An Empirical Examination of the Parsimony of Perceptual Congruence Scores

Abstract

A growing body of research deals with congruence and incongruence between supervisors' and subordinates' perception and subsequent effects on outcome variables for organizations and individuals. The results of these studies have indicated positive relationships between congruence and (1) supervisors' evaluations of subordinates (; ; ); (2) subordinates' satisfaction and morale (; ; ); (3) subordinates' liking for supervisors (); (4) quality of relationships between supervisors and subordinates (); and (5) subordinates' satisfaction with communication (). When computing congruence scores, researchers have used several techniques. The most commonly used technique, the D statistic, derives from simple differences in raw scores for supervisors' and subordinates' perceptions of scale items (e.g., ). But the question raised by about the parsimony of such difference scores is an important issue for such research. To state the problem more specifically, when a congruence relationship appears with variables of interest, has that relationship been created by one of the components of the congruence score, or is it actually due to congruence? There is some evidence that component scores contain enough information to render difference scores redundant and unparsimonious (cf. ; ). The purpose of this study is to examine a relationship between congruence and communication satisfaction to determine if it is primarily a function of congruence, or of one or the other of the components of congruence. This study does not seek to replicate earlier perceptual congruence research, but rather to investigate the parsimony of D statistics in the context of a perceptual congruence study.