Who Suffers More from Job Insecurity?

A Meta-Analytic Review

Grand  H.-L.  Cheng

University of Queensland, Australia

Darius  K.-S. Chan*

The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong

The present meta-analysis  examined the tenure,  age, and gender differences in the relationship between job insecurity  and  its job-related  and  health-related consequences. A total of 133 studies, providing 172 independent samples, were included in the analysis. Our results basically replicated  Sverke et al.’s (2002) meta-analytic findings with an updated  methodological approach and a larger database. The main  differences between  our  findings  and  Sverke et al.’s are that  the negative association  between job insecurity and job performance was significant  and  that  the relationship between  insecurity  and  job involvement was smaller in our study.  The moderator analysis also indicated  that:  (1) the positive   association   between   job   insecurity   and   turnover  intention   was stronger  among  employees with shorter  tenure  than  those with longer tenure, and was stronger  among younger than older employees; (2) the negative effect of insecurity  on its health  outcomes  was more severe among  employees with longer  tenure  than  those  with  shorter  tenure,  and  was more  severe among older than younger employees; (3) the relationship between insecurity and the criterion  variables was similar across gender. Results are discussed with refer- ence to Hulin’s (1991) theory  of job adaptation and  Greenhalgh and  Rosen- blatt’s (1984) job dependence  perspective.

La  présente  méta-analyse  étudie  les différences  de statut  (titulaire  ou  non), d’âge et  de genre  dans  la  relation  entre  l’insécurité  de l’emploi et  ses con- séquences relatives au travail et à la santé. Un total de 133 recherches, comprenant 172 échantillons  indépendants, a  été inclu  dans  l’analyse.  Nos résultats,  obtenus  avec une approche  méthodologique actualisée et sur une plus grande base de données, sont pour l’essentiel congruents  avec ceux de la méta- analyse de Sverke et al. (2002). Les différences principales  entre nos résultats

* Address  for  correspondence: Darius  Chan,  Department of  Psychology,  The  Chinese

University  of Hong  Kong,  Hong  Kong  SAR, China.  Email: dchan@cuhk.edu.hk

The paper  is based in part  on the first author’s  masters  thesis, under  the supervision  of the second  author, submitted  to the Chinese University  of Hong  Kong.  We would like to thank Dr Robert  Haccoun, the action editor, and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.

© 2007 The  Authors. Journal   compilation © 2007 International Association   of  Applied Psychology.  Published  by Blackwell Publishing,  9600 Garsington Road,  Oxford  OX4 2DQ, UK  and  350 Main  Street,  Malden,  MA  02148, USA.

et ceux de Sverke  et al.  sont  les suivantes:  d’une  part,  entre  l’insécurité  de l’emploi et la productivité la relation  est significativement  négative,  d’autre part  la  relation  entre  l’insécurité  de l’emploi et  l’engagement  au  travail  est moindre  dans notre étude. L’analyse indique aussi que: (1) la relation  positive entre l’insécurité de l’emploi et l’intention  de le quitter  est plus forte parmi les employés  ayant  un  contrat à  courte  durée  contrairement à  ceux  ayant  un contrat à plus longue durée et est plus forte parmi les employés les plus jeunes; (2)  l’effet négatif  de  l’insécurité  sur  la  santé  est  plus  important parmi  les employés ayant  un contrat de longue  durée  que pour  ceux ayant  un contrat de plus courte durée, ce qui est aussi le cas pour les employés les plus âgés; (3) le genre n’a pas d’effet sur la relation  entre l’insécurité et les variables choisies. Les résultats  sont discutés en référence à la théorie  de l’adaptation au travail de Hulin  (1991) et la perspective  de dépendance  au travail  de Greenhalgh et Rosenblatt (1984).

INTRODUCTION

Job  insecurity  has received a considerable  amount  of research  attention in recent years (Sverke, Hellgren,  & Naswall,  2002). Numerous organisations worldwide have undergone  downsizing (Armstrong-Stassen, 2004) to reduce expenditure  and raise their effectiveness (Burke & Nelson, 1998). According to  the  United  States  Bureau  of Labor  Statistics  (2001), a total  of 21,345 mass  layoffs  events  occurred  there  in  2001.  Forty-three per  cent  of  the organisations surveyed  by the  Society for  Human  Resource  Management (2001) reported  that  they had carried  out layoffs, with reductions  in 10 per cent and 13 per cent of their locations’ workforces in 2000 and 2001, respec- tively. Long-term  employment  has become rare. More and more job oppor- tunities are temporary or contract-based (Sparks, Faragher, & Cooper,  2001). All these changes  have led to a heightened  sense of job insecurity  among the  workforce  worldwide  (Hartley,  Jacobson, Klandermans, & van Vuuren,

1991).

The purpose of the present meta-analysis  was to examine how three demo- graphic variables of employees, namely, organisational tenure, age, and gender, moderated the  relationship between  job insecurity  and  its job-related  and health-related consequences.  We argue that it is important to examine these moderating effects for four  reasons.  First,  after  25 years of job insecurity research,  little is known  about  who would suffer more  from job insecurity than others.  Specifically, as described below, there are conflicting views and inconsistent  findings  on  how  organisational tenure,  age,  and  gender  may moderate  the effects of job insecurity  on  its outcomes.  The present  meta- analysis will help fill this gap in the job insecurity literature.

Second,  investigating  the  moderating effects  of  demographic  variables helps advance  our understanding of the underlying  psychological  processes of job insecurity and is essential for theoretical  development  in this field. For instance, Sverke and his colleagues (2002) examined how occupational status

moderates  the relationship between job insecurity and its consequences. The results shed light on how job dependence,  which is reflected by occupational status,  moderates   the  effect  of  job  insecurity  on  its  outcomes  (discussed below).  In  the  present  study,  through examining  the  moderating effects of tenure,  age, and gender, we tested predictions  drawn  from the theory  of job adaptation (Hulin,  1991) and  the  job dependence  perspective  (Green- halgh  & Rosenblatt, 1984) on  how  different  employees  may  react  to  job insecurity.

