes for younger workers, for whom training is instrumental to their careers. But this relationship
should be less positive for older workers, for whom the benefits of training such as career development
are less interesting and relevant.
We are not aware of other studies that have investigated the moderating effects of age on the
relationship between proactive personality and training-related outcomes, but we consider this to be an
important topic for organizations and researchers alike. As noted, proactive personality is a critical,
motivation-focused individual difference variable focused on seeking opportunities in one’s
organizational setting. In general, the more proactive employees are, the more likely they are to
show initiative and motivation regarding training and to see training as important, assuming that
training affords them opportunities in the organization. For younger workers, proactivity is likely to be
focused on job-related training and development activity because they see it as a vehicle for career
development. Proactive older workers, on the other hand, will be less focused on training and
DOI: 10.1002/job
development activity, perhaps focusing instead on mentoring and maintenance activities (cf., Ebner
et al., 2006; Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004). This difference in the manifestation of proactive personality
for older and younger workers could lead to a differential impact on development variables such as
training motivation, perceived career development from training, and training behavioral intentions. In
short, proactive personality may differentially predict these training and development outcomes for
older and younger workers.
In summary, the outcomes in our model are based on the motivational and behavioral categories
included in Maurer et al.’s (2003) model of the role of age in development activity. However, rather than
focusing on the main effects of age, we now examine age as a possible moderator. Although researchers
have separately examined the effects of age (Maurer et al., 2003) and proactive personality (Major
et al., 2006) in development activity, the combined role of age and proactive personality has not been
examined. Thus, in the present study we looked at the interactive effects of age and proactive
personality on training and development-related variables.
Hypotheses
Training motivation
Training motivation refers to the tendency to engage in training and development activities, to learn
training content, and to embrace the training experience (cf. Carlson, Bozeman, Kacmar, Wright, &
McMahan, 2000; Noe, 1986). Major et al. (2006) found that proactive personality predicted motivation
to learn in a training context. However, according to Kanfer and Ackerman’s (2004) review, the
strength of such achievement motives may decline as workers age. In contrast, younger individuals are
more focused on career success (Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004). Thus, research suggests that the value of
training may be lower among older workers, especially since training is less useful to older workers in
the organizational context. In this sense, the instrumentality of the training to achieving work-related
goals may be lower for older workers. Thus, while proactive younger workers will recognize the
instrumentality of training to learn new job skills, a proactive older worker will be less likely to do so.
For these reasons, we expected that the relationship between proactive personality and training
instrumentality motivation would be moderated by age.
Hypothesis 1: Workers’ age will moderate the relationship between proactive personality and
training instrumentality motivation. Specifically, there will be a more positive relationship between
proactive personality and training motivation for younger workers than for older workers.
Perceived career development from training

