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Factors That Motivate Business Faculty to Conduct

Research: An Expectancy Theory Analysis
a a a
Yining Chen , Ashok Gupta & Leon Hoshower
a
Ohio University, Athens, Ohio
Published online: 07 Aug 2010.

To cite this article: Yining Chen , Ashok Gupta & Leon Hoshower (2006) Factors That Motivate Business Faculty to Conduct
Research: An Expectancy Theory Analysis, Journal of Education for Business, 81:4, 179-189, DOI: 10.3200/JOEB.81.4.179-189

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 Factors That Motivate Business
Faculty to Conduct Research:
An Expectancy Theory Analysis
YINING CHEN
ASHOK GUPTA
LEON HOSHOWER
Downloaded by [University of Southern Queensland] at 01:14 04 October 2014
OHIO UNIVERSITY
ATHENS, OHIO
ABSTRACT. In this study, the authors
used expectancy theory to examine key fac-
tors that motivate business faculty to con-
duct research. The survey results, from 320
faculty members at 10 business schools,
showed that faculty members who assign
higher importance ratings to both the
extrinsic and the intrinsic rewards of
research exhibit higher research productivi-
ty. Study findings suggest that: (a)
untenured faculty members are motivated
by extrinsic rewards; (b) tenured faculty
members are motivated by intrinsic
rewards; (c) research productivity is posi-
tively correlated with tenure status and the
percentage of work time allocated to
research activities and negatively correlated
with years in academic employment; (d)
there is no relationship between research
productivity and academic discipline; and
(e) there is no relationship between
research productivity and gender.
Copyright © 2006 Heldref Publications
A cademic institutions classified as
research universities are often per-
ceived as indicative of having quality
programs, faculty, and students (Hu &
Gill, 2000). As higher education institu-
tions compete with each other for
resources, being known as a research
institution is becoming increasingly
important. Hermanson, Hermanson,
Ivancevich, and Ivancevich (1995) noted
that many schools, which were formerly
thought of as teaching oriented, required
publications in refereed journals for
tenure and promotion. Because scholar-
ly activities and research productivity
are used to measure the success of insti-
tutions, it is becoming increasingly
important for faculty to be more produc-
tive in research. Thus, an individual fac-
ulty member’s compensation, promotion
and tenure, prestige, and marketability
are very much related to his or her
research productivity.
There are two streams of research on
faculty research productivity. In the first
stream, researchers examined the
changes of research publication require-
ments in faculty tenure and promotion
decisions (Campbell & Morgan, 1987;
Cargile & Bublitz, 1986; Englebrecht,
Iyer, & Patterson, 1994; Milne & Vent,
1987; Read, Rama, & Raghunandan,
1998; Schultz, Meade, & Khurana,
1989). Those researchers have docu-
mented that publication requirements for
promotions and tenure have increased
over time. In the second stream of
research, researchers (Buchheit, Collins,
& Collins, 2001; Hu & Gill, 2000) have
examined individual or institutional fac-
tors that most significantly influence the
research productivity of faculty mem-
bers. Certainly, personal characteristics
like intelligence, insight, curiosity, and
work ethics have an influence, but other
observable and systematic traits can also
be important indicators of scholarly
achievement. Many of the prior studies
that examined influential factors of
research productivity were based on
anecdotal evidence (e.g., personal opin-
ions or experiences; Fox, 1985; McK-
eachie, 1979). The few studies (Bridge-
water, Walsh, & Walkenbach, 1982;
Holly, 1977; Tien & Blackburn, 1996) in
which researchers provided empirical
evidence regarding faculty members’
perceptions of research productivity and
their motivation to conduct research
were limited in external validity by
using a small sample from a specific
field or in internal validity by lacking a
theoretical base.
Expectancy theory (Vroom, 1964)
provides this theoretical basis. It con-
structs a conceptual framework of moti-
vation as well as a measurable mathe-
matical model. In this study, we applied
expectancy theory to 10 college of busi-
ness faculties to provide a better under-
standing of the faculties’ behavioral
intentions (motivation) to do research.
March/April 2006 179
 We then examined the relationship of
these motivational factors to actual
research productivity.
Literature Review
Factors Influencing Research
Productivity
Researchers have examined the factors
that most significantly influence the
research productivity of faculty members
(Cargile & Bublitz, 1986; Diamond,
1986; Goodwin & Sauer, 1995; Hu &
Gill, 2000; Levitan & Ray, 1992). Some
scholars believe that promotion has a
motivating effect on research productivi-
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ty: For instance, Fox (1985) suggested
that higher education institutions can
influence faculty research behavior
through the manipulation of the reward
structure for promotion. However, other
researchers have insisted that faculty pub-
lish not for external rewards but because
they enjoy the process of inquiry (e.g.,
McKeachie, 1979). In summary, prior
studies identified two categories of per-
