An exploratory analysis of the relationship between organizational culture, regional culture, causal ambiguity and competitive advantage in an international setting.

Moran, Florencia ; Palmer, David W. ; Borstorff, Patricia C. 等

ABSTRACT

It is important for managers to understand the dynamics of competitive advantage in the global environment. Today, companies find more difficulties in distinguishing their core competencies and achieving a competitive advantage. The current global environment is changing and some competitive advantages may be losing their sustainability as new firms entering an industry imitate distinctive competencies of incumbent firms. This research is a preliminary exploratory analysis of the relationship between the social complexity of the firm, causal ambiguity and susceptibility to imitation as affected by regional/national and organizational culture. The research is important since it has been shown that causal ambiguity limits imitation and increases the sustainability of competitive advantage. Our results confirm the relationship between organizational culture, national/regional culture, imitation and causal ambiguity through a survey and factor analysis. Thus, firms should take advantage of the unique complexity of their corporate culture to limit imitation and increase competitive advantage.

INTRODUCTION

The evolution of economic organizations throughout the world is influencing the nature of competition due to technological advances, changes in the operating environment, and managerial developments. The number of players in the world economy is increasing significantly and competition beyond national borders is creating a complicated business environment (Threlkel, 1999). Due to this ever growing pool of competitors companies find more difficulties in distinguishing their core competencies and achieving a competitive advantage. Market boundaries are changing quickly and strategies to develop competitive advantage are becoming less sustainable. But, for many firms constant changes in the world economy are providing more opportunities.

For example, automobile manufacturers in the United States are finding difficulties in differentiating their products from their competitors. They have also had problems with improving quality, reducing inventory costs and improving efficiency. One of the main international competitors, Toyota, has become the largest car manufacturer in the world in recent years. Toyota has been able to accomplish this by being the low-cost leader in product and the differentiator in quality, styling and customer service.

It is probable that firms, such as GM (General Motors), Ford and Chrysler are continuously attempting to duplicate/copy the capabilities and resources of the new industry leader, Toyota. Particular resources and capabilities of Toyota such as the kanban inventory system, quality teams and supplier management systems should be relatively easy for these companies to imitate. Yet, these capabilities are the competencies that allow Toyota to sustain its competitive advantage. In trying to explain the seeming inability of U.S. auto makers to fully imitate and utilize these capabilities there are several unexplainable factors that create a barrier to imitation. So we know that Toyota's competitive advantage clearly does not lie in just the visible resources and capabilities listed above.

The objective of this research is a preliminary exploratory analysis of the relationship between the social complexity of the firm, causal ambiguity and susceptibility to imitation as affected by national, regional and organizational culture. We feel that these are the hidden factors that make imitation difficult and deserve further research in order to explain their contribution to sustainable competitive advantage in the global marketplace.

CONCEPTUAL DEVELOPMENT AND DEFINITIONS

Global competition, especially in established markets, is leading companies to realize that traditional strategies have become inadequate. Prahalad and Hamel (1990) observed that only a few companies are able to adapt themselves to inventing new markets, quickly entering new markets, and/or shifting patterns of customer choice. Only these few firms will be able to sustain competitive advantage because they can differentiate themselves from their competitors. This is, as Barney (1991) observed, because homogeneous resources would lead all firms to implement the same strategies. There are three basic types of resources that may provide a firm with competitive advantage: physical capital resources, such as the firm's plant, equipment and finances; organizational capital resources, such as the firm's structure, planning, controlling and coordination; and, human capital resources, such as the skills, judgement and intelligence of the firm's employees (Barney & Wright, 1998). The human resources, planning, controlling and coordination are all contributors to the organizational culture of the firm. When a resource like the culture of the firm is valuable, rare and not easily imitable it can provide a temporary competitive advantage that allows some firms to consistently outperform others by sustaining performance differences and protecting these resources and capabilities (Barney, 2001.)

Firm Level Sources of Sustained Competitive Advantage

Studies have shown that firms that build their strategies on path dependent, causally ambiguous, socially complex, and intangible assets outperform firms that build their strategies on tangible assets. It is the fit and linkage between these interdependencies that is viewed as a potential factor in creating sustained competitive advantage (Barney, 2001).