Specifically, Hulin’s (1991) theory  of job adaptation suggests how organ- isational  commitment and  job involvement  may moderate  the relationship between  job  insecurity  and  its consequences.  While  organisational tenure was not  included  in the original  formulation of Hulin’s theory,  it has con- sistently been found  to be associated  with organisational commitment and job involvement  (Brown, 1996; Mathieu  & Zajac, 1990). It is reasonable  to conceptualise  the moderating effects of tenure  by referring to the theory  of job adaptation. In a similar vein, Greenhalgh and  Rosenblatt’s  (1984) job dependence  perspective  predicts  how occupational mobility  and  economic insecurity  may  moderate   the  relationship between  job  insecurity  and  its consequences.  While age and  gender were not  included  in Greenhalgh and Rosenblatt’s  original  idea, these two demographic variables  are associated with  occupational mobility  and  economic  insecurity  (Kuhnert & Vance,

1992; Rosenblatt, Talmud,  & Ruvio,  1999). We thus argue that  the moder- ating effects of age and gender can be conceptualised  with reference to the job  dependence  perspective.  In  other  words,  there  is theoretical  basis  for proposing  these moderating effects.

Third,  understanding who would suffer more  from  job insecurity  merits examination because of its practical  implications.  A sense of insecurity has a negative  impact  on  employees’ health  and  elicits withdrawal  cognitions such as turnover intention  (Sverke et al., 2002). Health  problems and volun- tary  turnover of employees are detrimental to  organisational  effectiveness and are costly to organisations (Ramlall,  2003; Sagie, Birati, & Tziner, 2002; Sparks  et  al.,  2001).  It  is essential  for  organisations to  know  if certain employees suffer more from job insecurity than others (Probst,  2000; Sparks et al., 2001).

Fourth, the  previous  meta-analysis   of  job  insecurity  by  Sverke  et  al. (2002) revealed  that  there  were large  variations  in the  effect sizes of  the relationship between  job  insecurity  and  its  outcomes.  However,  some  of these  variations   were  not   explained   by  the  moderators  identified   by Sverke  et  al.  (i.e. type  of measure  and  occupational status).  The  present meta-analysis,  using  a  larger  database and  different  meta-analytic proce- dures,  attempted to  extend  Sverke  et al.’s findings  by examining  whether organisational tenure,  age,  and  gender  would  account  for  some  of  these variations.

Definition and Conceptualisation of Job Insecurity

Davy,  Kinicki,  and  Scheck (1997) defined  job insecurity  as an employee’s “expectations about  continuity  in a job situation” (p. 323). Similarly,  van Vuuren  and  Klandermans (1990) defined  job insecurity  as an  individual’s “concern  about  the  future  permanence  of the  job”  (p. 133), and  Heaney, Israel,  and  House  (1994) defined the construct  as an individual’s  “percep- tion of a potential  threat  to continuity  in his or her current  job” (p. 1431). All in all, researchers  have generally regarded  job insecurity  as “an overall concern  about  the continued  existence of the job in the future”  (Sverke et al., 2002, p. 243; see also De Witte, 1999), and it is often assessed in terms of respondents’  perceived probability of job loss (e.g. Mohr,  2000).

Job insecurity is a job stressor (Ashford,  Lee, & Bobko, 1989; Probst,  2002; Sverke et al., 2002), which not only brings about  negative psychological and physical health (Crandall & Perrewe, 1995; Quick & Tetrick, 2003), but also negative job-related reactions. According to the theory of job adaptation (Hulin,

1991), employees would attempt  to alleviate job dissatisfaction through various job adaptation responses.  For  instance,  employees may withdraw  themselves from the stressor  by being less satisfied with the job and less committed  to the organisation, and having a stronger  intention  to leave the organisation (Davy et al., 1997; Probst,  2000, 2002). In fact, the meta-analysis  conducted by Sverke and his colleagues (2002) showed that job insecurity was negatively related to job satisfaction,  organisational commitment, trust, and job involve- ment,  and  was  positively  related  to  turnover intention. In  addition, job insecurity was negatively related  to psychological  and physical health.

The  Relationship between Job Insecurity and its

Consequences

Greenhalgh and Rosenblatt (1984) identified a number  of factors  that  may moderate  the relationship between job insecurity and its consequences.  Spe- cifically, they suggested that  social support, job dependence,  and individual differences like work orientation may moderate  the effect of job insecurity. Job insecurity may be particularly stressful to those who lack social support and/or  tend  to rank  work high in their  lives. Job  dependence  is a function of occupational mobility  (the perceived likelihood  of finding a similar job in another  organisation) and economic insecurity (the perceived inability to meet living expenses if losing the current job). According to Greenhalgh and Rosenblatt’s  job dependence perspective, employees who are highly depend- ent on their current  jobs should  suffer more from and  react more strongly to job insecurity.

Sverke et al.’s (2002) meta-analysis  examined  the  moderating effects of type of measure  of job insecurity  and  occupational status  of employees on

the  relationship between  job  insecurity  and  its consequences.  They  found that  the negative effect of job insecurity on job satisfaction,  trust,  and per- formance  was stronger  when job insecurity  was captured by multiple-item than by single-item measures. Furthermore, the negative impact of job insecu- rity on performance and turnover intention  was more profound among manual employees (blue-collar  workers)  than  non-manual employees (white-collar workers, professionals, and managers). Sverke et al. argued that manual employees react more strongly  to insecurity because these employees gener- ally have lower levels of education  and  skills, and  are more  dependent  on their current  jobs.

However,  Sverke et al. (2002) showed that  type of measure  and  occupa- tional  status  did not  moderate  the relationship between job insecurity  and its health-related outcomes.  This has raised two questions.  First, as revealed by Sverke et al., the effect sizes of the relationship between  job insecurity and  its health-related outcomes  varied greatly across studies. There should be other moderating factors accounting  for these variations,  which were not captured by type of measure  and  occupational status.  Second,  the finding that  occupational status  did not  moderate  the impact  of job insecurity  on psychological and physical health left a question  about  whether job depend- ence moderates  the relationship between job insecurity and its health-related consequences  (see Greenhalgh & Rosenblatt, 1984). In  this light,  we pro- posed to examine other  factors which may account  for the variations  in the relationship between job insecurity and its consequences.

The  Moderating Effects of Organisational Tenure and Age

Organisational tenure  and  age are  closely related.  Employees  with  longer tenure are likely to be older than those with shorter  tenure. The moderating effect of age, if any, should be consistent  with that  of tenure.  However, it is also important to examine the moderating effects of tenure and age separately. According to Cohen (1991), tenure and age seem to capture  different mean- ings. Specifically, age is associated  with both career issues and psychological issues in one’s life events. It has implications  not only on one’s status in the organisation but  also on one’s non-work  aspects such as family and  social life. On the contrary, tenure mainly captures  career issues with fewer effects upon   life  events.  As  described  below,  age  indicates  one’s  occupational mobility  (a career issue) and  economic  insecurity  (related  to family obliga- tions).  While tenure  mainly reflects career issues, it seems to be associated with some specific aspects of career issues (e.g. organisational commitment and job involvement)  that  may not be captured by age. That  is, the moder- ating  effects of tenure  and  age on  the  relationship between  job insecurity and its outcomes  may be manifest through different psychological  processes.