sonal motivational factors that drive aca-
demic research: Investment factors, or
extrinsic rewards (e.g., income increase,
tenure, promotion), and consumption fac-
tors, or intrinsic rewards (e.g., an individ-
ual’s personal satisfaction from solving
research puzzles, contributing to the dis-
cipline, achieving peer recognition).
In addition to personal motivation,
other factors also have a substantial
influence on faculties’ research produc-
tivity. One well-established research
productivity theory, Life-Cycle theory
(Hu & Gill, 2000), suggests that, in gen-
eral, the research productivity of a
researcher rises sharply in the initial
stages of a career, peeks at the time of
tenure review, and then begins a decline.
Pretenure research productivity is dom-
inated by investment factors and post-
tenure productivity by consumption fac-
tors. Researchers in prior studies
(Buchheit et al., 2001; Cargile &
Bublitz, 1986; Chow & Harrison, 1998)
have identified the following factors as
influencing research productivity: (a)
tenure status, (b) the allocation of work-
ing time to research activities, (c) length
of the tenure probationary period, (d)
teaching loads, and (e) financial
research support.
180 Journal of Education for Business
Perspective Behavioral Theories
A number of theories have been pro-
posed to explain individual motivation
to perform. Equity theory (or theory of
fair exchange; Adams, 1963) and
expectancy theory (Vroom, 1964) are
the two theories most widely used in the
research literature. According to equity
theory, a person compares his or her
inputs into the situation and outcomes
from the situation (Outcomes A/Inputs
A) with a similar ratio of a referent
other (Outcomes B/Inputs B). Inequity
exists when the perceived ratios of out-
puts to inputs for a person and his or her
referent are unequal (Adams). Perceived
inequity is the source of motivation to
act to restore equity or fairness in the
exchange. Equity theory has been suc-
cessfully applied to study consumer dis-
satisfaction, brand and retailer switch-
ing, consumer complaining behavior,
negative word of mouth communica-
tion, and several other marketing and
social exchange situations.
Expectancy theory has been recog-
nized as one of the most promising
conceptualizations of individual moti-
vation (Ferris, 1977). Many
researchers (Ajzen & Fishbein, 1980;
Brownell & McInnes, 1986; Ferris;
Hancock, 1995; Warshaw, 1980) have
proposed that expectancy theory can
provide an appropriate theoretical
framework for research that examines
an individual’s acceptance of and
intention to use a system (DeSanctis,
1983). However, empirical research
employing expectancy theory within an
academe has been limited. This study
uses expectancy theory to examine fac-
ulties’ motivation to conduct research.
Expectancy models are cognitive
explanations of human behavior that
cast people as active, thinking, predict-
ing creatures in their environments.
They continuously evaluate the out-
comes of their behavior and subjective-
ly assess the likelihood that each of their
possible actions will lead to various out-
comes. The choice of the amount of
effort people exert is based on a system-
atic analysis of (a) the values of the
rewards from these outcomes, (b) the
likelihood that rewards will result from
these outcomes, and (c) the likelihood
of attaining these outcomes through
their actions and efforts.
According to Vroom (1964),
expectancy theory shows that the over-
all Motivation (M) of a faculty member
to conduct research is the summation of
the products of the attractiveness of var-
ious individual outcomes associated
with research (Ak) and the probability
that research will produce those out-
comes (Ik), which is expressed by the
equation:
n
M= ∑ ( Ak * I k ), (1)
k =1
where M = motivation for conducting
research; Ak = attractiveness (or value or
importance) of outcome k associated
with research productivity; and Ik = the
perceived probability (or impact) that
being productive in research will lead to
outcome k.
In our application of the expectancy
theory (see Figure 1), faculty members
evaluated the attractiveness of 13 possi-
ble outcomes resulting from performing
research. They then considered the likeli-
hood that each of these outcomes would
occur. According to expectancy theory,
multiplying the attractiveness of each
outcome by the probability of its occur-
rence and then adding the resulting prod-
ucts yields total motivation to conduct
research. On the basis of this systematic
analysis, the faculty members deter-
mined how much effort they would like
to exert in conducting research.
Research Objectives
Although many prior researchers
(Buchheit et al., 2001; Cargile &
Bublitz, 1986; Chow & Harrison, 1998;
Fox, 1985; Hu & Gill, 2000; McK-
eachie, 1979) examined factors that
influence research productivity, few
have examined faculty members’ per-
ceptions of these factors from a behav-
ioral perspective and how their percep-
tions are translated into the motivation
to exert themselves to publish. In the
current study, we employed expectancy
theory to examine the motivational fac-
tors and their relationship with actual
research productivity in a constructive
manner. By successful application of
expectancy theory, we were able to pro-
vide a better understanding of the
behavioral intention (motivation) of fac-
ulty members’ devotion to research.

