Proactive personality and cross-cultural adjustment: A moderated mediation model

International Journal of Intercultural Relations 72 (2019) 36–44

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International Journal of Intercultural Relations journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijintrel

Proactive personality and cross-cultural adjustment: A moderated mediation model

T

⁎

Jing Huaa, Lu Zhengb, , Guilin Zhanga, Jinyan Fanc a b c

Department of Management, HR & Law, Troy University, 238E Bibb Graves Hall, Troy, AL 36081, United States School of Management, Huazhong University of Science & Technology, Wuhan, 430047, China Department of Industrial & Organizational Psychology, Auburn University, 225 Thach Hall, Auburn, AL, 36849, United States

A R T IC LE I N F O

ABS TRA CT

Keywords: Proactive personality Social capital theory Trait activation theory Cross-cultural adjustment Citizenship behaviors Moderated mediation model

Combining the social capital theory and trait activation theory, we build a moderated mediation model to explain how and when sojourners’ proactive personality associates with their citizenship behaviors. Specifically, we argue that social adjustment works as the mediator via which proactive personality relates to citizenship behaviors. At the same time, cultural distance serves as a trait-relevant situational cue that activates the proactive personality of sojourners. Using the three-wave prospective design data and incorporating a sample of 167 international students studying at a southeastern U.S. University, we found that the conditional indirect effect of proactive personality on citizenship behavior through social adjustment was more positive under high, rather than low, levels of cultural distance.

Introduction In the past decades, the amount of sojourners (e.g., expatriates, international students, and missionaries) who transfer to another country temporarily has grown exponentially (Chen, Kirkman, Kim, Farh, & Tangirala, 2010; Church, 1982). Not surprisingly, much research has been conducted to investigate sojourners’ experiences abroad (e.g., Firth, Chen, Kirkman, & Kim, 2014; Takeuchi, 2010). Ever since Black, Mendenhall, and Oddou (1991) proposed the model of cross-cultural adjustment regarding the individual’s psychological ease with different aspects of a new culture, a lot of promising progress has been made in this field (Gelfand, Aycan, Erez, & Leung, 2017). Despite the progress, there are still some gaps in the cross-cultural literature. For example, scholars mainly adopt a stress perspective to view sojourner adjustment and its consequences. From this perspective, adjusting abroad is a stressful journey, and sojourners face cultural shocks and uncertainties that lead to increased stress (Harrison, Shaffer, & Bhaskar-Shrinivas, 2004). Consequently, sojourners may end up with premature turnover intentions and a low chance of success. Takeuchi (2010) encouraged cross-cultural researchers using new ideas and theories to investigate numerous issues associated with sojourner experiences. It is true that sojourners face lots of demands abroad, but instead of desperately reacting to these stressors, sojourners could proactively meet the challenges and shape their lives in the novel environment. With a positive perspective, Ren, Shaffer, Harrison, Fu, and Fodchuk (2014) highlighted the critical role of proactive behavior in sojourner literature. They found that sojourners could actively acquire resources to be flourishing during international relocation. Consistent with this line of research, in the present study, we take a more proactive perspective to look at the journey of sojourners adjustment. One relevant yet understudied personal factor in the cross-cultural literature is proactive personality. Proactive personality is ⁎

Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (J. Hua), [email protected] (L. Zheng), [email protected] (G. Zhang), [email protected] (J. Fan).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijintrel.2019.06.003 Received 16 June 2018; Received in revised form 6 June 2019; Accepted 22 June 2019 0147-1767/ © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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defined as individuals’ proactive tendency to make positive changes in their environment (Bateman & Crant, 1993). Much research has been done to exhibit the effectiveness of proactive personality in predicting innovation, political knowledge, career initiative (Seibert, Kraimer, & Crant, 2001), job satisfaction and organizational citizenship behavior (Li, Liang, & Crant, 2010), and task performance (Sun & van Emmerik, 2015). Regardless of its importance, few studies have included and empirically tested the role of proactive personality in the cross-cultural literature (Ren et al., 2014). Given that proactive personality highlights the initiation and activity of individuals (Fuller & Marler, 2009), we examine its role during sojourner adjustment in this study. We draw on social capital theory to explicate the impact of proactive personality on social adjustment. Social capital refers to “resources embedded in a social structure that are accessed and/or mobilized in purposive actions” (Lin, 2001, p. 29). Living abroad, sojourners face many challenges, such as living socially disconnected (Earley & Ang, 2003; Fan & Wanous, 2008). The resources embedded in sojourners’ old social structure are either inappropriate or not applicable. Therefore, those sojourners may feel a lack of resource/support and uncomfortable socializing in the new cultural settings. There is a need for sojourners to build new connections in the new environment to help them adjust abroad. Sojourners should not wait passively for information and support to come to them, but instead, they should take the initiative to seek information and build new social networks (Farh, Bartol, Shapiro, & Shin, 2010). According to the social capital perspective, resources embedded in a social structure may stimulate citizenship behaviors toward others (Bolino, Turnley, & Bloodgood, 2002). The citizenship behavior, which promotes effective organizational functioning as a whole, highlights the helping manners that go beyond role requirements and approach altruism (Organ, 1988). Interest in citizenship behavior is not only limited to the organizational behavior domain but also in many other research areas; however, this concept is also understudied in cross-cultural literature (Liu, 2009; Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Paine, & Bachrach, 2000; Podsakoff, Podsakoff, Mackenzie, Maynes, & Spoelma, 2014). Citizenship behavior should be a very relevant criterion of measurement in the cross-cultural domain (Shaffer, Harrison, Gregersen, Black, & Ferzandi, 2006). Sojourners could exhibit helping behaviors even in a foreign environment. Drawing on a social capital perspective (Lin, 2001), we argue that sojourners with proactive personality could adjust well socially, and, as a result, these socially well-adjusted sojourners could direct their resources towards helping others in the local community abroad. Social adjustment refers to the psychological ease associated with social interactions and communications with host country citizens (Black & Stephens, 1989). Cross-cultural literature tends to focus on adjustment as an outcome, while we test it as a mediating mechanism connecting to citizenship behavior. Accordingly, we delineate a mechanism explaining how sojourners’ proactive personality associates with citizenship behavior via social adjustment. Another gap in the cross-cultural literature is that the majority of the research tends to be sojourner-centric, thus ignoring the contextual factors (Takeuchi, 2010). Behavior is an interaction between the individual and the circumstance (Judge & Zapata, 2015); hence, it should be more accurate to depict sojourner behavior by including both the personal and situational factors simultaneously (Chen et al., 2010). To address this gap, we consider situational factors to depict sojourner experiences abroad comprehensively. Culture, which strongly influences peoples’ values, beliefs, and behaviors, is a crucial situational factor (Gelfand et al., 2017). Individuals often do not acknowledge culture’s influence while interacting with citizens in their home countries; however, they usually become acutely aware of the home and host cultural differences when in a foreign country (Sussman, 2000). Cultural distance is a concept, which captures the extent of the cultural differences between the home and the host country (Shenkar, 2001). Following the trait activation theory (Tett & Burnett, 2003), we argue that cultural distance is the relevant situational cue that activates the effort of proactive personality on citizenship behavior. Our study contributes to cross-cultural adjustment literature in several ways. First, by integrating the social capital perspective (Lin, 2001) and trait activation theory (Tett & Burnett, 2003), we hypothesize and test (a) a mediating mechanism through which proactive personality positively related to citizenship behavior and (b) a moderating role of cultural distance in the mediating mechanism. Cross-cultural literature needs more research to explore the moderated mediating effect of personality on adjustment outcomes (Chen et al., 2010; Harrison et al., 2004). Hence, we are able to underline the process of how and when proactive personality associates with citizenship behavior. Regardless of the stressful experience abroad, sojourners could proactively leverage social capitals not only for their social adjustment but also for a positive impact on people around them. Second, we expand the study of citizenship behavior into cross-cultural literature. Deeply rooted in the social capital theory (Lin, 2001), we expect that proactive adjustment may positively connect with citizenship behavior. Third, combining cultural distance as a contextual factor, we increase the understanding of boundary conditions of proactive personality in the cross-cultural domain. Theoretical framework In the sections that follow, we hypothesize a model to explain how and when proactive personality relates to citizenship behavior. As shown in Fig. 1, we expect that proactive personality associates with citizenship behavior via social adjustment, and, at the same time, cultural distance moderates this indirect relationship. Proactive personality and citizenship behavior Li et al. (2010) proposed and approved the positive relationship between proactive personality and citizenship behavior. Both concepts focus on the behaviors that are beyond role request. Proactive employees are more likely to contribute and have better chance to show good citizen behaviors (Crant, 2000; Li et al., 2010). Sojourners with high proactive personality tend to proactively contact natives and engage in any events that promote social interaction. They are also willing to plug into the local community and connect with local citizens as much as possible. The more sojourners interact with local people, the better they can understand local 37