The reality of today’s work context suggests that organizations can no longer promise steady upward
mobility or lifelong employment (Farr, Tesluk, & Klein, 1998). Instead, work conditions may require
employees to continually learn new skills and acquire new knowledge (Hedge, Borman, & Lammlein,
2006). Thus, career development now involves more periodic cycles of skill learning, mastery, and
‘‘reskilling’’ in order to reach new positions, jobs, and assignments throughout a person’s career.
Further, factors that may affect employees’ perceptions of opportunities for career development are
important to examine.
DOI: 10.1002/job
Taking part in training activities is influenced by individual characteristics such as proactivity (e.g.,
Major et al., 2006), in the sense that more proactive people would be more likely to take part in
voluntary developmental activities. Moreover, highly proactive people are more likely to actively seek
out and identify new opportunities (Seibert et al., 1999). However, opportunities for career
development (such as training) are more relevant for younger workers than older workers because they
may have a greater impact on a younger worker’s career growth. As such, highly proactive older
workers may not perceive training as a particularly relevant opportunity. The opportunity-seeking
aspect of proactive personality is therefore unlikely to be manifested in terms of training opportunities
for older workers. We thus believed that the relationship between proactive personality and perceived
opportunity for career development offered by training would be moderated by age.
perceived career development from training. Specifically, there will be a more positive relationship
between proactive personality and perceived career development from training for younger workers
than for older workers.
Training behavioral intentions
More proactive people are thought to be more likely to take part in training programs and development
opportunities in order to maintain internal and external marketability (e.g., Arthur & Rousseau, 1996;
DeMeuse, Bergmann, & Lester, 2001; King, 2004). Empirically, Major et al. (2006) found proactive
personality was linked to development activity through the mediating role of motivation to learn.
However, learning new skills may be more relevant for younger adults, who are focused on getting
ahead, than for older adults, who are less focused on career advancement (e.g., Kanfer & Ackerman,
2004). In addition, research shows that younger adults are more persistent than older adults in realizing
a task that offers the possibility for optimizing performance (Freund, 2006). Thus, while proactive
younger persons may be more concerned with acquiring new knowledge and skills that will enable
them to reach their career goals, proactive older adults may focus on different goals, particularly for
training designed to provide skills needed for career advancement. Thus, we expected that proactive
personality would be manifested differently at different life stages, and that its relationship with
training behavioral intentions would be lower for older workers, for whom the training would be
perceived as less instrumental to career advancement.
training behavioral intentions. Specifically, there will be a more positive relationship between
proactive personality and training behavioral intentions for younger workers than for older workers.
Method
Participants and procedure
Participants were 272 employees of a municipal government in Northeast Italy. The sample was
composed of employees working in the administration, technical bureau, and accounting office, all
having a permanent working contract. Employees who work at the technical bureau perform tasks such
as town planning and design, and planning, managing, and controlling public works. Moreover, they do
DOI: 10.1002/job
drafting and survey work as part of building code enforcement. Employees who work in the accounting
office and administration perform tasks such as processing payments, counting pension contributions,
and performing welfare duties. They also deal with fiscal/tax reports, calculate internal balances, and
arrange monthly and annual fiscal reports for the government.
With regard to the work arrangements (contracts) employees have in this organization, level A is the
lowest level contract, and D is the highest level contract, which includes a range of jobs except at the
director level. (Contracts are a typical way of classifying work assignments in public organizations in
Italy.) In our sample, no participants belonged to the level A group, 16 participants belonged to level B,
18 belonged to level D, and the majority of the sample had a level C contract.
From the initial sample (N ¼ 272), because 14 participants did not totally complete the questionnaire
and six participants did not indicate their age, we excluded them from all data analyses, so the final
sample was based on 252 employees. This resulted in a final response rate of 94.85 percent among those
contacted. Their mean age was 40.60 (SD ¼ 8.30, Mode ¼ 40, Median ¼ 40.00) with a range from
21 to 60. Thirty-four percent of the samples were men, 64 percent were women, and 2 percent (five
participants) did not indicate gender. With regard to education, 4.3 percent had less than high school,
72.5 percent had a high school diploma, 18.2 percent had a university degree, and 2.3 percent had a post
university degree; 2.7 percent (seven participants) did not indicate their education. With regard to
organizational tenure, 14.7 percent had less than five years of experience with the organization, 15.9
percent had between 5 and 10 years, and 67.8 percent had more than 10 years of experience. The
training offered by the organization covered a range of issues such as new rules of the registry office and
vital statistics; training in management accounting; and training regarding privacy rules and the
treatment of personal data. Participation at these training programs was voluntary.
Participants were asked to fill out a survey on their perceptions regarding their proactivity, training
motivation, perceived career development from training, and training behavioral intentions. One
hundred and thirty one participants (Mage ¼ 40.35; SD ¼ 8.70) completed the survey during their
participation in one of the training programs, and the other group of participants (N ¼ 121;
Mage ¼ 40.84; SD ¼ 7.87) completed the survey during their break on the job. Note that these two data
collection groups did not differ in terms of mean (t(250) ¼ 0.47, ns) or variance (F ¼ 1.88, ns) for age.
Participants were assured of the confidentiality and anonymity of their responses, and they returned
the survey directly to the researchers.
Measures
To the extent possible, we chose established measures from the literature. An English version of the
items used in this study is in the Appendix. We used the following procedure to translate the proactive
personality and training motivation items into Italian from the original English. First, the items were
translated into Italian by two native Italian speakers. Second, the items were translated back into
English by a bilingual translator. Third, the items were checked by two of the authors to be sure their
meaning was correct.
Proactive personality
We measured proactive personality based on five positively worded items of the proactive personality
scale (Seibert et al., 1999). Although the original scale was composed of 10 items, in this survey we
retained only those items that could be meaningfully translated into Italian and back translated into
English. Respondents were asked to assess the extent to which they believed the items described
themselves. Responses were on a 7-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly
agree). A sample item is ‘‘I am constantly on the lookout for new ways to improve my life’’ (a ¼ 0.67).
DOI: 10.1002/job
Training motivation
Participants’ training motivation was assessed by two items adapted from the instrumentality subscale of
Truxillo and Weathers’ (2005) training motivation scale which is based in expectancy theory (Vroom,
1964). Responses were given on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly
agree). An example item is ‘‘My completion of this training will make me a better worker’’ (a ¼ 0.82).