Attractiveness or
importance of
research rewards × achievement of rewards
Ak
Motivation for research
• Extrinsic motivators
(investment factors)
• Intrinsic motivators
(consumption factors)
Xk
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n
Xk = Ak × Ik M = kΣ= 1(Ak × Ik)
FIGURE 1. Expectancy theory model.
Our objective was to investigate the
impact of the various potential rewards
from research on faculty motivation.
The 13 rewards we tested in this study
included 6 extrinsic and 6 intrinsic
rewards. The 6 extrinsic rewards were
(a) receiving or having tenure, (b) being
full professor or receiving promotion,
(c) getting better salary raises, (d) get-
ting an administrative assignment, (e)
getting a chaired professorship, and (f)
getting a reduced teaching load. The 6
intrinsic rewards were (a) achieving
peer recognition, (b) getting respect
from students, (c) satisfying a personal
need to contribute to the field, (d) satis-
fying a personal need for creativity or
curiosity, (e) satisfying a personal need
to collaborate with others, and (f) satis-
fying a personal need to stay current in
the field. The 13th reward, the ability to
find a better job at another university,
could be an extrinsic reward because a
better job would likely translate into
more pay, better research support, and a
lower teaching load. However, a better
job could also mean higher status,
which is an intrinsic reward. Conse-
quently, we segregated this reward from
the other 6 extrinsic rewards because,
unlike the others, it cannot be part of the
reward system of the faculty member’s
current university. We compiled this
group of 13 factors from previous liter-
ature and a pilot study, which asked a
Probability that research
productivity will impact
Ik
Institutional and
demographic factors:
Tenure status, years in
academics, gender,
academic rank, time spent
on research, discipline
focus group of 20 business professors to
list motivational factors other than those
identified by prior literature.
Our second objective was to discover
whether there was similarity between
tenured versus untenured faculty in their
preferences of the rewards for research
productivity or whether they have dif-
ferent motivations to conduct research.
Our third objective was to examine the
impact of influential institutional and
other factors (e.g., tenure status, years
of academic employment, percentage of
working time allocated to research
activities, academic discipline, and gen-
der) on research productivity.
On the basis of the literature reviewed
and research objectives discussed
above, we developed the following
research propositions:
Proposition 1: There is a positive correla-
tion between research productivity and
motivation for rewards. Those who show
higher total motivation for research
rewards display better research perfor-
mance than otherwise.
Proposition 2: Pretenure research produc-
tivity is dominated by investment (extrin-
sic) factors and posttenure productivity
by consumption (intrinsic) factors.
Proposition 2a: Among untenured facul-
ty, there is a positive correlation between
research productivity and motivation for
extrinsic rewards. Those who show
higher motivation for extrinsic rewards
display better research performance.
Proposition 2b: Among tenured faculty,
there is a positive correlation between
research productivity and motivation
for intrinsic rewards. Those who show
higher motivation for intrinsic rewards
display better research performance.
Proposition 3: There is a relationship
between research productivity and institu-
tional and other factors.
Proposition 3a: There is a positive rela-
tionship between research productivity
and tenure.
Proposition 3b: There is a negative
relationship between research produc-
tivity and years in academics.
Proposition 3c: There is a positive rela-
tionship between research productivity
and time allocated for research activities.
Proposition 3d: There is no relationship
between research productivity and aca-
demic discipline.
Proposition 3e: There is no relationship
between research productivity and gender.
To measure the relationship between
motivation and research productivity, it
is important to define research produc-
tivity. Doctoral-granting colleges of
business and non-doctoral-granting col-
leges differ widely in their perception of
acceptable publication outlets. Includ-
ing both types of colleges in the sample
would distort the measure of research
productivity. For example, within a
given time, seven journal articles at a
non-doctoral-granting college of busi-
ness would likely represent more
research productivity than seven articles
in the same journals at a doctoral-grant-
ing college of business. However, doc-
toral-granting colleges are more likely
to have a more restrictive list of which
journals count than are non-doctoral-
granting universities. Thus, it would be
difficult to compare both quantity and
quality of research between these two
types of schools. To avoid this measure-
ment problem and to increase our power
to discern the relationship between
research productivity and motivation,
we structured the sample to include sim-
ilar schools of business.
METHOD
We collected the data set for this
study via a mail survey, which is shown
in the Appendix. We mailed the ques-
tionnaire in February of 2004 to 670
March/April 2006 181
 business faculty members of 10 mid- of the 13 research rewards (Ak) to them Overall Motivation:
western universities with a balanced (Table 2), and their perceived probabil- 13 13
teaching and research mission. These ity that research productivity would MO = ∑ ( Ak * I k ) = ∑ ( X k ); (2 )
10 universities are Carnegie Research result in each of the 13 rewards at their k =1 k =1

