Abstract: This study developed a scale to measure the motivation preference based on ERG theory. Participants were a sample of employees from 10 organizations in Jiangsu province，east China. Results indicated that motivation preferences were strongly related to needs with which individuals desire to be satisfied. There were significant differences in motivation preferences between groups that were categorized by gender or personality. Implications for the results were discussed, and future research directions were offered.

Keywords: motivation preference; needs; gender; personality.

Scientists and practitioners have long been interested in employees’ motivation (Meyer, Becker & Vandenberghe, 2004). This interest derives from the fact that incentive methods can increase employees’ performance. Theories of work motivation evolved out of more general theories of motivation (Steers, Porter & Bigley, 1996), but have largely been applied to explain task performance.

Motivation has to do with a set of independent/dependent variable relationships that explain the direction, amplitude, and persistence of an individual’s behavior, holding constant the effects of aptitude, skill, and understanding of the task, and the constraints operating in the environment (Campbell & Pritchard, 1976). There are three aspects of action that motivation can affect, and they are direction, intensity, and duration (Locke & Latham, 2004). Employers can apply incentive methods to motivate employees, because motivation affects employees’ behaviors that determine task performance and contextual performance.

Work motivation has been of interest to scholars at least since the 1930s, stimulated in large part by Hawthorne studies (Roethlisberger & Dickson, 1939). There are two dominant motivation theories: one is content theory that focuses on “content”, and the other is process theory that focuses on “process”. They study motivation from different perspectives. However, most scholars neglected an important fact in real-life workplace, i.e., the same content or process of motivation usually has different effect on different employees. Actually, different employees have different motivation preferences (MP) based on their own needs. If an employee prefers certain incentive methods, he (or she) will be motivated effectively by these methods, because motivation preferences imply certain needs that are desired to satisfy through these incentive methods. Some scientists have noticed motivation preferences; nevertheless, it’s difficult to find an exact definition of motivation preferences. This study will define motivation preferences based on reviewing relevant literatures and examine it empirically in the context of China.

There is no effective instrument to measure motivation preference up to now. So we developed a 13-item scale to assess motivation preference according to the 8-step procedure recommended by Churchill (1979), which based on ERG theory (Alderfer, 1967, 1969). Results of exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis show acceptable reliability and validity of this scale. Researchers can use this scale to study motivation preferences and practitioners can use this scale to measure employees’ motivation preferences in practice. In short, such a valid scale will push both the studies and practices of motivation preferences.

As different employees have different motivation preferences, what are the diversities among them? For discovering diversities of motivation preferences, we proposed several hypotheses. After analyzing the results of a large-scale investigation, some hypotheses were supported and others rejected. There are significant differences between groups which were categorized by gender or personality. Man and woman have different motivation preferences, and we discuss this conclusion under Chinese context and find it is deeply affected by traditional culture in China. Motivation preferences of different personality types are different too, and we drew this conclusion based on Holland RIASEC model (Holland, 1985) that is closely associated with working environments. These conclusions are very useful to managers, and they can design and use motivation mechanisms effectively by taking gender or personality into consideration.

Based on our findings, if a firm considers employees’ motivation preferences based on their own needs and acknowledge the different effects of gender or personality in the process of designing motivation mechanisms, it will motivate its employees more effectively.

THEORY AND HYPOTHESES

The word motivation is derived from the ancient Latin movere, which means “to move”. As the word is used in the study of employee motivation, this definition developed. Motivation is the set of attitudes and values that predisposes a person to act on a specific, goal-directed manner (Furchgott, 1999).

Both managers and psychologists have been concerned the topic of motivation for a long time, but the emphases and approaches of them differed sharply. As we know, much of the work by managers is based on previous psychological ones. There are various theories that are relate to motivation, and they can be categorized by distinguishing whether the theory focuses on content or process. Content theories attempt to identify those factors that tent to cause a person to behave as he does, such as the need hierarchy theory (Maslow, 1943), motivation-hygiene theory (Herzberg, 1957), manifest needs theory (McClelland, 1961, 1964) and ERG theory (Alderfer, 1972). In contrast, process theories attempt to explain the psychological processes underlying behavior, such as reinforcement theory (Skinner, 1938), expectancy theory (Vroom, 1964), equity theory (Adams, 1963) and goal-setting theory (Locke, 1968).