Perceived career development from training in the organization was assessed by a 7-item scale from the
original 15 of Battistelli and Odoardi (2004). These items focused on the perceived likelihood of
various results workers would obtain as a result of training provided in their organization in the coming
years. Items were on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (not likely at all) to 5 (absolutely likely).
Sample items are ‘‘Contribute to improve the work in my organization’’ and ‘‘Improve my current level
of discretion and responsibility’’ (a ¼ 0.88).
Training behavioral intentions

One item assessed participants’ behavioral intentions to participate in training programs in the near
future, rated on a ‘‘yes’’ ‘‘no’’ scale (‘‘Do you plan to take part in training programs in the next six
months?’’). We chose this period of time because the following six months was when participants were
most likely to take part in the several training programs offered by their organization. Moreover, the
different types of training were usually offered repeatedly over a period of months so that all employees
would have the chance to receive training and so that offices would not need to close (i.e., if all
employees attended training at the same time).
Demographic information
The demographic section of the questionnaire asked questions about the participants’ age, gender,
education level, and organizational tenure. Participants’ age was measured by an open-ended question.
Participants’ gender, educational level, and organizational tenure were evaluated using a multiple-
choice response format.
Results
Means, standard deviations, intercorrelations, and a reliabilities are presented in Table 1. A review of
the correlation matrix indicates a non-significant correlation between age and proactive personality
(r ¼ 0.11, ns), which is consistent with past research (e.g., Erdogan & Bauer, 2005; Harvey et al.,
2006; Seibert et al., 1999). Although proactive personality was related to training motivation, r ¼ 0.24,
p < 0.01, it was not correlated with training behavioral intentions, r ¼ 0.03, ns, nor with perceived
career development from training, r ¼ 0.04, ns.
We used hierarchical regression to test Hypotheses H1 and H2. Hypothesis 3 was tested via logistic
regression. The three dependent variables in these equations were training motivation (H1), perceived
career development from training (H2), and training behavioral intentions (H3). Because gender was
correlated with at least one of the dependent variables and could be related to available opportunities
for development, we used it as a control variable. We centered (e.g., Aiken & West, 1991) the main
effects (i.e., set the mean equal to 0) in order to reduce multicollinearity between the main effects and
interaction term. The use of standardized scores to center variables also facilitates interpretation of the
difference in regression slopes at 1 and þ1 standard deviations from the mean. The control
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Table 1. Means, standard deviations, intercorrelations, and a reliabilities among all the variables
Variables M SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
1. Age 40.60 8.30

2. Gender 0.65 0.48 0.34 —
3. Educational level 1.20 0.54 0.11 0.02 —
4. Org. tenure 1.53 0.76 0.61 0.19 0.08 —
5. Proactive personality 5.70 0.76 0.11 0.07 0.06 0.12 (0.67)
6. Training motivation 3.80 0.73 0.02 0.06 0.08 0.03 0.24 (0.82)
7. Training behavioral intentions 0.67 0.47 0.06 0.08 0.09 0.00 0.03 0.13

8. Perceived career development 3.29 0.64 0.29 0.20 0.01 0.15 0.04 0.20 0.34 (0.86)

from training
Note: Gender was coded: 0 ¼ men, 1 ¼ women; educational level was coded: 0 ¼ less than high school, 1 ¼ high school diploma,
2 ¼ university degree; 3 ¼ post university degree; organizational tenure was coded: 0 ¼ less than five years, 1 ¼ between 5 and 10
years, 2 ¼ more than 10 years.