Classification II research universities respective colleges of business (Ik; see

that do not offer PhD programs in the Table 3). Extrinsic Motivation:
business college. They have similar 6 6
research expectations and academic ME = ∑ ( Ak * I k ) = ∑ ( X k ); (3)
RESULTS k =1 k =1
standards. We omitted non-tenure-
track faculty from the sample. Between
Research Productivity and Intrinsic Motivation:
the original mailing and the one
Motivation for Research Rewards
reminder mailing, we received 320 13 12
usable questionnaires, representing a Table 4 shows Pearson’s correlation MI = ∑ ( Ak * I k ) = ∑ ( X k ). (4 )
k =1 k =1
48% response rate. In the question- coefficients between faculty motivation
naire, we collected information such as to conduct research and various mea- We measured actual research produc-
academic discipline, gender, time allo- sures of research productivity. Faculty tivity by the number of books published,
cated to research, academic rank, motivation to conduct research (M) was number of book chapters or cases pub-
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tenure status, research output during measured by multiplying the impor- lished, number of refereed journal arti-
entire academic career, and research tance of each research reward (Ak) by cles published, and dollar amount of
output during the past 24 months (see the probability of achieving that reward grants received. We used two time peri-
Table 1). In the questionnaire, faculty through research (Ik) and then summing ods to measure the outputs: academic
members also evaluated the importance the resulting 13 products. career to date and in the 24 months prior
to the study. The correlations between
TABLE 1. Demographic Information research motivation and total journal
articles published (Y3) and journal arti-
cles published in the past 24 months
Characteristic n % (Y7) were both positive and significant
at the .01 level. The other measures of
Discipline research productivity (i.e., grants,
Accounting 69 21
Finance 38 12 books, and chapters in books) were not
Management Information Systems 26 8 significantly correlated with research
Marketing 63 20 motivation at the .05 level and were
Human Resource Management 20 6 omitted from further analysis. This
Organization Behavior 17 5 result supported Proposition 1, that fac-
Business Law 17 5
Managementa 28 9 ulty who show higher motivation for
Other 42 13 research rewards display better research
Rank performance in terms of publication of
Full professor 137 43 journal articles both in the short term
Associate professor 113 35 and the long term.
Assistant professor 68 22
Tenure status For untenured faculty, the correlation
Tenured 245 77 between extrinsic motivation (ME) and
Untenured 74 23 journal articles published in the past 24
Gender months was significant at the .01 level.
Male 232 73 No other correlations were significant.
Female 88 27
Average research output during entire academic career There were no significant correlations
Books 1.18 between intrinsic motivation and
Book chapters or cases 2.41 research productivity for untenured fac-
Journal articles 17.93 ulty. This generally supported Proposi-
Grants (in $000) 81.92 tion 2a, that untenured faculty are moti-
Average research output during the past 24 months
Books 0.24 vated by extrinsic rewards, and those
Book chapters or cases 0.43 untenured faculty members who show
Journal articles 2.86 higher extrinsic motivation display bet-
Grants (in $000) 18.62 ter research performance in terms of
journal articles published in the past 24
Note. N = 320; average time spent in research = 29%; average number of years of academic months.
employment = 17.02.
a
Management includes decision science, production, operations management, and quantitative Table 4 shows that the intrinsic moti-
business analysis. vation (MI) of tenured faculty was posi-
tively and significantly correlated well

182 Journal of Education for Business

 beyond the .01 level with both journal
TABLE 2. Importance of Research Rewards to Faculty publications within the past 24 months
and lifetime journal publications. Intrin-
Research reward M SD sic motivation of tenured faculty was
also positive, but not significant at the
Extrinsic .05 level, for the other six measures of
Receiving or having tenure 4.53 1.12 research productivity (not shown in
Receiving promotion 4.28 1.11 Table 4). There were no significant cor-
Getting better salary raises 4.18 1.09
Getting an administrative assignment 1.90 1.12 relations between extrinsic motivations
Getting chaired professorship 2.80 1.48 of tenured faculty and any measure of
Getting reduced teaching load 3.40 1.34 research productivity. These results sup-
Intrinsic port Proposition 3b, that tenured faculty
Achieving peer recognition 3.68 1.13 members’ research activities are moti-
Getting respect from students 3.53 1.28
Satisfying need to contribute 3.76 1.06 vated by intrinsic rewards. Those
Satisfying need for creativity or curiosity 4.06 1.02 tenured faculty members who have high-
Having collaborations with others 3.56 1.08 er intrinsic motivation display better
Satisfying need to stay current 3.99 0.95 research performance in terms of greater
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Finding a better job 2.76 1.46 number of published journal articles in

the short term as well as the long term.
Note. Responses were rated on a scale of 1 = not important at all to 5 = very important.

Research Productivity and

Tenure
TABLE 3. Faculty’s Perceived Impact of Research Productivity on
Achieving Various Rewards To determine the effect of the demo-
graphic and institutional factors on
research productivity, we estimated a
Research reward M SD linear regression model. We used journal
articles published within the past 24
Extrinsic months (Y7) as the measure of research
Receiving or having tenure 4.57 0.83 productivity, which was the dependent
Receiving promotion 4.53 0.88
variable. This measure of research pro-
Getting better salary raises 3.57 1.43
ductivity had the highest correlation
Getting an administrative assignment 2.08 1.04
Getting chaired professorship 3.52 1.49 with research motivation (see Table 4)
Getting reduced teaching load 3.24 1.43 across both tenured and untenured facul-
Intrinsic ty. The five independent variables were
Achieving peer recognition 3.85 1.11 (a) tenure status, (b) years of academic
Getting respect from students 2.31 1.06 employment, (c) percentage of time
Satisfying need to contribute 3.76 1.11 spent in research, (d) academic disci-
Satisfying need for creativity or curiosity 3.88 1.06 pline, and (e) gender. There was a good
Having collaborations with others 3.44 1.09 fit between the observed data and the
Satisfying need to stay current 3.79 0.98 model, F(5, 315) = 7.984, p < .0001.
Finding a better job 3.24 1.56
The regression results in Table 5 show
that there was a significant positive rela-
Note. Responses were rated on a scale of 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree.
tionship between tenure status and
research productivity. The regression