One perspective  on the moderating effects of organisational tenure  and age on the impact of job insecurity is that the association  should be stronger among  employees with longer  tenure  than  those  with shorter  tenure,  and be stronger  among  older than  younger  employees. Organisational tenure  is positively related  to organisational commitment (Mathieu  & Zajac,  1990), which is positively associated  with job involvement (Brown, 1996). Employ- ees with longer tenure  are typically more committed  to their organisations, and  are identified  more with and  invest more in their jobs than  employees with shorter  tenure. They should then have greater negative reactions to job insecurity  (Greenhalgh and  Rosenblatt, 1984; Kuhnert &  Palmer,  1991; Mathieu   & Zajac,  1990). In  fact,  Probst  (2000) found  that  only  among employees who were highly involved in their jobs, were high job insecurity perceptions  related  to lower level of psychological  well-being than  low job insecurity perceptions.  Similarly, Allen, Freeman,  Russell, Reizenstein,  and Rentz (2001) reported  that  the association  between job insecurity and turn- over intention  was stronger  among  employees highly involved in their jobs than  the less involved employees.

Older employees may also react more strongly to job insecurity than their younger  counterparts. Age  reflects  occupational  mobility  and  economic insecurity, which are the two indicators  of job dependence (see job dependence perspective; Greenhalgh & Rosenblatt, 1984). Compared with their younger counterparts, older employees perceive a lower level of occupational mobil- ity, and should thus be more dependent  on their current jobs and react more strongly  to  job  insecurity  (Kuhnert & Vance,  1992). Furthermore,  older employees generally have more family obligations  than  younger  employees (Finegold,  Mohrman, & Spreitzer,  2002; Kuhnert & Vance,  1992). With more family obligations,  older employees may be more sensitive to economic insecurity  and  thus  be more  vulnerable  to job insecurity.  In fact, Kuhnert and Vance (1992) found  that  there was a stronger  relationship between job insecurity  and  well-being among  employees with a lower level of occupa- tional  mobility  than  those  with  a  higher  level of  occupational  mobility. Similarly,  Finegold  et al.  (2002) reported  that  job  insecurity  had  a more negative  impact   on  organisational  commitment  and   turnover  intention among  older employees than  younger  employees.

However,  an  opposite  view on  the  moderating effects of organisational tenure and age on the impact of job insecurity is that the association  should be stronger  among  employees  with  shorter  tenure  than  those  with  longer tenure,  and  be stronger  among  younger  than  older  employees. First,  let us examine the tenure  effect. According  to Hulin’s (1991) theory  of job adapta- tion,  employees engage in job adaptation (e.g. having  a stronger  intention to leave the organisation) in order  to relieve stressful  job situations,  such as  a  sense  of  job  insecurity.   Although  the  range   of  job  adaptation responses  is potentially  broad,  the  choice is usually  limited  by individual

and  organisational contingencies.  Depending  on  the  situation,  employees, particularly  those  who  value  their  jobs,  would  choose  the  potentially adaptive  cognitions  and  behaviors  that  are most likely to reduce job stress (Roznowski  & Hulin,  1992). Because work  withdrawal  simply jeopardises the employment  and exacerbates  the stressor (Probst,  2000), one can expect that  compared  to those  with shorter  tenure,  employees with longer  tenure would be less likely to engage in work  withdrawal  as a way of adaptation because  these employees are usually  more  involved in their  jobs.  In other words,  employees  with  shorter  tenure  should  react  more  strongly  to  job insecurity than  those with longer tenure.

Regarding   the   age  effect,  younger   employees  may  also   react   more strongly to job insecurity than their older counterparts. Kuhnert and Vance (1992) reported  that  under  the threat  of job loss, older employees reported better well-being than did younger employees. These authors  attributed this finding to the difference in attitudes toward  job loss between younger  and older  employees.  As suggested  by De  Witte  (1999), older  employees  may simply consider  job loss as an earlier retirement, and  thus  suffer less from job insecurity than  younger  employees.

The  Moderating Effect  of Gender

Gender  has also been suggested as a moderator of the association  between job insecurity  and  its consequences.  Rosenblatt and  her colleagues  (1999) reported   that  the  negative  effect  of  job  insecurity  on  female  employees’ work  attitudes  was  stronger   than   on  male  employees’  attitudes.  These authors  argued that men typically have a higher occupational mobility than women, and thus the threat  of job loss should be less distressing to men (see job dependence  perspective; Greenhalgh & Rosenblatt, 1984).

On the contrary, De Witte (1999) found that job insecurity was negatively related  to  male employees’, but  not  female employees’, well-being.  Tradi- tionally,  it is believed that  men regard  themselves as the “breadwinner” of their  families (Bernard,  1981), while women  consider  financial  matters  as their  secondary  responsibility  (Conger,  Lorenz,  Edler,  Simons,  & Xiaojia,

1993).  Male  employees  may  thus  suffer  more  from  job  insecurity  than female employees because  male employees are more  aware  of the possible negative  consequences  of job loss (De Witte,  1999). According  to  the job dependence  perspective  (Greenhalgh & Rosenblatt, 1984), people  who are economically  insecure,  or  worry  that  they  cannot  meet  living expenses  if they lose their current  job, are vulnerable  to job insecurity.

In sum, one view on the moderating effect of gender is that  the threat  of job  loss  should  be  less distressing  to  men  than  to  women  because  men usually have higher occupational mobility. However, an opposing view would argue  that  men are more vulnerable  to job insecurity  than  women because

they  are  more  sensitive to  economic  insecurity.  Both  views have  received empirical  support  and  it is unclear  whether  men  would  suffer  more  from and react more strongly  to job insecurity than  women.

The  Present Study

The  present  meta-analysis  was  thus  designed  to  examine  the  moderating effects of organisational tenure, age, and gender on the relationship between job insecurity and its job-related  and health-related consequences.1 Follow- ing Sverke et al. (2002), we included job satisfaction,  organisational commitment, turnover intention, work performance, trust,  and job involve- ment as the job-related  criterion variables. Furthermore, we included psychological health and physical health as the health-related criterion variables.

