The relationship between decisional participation and commitment to the organization, community, and profession among municipal recreation administrators

Abstract

The study explores the nature of decisional participation among municipal recreation administrators and its relationship to organizational, community and professional commitment. The data were obtained from 139 recreation administrators. The results indicate that the majority of administrators (54.7 percent) are involved in as many decisions as they wish to be involved in (i.e., they are at decisional equilibrium). A substantial portion of the administrators (32.4 percent) are actually involved in more decisions than they would prefer (i.e., they are at decisional saturation), while a small segment (12.9 percent) wishes more participation in decisional situations (i.e., they are at decisional deprivation). The respondents exhibit a degree of commitment to the organization and the profession, but the highest degree of commitment is to the community. The decisionally deprived group exhibits a significantly lower rate of organizational commitment (p = .05) than the saturated and equilibrium groups. No such differences exist with commitment to the profession or to the community. The implications of these results are discussed from a managerial perspective.

Key words:

• Decisional condition
• decisional participation
• conditions of deprivation
• equilibrium
• and saturation
• organizational commitment
• community commitment
• professional commitment