TABLE 4. Pearson Product–Moment Correlations Between Faculty Motivation for Research and Research
Productivity Measures

All faculty Untenured faculty Tenured faculty

(N = 320) (n = 74) (n = 245)
Overall Extrinsic Intrinsic Extrinsic Intrinsic
motivation (MO) motivation (ME) motivation (MI) motivation (ME) motivation (MI)
Productivity measure r p r p r p r p r p

Journal articles published .159 .006 .127 .294 .048 .691 .064 .329 .270 .000
Articles published in past 24 months .197 .001 .283 .010 .044 .712 –.020 .762 .239 .000

March/April 2006 183


TABLE 5. Effect of Demographic and Institutional Factors on Faculty
Research Output
Model
Constant
Tenure status
Years in academics
% of time spent on research
Discipline
Gender
Note. Dependent variable: Journal articles published in past 24 months; independent variables:
Tenure status, years in academics, percentage of time spent on research, discipline, gender. F(5,
309) = 7.984. R 2 = 0.114. Bold p values are significant at .05 level.
coefficient for the tenure status variable
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was positive (0.950) and significantly
different from zero, p = .039 level. On
the basis of this result, we concluded
that our data supported Proposition 3a.
This is consistent with the findings of
Lane, Ray, and Glennon (1990) on sta-
tisticians, Levitan and Ray (1992) on
accounting faculty, and Hancock, Lane,
Ray, and Glennon (1992) on manage-
ment science researchers, which suggest
that tenured faculty members are more
productive than those without tenure.
Research Productivity and Years
in Academics
The life-cycle model (Diamond,
1986) predicts that faculty research pro-
ductivity will decline as an individual’s
academic experience increases. In Table
5, the estimated regression coefficient of
the variable years of academic employ-
ment was negative (−.045), which is sig-
nificantly different from zero (p = .022).
One plausible reason for this decline in
research productivity is the decline of
extrinsic motivation as a result of attain-
ment of tenure and promotion and the
proximity of retirement. Another factor
may be that senior faculty members tend
to have more service and administrative
responsibilities, which may hinder their
research productivity. Overall, we can
conclude that Proposition 3b was sup-
ported by our data.
Research Productivity and Time
Allocated to Research
Researchers have shown previously
that research productivity depends
heavily on how much time one spends
184 Journal of Education for Business
B β t p
1.609 2.827 .005
.950 .141 2.074 .039
–.045 –.162 –2.296 .022
4.715 .300 5.199 .000
–.082 –.080 –1.491 .137
.403 .064 1.101 .272
on research-related activities (Hancock
et al., 1992; Lane et al., 1990). That is,
faculty who display higher research pro-
ductivity allocate more time to research
activities. Our data in Table 5 show the
same pattern. The regression coefficient
for the percentage of time spent on
research was positive (4.715) and sig-
nificant, p < .0001. In fact, the beta
coefficient for percentage of time spent
on research was the highest, indicating
this was the most important variable in
the model. Thus, we concluded that our
data supported Proposition 3c.
Research Productivity and
Academic Discipline
In examining whether research pro-
ductivity differs across disciplines
within the business schools of our data
set, we found that the regression coef-
ficient for discipline was not signifi-
cantly different from zero at the .05
alpha level, p = .137 (see Table 5).
Thus, we could not reject Proposition
3d and did not find a difference in
research productivity among faculty
from the various disciplines.
Research Productivity and
Gender
In examining whether research pro-
ductivity differed between male and
female faculty of our data set, we found
that the regression coefficient for gender
was not significantly different from zero
at the .05 level (p = .272). Thus, we con-
cluded that Proposition 3e could not be
rejected by our data. We were unable to
find a relationship between gender and
research productivity.
Effect of Institutional and Other
Factors
Researchers (Buchheit et al., 2001;
Hu & Gill, 2000; Tien, 2000) have pre-
viously shown that faculty research pro-
ductivity was a result of the interaction
among many endogenous and exoge-
nous variables, including individual per-
sonal characteristics; academic disci-
pline; educational background; previous
employment; institutional characteris-
tics; and teaching, research, and service
assignments. All of our subjects were
from Carnegie Research Category II
non-doctoral-granting colleges of busi-
ness where many of the institutional
variables or factors were similar. This
enabled us to focus on personal motiva-
tional factors, which were the target of
our study. As a further simplification,
we set our research objective to be iden-
tifying the variables that may have a sig-
nificant effect on research productivity
rather than quantifying such effects on
the productivity. For that reason, we
chose a general linear regression model
as the most appropriate tool for the
analysis. The regression model can be
expressed as:
n
Y = B0 + ∑ Bi Xi , (5 )
i =1
where Y is the dependent variable, Xi (i
= 1, 2 … n) are the independent vari-
ables, and βi (i = 1, 2 … n) are the
regression coefficients.
In establishing the regression model,
we used the self-reported research pro-
ductivity data collected from the ques-
tionnaire on refereed journal articles
published in the past 24 months (Y7) as
the dependent variable. We calculated
the 13 independent motivational vari-
ables as the product of Ak (attractiveness
of reward k associated with research
productivity), which we collected from
Section 1 of the questionnaire, and Ik
(perceived probability that being pro-
ductive in research would have an
impact on outcome k), which was col-
lected from Sections 2 and 3 of the
questionnaire. To test whether there was
an order effect, we prepared the ques-
tionnaire in two versions, with the 13
variables arranged in different orders.
The results from the two versions did
not differ significantly, which indicated
 no order effect. The questionnaire used
for the study can be found in the Appen-
dix. In addition to the motivational vari-
ables (X1 to X13), discipline (X14), per-
centage of time devoted to research
(X15), gender (X16), years in academic
career (X17), and academic rank (X18)
were included in the stepwise regres-
sions as controlled factors for two sepa-
rate analyses—one for the tenured and
the other for untenured faculty.
Because the independent variables
may not be independent from each
other and, therefore, correlation may be
present among them, we adopted a
stepwise regression with a selection cri-
terion of Cronbach’s alpha = .10. In
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.01. This indicated a good fit between
the observed data and the models, and
the independent variables are related to
the dependent variable. Furthermore, we
found that R2 ranges from .140 to .141,
which indicated that about 14% of the
variation in the number of journal arti-
cles faculty published in the preceding
24 months was explained by the inde-
pendent variables. Given the large sam-
ple size and the great heterogeneity of
the respondents, these R2 values should
be considered satisfactory.
In terms of which variables con-
tributed most to explain the variance in
publication of journal articles, we
observed that, after controlling for the
sion coefficients for both variables were
positive and significant at .05 alpha lev-
els. However, research productivity
declined with the length of time a faculty
member stayed in academics. The regres-
sion coefficient associated with X17 was
negative and significant at the .05 alpha
level.
The desire for tenure (mean impor-
tance rating of 4.53 out of 5) and pro-
motion (mean importance rating of 4.28
out of 5) was great for all untenured fac-
ulty regardless of their research produc-
tivity and, thus, did not explain variation
in research productivity. However, vari-
ation in research productivity in terms
of number of journal articles published