Porter (1996) stated that companies must be flexible in order to respond rapidly to competitive and market changes because rivals can quickly copy any changes in market position and/or strategies. Therefore, companies' competitive advantage can be sustained only temporarily. But, the purpose of a competitive strategy is to achieve a sustainable competitive advantage (SCA) and long-term, enhanced a firm performance. As stated earlier, Competitive Advantage can come from valuable and rare organizational resources. However, these resources only become a source of SCA when they cannot be obtained and/or imitated by the firm's competitors (Barney, 1991; King & Zeithaml, 2001.) Resources may be protected from imitation in a variety of ways. Research has shown that there is a positive relationship between causal ambiguity and inimitability (King & Zeithaml, 2001); and, social complexity and inimitability (Porter, 1980; Barney, 1986). Therefore, regarding competencies, firms need to understand how social complexity, causal ambiguity and imitation are related in order to build stronger constraints against imitation.

Causal Ambiguity and Imperfectly Imitable Resources

Causal ambiguity is present in every process of the competition between firms (Gonzalez-Alvarez & Nieto-Antolin, 2005). Causal ambiguity is defined in the literature as a lack of clarity regarding the link between firm resources and sustained competitive advantage (King & Zeithaml, 2001) and occurs when competitors are unable to detect how a firm uses its competencies as a foundation for its competitive advantage. Barney (1991) stated that causal ambiguity occurs when a competing firm does not understand the link between the resources and capabilities of the incumbent firm and its sustained competitive advantage. The less observable the resource and the more difficult it is to understand, the greater the likelihood to be a source of SCA (Fahy, 2000). The firm's resources and capabilities characterized by causal ambiguity are associated with high firm performance (King & Zeithaml, 2001). The firm's resources, such as its unique history contributing to the firm's organizational culture, cannot be easily imitated and can provide a source of sustainable competitive advantage (Barney, 1986; Barney & Wright, 1998).

Organizational Culture

Empirical evidence consistently supports the distinctiveness of organizations' culture for those who are trying to ensure their position in the business environment (King & Zeithaml, 2001; Oliver, 1997; Wooldridge & Minsky, 2002). Organizational culture can be defined as the pattern of shared assumptions (at the deepest levels), values and beliefs that help individuals understand organizational functions thus providing them with the norms of behaviour in the organization; therefore, both the firm's outcomes and the means to achieve these outcomes are affected (Wooldridge & Minsky, 2002). Building competencies that reside in the culture of the firm helps build and sustain competitive advantage (King & Zeithaml, 2001). The phenomena of social complexity and culture play an important role in competitive advantage. A firm with a strong organizational culture must be organized and able to exploit this resource (Rashid, Sambasivan, & Johari, 2003). Trust and good relationships among organizational members are firm specific assets that provide value, are quite rare, and are extremely difficult for competitors to imitate (Barney, 1991). Only organizations in which these organizational relationships are developed benefit and can create advantage.

Oliver (1997) proposed a model stating that a firm's ability to generate above-normal profits from resources and capabilities will depend primarily on the firm's effectiveness in managing social context of these resources and capabilities. The competitive global business environment moves fast; therefore, firms face challenges developing strategies that will allow them to survive and sustain their competitive advantage.

National Culture

Because organizations are, in many ways, embedded in the larger society in which they exist, research on cultural differences of cross-national businesses lead to an examination of both national and organizational cultures. A company's performance or success depends on adaptability, flexibility and speed to manage the uncertainties of the future (Winston, 1996). However, business operations throughout the world have increased the interest in the relationship between organizational and national/regional cultures. Since many competitors may not understand and relate corporate culture to the national/regional cultures this may lead to increased social complexity and causal ambiguity.

Though there has been much research on organizational culture, none has yet been able to definitively link organizational performance to national/regional culture performance. In order to sustain its competitive advantage, a company should be able to create, support and apply an organizational culture responsive and suitable to the global competitive environment (Augsdorfer & Harding, 1995; Barney & Wright, 1998). In other words, how companies could meet the increasingly complex world markets' challenges and respond quickly to new opportunities would contribute to the sustainability of their competitive advantage.