p < 0.05; p < 0.01.
variable (gender), participants’ age (centered), and proactive personality (centered) were entered on
Step 1. The interaction term, which was the product of age and proactive personality, was entered on
Step 2. Hypotheses 1 and 2 were tested using OLS regression. Hypothesis 3 was tested using logistic
regression because training behavioral intentions is a binary variable. These results are presented in
Table 2.
Hypothesis 1 stated that workers’ age and proactive personality would interact to affect training
motivation (i.e., instrumentality), such that there would be a more positive relationship between
proactive personality and training motivation for younger workers than for older workers. Results
supported Hypothesis 1, as indicated by the significant increase in R2 with the addition of the
interaction term on Step 2, DR2 ¼ 0.01, F(1, 245) ¼ 4.00, p < 0.05. As shown in Figure 1, for younger
workers there was a stronger relationship between proactive personality and training motivation, but
this relationship was weaker for older workers.
Hypothesis 2 predicted that age and proactive personality would interact to affect perceived career
development from training, such that there would be a more positive relationship between proactive
Table 2. Hierarchical OLS regressions and logistic regression for age, proactive personality, and their interaction
on training motivation and perceived career development from training, and training behavioral intentions
Perceived career
development from Training behavioral
Training motivation training intentions
Variable R2 DR2 b R2 DR2 b R2 DR2 Odds ratio
Step 1 0.05 0.07 0.02

Control variable: gender 0.06 0.20 0.48
Age 0.03 0.12 1.01
Proactive personality 0.26 0.05 1.14
Step 2 0.07 0.01 0.09 0.03 0.05 0.02
Age proactive personality 0.13 0.17 0.72
Note: N ¼ 252. Hierarchical OLS regression was used for training motivation and perceived career development from training,
and logistic regression was used for training behavioral intentions. For training behavioral intentions, R2 values are for Cox and
Snell R2. R2 and DR2 may not add up due to rounding. Gender was coded: 0 ¼ men, 1 ¼ women. Betas and odds ratios are for the
final equation.