Aram and Piraino (1978) believed that the need theory is the most enduring way to understand motivation. Need theory suggests that employees are motivated to work hard by their striving to satisfy certain needs. The need satisfactions cause the desired work behavior. Understanding what the needs are and how the needs are satisfied will enhance insight into work-related behaviors that improves job performance (Stein and Hollowitz, 1992). This study focus on two need theories: need hierarchy theory and ERG theory.

Maslow (1943, 1954) categorized human needs into five broad groups, which are ranked and satisfied in the order of necessity and importance. In the order of ascendance, they are physiological, safety, belongingness, esteem and self-actualization needs. Physiological needs are the most basic and include hunger, thirst and gender; Safety needs are related to safe and secure physical and emotional environment; Belongingness needs are shown when a person desires to be accepted by his relations, friends, classmates and colleagues; Esteem needs focus on a person’s desire to have a worthy self-image and to receive recognition, attention, and appreciation; Self-actualization needs are the desire to become more and more what one is, to become everything that one is capable of becoming. Maslow’s theory was widely used (Porter, 1961; Bryan, 1983; Stahl, 1986; Hoffman, 1988), but various criticisms have been pointed to it (Wahba and Bridwell, 1976; DeCenzo and Robbins, 1988; Steers and Porter, 1991). Above all, the need hierarchy theory is a broad theory of human development rather than a description of work motivation, which is an important shortcoming (Landy, 1985). Results of those studies of Schneider and Alderfer (1973) didn’t support for Maslow’s need categories in organizational settings. They discovered two reasons: (1) an inadequate conceptualization that does not readily facilitate the development of operational indicators, (2) the initial orientation of Maslow’s theory that wasn’t specifically aimed to organizational settings.

According to Alderfer’s ERG theory (1967, 1969), man is motivated by three groups of needs, namely existence, relatedness and growth needs. The existence needs are human basic needs, which include the physiological and safety needs; The relatedness needs include man’s desire to maintain interpersonal relationships, which are man’s social, acceptance, belongingness and status desires; The growth needs represent man’s desire for personal development, self-fulfillment and self-actualization. Besides different categorizing, ERG theory differs from Maslow’s theory in two regards: (1) ERG theory suggests that in addition to Maslow’s satisfaction-progression process, there is also a frustration-regression process, (2) Person focuses on one need at a time in Maslow’s theory, but person concerns more than one need at a time in Alderfer’s theory. ERG theory is a conceptual and empirical system for studying the satisfaction and desire properties of human needs (Alderfer, 1972). One of the important strengths of the ERG theory is the job-specific nature of its focus. The ERG theory is regarded as a more valid version of the need hierarchy (Robbins, 1998) and has elicited more support from contemporary researchers as far as motivation in the work situation is concerned (Luthans, 1998). Many empirical assessments to ERG theory have focused primarily on the investigation of the correlation relationships between elements of the theory and work behaviors (Salancik and Pfeffer, 1977; Wanous and Zwany, 1977; Fox et al., 1993).

Employee will work hard if he knows the results of his behaviors can satisfy certain needs. So organizations can motivate employees by some methods, which lead to satisfy employees’ needs. Pay, benefits, promotion, training, praise are common methods of motivation. Communication, respect, safety, comfortable environment, harmonious relations and free working hours are also effective incentive methods. In fact, organizations can design and use many incentive methods as long as these methods can motivate employees. However, a person can’t concern about all needs at a time. And he will only be motivated by several needs that are unfulfilled and emerge to dominate his consciousness. Hence, employee is strongly inspired by incentive methods that are related to dominant needs and prefers these methods to others. Organizations know which methods employees will like, in other words, organizations know which methods motivate their employees more effectively. Motivation preference is an important criterion to choose methods of motivation. Motivation preferences or incentive preferences of managers, employees, students, teenagers, children, females or males were considered by many literatures (Bebeau, 1977; Robert, 1993, 2004; Mark, 1993; Judy, 1994; Heller, 1996; Stephen, 2001; Hao, 2004; Chumchit, 2005; Lisa, 2006), however no studies have given an well-established operational definition up to now. This study focuses on employees’ motivation preferences, and provides an operational definition of motivation preferences based on relevant literatures: Motivation preferences are the preferences of individuals on methods of motivation.