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Fig. 1. Proposed model for the structural relationships among proactive personality, social adjustment, cultural distance, and citizenship behaviors.

citizens and the more support they can get from natives. The new social structure could provide sojourners with the resources needed to feel socially comfortable. Findings in the literature consistently show that social support facilitates sojourners’ adjustment (Farh et al., 2010; Takeuchi, 2010). Johnson, Kristof-Brown, Van Vianen, De Pater, and Klein (2003) reported that expatriates’ total number of connections with host country nationals positively related to their adjustment abroad. Abdul Malek, Budhwar, and Reiche (2015) found that expatriate perceived organizational support positively related to their adjustment and performance. In contrast, sojourners with low proactive personality are hesitant to interact and build new connections with host country nationals. They tend not to take the initiative to reach out or make new friends. In this case, they tend to stay in their comfort zones, remain socially isolated and not adjust well socially. Williams and Anderson (1991) categorized citizenship behavior into two dimensions: behaviors benefit organization (OCBO) and behaviors benefit individuals (OCBI). Bolino et al. (2002) proposed the positive relationship between social capital and citizenship behavior. They argued that citizenship behavior could be a consequence of strong interpersonal relationships. Through a deeper understanding and interactions with each other, people tend to support and help each other and the group as a whole. In other words, social capital makes people willing and able to help each other for the benefit of the collective. During the process of social adjustment, proactive sojourners start to have personal relationships with natives, such as peers and supervisors. These sojourners and local people get to know each other well and build close connections. Therefore, socially welladjusted sojourners tend to have stronger networks, and hence have more resources compared to unadjusted ones in the host country. Based on the social capital theory (Lin, 2001), socially well-adjusted sojourners are more likely to exhibit citizenship behavior, such as helping newer sojourners or serving to the local community, because they have the resources to help. The conditional indirect effect of cultural distance The previous argument serves as a foundation for our more significant contribution, which incorporates the personal and situational factors simultaneously into the model. According to the trait activation theory, a trait is more likely to be expressed when presented with “trait-relevant” situations (Tett & Burnett, 2003, p. 502). In other words, a trait predicts behavior better in a traitrelevant situation than a trait-irrelevant situation. When sojourners enter a new culture, they face many challenges, such as study a new language, use that language to communicate with others, learn the novel culture, and build new connections. All these challenges derive from the fact that they are living in a foreign country/culture. People presume that sojourners know how to behave normally and appropriately in the novel cultural environment, and their behaviors are well accepted by local people. However, sojourners do not know what the appropriate behaviors are in a new culture; therefore, they have no clue of how to fulfill their purposes. This may be again due to the fact of culture distance. Cultural distance explains the number of challenges sojourners face (Dragoni, Oh, Tesluk, Moore, & VanKatwyk, 2014). Chen et al. (2010) stated that cultural distance is the contextual boundary of sojourners in particular as it captures all the complexities associated with international adjustment. Since Hofstede published his book, Culture’s Consequences, cross-cultural scholars pay more attention to cultural impact and consider it as an essential contextual factor (Gelfand et al., 2017). However, scholars report mixed findings. Chen et al. (2010) found that cross-cultural motivation associated more positively with work adjustment when the cultural distance was lower. Dragoni et al. (2014) discovered that the link between global work experience and strategic thinking competency was more positive for leaders who had gone through higher cultural distances than those who had gone through lower cultural distances. Following the trait activation theory (Tett & Burnett, 2003; Tett & Guterman, 2000), we expect that the effort of proactive personality is activated when the cultural distance is high rather than low. When the cultural distance is high, it is more challenging for sojourners to adjust in a host country (Chen et al., 2010). Sojourners need to put more effort into moving across the cultural boundary to gain resource (Liu & Shaffer, 2005). For example, it is harder for sojourners from Asia to use English to communicate fluently and thoroughly with local people in the U.S. compared to sojourners from Canada. Therefore, the high cultural distance environment sends signals to sojourners to work harder to actively acquire knowledge and information and build networks with local people to adjust well. Sojourners need to “take control to make things happen rather than watch things happen” (Parker, Bindl, & Strauss, 2010, p. 828). Proactive sojourners desire to overcome the 38