METHOD

Literature Search, Inclusion Criteria, and

Coding Procedure

The  search  for  published   studies  involved  both   computer   and  manual methods.  The keywords for our search were job security and job insecurity, and  the  time  frame  was  1980 to  2006. The  computer-based  search  was conducted   on  PsycINFO, ABI/INFORM,  Social  Science  Citation   Index and  Medline.  The  issue-by-issue  manual   search  was  conducted   on  15 academic   journals,   namely,  Academy   of  Management   Journal,  Anxiety, Stress and Coping: An International Journal, Applied Psychology: An International  Review,  European Journal of Work  and Organizational  Psy- chology, Human Relations, Journal of Applied Psychology,  Journal of Man- agerial Psychology, Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Journal of Vocational Behavior, Psychological Bulletin, Social Science and Medicine, Stress Medicine (Stress  and Health), and Work  and Stress.

In addition  to published  papers, we also tried to include dissertations  and unpublished studies.  We searched  for  dissertations  shown  in Dissertation Abstracts International for  the  current  meta-analysis.  We  also  contacted

1   Other  potential   moderating factors  like  mood  dispositions   (Roskies,  Louis-Guerin, & Fournier, 1993) and  social support  (Lim, 1996) were not  included  because these factors  have not been examined in a sufficient number  of primary studies or cannot  be aggregated  meaning- fully for meta-analysis.

prominent scholars  in the area  of job insecurity  and  asked  them  for their unpublished studies of job insecurity,  if any. Twelve scholars  responded  to our  request.2   Moreover,   we  inspected  the  reference  lists  of  the  studies obtained and review papers on job insecurity (e.g. Sverke & Hellgren, 2002; Sverke et al., 2002) to locate additional studies.

To be included in the current meta-analysis  of job insecurity, studies must be in English3   and  measure  the subjective experience of job insecurity  (e.g. perceived likelihood  of job loss) of employed people. Moreover,  they must report  zero-order  correlation or other statistics that can be transformed into a  correlation coefficient  (e.g.  the  t-value;  see Hunter &  Schmidt,  1990) between  individual  employees’ job insecurity  and  at least one of the crite- rion  variables  of interest  (i.e. job satisfaction,  organisational commitment, turnover intention, psychological  health,  physical  health,4  work  perform- ance,  trust,  and  job  involvement).  Articles  that  used  multiplicative  com- posites to measure job insecurity were excluded5  (unlike Sverke et al., 2002). For  longitudinal studies,  only  the  first-wave  data  were considered.  Some papers  provided  data  from the same or overlapping  samples, so preference (in descending order)  was given to the one allowing us to test the moderat- ing effect, including more criterion  variables,  involving a larger sample and published  most recently.

A total of 133 studies were included in the current analysis (121 published studies and 12 dissertations;6  all marked  with an asterisk  in the References section).  These  studies  provided   172  independent samples,  with  132,927 employees  involved.  The  number  of independent samples  included  in our study was 86 more than  that  included in Sverke et al. (2002).

2   We thank  Marjorie  Armstrong-Stassen, Julian  Barling,  Ronald  Burke,  Hans  De  Witte, Leon  Grunberg, Johnny  Hellgren,  John  Kammeyer-Mueller, Ulla  Kinnunen, Saija  Mauno, Sarah  Moore,  Tahira  Probst,  and Magnus  Sverke for their replies.

3  Based on the results of Egger, Zellweger-Zahner,  Schneider,  Junker,  Lengeler,  and  Antes (1997) and  Juni,  Holstein,  Sterne, Barlett,  and  Egger (2002), Dickersin  (2005) concluded  that one does not necessarily assume that  publication practices are language related.  It seems to be equally likely for both non-English  studies and English studies to report  statistically  significant results.  On  the  other  hand,  we should  note  that  excluding  non-English  studies  might  have reduced  the number  of samples in our analysis.

4   Indicators like  anxiety  and  psychological  distress  were  considered  as  the  indicators   of psychological health such that absence of anxiety and psychological distress implied good psychological  health.  Physical  symptoms  like  headache  and  back  pain  were  considered  as indicators  of physical health such that absence of physical symptoms implied good physical health.

5   Evans  (1991) noted  that  it  is inappropriate to  include  the  multiplicative   composite  in bivariate  correlational analysis. Analysis addressing  the simple bivariate  relationship between the multiplicative  composite and criterion  variables is subject to scaling effect and may thus give rise to spurious  results. Meta-analysing such correlations may lead to problematic conclusions.

6  The unpublished studies provided  by other  researchers  did not meet our inclusion criteria and, hence, were not included in the analysis.

Two  raters,  who were psychology  graduate students,  coded  the  172 in- dependent  samples included in the analysis. Specifically, for each independ- ent sample, raters coded its sample size, the reliabilities of job insecurity and each  criterion  variable,  and  the  uncorrected effect sizes that  indicate  the relationship between job insecurity  and  the criterion  variables.  Raters  also recorded  the  potential  moderators, i.e. mean  organisational tenure,  mean age, and gender composition  (percentage  of males) of each sample.7  Over 90 per cent of the initial coding decisions were consistent.  Any inconsistencies were resolved by discussion among  the raters  and the authors.

For  samples  not  reporting  the  reliability  of a multi-item  measure  of a certain variable,  the sample size–weighted mean reliability of the multi-item measure  of that  variable  across the samples was used as the substitute  (see e.g. Judge & Ilies, 2002; Shaw, Wild, & Colquitt, 2003; Sverke et al., 2002). For studies using a single-item measure for a certain variable, when the corresponding reliability  was missing we followed the procedure  proposed by Williams, McDaniel,  and  Nguyen  (2006). Specifically, we estimated  the sample size–weighted mean reliability of single-item measures  of each vari- able and  used this estimate  as the substitute  (but  see Sverke et al., 2002). The mean reliabilities of multi-item  measures of job insecurity, job satisfac- tion,  organisational commitment, turnover intention, psychological  health, physical health, work performance, trust, and job involvement were .77, .79,

.80, .76, .84, .81, .72, .82, and  .74, respectively. The mean  reliabilities  of single-item measures  of these variables  were .46, .48, .40, .44, .34, .30, .34,

.48, and .49, respectively.