METHODOLOGY

The data collected to test the propositions was collected by means of a self-administered questionnaire. For the purposes of a better respondent understanding and error deduction, the survey instrument began with the description of a current situation with two of the world's largest automotive companies: Toyota and General Motors (GM, representing all US manufacturers).

Automobile manufacturers in the United States are having difficulties in differentiating their products from their competitors. They have also had problems with improving quality, reducing inventory costs and improving efficiency. And one of the main international competitors, Toyota, continues its quest to become the largest car manufacturer in the world. Toyota will accomplish this by being the low-cost leader in production and the differentiator in quality, styling and customer service. The relationship with its suppliers, the commitment with customers, innovation on process and products, a flexible production process, and the organizational commitment to quality are the main characteristics of the Toyota system.

Competitors have copied many of Toyota's process innovations, such as its kanban inventory system and team production. However, it is difficult for competitors to duplicate and/or to take full advantage of many of Toyota's competencies. These factors are not visible to outsiders; they are embedded firmly in Toyota's socially complex organizational culture and become difficult to imitate. It is probable then that a challenger firm, such as GM may continuously attempt to duplicate/copy the capabilities and resources of the new industry leader, Toyota. Particular resources and capabilities allow Toyota to sustain its competitive advantage. Competitors in the automotive industry seem to be unable to understand and imitate Toyota's distinctive competencies.

In trying to explain the seeming inability of GM to imitate and utilize these capabilities, there are several unexplainable factors that create a barrier to imitation. In this survey instrument, Toyota will be referred as the "incumbent firm," while GM will be the "challenger/copier firm." The definition of causal ambiguity is also given for respondents' better understanding. Thus, it is proposed that there is some causal ambiguity that limits imitation and helps Toyota maintain a competitive advantage.

The instrument included two parts, looking from the perspective of the "incumbent" firm, and from the perspective of the "challenger/copier" firm. A Likert scale was utilized; therefore, each respondent was asked to rate each item on a 1-to-5 scale (1=strongly disagree; 5=strongly agree).

PROPOSITIONS

Figure 1 presents the tested and the hypothesized relationship among organizational culture, national/regional culture and causal ambiguity. The review of the literature leads to the following propositions. As noted by Martin-de-Castro, Navas-Lopez, Lopez-Saez and Alama-Salzar (2006), organizational culture can be highly valuable and difficult to imitate. If a company is able to develop a strong culture, competitors are disadvantaged in imitation since culture requires specific conditions and time for its formation. A strong organizational culture can be a source of sustained competitive advantage (Martin-de-Castro, 2006; King & Zeithaml, 2001). Inimitability is the difficulty that competitors find in copying the resources and capabilities of the company through internal development (Barney, 1991, 2001). Martin-de-Castro, Navas-Lopez, Lopez-Saez and Alama-Salzar (2006) stated that it is almost impossible for the potential imitator to copy something that cannot be described clearly. Giving these findings, it is reasonable to propose that a company's strong and homogeneous culture will limit imitation by the firm's competitors. Thus,

[P.sub.1]: The stronger the organizational/corporate culture within the firm, the more difficult imitation by competitors will be.

Building competencies that reside in organizational culture helps build and sustain competitive advantage; however, changes in the environment put the value of these competencies at risk (King & Zeithaml, 2001). According to Martin-de-Castro, Navas-Lopez, Lopez-Saez and Alama-Salzar (2006) culture and organizational learning allow firms to adapt to market requirements.

The changes in the global marketplace require a flexible and adaptable corporate culture (Elashmawi, 2000). To ensure that current organizational resources add value in the face of environmental change, companies may continually question the organizational culture (King & Zeithaml, 2001). Corporate culture is a key element in ensuring that as the business environment evolves (due to new technology, client segmentation, regulation, competition, and other factors) organizations respond effectively to the global market changes before their competitors (Elashmawi, 2000). Successfully reacting to changes in the global marketplace requires a flexible and adaptable corporate culture. A new horizon of multicultural management is necessary in anticipation of globalization; managers must become skilled in the multicultural aspects of the company (Elashmawi, 2000). This results in the following proposition:

[P.sub.2]: Social complexities of the firm will make imitation by competitors more difficult in the global competitive environment.