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greater challenges posed by high cultural distance through actively seeking connections and helps from others. Consequently, these sojourners can have more capability, resources, and opportunities to help others in the novel country. On the contrary, a low cultural distance environment has fewer cues that would trigger proactive personality. Sojourners are less involved with proactivity because they face less challenge. Compared with sojourners coming from high distance culture, there is less need for these sojourners to be proactive to adjust well. Thus, we argue that high cultural distance serves as a trait-relevant situational cue to trigger proactive personality. We hypothesize that cultural distance is a situational factor – whether proactive personality relates to citizenship behavior via social adjustment depends on the extent of the cultural difference. This is also termed as a moderated mediation effect, wherein an indirect effect is moderated by a third factor (Edwards & Lambert, 2007). Hypothesis 1. Cultural distance moderates the indirect effect of proactive personality on (a) OCBO and (b) OCBI through social adjustment, such that the indirect effect will be more positive when the cultural distance is high. Method Participants and procedure Participants were international students enrolled at a southeastern U.S. university. We collected data after approval from the Institutional Review Board (IRB) of that university. Data was collected using three self-report surveys over a one-year period. Participants received a small gift (i.e., a bracelet) for completing the first survey, $5 for completing the second survey, and $10 for completing the third survey. The first survey took place during the new international student orientation (right after the students arrived in the U.S.) when most of the students had little experience studying at an American university. The second survey was administered six months later after students had completed their first semester abroad. After another six months, the third survey was administered. The one-year period provided participants with sufficient time to notice the cultural differences and try to adjust to the new culture. One hundred sixty-seven participants completed the first survey that measured demographic information and proactive personality. Of these, 103 students (62%) submitted the second survey measuring cultural distance and cross-cultural adjustment. Finally, 84 (or 82%) of the 103 students completed the final survey assessing their OCBO and OCBI. Since a number of participants had missing data for some items in our surveys, Little’s MCAR test was conducted. Result showed that data were missing completely at random (MCAR), χ2 (df = 156) = 179.08, p = .10. Based on these findings, full information maximum likelihood (FIML) estimation was used in Mplus 7.4 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998-2017; Muthén and Muthén, 1998) to handle missing data in the moderated mediation model, that is, to estimate the model under missing data theory using all available data. To further examine the extent of nonresponse bias, we conducted a series of analysis focusing on different types of participants (1 = participants only completed the Time 1 survey; 2 = those participants completed the Time 1 and Time 2 survey but did not complete the Time 3 survey, and 3 = those participants completed all the three surveys). Chi-square test showed that the three groups did not significantly differ in gender, χ2 (2) = 1.30, p = .52. In addition, the three groups did not differ in months stayed in the U.S. with F (2, 164) = 1.73, p = .18. However, the three groups were significantly different in age, F (2, 164) = 6.26, p < .01. Post hoc tests indicated those who completed all the three surveys were significantly older (M = 25, SD = 4) than those who completed Time1 and Time 2 survey but did not complete the Time 3 survey (M = 23, SD = 3) and those who only completed T1 survey (M = 24, SD = 3). Despite of this difference, we believed this nonresponse bias would not have a great impact on our results because the three groups did not differ significantly on proactive personality (F (2, 164) = 2.34, p = .10), cultural distance (F (1, 101) = .26, p = .61) and social adjustment (F (1, 101) = .07, p = .80). Of those who completed the first survey (N = 167), 100 participants were male. The average age was 24 years old (SD = 3). More than half (53%) of the students came from China, 12% came from India, and the remaining students came from 30 other countries, including Brazil, Nepal, Korea, and others. Of those 167 participants, 104 students (62%) were new to the U.S; twenty students (12%) arrived the U.S. for less one month; nineteen students (11%) stayed in the U.S for less than one year; twelve students (7%) stayed in the U.S. for less than 2 years; and sixteen students (10%) stayed in the U.S. for more than 3 years. Even though we collected data on the new international student orientation, some students may have previously studied in other U.S. university and newly registered in this university. To tease out the effect of time stayed in the U.S., we included it as a control variable in our analysis. Of those who completed all the three surveys (N = 84), 47 participants were male. The average age was 25 years old (SD = 4). Forty-five students (54%) came from China, 14% came from India, and the remaining student came from more than 20 countries, including Sri Lanka, Russia, and Bangladesh. Measures Proactive personality We used the 10-item proactive personality scale (Bateman & Crant, 1993) to measure proactive personality. Sample items for this measure were “If I believe in an idea, no obstacle will prevent me from making it happen” and “Wherever I have been, I have been a powerful force for constructive change.” Items were rated on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). The Cronbach’s alpha reliability was .75. Recommended by McNeish (2017), Omega total was calculated using psych R package (Revelle, 2018). The omega total was .81. 39