p < 0.05; p < 0.01; p < 0.001.
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Figure 1. Interaction of age and proactive personality on training motivation (instrumentality). Note: Younger age
means 32.3 (– 1 SD below the mean) and older age means 48.9 (þ 1 SD below the mean)
personality and perceived career development from training for younger workers than for older
workers. Results supported Hypothesis 2, DR2 ¼ 0.03, F(1, 245) ¼ 7.05, p < 0.05. This interaction is
shown graphically in Figure 2. Specifically, there was a more positive relationship between proactive
personality and perceived career development from training for younger workers than for older
workers.
Hypothesis 3 stated that age and proactive personality would interact to affect training behavioral
intentions. Results supported Hypothesis 3 as indicated by the significant increase in Cox and Snell’s R2
with the addition of the interaction term on Step 2, DR2 ¼ 0.02, x2(1) ¼ 5.10, p < 0.05. We then
transformed the predicted values of the dependent variable (log odds of training behavioral intentions)
into the probability of behavioral intentions regarding training using the formula described by Cohen,
Cohen, West, and Aiken (2003). This interaction, shown graphically in Figure 3, suggests a more
positive relationship between proactive personality and training behavioral intentions for younger
workers than for older workers.
Discussion
The purpose of this study was to fill a gap in the literature by examining the interaction between
proactive personality and age, specifically, to understand the moderating effect of age on the
relationship between proactivity and training motivation, perceived career development from training,
and training behavioral intentions. We sought to integrate research on the role of proactive personality
Figure 2. Interaction of age and proactive personality on perceived career development from training. Note:
Younger age means 32.3 (– 1 SD below the mean) and older age means 48.9 (þ 1 SD below the mean)
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Figure 3. Interaction of age and proactive personality on training behavioral intentions. Note: Younger age means
32.3 (– 1 SD below the mean) and older age means 48.9 (þ 1 SD below the mean)
in training and development (e.g., Major et al., 2006), models of age and development activity (Maurer
et al., 2003), and research regarding the motivation of older and younger workers (e.g., Kanfer &
Ackerman, 2004). As hypothesized, we found that proactive personality was differentially related to
these training-related variables for older and younger workers.
Our results illustrate that age moderated the relationships of proactive personality with training
motivation, perceived career development from training, and behavioral intentions. Although previous
empirical research has found that age is associated with differences in motivation (e.g., Freund, 2006)
and development outcomes (e.g., Maurer et al., 2003), and that personality may differ with age (e.g.,
Roberts, Walton, & Viechtbauer, 2006), we are not aware of other published studies that explored the
interaction between proactive personality and an individual’s age. The results of this study were
consistent across the outcomes we examined: More positive relationships were found between
proactive personality and training motivation (H1), perceived career development from training (H2),
and training behavioral intentions (H3) for younger workers than for their older counterparts. Indeed,
for the overall sample we found no correlation between proactive personality and two of the dependent
variables (perceived career development from training and training behavioral intentions). This may be
due to the effects of a moderator variable such as age, as the differential relationships between proactive
personality and these dependent variables for older and younger workers may have reduced the
correlations within the larger sample. These findings support the idea that the relationship between
proactive personality and its motivational outcomes may differ across the life span. It is noteworthy that
for training motivation and training behavioral intentions, the greatest differences between older and
younger workers were for those with low levels of proactivity. Specifically, younger workers with low
levels of proactivity were relatively less motivated to receive training than their older counterparts.
Similarly, they were less likely to indicate that they intend to get training. In addition, it appears that for
older workers there is a negative relationship between proactivity and the development outcomes of
perceived career development from training and training behavioral intentions, perhaps because
proactive older workers are focused on other outcomes at the expense of these (cf. Kanfer & Ackerman,
2004). Future research should investigate this issue.
From an applied perspective, organizations should take into consideration that proactive personality
may not have the same meaning or lead to the same outcomes for younger and older workers. A
possible explanation for these findings is that proactive personality may lead to different behavioral
manifestations depending on individuals’ career stage. Indeed, reviews of worker age and
organizationally relevant outcomes suggest that chronological age is an indicator of many variables
that may affect work outcomes (e.g., Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004). Moreover, as Kanfer and Ackerman’s
review points out, employees’ motivation can be focused on different factors depending on their
life stage. For instance, older employees may be less threatened by a failure to get promoted,
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because occupational achievement plays a smaller role in their lives. Indeed, older people may be
more oriented toward factors such as task maintenance rather than optimization (Freund, 2006) or
growth (Ebner et al., 2006). However, this does not mean that older workers are not proactive; indeed,
as in past research (e.g., Erdogan & Bauer, 2005; Harvey et al., 2006; Seibert et al., 1999), in the present
study we did not find a significant relationship between age and proactive personality. Rather, older
workers may focus their proactivity on substantially different goals than younger workers (cf., Ebner
et al., 2006) such as generativity motivation (e.g., Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004). Future research should
investigate whether there are outcomes that are better predicted by proactive personality for older
workers than for younger workers, for example, coaching or mentoring coworkers (e.g., Kanfer &
Ackerman, 2004), or perhaps a greater focus on non-work-related activities (e.g., spending more time
with family).
The theory of socio-emotional selectivity (Carstensen, Isaacowitz, & Charles, 1999) could
provide an additional interpretation. This theory posits that the perceptions people have about time
play a critical role in goal setting. Specifically, when time is perceived as unlimited people are more
inclined to choose career-focused objectives. Translated into an organizational setting, younger
workers who perceive that they have more time remaining in their careers would be more
interested in training and development activities, while older workers would have greater
motivation for activities more oriented toward building and maintaining relationships with
colleagues (Beier, 2008). Alternatively, older workers may be less motivated to participate in
training because there are fewer career development opportunities for them. In this sense, it may be
that even proactive older workers see little value in training. It may in fact be that our results
were also due to cohort differences. In any case, it is interesting to point out that in this sample,
older workers did not show lower intention to participate in training, and they did not see training
as less instrumental. However, age was associated with lower perceived career development from
training.
Potential limitations and future research
Although this study makes several contributions, it is also important to note some potential limitations.
First, because the sample was made up of municipal government employees, the results of this study
may not generalize to other contexts. However, our sample did include a wide range of jobs. We
encourage further research on this topic using additional samples from a variety of organizations.
Second, our study used a cross-sectional data collection methodology to examine these hypotheses.
Although this could be problematic in terms of drawing inferences regarding changes in proactive
personality across the lifespan, the aim of this study was to better understand the role of age in the
relationship between proactive personality and training-related variables, not to study the aging process
across the lifespan. Moreover, while such cross-sectional data may lead to inflated relationships among