doing so, only the independent vari-
ables that have a significant contribu-
tion at the .10 alpha level can enter into
the regression. Table 6 shows the para-
meter estimates and model statistics for
the stepwise regression models. The
independent variables are listed by the
order that they enter into the stepwise
regression.
Table 6 shows model statistics for two
regressions, tenured faculty and
untenured faculty. For each regression
model, the F statistic was significant, p <
TABLE 6. Motivators of Journal Article Publications: A Stepwise
Regression Analysis
Independent variable
effects of demographic and institutional
variables, the three factors that had the
most impact on explaining the variability
in number of journal articles published in
the past 24 months by tenured faculty
were percentage of time spent on
research, motivation to contribute to the
field, and years in academics, in that
order. The greater the percentage of time
that tenured faculty members spent on
research and the more motivated they
were to make a contribution to the field,
the more articles they published. Regres-
B β t p
in the past 24 months was most
explained by professors’ ambition to get
chaired professorships and by the num-
ber of years they had been untenured.
Those who were more motivated by the
prospect of becoming a chaired profes-
sor and those who had waited longer in
the tenure pipeline had published more
within the past 24 months. Regression
coefficients for both these variables
were positive and significant at the .05
alpha level. Because those who had
been untenured longer were, presum-
ably, closer to the tenure decision, they
would have responded to the reward of
tenure and the punishment of denial of
tenure more strongly than would faculty
who were further away from the tenure
decision.

Tenured facultya
DISCUSSION
Constant 1.642 2.502 .013
% of time spent on research (X15) 3.955 0.218 3.166 .002 Effective Use of Tenure and
Motivation to contribute to field (X9) 0.073 0.174 2.563 .011
Years in academics (X17) –0.045 –0.137 –2.150 .033 Promotion
There are two aspects to the motiva-
Untenured facultyb tional strength of any reward. Those fac-
Constant 1.102 1.582 .119 tors are the value of the reward to the
Motivation to get chaired professorship (X5) 0.112 0.298 2.497 .015 individual and the probability that the
Years in academics (X17) 0.133 0.280 2.346 .022 reward will occur if the individual is
successful in achieving the goal to
Note. Dependent variable: Journal articles published in past 24 months (Y7); independent variables: which the reward is attached. Of the 13
Receiving or having tenure (X1), receiving promotion (X2), getting better salary raise (X3), getting
administrative assignment (X4), getting chaired professorship (X5), getting reduced teaching load motivations examined in this study, fac-
(X6), achieving peer recognition (X7), getting respect from students (X8), satisfying need to con- ulty ranked tenure and promotion,
tribute (X9), satisfying need for creativity (X10), having collaborations with others (X11), satisfying respectively, as their two most valued
need to stay current (X12), finding a better job (X13), discipline (X14), % of time spent on research
(X15) gender (X16), years of academic employment (X17). X1 to X13 are the importance or attrac- rewards. They also assigned the highest
tiveness of the reward (Ak) multiplied by the perceived probability (Ik) that being productive will probabilities to these rewards; of the 13
have a high impact on receiving that reward. Therefore, Xk = Ak × Ik. In this survey, the maximum rewards, the faculty believed that
score is 25 (5 × 5) and the minimum is 1 (1 × 1).
a
F(3, 218) = 11.999, p < .000, R 2 = .141; number of observations = 222. bF(2, 61) = 5.034, p < research productivity would most likely
.009, R 2 = .140; number of observations = 64. lead to the rewards of tenure and pro-
motion. This made having or receiving