In order to become a successful global business, companies must become skilled in the multicultural aspects of the company (Elashmawi, 2000). As noted by Oliver (1997), a firm's ability to generate revenues from resources and capabilities depend primarily on the firm's effectiveness in managing the social context of these resources and capabilities. The challenge for an organization is identifying the specific culture that exists within the firm (Pool, 2000); therefore, a firm that operates in different cultural environments should be able to recognize, support and combine these differences with the organizational culture. Chow, Haddad, and Wu (2003) discovered that the most valued corporate cultural aspects differed from country to country. Some aspects of corporate culture may enhance performance in one national setting; however, they may not be effective, and may be even dysfunctional in another country (Chow, Haddad & Wu, 2003). The above discussion leads to the following proposition:

[P.sub.3]: Firms with a strong combination of corporate culture and national/regional culture will be able to limit imitation and create competitive advantage.

SAMPLE

As exploratory research, our sample consisted of 36 undergraduate, six graduate students, and nine faculty and staff members at a university located in the south eastern US. The undergraduate and graduate students were enrolled in a business policy and strategy class; therefore, the items on the scales were pertinent. The faculty and staff members are part of the College of Commerce and Business Administration (CCBA). Therefore, this study examined issues relevant to their interest. Current subject matters, such as business strategy, organizational/corporate culture, national/regional culture, causal ambiguity, and limitations for imitation were analyzed.

The sample data was evaluated with an independent t-test comparing the three different groups: undergraduate students, graduate students and faculty/staff. The results showed that there is a significant ([alpha] = .05) difference in the responses between groups. These differences may have been due to sample size, since our samples were small. The difference in means was on the following groups and items:

Graduate compared to undergraduate

1-a7) Of the following, which provides the firm with a "clear competitive advantage"? Organizational or firm culture

2-e) A company must continually improve its efforts to extend its uniqueness

2-h) The stronger the organizational/corporate culture within the firm, the more difficult imitation of the incumbent firm will be.

2-I) Efforts to imitate the incumbent firm's competency in quality will blur uniqueness, reduce fit, and ultimately undermine the core competencies of the challenger/copier firm

Graduate compared to faculty

Questions 2-e, 2-h and 2-i showed significant differences in the means.

RESULTS

The survey instrument was divided into two parts. The first part was from the "incumbent firm" perspective, while the second part was from the "challenger/copier firm" perspective. The data was measured by using the confirmatory factor analysis. Stevens (1996) suggested the use of the Varimax rotation method; therefore, a factor rotation using the Varimax method with Kaiser Normalization was applied. This rotation approach was designed to reduce the number of variables to simplify the factor analysis. To obtain more easily interpretable results, the original data was summarized with four factors, which explains 76.3 % of the cumulative variance. The fourth factor did not show a strong relationship between the variables. The analysis could also be carried out with only 3 factors, which explains 63.69% of the total variance (see Table 3).

Eight questions were chosen from the survey instrument to be analyzed in the rotated component matrix. The questions that formed factors could be classified as (see Table 4):

Factor 1--For the challenger firm, imitation will blur their uniqueness

2e) Efforts to imitate the incumbent firm's competency in quality will blur uniqueness, reduce fit, and ultimately undermine the core competencies of the challenger/copier firm

2f) Efforts to imitate the incumbent firm's competency in supply chain relationship will blur uniqueness, reduce fit, and ultimately undermine the core competencies of the challenger/copier firm

2g) Efforts to imitate the incumbent firm's competency in flexible manufacturing will blur uniqueness, reduce fit, and ultimately undermine the core competencies of the challenger/copier firm

Factor 2--For the incumbent firm, causal ambiguity is based on organizational and national culture

1b) There is a positive relationship between organizational culture and causal ambiguity

1c) There is a positive relationship between national culture and causal ambiguity

Factor 3--For the incumbent firm, clear competitive advantage roots come from complexity

1a) Of the following, which provides the firm with a "clear competitive advantage"?