Effect sizes like the t-value  were transformed into  Pearson’s  correlation coefficients.  For  samples  reporting  effect sizes between  job insecurity  and multiple  measures  of a criterion  variable  (e.g. correlations between  job in- security and anxiety as well as distress), we computed  a single estimate when standard deviations  of these variables and the intercorrelations among these variables  were available  (Hunter  & Schmidt,  1990). A simple average  was instead  computed  when such information was not offered (cf. Martinussen

& Bjornstad, 1999).

7 Some may question the validity of testing the moderating effect of individual-level variables such as organisational tenure  and age in a meta-analysis.  It is because the unit of analysis in a meta-analysis  is samples, not  individuals.  Mean  tenure  and  mean  age of samples  are  used, and within-sample  variances in tenure and age are not captured.  However, we argued that  our predictions  were  all  drawn  from  theories  (our  discussions  about  the  moderating effects  of organisational tenure,  and the moderating effects of age and gender were based on the theory of job adaptation and the job dependence perspective, respectively). In addition, it is a common practice  to  examine  the  moderating effects of demographic variables  such  as organisational tenure, age, and gender in meta-analysis  (e.g. Chapman, Uggerslev, Carroll, Piasentin, & Jones,

2005; Eagly,  Johannesen-Schmidt, & van  Engen,  2003; Griffeth,  Hom,  & Gaertner, 2000; Riketta, 2002).

Meta-Analytic Procedures

Hunter and Schmidt’s (1990) meta-analytic method was employed to estimate the “true”  correlations (corrected  effect sizes) between job insecurity and its consequences.  Each  observed  correlation was  corrected  for  measurement error  by taking  the reliabilities of job insecurity  and  the criterion  variables into account,  and weighted by sample size and degree of artifact  correction (Hunter  & Schmidt,  1990; see e.g. Meyer,  Stanley,  Herscovitch, & Topol- nytsky, 2002; but see Sverke et al., 2002). A 95 per cent confidence interval was constructed for the association  between job insecurity and each criterion variable  to test if each of these associations  was non-zero.  The 75 per cent rule and  the credibility  interval  of each relationship were used to examine the presence of moderators (Hunter  & Schmidt,  1990; Whitener,  1990; see e.g. Zhao  & Seibert, 2006).

For  the identification of moderators, we referred to the results of Hunter and Schmidt’s (1990) subgroup  analysis.8  According  to Hunter and Schmidt, the main criterion for the identification of moderators is whether the corrected effect sizes of subgroups  differ substantially (e.g. Judge & Ilies, 2002; Meyer et  al.,  2002).  Following  Brown  (1996),  Mathieu   and  Zajac  (1990),  and Sverke et al. (2002), we conducted  a t-test for small samples (Winer, Brown,

& Michels, 1991) to test for the differences in corrected  correlations across subgroups. We also applied  the Bonferroni  method  to  control  for Type  I errors.

It is a common practice to break down continuous variables into categories to  test  moderating  effects  in  subgroup   analysis  (Steel  &  Kammeyer- Mueller,  2002). Following  previous  operationalisations of time frames  of organisational tenure  (e.g. Gould  & Hawkins,  1978; Mount, 1984) and age (e.g.  Gould,   1979;  Rush,   Peacock,   &  Milkovich,   1980),  and  previous meta-analyses   such  as  Cohen   (1991,  1993)  and   Griffeth,   Hom,   and Gaertner (2000), in our  subgroup  analysis  samples  with  mean  organisa- tional  tenure  equal  to  or  longer  than  9 years  were regarded  as  being  of

8  The correlation between  organisational tenure  and  age in our  database was quite  high (r = .69, p < .001). However, we did not run a multiple weighted least square (WLS) regression (Hedges  & Olkin,  1985; Steel & Kammeyer-Mueller, 2002; Viswesvaran  & Sanchez,  1998), which takes  multicollinearity into  account,  to examine  the moderating effects of tenure,  age, and gender because there were only a handful  of studies reporting  all three pieces of informa- tion  about  tenure,  age, and  gender  composition. On  the  other  hand,  we ran  a simple WLS regression  as a reference to subgroup  analysis for the identification of moderators. Note  that subgroup  analysis,  which involves splitting  studies  into  subgroups, may  be less powerful  to detect continuous moderators than WLS regression (Steel & Kammeyer-Mueller, 2002). Sample size and  degree of artifact  correction  were used as the weight in the regression  analysis.  The corrected  effect sizes were regressed on tenure,  age, and gender composition, respectively. The Bonferroni  adjustment was applied.

longer organisational tenure.  And samples with mean age equal to or higher than  40 were regarded  as older.  Note  that  a subgroup  analysis  was not run  for  the  relationship  between  job  insecurity  and  certain  variables when there were fewer than  three samples in at least one of the subgroups.

RESULTS

The  estimated  true  (corrected)  correlations, the  confidence  intervals,  the percentages   of  variance  accounted   for  by  artifacts,   and  the  credibility intervals are summarised  in Table 1. Results showed that job insecurity was negatively related to job satisfaction  (rc = −.43), organisational commitment (rc = −.35), work performance (rc = −.21), trust (rc = −.49), and job involvement (rc  = −.20), and  was positively related  to turnover intention  (rc  = .32). In addition, job insecurity  was negatively  related  to  psychological  health (rc = −.28) and physical health  (rc = −.23). That  the confidence intervals of these relationships excluded zero suggested that  these associations  were significantly different from zero. The amount  of variance of all these relation- ships accounted  for by artifacts  was less than  75 per cent. Furthermore, the credibility intervals of these relationships were large. These results suggested that  these relationships were subject to certain  moderating effects.

The  Moderating Effect  of Organisational Tenure

Organisational tenure  moderated the  relationship between  job  insecurity and turnover intention  (Table 2). Subgroup  analysis showed that this relationship was stronger among employees with shorter tenure (rc = .41) than employees with longer tenure  (rc  = .24). Organisational tenure  also moder- ated  the relationship between job insecurity  and  physical health  (Table 2). Subgroup  analysis revealed that  the association  between job insecurity and physical  health  was more  profound among  employees with longer  tenure (rc  = −.30) than  employees with shorter  tenure  (rc  = −.22). The moderating effect of organisational tenure  on the relationships between  job insecurity and  job satisfaction,  organisational commitment, and  psychological  health was non-significant.9

The  Moderating Effect  of Age

Subgroup  analysis showed that  age moderated the effects of job insecurity on turnover intention, psychological  health,  and  physical health  (Table 3).