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Social adjustment We used the social adjustment scale (four items) developed by Black and Stephens (1989) and modified by Gong and Fan (2006). Sample items were “How well adjusted are you to talking to Americans?” and “How well adjusted are you to social gatherings in America?” Items were rated on a 7-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 (not adjusted at all) to 7 (very well adjusted). Cronbach’s alpha reliability was .92, and the Omega total was .93. Cultural distance We used the six-item measurement developed by Chen et al. (2010). Sojourners were asked to rate the extent to which various cultural aspects (i.e., values, customs, religions and rituals, beliefs, norms, and ways of conducting business) in the host country were different from home country (1 = highly similar, 5 = not at all similar). The Cronbach’s alpha reliability was .75, and the Omega total was .85. Citizenship behavior We used the 16-item scale developed by Lee and Allen (2002) to measure OCBO and OCBI, modifying the words to better suit our sample in this study. Items were rated on a 7-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 (never) to 7 (always). Sample items for the OCBO included “How often do you offer ideas to improve the functioning of your University?” and “How often do you show pride when representing your University in public?” Sample items for the OCBI included “How often do you go out of the way to make newer students feel welcome in the work group?” and “How often do you share the personal property with others to help their work?” For OCBO, the Cronbach’s alpha reliability was .88, and the Omega total was .94. For OCBI, the Cronbach’s alpha reliability was .81, and the Omega total was .88. Motivational cultural intelligence Cultural intelligence (CQ) refers to the capability to function effectively in a diverse cultural environment (Earley & Ang, 2003). It is a multi-dimensional concept, including metacognitive, cognitive, motivational and behavioral dimensions (Ang et al., 2007). Metacognitive CQ refers to the cognitive process of acquiring cultural knowledge. Cognitive CQ refers to the knowledge structures of the new culture. Motivational CQ refers to the intrinsic motivation and self-efficacy to adjust to diverse cultural situations. Behavioral CQ refers to the overt actions of individuals to adapt in an intercultural environment. Of the four sub-dimensions, we included motivational CQ as a control variable for two reasons. First, motivational CQ has been well tested in the cross-cultural literature to predict cultural adaptation across diverse settings (Ang et al., 2007; Chen et al., 2010; Chen, Liu, & Portnoy, 2012). It is a wellestablished concept, and we want to test the validity of proactive personality in cross-cultural adjustment with the presence of motivational CQ. Second, both proactive personality and motivational CQ emphasize the individuals’ motivation and willingness, which determines their cognitive process and final behaviors. By putting these two concepts together, we could test the predictive role of proactive personality in cross-cultural adjustment beyond motivational CQ. We used the 5-item motivational cultural intelligence scale to measure this concept (Ang et al., 2007). A sample item was “I am confident that I can socialize with locals in a culture that is unfamiliar to me.” Items were rated on a 7-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strong agree). Cronbach’s alpha reliability was .82 in the current sample, and the Omega total was .85. Other control variables We also included gender, age, and time stayed in the U.S. as control variables. Previous research showed that these variables could have an impact on cross-cultural adjustment (Bhaskar-Shrinivas, Harrison, Shaffer, & Luk, 2005; Chen et al., 2010). Table 1 Descriptive statistics, Reliability Coefficients, and Correlations. Variables 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