Furthermore, an intensive literature review finds only two studies focusing on the motivation preferences in Chinese journals. One study (Hao, Kaiya and Xiaojian, 2004) used conjoint analysis to study flexible motivation plan, and they recognized motivation preference based on eleven motivation methods. The other study (Yuanqing, 2001) studied motivation utility based on economic theory, only a few words mentioned motivation preferences. Therefore, studying motivation preference under Chinese context is necessary.

Motivation preferences show person’s preferences of incentive methods, which associate with dominant needs. Every incentive method has a primary affiliation with a certain need. Therefore, motivation preferences can be categorized by needs. Need hierarchy theory and ERG theory are important need theories and are widely used worldwide. Based on reviewing literatures, this study chose ERG theory to analyze motivation preferences, and we propose the following hypothesis:

Hypothesis 1 Motivation preferences can be characterized by existence needs, relatedness needs and growth needs.

Combining with social self, beliefs, attitudes and values, self-concept has a significant impact on an individual’s needs (Mullins, 1999). Different person has different needs, are there some relationships between motivation preference and certain trait of person? People are always distinguished by gender, we thus hypothesize:

Hypothesis 2 There is a significant association between gender and motivation preference.

Personality is an important trait of person too. An individual is said to be an individual because he has acquired a distinctive pattern of cognitive style as a trait of his personality, and a specific level of motivational process (Sharma, 1991). Some scholars (Kretshmer, 1921; Sheldon, 1942; Eysenck, 1970, 1975; Coasta and McCrae, 1985; Cattell, 9999; Holland, 1973, 1985) attempted to categorize personality, and their studies were applied in many fields. This study focused on employee’s motivation preference, so we chose Holland’s model that categorized personality by occupational interest preferences and skills. Holland (1973, 1985) proposed that there are six personality types: realistic, investigative, artistic, social, enterprising and conventional. Holland’s personality types have received extensive examination (Prediger, 1982; Rounds & Zevon, 1983; Holland, 1985; Gati, 1991; Rounds & Tracey, 1993, 1995). Based on Holland’s personality types, we propose:

Hypothesis 3 There is a significant association between personality and motivation preference.                                                                                                                                              

    A shortcoming in the research on need theories is that no provision is made for individual differences among people (Alnolds and Boshoff, 2002). Many need theories didn’t consider gender or personality factors although they affect needs powerfully. Perhaps gender and personality affect motivation preferences strongly too. According to Quinn and Judy’s (1994) survey of 1500 incentive recipients, 88 percent of men and 77 percent of women felt the gender have inherently different work styles and motivation preferences. Are Male and female different on motivation preference? Are different personality types different on motivation preference? Are the interaction between gender and personality different on motivation preference? These three questions are interesting and important. If their answers are “yes”, organizations should design and use incentive methods based on gender and personality, which can strengthen motivation greatly. We therefore suggest:

Hypothesis 4 There are significant differences between male and female on motivation preferences

Hypothesis 5 There are significant differences between personality types on motivation preferences

Hypothesis 6 There are significant differences between the interaction of gender and personality on motivation preferences

    Motivation preferences influence effects of incentive methods. Employees’ motivation preferences based on satisfied and unsatisfied needs. Managers can spirit employees efficiently if they know which motivation preferences based on which needs. Furthermore, if motivation preferences relate to gender and personality and managers know the differences between them, organizations can inspirit different employees more efficiently. We suggested 6 hypotheses based on those considerations. Those hypotheses will be tested empirically in the context of China in this study.

METHODS

Sample and Procedures

The sample of this study consisted of 132 respondents in Jiangsu province, east China. The respondents were asked to make self-assessment on scales. In total, 150 questionnaires were given to 10 organizations and 132 valid responses were returned, representing a response rate of 88.0%. The average age of the respondents was 29.3, and 87 of the respondents (65.9%) were female. Most of the respondents (74.2%) were nonmanagerial employees. The least work experience of the respondents was 1.5 years. Table 1 provides a profile of the sample.