March/April 2006 185

 tenure and promotion the two highest
motivational factors. By making the link
between research productivity and the
rewards of tenure and promotion so
clear in the minds of faculty, universi-
ties are using these rewards very effec-
tively to motivate research productivity.
However, the stepwise regressions did
not show that the rewards of tenure and
promotion were the most important fac-
tors in explaining the variations in num-
ber of publications among faculty. We
supposed that this was because all fac-
ulty were highly motivated by tenure
and promotion and the standard devia-
tion of the force of this motivation was
relatively low. Thus, the difference in
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number of publications was explained
by other factors. For example, all pro-
fessional athletic coaches want to win.
Consequently, the will to win may not
be an important factor in explaining the
variations in the win–loss records of
coaches. However, this does not mean
that the will to win is not critical.
Occasionally, legislators and other
public figures question the value of the
tenure system in academe. They suggest
that, once tenured, faculty members
cannot be fired whether they work or
not. Consequently, tenured faculty
members have little incentive to per-
form and may become semiretired while
still employed by the university. This
scenario seems plausible. However, the
data gathered by this study show the
opposite. As shown in Table 6, tenured
status is significantly and positively
related to the number of journal articles
accepted or published by tenure-tracked
faculty within the past 24 months.
Ineffective Use of Pay Raises
Faculty ranked getting better pay
raises as their third most valued reward.
However, their subjective probability of
receiving pay raises from achieving
research productivity ranked 7th out of
13. Universities have not established a
strong link in the minds of their faculty
between research productivity and the
reward of pay raises. Thus, the motiva-
tional effect of the pay raise system is
limited. Universities could, therefore,
increase the motivational impact of
salary raises by making a clearer link
between raises and research productivi-
ty. One possibility is to assure faculty
186 Journal of Education for Business
that they will receive a raise in a partic-
ular amount (e.g., $1,000 raise) for each
journal article published in a predeter-
mined list of journals. Colleges of busi-
ness could fund these pay raises by
deducting the total amount of these pub-
lication-based pay raises from their
annual raise pool. The remainder of the
raise pool could then be distributed as
before.
Unexpected Consequences of
the Annuity Pay Raise System
Typically, universities give annual pay
raises, which then become part of pro-
fessors’ base pay. This increase in base
pay continues throughout the careers of
the professors, provided that they remain
at the university. Thus, each annual pay
increase is effectively an annuity. Conse-
quently, faculty members could still be
receiving rewards when aged 60 years
for research that was published when
they were aged 45 years. Such a system
inadvertently gives a greater incentive to
faculty members who are both young
and intend to stay at the university for a
long time. In contrast, faculty who are
close to retirement have fewer years to
reap the rewards of any increase in annu-
al base pay and, therefore, effectively
receive a lesser monetary reward for
research productivity.
Another, and perhaps related, finding
is that the number of articles published
within the past 24 months decreases
with years in academe. One reason for
that may be that abilities and energy
decrease with age. Another reason that
publications decrease might be that
senior faculty members typically have
greater service requirements. However, a
contributing factor to this observed
decrease in research productivity with
longevity in academe might be the
“annuity” pay raise system. With
longevity, a greater proportion of faculty
members’ pay is derived from past
increases in base pay, which were pre-
sumably linked to past accomplish-
ments. The benefits from any current or
future pay raises simultaneously
decrease because older faculty members
have fewer years to reap the benefit of
the annual increase in base pay. Perhaps
the pay system is partially responsible
for the decrease in older faculty’s
research productivity.
One alternative to the current pay
raise system is to give large one-time
bonuses for research productivity (i.e.,
publication) and smaller base increases.
A bonus-based system would reward
faculty with a single, relatively large
monetary reward for research produc-
tivity. Such a system would reward all
faculty equally rather than giving de
facto greater rewards to younger faculty.
Time Spent Doing Research
The number of journal articles pub-
lished or accepted within the past 24
months is significantly (p < .001) relat-
ed to the percentage of work time that
faculty members spent on research. Fac-
ulty may increase the percentage of
work time devoted to research by work-
ing additional hours and dedicating
those additional hours to research. Thus,
increased publications may come purely
from additional effort. However, faculty
members could also increase the per-
centage of their time devoted to research
by decreasing their teaching and service
hours and substituting these additional
hours to research. Future research could
examine the extent, if any, of the substi-
tution effect suggested earlier. If the
hours substituted from teaching and ser-
vice are meaningfully large, administra-
tors should modify their research
requirements in light of their college
mission’s balance of teaching and
research.
Conclusion
In this study, we employed expectan-
cy theory (Vroom, 1964) to examine the
impact of various motivational factors
on faculty research productivity. Our
faculty survey data shows that faculty
with higher total (both intrinsic and
extrinsic) motivation for rewards pub-
lished significantly more articles within
the 24 months prior to the study and
over their careers than did those with
lower motivation for rewards. However,
the category of motivation differs with
tenure status. Tenured faculty members
are motivated more by intrinsic motiva-
tional rewards, whereas untenured fac-
ulty are more motivated by extrinsic
rewards.
Tenure and promotion are potent
motivators of faculty research produc-
 tivity, whereas pay raises are insuffi-
ciently linked to research productivity
to be a good incentive. After controlling
for other institutional and motivational
factors, we found the number of journal
articles published in the 24 months prior
to the study was (a) positively related to
tenured status, (b) negatively related to
years in academe, and (c) positively
related to the percentage of working
time a faculty member allocates to
research activities.
NOTE
Correspondence concerning this article should
be addressed to Leon Hoshower, Professor, Col-
lege of Business, Ohio University, Athens, Ohio.
Downloaded by [University of Southern Queensland] at 01:14 04 October 2014
E-mail: hoshower@ohio.edu
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1 being not important at all.
Importance of the following to me:
a. Receiving or having tenure
b. Being full professor or receiving promotion
c. Getting better salary raises
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(appendix continues)
March/April 2006 187
 APPENDIX (continued)