a

Gender (T1) Age (T1) Timeb stayed in the U.S. (T1) Motivational cultural intelligence (T1) Proactive personality (T1) Cultural distance (T2) Social adjustment (T2) OCBO (T3) OCBI (T3)

Mean

SD

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

.60 24 7.06 5.57 3.61 3.34 4.57 4.49 4.63

.49 3 17.03 .87 .45 .65 1.22 .97 .78

1 .10 .03 −.03 .10 −.07 .04 .05 .06

1 .15* .13 .24** .01 .02 .28** .23*

1 .08 −.03 −.21* .10 −.09 .01

(.82) .33** -.05 .45** .22* .19

(.75) .11 .10 .39** .30**

(.75) −.31** .07 .02

(.92) .31** .27*

(.88) .59**

(.81)

Notes. Numbers in the parentheses are Alpha coefficients. T1 = Month 1 (n = 167); T2 = Month 6 (n = 103); T3 = Month 12 (n = 84). * p < .05. ** p < .01. a 1 = male; 0 = female. b Months. 40

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Fig. 2. Moderated Mediation Model with Regression Weights. Notes. Controlling for motivational cultural intelligence, gender, age, and time stayed in the U.S. Standardized coefficients are reported. *p < .05. ** p < .01. The effect size f 2 for multiple regressions is calculated (Cohen, 1988). According to Cohen’s standard, an f 2 of .02 to be a small effect, .15 a medium effect, and .35 a large effect (Cohen, 1988).

Results The descriptive statistics of all measures are presented in Table 1. We used the Mplus 7.4 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998-2017; Muthén and Muthén, 1998) to test the moderated mediation model for our hypotheses. Because of the low ratio of sample size to the number of parameters, path analysis instead of structural equation model was run (Carlson & Kacmar, 2000; Tharenou & Caulfield, 2010). We centered the proactive personality and cultural distance measures to avoid multicollinearity with the product term of these two variables (Aiken & West, 1991). Regarding control variables, we specified links from motivational cultural intelligence, gender, age, and time stayed in the U.S. to social adjustment, OCBO, and OCBI. The moderated mediation model fit was reasonably good: χ2 (2) = 1.42, p = .49, CFI = 1.00, TLI = 1.08, RMSEA = .00 with 95% CI [.00, .18], SRMR = .01. We presented the standardized regression weights and associated p-values in Fig. 2. We used the bootstrap resampling procedure to obtain the 95% bias-corrected bootstrap confidence intervals for the conditional indirect effects (Mackinnon, Lockwood, & Williams, 2004; Preacher & Hayes, 2004). Hypotheses 1a and 1b expected the conditional indirect effects of proactive personality on OCBO and OCBI through social adjustment. As shown in Fig. 2, the standardized moderating effect of cultural distance on the relationship between proactive personality and social adjustment was positive and significant (β = .26, p < .01). To test the degree of practical significance for this interaction, we calculated the effect size f 2 for the strength of moderating effect following Aiken and West’s (1991) recommended formula. The effect size of the moderating effect is .13, which is a medium effect (Cohen, 1988). Additionally, this effect size of moderation is larger than the average effect size in the organizational sciences literature (mean f 2 = .009) reported in Aguinis, Beaty, Boik, and Pierce’s (2005) review. We plotted this interaction effect in Fig. 3. As shown in Fig. 3, proactive personality is positively associated with social adjustment when cultural distance is high. In addition, social adjustment is positively related to OCBO and

