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In this section, I indicate several topics that can be further explored to contribute to the literature on employee voice behaviour. I also elaborate which areas can be explored in the future to extend understandings of regulatory focus.

5.5.1 Future Directions for Voice Research

extensively increased our knowledge of employee voice behaviour, there remains much we do not know about voice behaviour and some critical issues related to voice behaviour remain unaddressed. The important research gaps are discussed as follows.

First, there is lack of overarching framework to integrate different perspectives regarding voice conceptualisation. Since LePine and Van Dyne (1998) proposed the construct of voice, the way to conceptualise this construct has been controversial. There are different perspectives regarding how to define the boundary of employee voice behaviour domain—namely, which behaviour should and should not be included in the conceptualisation of voice (e.g., Liang et al., 2012; Maynes & Podsakoff, 2014; Van Dyne et al., 2003 )—which has caused confusion regarding the nature of employee voice behaviour (such as whether voice behaviour is prosocial or not) and its

relationship with the other conceptually similar constructs, such as silence, OCB, and voice in Hirschman’s (1970) framework. This fact raises the importance of developing an overarching framework to clarify the conceptualisation of employee voice behaviour and integrate different perspectives (Chamberlin et al., 2017).

Second, more research effort is required to investigate specific forms of employee voice behaviour is needed. Although a few recent works attempted to highlight the divergent antecedents of different forms of voice behaviour by examining their associations with different antecedents, the majority of voice literature is based on the undifferentiated general voice conceptualisation. This is understandable because the dimensionality of voice behaviour and their operational measures were only introduced recently (Liang et al., 2012; Maynes & Podsakoff, 2014). However, considering the apparent differences between various forms of employee voice behaviour, the results of research based on undifferentiated general voice conceptualisation should be interpreted

with caution. More importantly, more research is required that focuses on specific forms of voice behaviour—especially some forms of voice behaviour that have long been ignored due to their negative attributes—to improve understandings of employee voice behaviour and lend clarity to the voice literature.

Third, future research may also contribute to the voice literature by expanding of our knowledge of the forces that facilitate or inhibit employee voice behaviour,

especially employees’ emotions. Employee voice behaviour is emotionally charged, and the voice literature has highlighted the importance of emotional factors in shaping employee voice behaviour has been highlighted in voice literature (Grant, 2013). However, past research generally focused on the broad categories of positive or negative affective states by lumping together different discrete emotions with similar valance (e.g., Lam et al., 2014; Liu et al., 2017). These discrete emotions may have different antecedents and consequences; thus, attention should be suggested to be focused on the discrete emotions, rather than the broad categories of affective states (Ilies, Peng, Savani, & Dimotakis, 2013). In the voice literature, only the effect of fear on employee voice behaviour is well-recognised (Detert & Edmondson, 2011; Kish- Gephart et al., 2009). The effect of other emotional factors has long been overlooked, which leaves significant opportunities for future research.

Finally, there is also a need for multilevel research on employee voice behaviour. In fact, Morrison (2011) has noted the importance of integrating individual forces with group level factors to predict employee voice behaviour: ‘just focus on one or the other is likely to provide incomplete, or even inaccurate, understanding of the conditions leading to and inhibiting voice’ (p. 405). Therefore, multilevel models would improve understandings of employee voice behaviour by providing a more complete picture.

5.5.2 Future Directions for Regulatory Focus Research

So far, I have discussed future directions that can contribute to the literature on employee voice behaviour. Below I focus on regulatory focus. Although there are many research questions regarding regulatory focus that merit further examination, here I will stay with the research focus of this thesis — organisational commitment and regulatory focus, as well as the interaction effect of regulatory focus and contextual forces.

First, the relationship between chronic regulatory focus and organisational

commitment remains unclear. In Study 2, I found that chronic promotion and prevention foci were unrelated to the two types of organisational commitment (affective

organisational commitment and continuance organisational commitment), which

contrasts the findings of prior works (Gorman et al., 2012; Lanaj et al., 2012; Markovits et al., 2008). One possible reason for this inconsistency is that prior work did not make distinction between chronic and situational regulatory foci; and therefore, their results reflected the combined effect of the two components of regulatory foci. In addition, different measures of regulatory foci and different social cultural values of the samples may also lead to inconsistency. To address these inconsistent findings, future research is required to further examine the relationship between chronic regulatory foci and

organisational commitment, especially in a longitudinal field study, which may be the most rigorours research method for establishing the direction of causality.

Second, there is still much we do not know about the interactional effect of regulatory focus and contextual factors. Prior work provided strong evidence for the regulatory fit perspective that the match between individual regulatory focus and means available for goal pursuit in a given situation is associated with stronger motivation during goal pursuit, more positive feelings towards the direction taken, and higher

performance in the goal-related area (Higgins, 2000). In other word, when regulatory focus is congruent with contextual factors, its effect will be enhanced by contextual factors. However, a recent study suggested that, for interpersonally risky behaviour, employees need social cues to make decisions regarding whether to engage in such behaviour; thus, contextual factors may have overriding effect on regulatory focus (Kakkar et al., 2016). In contrast, for less socially risky behaviour, the moderating effect of contextual factors follows the pattern suggested by regulatory fit perspective (Kakkar et al., 2016). Taken together, the findings of prior research indicate that the interactional effect between regulatory focus and contextual factors are much more complex than previously considered, which raises some research questions that may have the potential to expand understandings. Given that the boundary conditions for regulatory fit

perspective were not tested directly in Kakkar et al.’s (2016) work, I encourage future research to examine whether or not regulatory fit theory only operates for less socially risky behaviours. If the perceived interpersonal riskiness of behavioural outcomes does operate as a boundary condition for regulatory fit theory, related questions are which contextual forces will moderate the influence of regulatory focus on socially risky behaviours in the manner suggested by regulatory fit perspective, by altering the perceived riskiness of challenging behaviours (such as employee voice behaviour), and which contextual forces will exert a moderating effect in the manner suggested by situational demands perspective.