variables, this is less of a problem when examining moderator effects as in the present study, where
differences in age produced different slopes (i.e., the relationship between proactive personality and the
outcomes was different for older and younger workers.) Third, some of the effect sizes for our
interaction terms were fairly low. On the other hand, given the difficulty of detecting interaction effects
especially in field samples (Judd, McClelland, & Culhane, 1995; McClelland & Judd, 1993; Whisman
& McClelland, 2005), we were pleased that we were able to detect the hypothesized interactions.
Fourth, although the a for the proactive personality scale was a bit low, we were able to obtain support
for our hypotheses. A small weakness of the study design is that all the data were self-reported. When
possible, the use of company training records would be useful in future studies of these issues. Another
limitation is that our study only examined outcomes that would be of interest to younger workers, that
DOI: 10.1002/job
is, training-related outcomes. As our study was focused on worker reactions to training, we did not
measure other, non-training related outcomes which might be of interest to proactive older workers.
Future research should examine these additional outcomes.
Another limitation of this study regards the motivation training scale based on Vroom’s (1964)
expectancy theory. In the present study, we used only the instrumentality dimension because it is the
most likely to be affected by age, specifically, because older workers would likely find training to be
less instrumental to them than younger workers. Another potential limitation regards changes that were
made to the proactive personality scale. Although the original scale is composed of 10 items (cf. Seibert
et al., 1999), in our survey we kept the most representative and meaningful ones (five items) that
resulted after the translation into Italian and back translation into English. If possible, future studies
should use other measures of proactive personality.
A final potential limitation of this study regards the perceived career development from
training scale. As an anonymous reviewer pointed out, the items of this scale refer to the perceived
opportunity employees have regarding their development in that organization. Proactive personality
should be related to the perceived availability of opportunities for action and not only to perceived
opportunity for career development. Future studies should focus on the actual actions employees would
take.
Future studies should also clarify the role played by proactive personality in predicting a range of
different outcomes for different age groups. For example, some studies have investigated the role of
contextualizing motivational effects of goal focus during the life span (e.g., Baltes & Baltes, 1990;
Ebner et al., 2006; Freund, 2006), such that goals and motivation had different foci for younger and
older adults. The findings of the present study are consistent with the selection, optimization, and
compensation theory (SOC; Baltes & Baltes, 1990; Freund & Baltes, 2000), which underlines the
importance of contextualizing motivational processes into a life span approach. Accordingly, one line
of research could examine how proactivity is manifested on the job among older individuals. For
example, organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs) are an important component of job performance
(e.g., Motowidlo & van Scotter, 1994). Because older workers may be more oriented toward generative
motives (e.g., Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004), proactivity among older workers may be manifested in
increased OCBs. Thus, future research should examine how proactive personality is related to different
job behaviors at work for older and younger people, similar to the differential relationships that have
been found between age and various work behaviors (e.g., Ng & Feldman, 2008). This might be
especially true because certain work behaviors are more instrumental for certain age groups. Relatedly,
research should investigate whether other personality variables (e.g., conscientiousness) may
differentially relate to work attitudes and outcomes for older and younger workers, as has been noted in
recent reviews (e.g., Kanfer, 2009). Given the recent interest in personality in the work and
organizational psychology literature (e.g., Morgeson, Campion, Dipboye, Hollenbeck, Murphy, &
Schmitt, 2007), an examination of variables such as age which may moderate the relationship between
personality and attitudinal and behavioral outcomes is in order.
In this study, we examined the interaction between chronological age and proactive personality in
relationship with several training-related outcomes. Future studies should consider individual
psychological or subjective age measures that indicate how old or young the individual perceives him-
or herself to be (Barak, 1987; Riordan, 2000), and perhaps captures a person’s capacity to adapt
behavior to the demands of the environment (Sterns & Miklos, 1995). Also it seems useful to
investigate social age, or the social norms and roles applied to a person who lives in a cultural context
(Birren & Birren, 1990). Although it is beyond the scope of this study, future research should take into
consideration the interaction between age and gender (as suggested by an anonymous reviewer).
Indeed, these two variables could have a different influence on several outcomes. For example, older
women and older men could orient their motivation toward different outcomes.
DOI: 10.1002/job
Another important issue for future research is to examine what is meant by ‘‘older’’ and ‘‘younger’’
workers, and relatedly, how workers’ motivation and behavior might change at different life stages.
There has been little agreement in the literature on how to operationalize worker age groups, or what is
meant by ‘‘older’’ and ‘‘younger’’ workers (e.g, Finkelstein & Farrell, 2007). Future research should
examine at what specific ages or stages important, work-related differences occur in workers to better
understand the motivations and work behaviors of different age groups. It may also be that these ages
are different for different types of workers; for example, age may have different effects on work
motivation and behavior for managers than for non-managers.
In conclusion, the results of this study suggest that age may be an important consideration in
understanding the meaning of proactivity to work outcomes. Specifically, it suggests that proactive
personality may lead to different work outcomes for employees of different ages. As the first study to
examine the moderating effect of age on the relationship between proactive personality and training
and development-related outcomes, this study contributes to and extends the literatures on personality,
training and development, older workers, and work motivation.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank Talya Bauer, David Cadiz and Kyle Mack for their helpful comments on this paper.
We also acknowledge Cristina Rizzi for work on the data collection. This research was funded by
Ministero dell’Istruzione, dell’Università e della Ricerca (MIUR), Programmi di Ricerca Scientifica di
Rilevante Interesse Nazionale (PRIN), 2006, prot. 2006119348_003.
Marilena Bertolino’s term at University of Trento was supported by the postdoctoral fellowship from
Municipality of Rovereto (2006–2008).
Author biographies
Marilena Bertolino is an assistant professor of I/O Psychology at the University of Nice Sophia-
Antipolis, where she received her PhD in 2004. Her primary research interests are in the area of
discrimination in the workplace, including age stereotyping and other issues regarding older and
younger workers. She also conducts research on applicant reactions among minority and majority
groups in France, based on organizational justice theory. Moreover, she is interested in the antecedents
of workplace safety including the role of individual variables in relation to safety behavior.
Donald M. Truxillo is a professor in the Department of Psychology at Portland State University in
Portland, Oregon. His research interests include applicant and test taker reactions, older worker issues
including older worker stereotypes and motivation, and workplace safety. He is a fellow of the Society
for Industrial and Organizational Psychology and the American Psychological Association.
Franco Fraccaroli received his PhD from the University of Trento where he is currently a professor of
Work and Organizational Psychology. He is Director of the Department of Cognitive Science and
Education and past President of the European Association of Work and Organizational Psychology. His
research interests include organizational socialization, older workers and late career, and psychosocial
risks in organizations.
DOI: 10.1002/job
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Appendix: Items for Proactive Personality, Training Motivation,