Fig. 3. Interaction Effect of Proactive Personality by Cultural Distance on Social Adjustment. Notes. b is the unstandardized simple slope. The effect size f 2 of this moderation effect of cultural distance is .13, which is a medium effect size. Following the Bodner’s (2017) formula, we also calculated the effect sizes for moderated conditional effects. The conditional semi-partial correlations between proactive personality and social adjustment for cultural distance 1SD above the mean and 1SD below the mean are .41 and −.14, respectively. The difference in the semi-partial correlations (.41– (−.14) = .55) for a 2SD increase in cultural distance would be considered as a medium to large effect size in magnitude. 41

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OCBI, with β = .33, p < .01 and β = .28, p < .05, respectively (as shown in Fig. 2). Given this result, we tested the conditional indirect effects based on the 95% bias-corrected bootstrap confidence intervals. We also used the R square effect size measure (de Heus, 2012) to calculate the effect size of indirect effects. The conditional unstandardized indirect effect of proactive personality on OCBO was more positive at high (effecthigh(+1SD) = .19, CI95% = [.02, .55], R2 = .17), rather than low (effectlow(-1SD) = −.12, CI95% = [−.37, −.00], R2 = .07) levels of cultural distance, and the two conditional indirect effects’ difference was significant (diff = .31, CI95% = [.07, .74]). Thus, Hypothesis 1a was supported. In addition, as shown in Fig. 2, the direct effect of proactive personality on OCBO is significant (β = .29, p < .01). The conditional indirect effect of proactive personality on OCBI was more positive at high (effecthigh(+1SD) = .13, CI95% = [.01, .38], R2 = .06), rather than low (effectlow(-1SD) = −.08, CI95% = [−.24, .00], R2 = .03) levels of cultural distance, and the two conditional indirect effects’ difference was significant (diff = .21, CI95% = [.03, .50]). Hence, Hypothesis 1b was supported as well. In addition, the direct effect of proactive personality on OCBI is significant (β = .22, p < .05). In terms of the control variables, cultural intelligence was positively related to social adjustment (β = .37, p < .01).

Discussion Based on the social capital theory and trait activation theory, this study builds a framework to explain how and when sojourners’ proactive personality relates to citizenship behavior. Using the three-wave prospective design, we found the conditional indirect effects of proactive personality (Time 1) on OCBO (Time 3) and OCBI (Time 3) via social adjustment (Time 2).

Theoretical implications Our study contributes to the cross-cultural domain in several ways. First, we delineated a moderated mediation model to consider the personal and situational factors on sojourner behavior as a whole. We included cultural distance as a boundary condition of the indirect effect between proactive personality and citizenship behavior. We argue that cultural distance can serve as a situational cue expressing the effort of proactive personality. Specifically, we found that high cultural distance amplified the conditional indirect effect of proactive personality on OCBO and OCBI via social adjustment. In other words, proactive personality would associate with citizenship behavior through social adjustment only when the cultural distance is high rather than low. By building such a model, we answered the call to discover the moderated mediating effect of a trait on adjustment consequences (Chen et al., 2010). Second, by adopting the social capital theory (Lin, 2001), we are able to view the adjustment process from a positive perspective, which is encouraged by the cross-cultural literature (Kraimer, Takeuchi, & Frese, 2014). Instead of living in the social vacuum, sojourners could take the initiative to increase their social capital and leverage their resources to help others. In this framework, we highlighted the role of proactive personality in sojourners’ adjustment processes. Scholars mentioned this trait several times during the previous discussion, yet few studies have been done to test it (Ren et al., 2014). Our findings provided evidence that proactive personality is a very relevant predictor in a cross-cultural area. It is important to note that we included a well-established concept – motivational cultural intelligence – as a control variable. Therefore, we proved the incremental validity of proactive personality with the presence of another relevant predictor. In addition, closely following the social capital theory, we are able to include well adjustment is positively linked to citizenship behavior. Our results showed that citizenship behavior is a very relevant concept in the cross-cultural domain, which answered the call of Podsakoff et al. (2000). Instead of only seeking help, sojourners could also help others in the novel environment. Third, proactive personality literature always encouraged studies to investigate the boundary conditions of proactive personality (Campbell, 2000; Sun & van Emmerik, 2015). By considering cultural distance as a moderator, we are able to discover the boundary condition of proactive personality in the cross-cultural domain. Proactive personality only relates to citizenship behaviors when the cultural distance is high rather than low. Methodologically, we used a three-wave prospective design to test our hypotheses to reduce the common method bias commonly found in cross-sectional studies (Bhaskar-Shrinivas et al., 2005).