9  The results of simple WLS regression  were consistent  with those of subgroup  analysis for tenure,  age, and gender.

TABLE 1

The  Relationship between Job Insecurity and its  Consequences

Criterion variable	N	k	95% CI r            SE           lower			95% CI upper	rc                    SD		80% CV lower	80% CV upper	% due to artifacts
Job Satisfaction	76260	94	−.32	.01	−.35	−.30	−.43	.18	−.66	−.21	19.90
Organisational Commitment	38650	83	−.26	.02	−.30	−.23	−.35	.24	−.65	−.05	12.01
Turnover  Intention	25669	49	.22	.01	.19	.25	.32	.14	.14	.50	32.87
Psychological  Health	72339	77	−.20	.01	−.22	−.18	−.28	.12	−.43	−.12	22.92
Physical Health	56934	44	−.16	.01	−.18	−.13	−.23	.13	−.40	−.06	16.50
Work  Performance	3752	15	−.16	.03	−.22	−.11	−.21	.13	−.37	−.05	35.63
Trust	4152	16	−.35	.02	−.40	−.31	−.49	.18	−.72	−.26	40.16
Job Involvement	3034	6	−.15	.03	−.21	−.09	−.20	.08	−.31	−.10	33.78

Note: N = sample size; k = number  of sample; r = uncorrected mean correlation; SE = standard error  of r; CI = confidence  interval; rc  = estimated  true correlation; SD

= standard deviation  of r; CV = credibility interval; % due to artifacts  = percentage  of variance accounted  for by artifacts.

TABLE 2

Subgroup Analysis of the  Moderating Effect  on  the  Relationship between Job

Insecurity and its  Consequences: by  Organisational Tenure

Criterion variable                         Tenure         N         k         r        SE       rc             SD          t          df

Job Satisfaction	Shorter	6813	14	−.24	.02	−.31	.12	.47	38
	Longer	11408	25	−.27	.03	−.34	.19
Organisational Commitment	Shorter	4982	19	−.27	.04	−.36	.16	1.47	47
	Longer	15658	28	−.23	.03	−.28	.24
Turnover  Intention	Shorter	2804	9	.28	.02	.41	.00	5.69**	16
	Longer	10482	17	.18	.02	.24	.12
Psychological  Health	Shorter	1337	4	−.21	.03	−.27	.04	1.70	6
	Longer	10515	17	−.25	.01	−.31	.04
Physical Health	Shorter	1604	6	−.14	.02	−.22	.03	5.17**	11
	Longer	5500	9	−.22	.02	−.30	.03

Note:  Subgroup  analysis  was not  run  for  the  relationships between  job insecurity  and  work  performance, trust,  and job involvement because in these relationships there were fewer than  three samples in at least one of the subgroups. Shorter:  Mean  organisational tenure  of the sample  <  9; Longer:  ≥ 9. ** p <  .01 (after Bonferroni  adjustment).

TABLE 3

Subgroup Analysis of the  Moderating Effect  on  the  Relationship between Job

Insecurity and its  Consequences: by  Age

Criterion variable	Age	N	k	r	SE	rc	SD         t         df
Job Satisfaction	Younger	31183	33	−.32	.02	−.42	.17	.25	60
	Older	21098	30	−.30	.02	−.41	.19
Organisational Commitment	Younger	12679	29	−.21	.02	−.28	.15	.89	44
	Older	9120	27	−.19	.04	−.23	.24
Turnover  Intention	Younger	3513	14	.26	.02	.36	.07	2.59#	23
	Older	6324	16	.20	.03	.26	.15
Psychological  Health	Younger	27008	21	−.16	.02	−.24	.12	2.49#	45
	Older	32943	29	−.24	.01	−.32	.12
Physical Health	Younger	24104	15	−.12	.02	−.19	.12	2.53#	32
	Older	25226	17	−.20	.02	−.30	.13
Work  Performance	Younger	2847	9	−.15	.04	−.19	.11	1.50	11
	Older	722	4	−.19	.06	−.25	.03

Note:  Subgroup   analysis  was  not  run  for  the  relationships  between  job  insecurity  and  trust,   and  job involvement  because  in  these  relationships there  were  fewer  than  three  samples  in  at  least  one  of  the subgroups. Younger:  Mean  age of the sample < 40; Older: > = 40. # p < .10 (after Bonferroni  adjustment).

The relationship between  job insecurity  and  turnover was more  profound among  younger  employees (rc  = .36) than  older  employees (rc  = .26). The effect of job insecurity  on psychological  health  was stronger  among  older employees  (rc   = −.32) than  younger  employees  (rc   = −.24),  and  that  on physical  health  was also stronger  among  older  employees (rc  = −.30) than

TABLE 4

Subgroup Analysis of the  Moderating Effect  on  the  Relationship between Job

Insecurity and its  Consequences: by  Gender

Criterion variable              Gender          N           k           r          SE         rc                 SD         t         df

Job Satisfaction	Male	9758	6	−.37	.02	−.60	.08	.12	11
	Female	6885	7	−.39	.03	−.61	.16
Psychological  Health	Male	18387	10	−.25	.02	−.38	.12	.87	18
	Female	9898	8	−.22	.03	−.34	.11
Physical Health	Male	17422	5	−.22	.01	−.33	.13	.34	9
	Female	9419	4	−.20	.01	−.30	.13

Note: Male-only  samples were compared  with female-only samples. Subgroup  analysis was not run for the relationships between job insecurity and organisational commitment, turnover intention, work performance, trust,  and job involvement because in these relationships there were fewer than  three samples in at least one of the subgroups. The Bonferroni  adjustment was applied.

younger   employees  (rc    =  −.19).  On  the  other   hand,   the  associations between  job  insecurity  and  job  satisfaction,   organisational  commitment, and  work  performance did not differ between younger  employees and older employees.

The  Moderating Effect  of Gender

Subgroup  analysis revealed that the relationship between job insecurity and its consequences  among males was comparable to that among females (Table 4). Specifically, the difference in the relationship between job insecurity and job satisfaction  across  gender  was non-significant. The difference  in the effect of job insecurity on psychological  health  and physical health  across gender was also non-significant.