TABLE 1 Characteristics of the Sample

Measures

Motivation preferences. Porter (1961) developed a scale based on Maslow’s concepts; Schneider (1973) designed a scale to operationalize Maslow’s concepts. Alderfer (1967) developed an instrument to measure the extent to which the respondent’s job permits the satisfaction of needs according to the ERG theory. Alderfer, Kaplan and Smith (1974) designed a scale to measure relationship desires based on ERG theory. Many scholars attempted to develop an effective instrument to measure needs, but only a few scholars tried to design an instrument to assess motivation preference. Dmitruk (1971) evaluated incentive preference of children by a poster. Hao (2004) subdivided motivation preferences to study flexible motivation plan in China, but he only discussed 11 motivation methods and didn’t use scale. Because motivation preference hasn’t a clearly definition, a few scholars tried to develop instruments to measure it. A special scale to measure employees’ motivation preference is scarcity.

A scale of motivation preferences were designed and tested by exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis. After reviewed many literatures, 37 methods of motivations were chosen and they were found strongly related with special needs. Initially, a 37-item scale was designed to measure motivation preferences based on Maslow’s needs theory (1943). 134 questionnaires were collected, and there are acceptable reliability and validity support for the scale (Lianke, 2002). The 37 items were factor analyzed that resulted in five factors reflecting physiological needs, safety needs, belongingness needs, esteem needs and self-actualization needs respectively. When an individual strongly desires to satisfy special needs, he will be motivated by these methods which are strongly associated with these needs.

Then a discussion of those items was made with professors and PhD students in Business School of Nanjing University, some potential limitations were disclosed. Some items were defined intangibly, some were stated incorrectly, and some were not applicable to China. Because there is limited evidence to support the validity of motivation preference measures, this empirical investigation began with exploratory factor analyses (EFA). After the deletion of improper items, scree plots of eigenvalues suggested that three factors accounted for most of the variance in the data for the 134 respondents. Only 13 items remained after factor analyzing. The factor analysis of 13 items led to the extraction of three factors that cumulatively explained 70.02% of the variance. The result shows that three-factor model (MSA=.879; χ²=1217.086; df=82) fitted the data better than five-factor model (Lianke, 2002). First factor related to interpersonal relationships, second factor related to personal development and self-actualization, and the third factor related to physiological and safety needs. To our surprise, these three factors were strongly related with existence needs, relatedness needs and growth needs respectively, in other words, ERG theory (Alderfer, 1967, 1969) explained motivation preference better than needs hierarchy theory (Maslow, 1943). Internal consistency of each motivation preference was assessed using the Cronbach alpha. Measures of MPE, MPR and MPG were found to be reliable ( α=.8978, .8204 and .8562, respectively). In short, authors found 13-item scale’s reliability and validity better than 37-item scale’s.

This study measured motivation preferences with the 13-item scale. Motivation preference related to existence need (MPE) was measured by 3 items, motivation preference related to relatedness needs (MPR) was measured by 5 items, and motivation preference related to growth need (MPG) was measured by 5 items. The respondents were asked to express their level of like or dislike with the items. A five-point scale, ranging from 1=strongly dislike to 5=strongly like, was used to measure the variable. Details on the 13-item scale are presented in Appendix A.

Personality types. We measured personality types with 180 items from the Vocational Preference Inventory (VPI) developed by Holland (1985). Holland revised and utilized VPI many times, but VPI developed in 1985 was more widely used than others. VPI is a measure based on the Holland RIASEC model (Holland, 1985). In Holland’s model, there are six personality types: Realistic (R), Investigative (I), Artistic (A), Social (S), Enterprising (E), and Conventional (C). The VPI consists of occupational items which are responded to using a “l(fā)ike or dislike” format. Six total scores are generated by summing selected “l(fā)ike” responses. There are extensive reliability and validity support for the scales (Holland, 1985). In this study, the coefficient alphas for the six personality types were .89, .83, .76, .80, .77 and .86, respectively.