Managerial implications Nowadays the cross-board relocation is increasing significantly compared to the previous generation. Organizations are sending out sojourners to fulfill a task, and the sojourners’ performance is critical to the organization’s success. Our findings suggest that proactive personality is a very relevant trait to this position. HR may consider including proactive personality as part of the screening test when selecting people for an overseas task. In addition, training designed to increase individuals’ proactivity may be provided before sending people abroad. The effort is necessary because it benefits not only the sojourners but also the organizations. As they adjust to the novel environment, proactive sojourners could contribute by showing citizenship behavior. Therefore, just as sojourners need help with adjustment in the beginning, they could help others in the future. From the organizations' perspective, you could have high expectations on proactive sojourners once they adjust. Meanwhile, we found that proactive personality is more strongly associated with adjustment when the cultural distance is higher. This suggests that when selecting people to work abroad, it is important to select those who have a low cultural distance because it is easier for them to adjust. If the organization does have to choose individuals who have high cultural distance, based on this study, they should pick someone with a high level of proactive personality. 42

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Study limitations and future research directions Regardless of the strengths of this study, we have some limitations that need attention in future research. First, we do not measure social capital variables in this study. However, the social adjustment measure is a good reflection of social capital. Liu and Shaffer (2005) validated the positive relationship between social networks and adjustment. Future research should include social capital variables, such as network building, into the study (Thompson, 2005). Meanwhile, it will be very interesting to measure network building and social support embedded in these networks to investigate the adjustment trajectory (Farh et al., 2010). It would be beneficial to distinguish sojourners’ social supports into supports from sojourners’ family, other sojourners, and host country nationals because each source could provide different information and supports to sojourners, which assist their adjustment overseas (Takeuchi, 2010). Second, we have student samples in this study. Our findings may not generalize other sojourner groups such as expatriates. Nevertheless, international students and expatriates face similar challenges, such as learning and using new languages, adjusting to the novel environments, and equally needing to build new social structures (Gong & Fan, 2006). Both international students and expatriates could be helpers abroad after settling down in the host nation. Future studies might consider replicating our study using expatriate samples. Third, we do not include proactive behaviors in this study. It may be beneficial to include both proactive personality and behaviors and to explore the relationship between the two (Ren et al., 2014). Fourth, we do not measure all measures at each time point, which limits the causal inferences that could be drawn from our model. Future study should consider measuring all the measures at each time point to test the predictive role of proactive personality more rigorously. Fifth, the measures in this study were self-reported and the common method bias could be reduced to some extent by using a three-wave sample. Future studies should include multiple-source data, such as adjustment or performance rating from peers or supervisors. This is important because it is a more objective way to evaluate sojourners Conclusion Despite some limitations, this is the first study that tested the predictive effects of proactive personality on citizenship behaviors in the cross-cultural adjustment domain. By integrating proactive personality literature, the social capital theory, the trait activation theory, and cross-cultural literature, we build a framework to explain how and when proactive personality could work. We also consider both personal and situational factors to predict citizenship behaviors of sojourners. 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