and Perceived Career Development from Training
Proactive personality
(1) I am constantly on the lookout for new ways to improve my life.
(2) If I see something I don’t like, I fix it.
(3) I love being a champion for my ideas, even against others’ opposition.
(4) I excel at identifying opportunities.
(5) I am always looking for better ways to do things.
Training motivation
(1) I will be able to apply on my job what I learn in the training activities.
(2) Gaining the skills provided by training activities will positively affect my performance.

(1) Improve my skills at work.
(2) Use in my everyday job what I learned through training and experience.
(3) Contribute to improve the work in my organization.
(4) Become more competent, having the possibility to take part at several specialized development
activities.
(5) Apply on my job knowledge learned outside.
(6) Be more able to solve problems at work.
(7) Improve my current level of discretion and responsibility.
DOI: 10.1002/job

Age As Moderator of The Relationship of Proactive Personality With Training Motivation Perceived Career Development

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Journal of Organizational Behavior

J. Organiz. Behav. 32, 248–263 (2011)

Age as moderator of the relationship of

Received 1 December 2008

Proactive personality, motivation, and age

Perceived career development from training

Training behavioral intentions

Participants and procedure

Perceived career development from training

Training behavioral intentions

1. Age 40.60 8.30

Variable R2 DR2 b R2 DR2 b R2 DR2 Odds ratio

Step 1 0.05 0.07 0.02

Potential limitations and future research

Appendix: Items for Proactive Personality, Training Motivation,

Perceived career development from training

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