1. Complex company resources

5. High social complexity within the firm

Factor 4--For the copier firm, national culture affects the industry

2a) National culture has a positive effect on the culture of the industry (ex. auto industry)

Proposition 1 examined the importance of a strong organizational culture within the firm. The third factor converged with a commonality of complexity. According to this indicator, social complexity within the firm and complex company resources may provide a firm with a clear competitive advantage. Thus, Proposition 1 was supported (see Table 2).

Proposition 2 dealt with the firms' relationship between the degree of corporate flexibility, and how quickly they respond to the changes in the global competitive environment. The first factor component of the rotated matrix showed a strong correlation between three questions indicating how firms, in trying imitation, may blur their uniqueness, reduce fit among their operations and undermine their core competencies. Therefore, validity to the Proposition 2 is provided.

Proposition 3 examined the effect of a firm's relationship between the combination of corporate/regional culture and national/regional culture. The second factor indicates that organizational/corporate culture and national/regional culture has an impact on causal ambiguity. This factor converged to support Proposition 3. A fourth factor indicates some relationship between national culture and industry culture; however, more than one question may be needed to support this proposition. As it is described above, the factor rotation could be applied with only the first three factors.

RECOMMENDATIONS AND MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS

In this global era, it is critical for companies to understand several cultures. Over time, competencies derived from the culture of a firm may be understood by competitors; however, replicating this environment outside the company may be difficult, if not impossible (King & Zeithaml, 2001). Additionally, companies should be able to design a new goal-oriented corporate culture strategy considering the changes in the global environment. The results of this study indicate that firms that concentrate on retaining the relationship between their corporate culture and their national/regional culture will be able to limit imitation and create competitive advantage.

This information can be used for organizations to understand and improve cross-national organizational cultural differences. Therefore, by discovering new sources of competitive advantage, a company can sustain its above average returns in the current global economic environment.

FUTURE RESEARCH

Many times, competencies that reside in organizational culture and values are characterized as causally ambiguous; therefore, they are protected from acquisition or imitation by competitors (Barney, 1991; King and Zeithaml, 2001; Threlkel, 1999). The long-term inimitability, and hence value, of resources is never certain; therefore managers have to undertake activities that attempt to maximize their chances of survival in conditions of incomplete knowledge (Jenkins, 2005). Oliver (1997) stated that future research on sustainable advantage should focus not only on the attributes of firm resources, such as their rarity, uniqueness and non-substitutability, but also on how resources are developed, managed, and diffused. In addition, further study needs to be encouraged on imitation and the affect trying to copy "incumbent firm" (ex. Toyota) competencies may have on the "challenger/copier firm" (ex. GM). The attempt at imitation by the challenger/copier may blur firm uniqueness, reduce internal fit, and negatively affect the core competencies of the firm.

It is clear that this study has many limitations, such as the size and the nature of the samples. To the extent that the findings of this study are valid, future research would include a larger sample in testing the research propositions suggested. Research directed to these issues and others will continue to form the understanding of these important relationships. There is much yet to be analyzed about why particular aspects of the relationship between corporate/organizational culture, national/regional culture and causal ambiguity seem to be performance-relevant between firms in different countries.

In conclusion, this study has contributed to an exploration and analysis of how causal ambiguity around a flexible and suitable organizational culture limits imitation and influences firm performance. The findings of this study suggest that there is a relationship between companies' corporate and national culture and the linkage between inimitability and causal ambiguity. Therefore, companies need to consider culture differences as they adapt their resources and expand their capabilities internationally. Discovering the drivers of these relationships can enable international companies to understand the impact of their organizational culture with the national/regional culture of each country. In other words, the current global environment is changing the way competitive advantage could be sustained; therefore, it is important to understand the dynamics of the global environment.

REFERENCES

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Barney, J. B. (1986). Organizational Culture: Can it be a Source of Sustained Competitive Advantage? Academy of Management Review, 11, 656-665.

Barney, J. B. (1991). Firm Resources and Sustained Competitive Advantage. Journal of Management, 17(1), 99-120.