Importance of the following to me: Not

Important Very
At All Important
i. Satisfying my need to contribute to the field 1 2 3 4 5
j. Satisfying my need for creativity or curiosity 1 2 3 4 5
k. Having satisfying collaborations with others 1 2 3 4 5
l. Satisfying my need to stay current in the field 1 2 3 4 5
m. Finding a better job at another university 1 2 3 4 5

2. Based on your experience and expectations of your college’s environment, please evaluate the impact of faculty research productivity
on achieving the following using a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being strongly agree and 1 being strongly disagree.

At my college or school, faculty research Strongly Strongly

productivity has a high impact on: Disagree Agree
a. Receiving tenure 1 2 3 4 5
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b. Receiving promotion 1 2 3 4 5
c. Getting better salary raises 1 2 3 4 5
d. Getting an administrative assignment 1 2 3 4 5
e. Getting a chaired professorship 1 2 3 4 5
f. Getting reduced teaching load 1 2 3 4 5

3. Based on your perception, please evaluate the impact of your research productivity on achieving the following using a scale of 1 to
5, with 5 being strongly agree and 1 being strongly disagree.

My research productivity has a high impact on: Strongly Strongly

Disagree Agree
g. Achieving peer recognition 1 2 3 4 5
h. Getting respect from students 1 2 3 4 5
i. Satisfying my need to contribute to the field 1 2 3 4 5
j. Satisfying my need for creativity or curiosity 1 2 3 4 5
k. Having satisfying collaborations with others 1 2 3 4 5
l. Satisfying my need to stay current in the field 1 2 3 4 5
m. Finding a better job at another university 1 2 3 4 5

4. Demographic Profile:
Discipline: ❑ Accounting ❑ Finance ❑ MIS ❑ Marketing ❑ HRM ❑ OB
❑ Business Law ❑ Decision Science/Production/Operations Mgmt/QBA ❑ Other

Please indicate the percentage of work time you spent on research in the past 12 months: %
Gender: ❑ Male ❑ Female

The year in which you started your first tenure-track faculty position:
Current academic rank: ❑ Assistant Prof. ❑ Associate Prof. ❑ Full Prof.

As applicable, please provide the year in which you were promoted from:
Assistant to Associate Professor rank:
Associate to Full Professor rank:

Tenure Status: ❑ Tenured ❑ Untenured but on Tenure Track ❑ Non-Tenure Track

If tenured, in which year did you receive tenure:

Your Research Output during your entire academic career:

Total number of books published or accepted for publication:
Total book chapters or cases published or accepted for publication:
Total number of refereed journal articles published or accepted for publication:
Total worth of research grants received: $

Your Research Output during the past 24 months:

Total number of books published or accepted for publication:
(appendix continues)

188 Journal of Education for Business

 APPENDIX (continued)

Total book chapters or cases published or accepted for publication:

Total number of refereed journal articles published or accepted for publication:
Total worth of research grants received: $

To what extent do you believe that your efforts will achieve or have achieved research output that is:

Not to a To a great
great extent extent
a. Acceptable to your college’s standard 1 2 3 4 5
b. Acceptable to your own satisfaction 1 2 3 4 5
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March/April 2006 189