Masculinity contest cultures and job satisfaction: better to be competent or embedded?

Abstract Measures of masculinity contest culture (MCC) examine the degree to which workplace norms align with traditional tenets of masculinity. Past research suggests MCC is negatively related to job satisfaction. Informed by theories of MCC, we begin to unravel the moderating variables through which this relationship is attenuated or strengthened via testing gender and two forms of perceived success at work (in-role competence and social embeddedness), informing on whether MCCs relate to lesser job satisfaction for all employees or primarily among subsets of those who perceive they perform poorly within them. Hypotheses were tested using a three-timepoint survey with a sample of 408 full-time employed adults. Results from a 5,000 bootstrap linear regression suggest the relationship between MCC and job satisfaction is moderated by gender. The relationship is strongest among men with lower perceived social embeddedness and is not statistically significant among men with higher perceived social embeddedness. In contrast, the relationship is not significant among women who report social embeddedness scores that approach the minimum but is consistently negative otherwise. Moreover, there was no evidence that social embeddedness was a moderator absent gender. Additionally, there were no moderation effects associated with perceived in-role competence, potentially reflecting that in-role performance may not buffer employees against the potential harms of MCC environments. Implications for employee wellbeing, employee performance, and theories of masculinity contest culture are discussed.