Barney, J. B. (2001). Resource-based theories of competitive advantage: A ten-year retrospective on the resource-based view. Journal of Management, 27, 643-650.

Barney, J. B., & Wright, P. M. (1998). On becoming a strategic partner: The role of human resources in gaining competitive advantage. Human Resource Management, 37(1), 31-46.

Chow, C. W., Haddad, K. M. & Wu, A. (2003). Corporate Culture and Its Relation to Performance: A Comparative Study of Taiwanese and U.S Manufacturing Firms. Managerial Finance, 29(12), 65-76.

Elashmawi, F. (2000). Creating a winning corporate culture: experience inside the Asian telecommunication industry. European Business Review, 12(3), 148-156.

Fahy, J. (2000). The resource-based view of the firm: some stumbling-blocks on the road to understanding sustainable competitive advantage. Journal of European Industrial Training, 24(2-4), 94-104.

Gonzalez-Alvarez, N., & Nieto-Antolin, M. (2005). Protection and internal transfer of technological competencies: The role of causal ambiguity. Industrial Management and Data Systems, 105(7), 841-856.

Jenkins, W. (2005). Competing in times of evolution and revolution. Management Decision, 43(1), 26-37.

King, A. W., & Zeithaml, C. P. (2001). Competencies and Firm Performance: Examining the Causal Ambiguity Paradox. Strategic Management Journal, 22, 75-99.

Martin-de-Castro, G. M., Navas-Lopez, J. E., Lopez-Saez, P., and Alama-Salzar, E. (2006). Organizational capital as competitive advantage of the firm. Journal of Intellectual Capital, 7(3), 324-337.

Oliver, C. (1997). Sustainable Competitive Advantage: combining institutional and resource-based views. Strategic Management Journal, 18(9), 697-713.

Pool, S. W. (2000). Organizational culture and its relationship between job tension in measuring outcomes among business executives. Journal of Management Development, 19(1), 32-49.

Porter, M.E. (1980). Competitive Strategy. New York: Free Press.

Porter, M. (1996, November-December). What is Strategy? Harvard Business Review, 62-78.

Prahalad, C. K, & Hamel, G. (1990). The Core Competence of the Corporation. Harvard Business Review, 1-14.

Rashid, Z. A, Sambasivan, M., & Johari, J. (2003). The influence of corporate culture and organizational commitment on performance. Journal of Management Development, 22(8), 708-728.

Stevens, J. (1996). Applied Multivariate Statistics for the Social Sciences (3rd ed.). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.

Threlkel, M. S. (1999). Competitive Advantage: Paths to Sustainability. University of North Florida, 1-34.

Winston, M. G. (1996). Leadership of renewal: leadership for the twenty-first century. Management Development Review, 9(7), 15-19.

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Florencia Moran, Jacksonville State University

