Manifesting the academic psychological contract

Abstract

The level of research undertaken on the academic psychological contract, and its influence on academic’s behaviour is limited. This paper seeks to consider the academic psychological contract, by reviewing its manifestation within the role of and the influence on their undertaking of the role. Particularly important is academics’ interpretation of the role and what they consider important. Within this, the paper considers in-role and extra-role activities and what may be the grey areas in which time is spent. The research adopts the combined usage of phenomenology with interpretivist processes to investigate the insights of eighteen academics at nine UK University Business Schools. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect to consider the constructs’ manifestation. Key aspects of behaviour were identified as discretionary effort and autonomy and managerialism with links to academic citizenship.