DISCUSSION

The present meta-analytic study revealed a significant relationship between job insecurity and its consequences.  Results showed that  job insecurity was negatively  related  to job satisfaction,  organisational commitment, psycho- logical  health,  physical  health,  work  performance, trust,  and  job  involve- ment, and was positively related to turnover intention. The estimates of the main effects found in our study were generally comparable to those reported in Sverke et al.’s (2002) study. One notable  discrepancy  between our results and  Sverke et al.’s results was that  the estimate  of the association  between job  insecurity  and  work  performance was found  to  be significant  in our study but not in Sverke et al.’s study. Another  notable  discrepancy  was that

the estimate  of the association  between job insecurity  and  job involvement found  in our  study  was much  lower than  that  reported  in Sverke  et al.’s study (rc = −.20 vs. rc = −.37). The discrepancy  in the estimates of the main effects could be attributed to the fact that our database was more up to date than  Sverke et al.’s. Furthermore, as described  in the Method  section,  our meta-analytic procedures  were different from theirs in a number  of ways.

The present study also revealed that organisational tenure and age moderated the relationship between job insecurity  and  turnover intention. Furthermore, tenure  and  age moderated the  relationship between  job  in- security and its health-related outcomes.  On the other  hand,  gender did not moderate  the relationship between job insecurity and its consequences.

The  Moderating Effects of Organisational Tenure and Age  on  the  Relationship between Job Insecurity and its Job-related Outcomes

The relationship between  job insecurity  and  turnover intention  was found to be stronger  among  employees with shorter  tenure  than  employees with longer tenure.  This is in line with the arguments  of the theory  of job adap- tation  (Hulin,  1991). According  to the theory  of job adaptation,  employees would attempt  to engage in cognitions  and behaviors  which are most effec- tive to alleviate stressful job situations.  Turnover  seems to be a good choice for  employees  with  shorter  tenure  to  escape  from  job  insecurity  because these employees have a smaller psychological  investment  in their organisa- tions (see Brown, 1996; Cohen, 1991; Mathieu  & Zajac, 1990). On the other hand,   employees  with  longer  tenure,   who  value  their  jobs  more,  avoid engaging in withdrawal  cognitions  and behaviors  because work withdrawal simply makes their employment  more vulnerable  (Probst,  2000).

With  reference  to  Greenhalgh and  Rosenblatt’s  (1984) job  dependence perspective,  older  employees,  who  have  lower levels of perceived  occupa- tional  mobility  and  are  more  sensitive  to  economic  insecurity,  should  be more dependent  on their current  jobs and  thus should  react more strongly to job insecurity (Finegold  et al., 2002; Kuhnert & Vance, 1992). However, our results showed that the association  between job insecurity and turnover intention  was actually  more profound among  younger  employees. Younger employees  are  less dependent   on  their  current  jobs  (Kuhnert &  Vance,

1992), and  turnover may be a readily  available  option  for them  to handle the existing stressful job-insecure  situation  (see also the theory  of job adap- tation;  Hulin,  1991). Hence, when facing job insecurity, younger  employees have a stronger  intention  to leave their organisation than  older employees.

Sverke et al. (2002) showed that  the influence of job insecurity  on turn- over intention was stronger among manual employees than non-manual employees. They argued that under the threat  of job loss, manual employees

have  a  stronger  turnover intention   because  these  employees  have  lower occupational mobility  and  are thus  more  dependent  on their  current  jobs. Further research  is called for addressing  the discrepancy  between  Sverke et al.’s results and our results, which shows that younger job-insecure employees, who  are  less dependent   on  their  jobs,  have  a  stronger  turnover inten- tion. One possibility for this discrepancy  is that  unlike occupational status, age not  only  reflects occupational mobility  but  also  economic  insecurity. Compared with older employees, younger employees have fewer family obli- gations  (Finegold  et al., 2002; Kuhnert & Vance, 1992). With fewer family obligations,   younger  employees  may  be  less worried  about   the  financial situation  of being jobless, and  are thus  more  inclined to leave the current job-insecure  organisation.

Our results revealed that  organisational tenure and age did not moderate the impact of job insecurity on job satisfaction,  organisational commitment, and  work performance. Compared to job satisfaction,  organisational com- mitment,  and  work  performance, turnover intention  has a special implica- tion for coping with job insecurity (Davy et al., 1997). As discussed above, compared  to having lower levels of job satisfaction,  organisational commit- ment, and work performance, leaving the stressful job-insecure organisation (having a high level of turnover intention)  seems to be a more effective way for employees to cope with job insecurity, particularly for those with shorter tenure  and younger  age (usually having a smaller psychological  investment in their  jobs  and  a lower  level of economic  insecurity).  Hence,  there  are moderating effects  of  organisational tenure  and  age  on  the  relationship between job insecurity and turnover intention, but not on the relationships between  job  insecurity  and  job  satisfaction,   organisational  commitment, and work performance.

The  Moderating Effects of Organisational Tenure and Age  on  the  Relationship between Job Insecurity and its Health-related Outcomes

The negative association  between job insecurity and health was found to be stronger  among  employees with longer tenure  than  employees with shorter tenure.  Employees  with longer  tenure  are generally more  involved in their jobs  and  more  committed  to  their  organisations than  those  with  shorter tenure  (Brown,  1996; Cohen,  1991; Mathieu  & Zajac,  1990). Hence,  these employees are more vulnerable  to the threat  of job loss (Probst,  2000).

In  a  similar  vein,  the  negative  association   between  job  insecurity  and health  was found  to be more  severe among  older  employees than  younger employees. This is consistent with the predictions  of Greenhalgh and Rosen- blatt’s (1984) job dependence perspective, which suggests that job insecurity is particularly stressful  to  individuals  who  are  highly  dependent  on  their

jobs. Older employees suffer more from job insecurity because they are less likely to perceive themselves as being able to find comparable jobs in other organisations and  are  thus  highly  dependent   on  their  jobs  (Kuhnert & Vance,  1992). Another   possible  reason  for  older  employees  being  highly dependent  on their jobs is that  they generally have more family obligations and are more sensitive to economic insecurity (Finegold  et al., 2002; Kuhnert

& Vance,  1992). Note  that  Sverke  et  al.  (2002) found  that  occupational status,  which  reflects  job  dependence,  did  not  moderate   the  relationship between  job  insecurity  and  its  health-related outcomes.  Perhaps  occupa- tional  status  is only  related  to  occupational mobility  but  not  amount  of family  obligations  and  economic  insecurity.  Further studies  may  address this speculation.