David W. Palmer, Jacksonville State University

Patricia C. Borstorff, Jacksonville State University

Table 1: Analysis of Means

Question Category * N Mean Std. Deviation

I-a1 F 9 3.56 0.882
 G 6 3.50 1.225
 U 36 3.61 0.964

I-a2 F 9 4.22 0.833
 G 6 4.83 0.408
 U 36 4.53 0.560

I-a3 F 9 4.00 0.707
 G 6 4.17 0.753
 U 36 4.03 0.774

I-a4 F 9 3.78 0.833
 G 6 3.33 1.211
 U 36 4.31 0.624

I-a5 F 9 2.67 1.118
 G 6 3.00 1.265
 U 36 3.33 1.042

I-a6 F 9 3.56 0.882
 G 6 3.83 0.408
 U 36 3.64 0.867

I-a7 F 9 4.33 0.707
 G 6 4.83 0.408
 U 36 4.08 0.770

I-b F 9 4.00 0.707
 G 6 3.83 0.983
 U 36 3.69 0.710

I-c F 9 3.44 0.882
 G 6 3.33 1.033
 U 36 3.53 0.696

I-d F 9 4.44 0.726
 G 6 4.33 0.516
 U 36 4.25 0.770

I-e F 9 4.33 1.000
 G 6 4.67 0.516
 U 36 4.17 0.737

II-a F 9 3.33 1.000
 G 6 3.67 0.516
 U 36 3.44 0.695

II-b F 9 3.33 1.000
 G 6 3.00 1.095
 U 36 3.19 0.951

II-c F 9 2.56 0.726
 G 6 3.00 0.894
 U 36 3.17 0.971

II-d F 9 3.56 1.014
 G 6 3.50 1.225
 U 36 3.56 1.027

II-e F 9 2.56 0.882
 G 6 4.17 0.408
 U 36 3.19 1.064

II-f F 9 2.78 0.972
 G 6 3.33 0.816
 U 36 2.97 1.055

II-g F 9 2.56 0.726
 G 6 3.17 0.983
 U 36 2.81 0.980

II-h F 9 4.56 0.527
 G 6 5.00 0.000
 U 36 4.67 0.535

II-i F 9 4.33 0.500
 G 6 5.00 0.000
 U 36 3.94 1.068

Table 2: Comparison of Means

 G compared with U Sig

Question t Sig. (2-tail) *

I-a1 -0.212 0.839
I-a2 1.600 0.146
I-a3 0.417 0.690
I-a4 -1.924 0.108
I-a5 -0.612 0.562
I-a6 0.882 0.393
I-a7 3.566 0.004 *
I-b 0.332 0.751
I-c -0.445 0.673
I-d 0.338 0.743
I-e 2.049 0.071
II-a 0.924 0.381
II-b -0.410 0.695
II-c -0.417 0.689
II-d -0.105 0.920
II-e 3.995 0.001 *
II-f 0.958 0.366
II-g 0.833 0.433
II-h 3.742 0.001 *
II-i 5.933 0.000 *

 F compared with U Sig

Question t Sig. (2-tail) *

I-a1 -0.166 0.871
I-a2 -1.043 0.322
I-a3 -0.103 0.919
I-a4 -1.779 0.105
I-a5 -1.621 0.131
I-a6 -0.254 0.803
I-a7 0.932 0.368
I-b 1.159 0.269
I-c -0.264 0.797
I-d 0.709 0.491
I-e 0.469 0.649
II-a -0.315 0.759
II-b 0.376 0.713
II-c -2.098 0.052
II-d 0.000 1.000
II-e -1.861 0.083
II-f -0.528 0.607
II-g -0.856 0.405
II-h -0.564 0.583
II-i 1.595 0.122

 G compared with F Sig

Question t Sig. (2-tail) *

I-a1 0.096 0.926
I-a2 -1.886 0.083
I-a3 -0.430 0.676
I-a4 0.784 0.455
I-a5 -0.523 0.612
I-a6 -0.822 0.427
I-a7 -1.732 0.107
I-b 0.358 0.729
I-c 0.216 0.833
I-d 0.346 0.735
I-e -0.845 0.414
II-a -0.845 0.414
II-b 0.598 0.563
II-c -1.014 0.336
II-d 0.092 0.929
II-e -4.768 0.000 *
II-f -1.195 0.255
II-g -1.304 0.226
II-h -2.530 0.035 *
II-i -4.000 0.004 *

(*) t-test shows significant difference in means at [alpha] = .05

Table 3: Cumulative Percent of Variance Explained by Confirmatory
Factor Analysis

 Initial Eigenvalues

 Component Total % of Variance Cumulative %

 1 2.133 26.663 26.663
 2 1.556 19.450 46.113
 3 1.406 17.578 63.690
 4 1.007 12.591 76.281

Table 4: Rotated Component Matrix

 Component
 1 2 3 4

Part I: a-1 -0.069 -0.253 0.847 0.104
Part I: a-5 0.100 0.284 0.805 -0.168
Part I: b -0.196 0.819 0.020 -0.203
Part I: c 0.063 0.864 -0.018 0.102
Part II: a 0.051 -0.045 -0.042 0.941
Part II: e 0.636 -0.053 0.022 0.356
Part II: f 0.889 0.023 -0.131 -0.145
Part II: g 0.870 -0.097 0.134 0.044