Warmth in Groups and Satisfaction with Supervision

Most previous studies of Person-Environment fit have failed to use objective measures of the work environment that are independent of the person examined. This study aims to further develop and improve the operationalisation of Person-Environment fit by investigating objective fit and the interaction effect of group size on the relationship between the personality trait of warmth and satisfaction with supervision. Group size (obtained from company records) was the objective measure of the work environment and warmth was measured by the 16PF (Cattel et al 1987). On the basis of data from 257 shop-floor workers in a factory in Wales, UK, results of hierarchical multiple regression generally indicated that the relationship between warmth and satisfaction with supervision are moderated by group size such that the relationship is positive in small groups and negative in large groups.