The  Moderating Effect  of Gender

We predicted that gender might moderate  the relationship between job insecurity  and  its  consequences.  Traditionally,  females  are  expected  to have lower occupational mobility than males (Rosenblatt et al., 1999), while males are  more  likely to  regard  themselves  as the  “breadwinner” of their families (De Witte, 1999). Our results did not show any gender difference in the  effect  of  job  insecurity.  One  possible  reason  is that  more  and  more females are  committed  to  their  jobs (Bradley,  1997) and  the  difference  in work  orientation between  males  and  females  is becoming  small  (Hakim,

1996). Another  possible  reason  is that  job opportunities for  females have been creeping up slowly towards  those of males (Bradley, 1997). That is, the occupational mobility  of females may have become comparable to that  of males. And it has been increasingly common  for the woman  to be the pri- mary “breadwinner” of the family. According  to the United  States Census Bureau  (2004), there are more and  more females who are earning  as much as, if not more than,  their spouse (or partner). Taken  together,  job insecu- rity  seems  to  be  equally  dissatisfying  and  stressful  to  both   males  and females.

Limitations and Further Research Directions

It is important to note  that  our  estimates  of the relationship between  job insecurity  and  its consequences  were subject to the following biases. First, we did not have any unpublished studies in our database, despite our effort to  collect  such  papers.  We  did  try  to  include  as  many  dissertations   as possible. We also carried out the funnel plots (Sterne, Becker, & Egger, 2005) and they appeared  roughly  symmetrical.  Nevertheless,  future  meta-analysis of job insecurity should  try to include unpublished studies to reduce publi- cation  bias.  Second,  the  reliabilities  coded  were Cronbach’s  alpha  which

fails  to  account   for  stability  and  transient errors  (Schmidt,  Le,  & Ilies,

2003). As a result,  the  population correlations would  be underestimated. Third,  because  the mean  reliabilities  used as substitutes  were less variable than  the  actual  reliability  values  which  were  missing,  the  population variance would be underestimated. Fourth, we could not correct for indirect range  restriction   (Hunter,  Schmidt,  &  Le,  2006;  Schmidt,  Oh,  &  Le,

2006).  To  the  extent  that   the  measures  were  subject  to  indirect  range restriction,  population  correlations  would  be  underestimated  and   SDs would be overestimated.

We did not run multiple regression analysis to investigate the unique moderating effects  of  organisational tenure  and  age  on  the  relationship between job insecurity and its consequences.  Because organisational tenure is closely related  to  age, one  may  instead  conclude  from  our  results  that when facing job insecurity, older employees who typically have longer tenure have  a lower  level of turnover intention  and  have  more  health  problems than younger employees (who typically have shorter  tenure). Further primary studies  should  examine  the  relative  importance of the  unique  moderating effects of tenure  and  age. This  is important for  clarifying  the  differential effects of these two variables.

As discussed above, organisational tenure and age seem to capture  differ- ent meanings  and  influence  the association  between  job insecurity  and  its consequences through different processes. Organisational tenure reflects job involvement   and  organisational  commitment (Brown,  1996;  Mathieu   & Zajac, 1990) while age captures  occupational mobility and economic insecu- rity (Kuhnert & Vance, 1992). However,  the present  study did not address whether organisational commitment and job involvement really account  for the tenure difference in the relationship between job insecurity and its consequences.  It  also  did  not  reveal  whether  occupational mobility  and economic insecurity really account  for the age difference in the relationship between job insecurity and its consequences.

Future research should  be conducted  to examine if the moderating effect of organisational tenure  on the association  between  job insecurity  and  its consequences  is mediated  by organisational commitment and  job involve- ment. For instance, the positive association  between job insecurity and turn- over intention  may be more  profound among  employees with lower levels of organisational commitment and  job  involvement.  And  the  moderating effect of organisational tenure  may become  negligible after  organisational commitment  and  job  involvement  have  been  controlled   for.  Similarly, further studies should be conducted  to examine if occupational mobility and economic  insecurity  mediate  the moderating effect of age on the impact  of job insecurity. For  example, perceived occupational mobility and economic insecurity  may predict  the negative  association  between  job insecurity  and well-being  that  this  association   is more  negative  among  employees  with

lower occupational mobility and higher economic insecurity. The moderating effect of age may  become  negligible after  occupational mobility  and  eco- nomic insecurity are held constant.

Finally,  echoing Sverke et al. (2002), we call for future  research focusing on the following issues concerning  with the effect of job insecurity.  In this study,  we meta-analysed bivariate  correlational data.  Correlational studies can  only  reveal association  but  not  direction  of causality.  The  claims  we have made on the “causal  relationship” between job insecurity and its job- related  correlates  and health-related correlates  are solely based on past dis- cussion and  research  on job insecurity,  in which job insecurity  is typically considered  as a stressor  (Ashford  et al., 1989; Probst,  2002; Sverke et al.,

2002). More  longitudinal research  is called for investigating  the role of job insecurity  on  its  job-related   correlates  and  health-related correlates  (e.g. Heaney  et al., 1994; Hellgren,  Sverke, & Isaksson,  1999).

The scope of our  study  was limited  to which kinds  of employees suffer more  from and  react more  strongly  to job insecurity.  We did not  examine how  the  relationship between  job  insecurity  and  its  consequences  varies across  different  types  of  measure  (see Sverke  & Hellgren,  2002). Probst (2003; Borg  & Elizur,  1992)  argued  that  it  is important to  distinguish cognitive  (e.g.  perceived  likelihood  of  job  loss)  and  affective  (e.g.  worry about  job  loss)  measures  of  job  insecurity.  Furthermore, consistent  with Greenhalgh  and  Rosenblatt’s   (1984)  discussion,  Hellgren  et  al.  (1999; Ashford  et al., 1989) distinguished  quantitative (i.e. threat  to the continuity of the job itself) from qualitative  (i.e. threat  to the continuity  of important job features) aspects of job insecurity. Future meta-analysis  of job insecurity may focus on how the type of measure, with reference to these two concep- tualisations  of  dimensions   of  job  insecurity,   influences  the  association between  job insecurity  and  its consequences.  However,  perhaps  more  pri- mary studies reporting  the effect size of the relationship between qualitative aspects  of job insecurity  and  its outcomes  are needed before the proposed meta-analysis  can be conducted.

Concluding Remarks

The present study confirms the negative impact of job insecurity on employees. More  importantly, it also  reveals  that  different  types  of employees  suffer from and  react to job insecurity  in different  ways. Under  the threat  of job loss, younger  employees and  employees with shorter  tenure  tend to have a stronger   intention   to   leave  their   organisations.  Older   employees   and employees with longer tenure, on the other hand, are more affected in terms of their physical and psychological health. Organisations should take differ- ent measures to help their employees to deal with job insecurity. Otherwise, both  employees and organisations will suffer.

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