RESULTS

EFA is useful for probing the underlying structure of data and generating hypotheses that can be subjected to more rigorous subsequent testing (Finch and West, 1997). The results of EFA (N=134) suggested that analyzing motivation preferences based on ERG theory (Alderfer, 1967, 1969). For testing our hypothesis, we analyzed other sample (N=132) again. Table 2 presents the EFA of measures of motivation preferences. The factor analysis of 13 items led to the extraction of three factors, which cumulatively explained 73.81% of the variance. As is shown, the three-factor model fitted the data well (MSA=.861; χ²=1103.910; df=78). The first factor loaded five items onto a vector generating an eigenvalue of over three and accounting for 27.65% of total variance. Each of the five items appeared to gauge the preference of motivational methods, which were related with relatedness needs. The solution was accepted and the factor labeled as motivation preference related to relatedness needs (MPR). The second factor loaded five items onto a vector generating an eigenvalue of over two and accounting for 27.46% of total variance. The five items focused on the preference of motivational methods, which were related with growth needs. The solution was accepted and ascribed the label motivation preference related to growth needs (MPG). The final factor loaded three items onto a vector generating an eigenvalue of over one and accounting for 18.70% of total variance. These items appeared to gauge the preference of motivational methods, which were related with existence needs. The factor was approved and given the label motivation preference related to existence needs (MPE). Reliability was judged via the calculation of a Cronbach alpha coefficient (Cronbach, 1951). The calculation of Cronbach alpha coefficients resulted in alpha coefficients, which ranged from .8701 to .9007. In this study, reliability and validity supported for the motivation preference scale. Supporting Hypothesis 1, motivation preference can be characterized by existence needs, relatedness needs and growth needs.

Table 2 Exploratory factor analysis and reliability assessment of

measures of motivation preferences

^a 1=strongly dislike, 5=strongly like.

^b Principal components analysis with varimax rotation.

Descriptive statistics and correlation among variables are shown in Table 3. The means and standard deviations were within the expected ranges. The univariate correlation coefficients between MPG and gender (r = .26, p < .001) and MPG and personality types (r = .37, p < .001) were moderately high. On the contrary, there were no significant correlation between MPE and gender (p > .05) and MPE and personality types (p > .05) and MPR and gender (p > .05) and MPR and personality types (p > .05). Hypothesis 2 and hypothesis 3 were partially supported.

TABLE 3 Means, Standard Deviations; and Correlation among Study Variables^a

^a n = 132

* p < .05                                                                                                                                                                                        

** p < .001

The multivariate results of the MANOVA test of this study indicated that two hypotheses were supported and one hypothesis was rejected. Hypothesis 4 was supported (Wilks’ lambda F = 3.400, p = .020), there were significant differences between male and female on motivation preference. Hypothesis 5 was supported (Wilks’ lambda F =6.186, p = .000), there were significant differences between personality types on motivation preference. Hypothesis 6 was rejected (Wilks’ lambda F = 1.047, p = .406), the interaction between gender and personality wasn’t significant for motivation preference.

Table 4a, 4b and 4c summarize the results of the MANOVAs. The preference of gender on MPE and MPG were significant differences but the preference of gender on MPR was not. The preference of personality on MPR and MPG were significantly different but the preference of personality on MPE was not. There were no significant difference of the interaction between gender and personality on MP.

TABLE 4(a)   MANOVA for MPE

TABLE 4(b)   MANOVA for MPR

TABLE 4(c)   MANOVA for MPG

Table 5 displays the means and standard deviations of motivation preference. Based on those analyses and post hoc Scheffe test, we compared the means of motivation preference of different variables. Man liked MPE and MPG more than woman did. A-type liked MPR less than S-type did (p = .048). R-type liked MPG less than S-type and E-type did (p = .002 and p = .005, respectively). A-type liked MPG less than S-type and E-type did (p = .019 and p = .010, respectively).

TABLE 5 Means and Standard Deviations of Motivation Preference of

Different Gender and Different Personality

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION

Considering the number of theoretical articles published in leading behavioral science journals over the past decade (Ambrose & Kulik, 1999; Mitchell & Daniels, 2002), Steers (2004) concluded that intellectual interest in work motivation theory seemed to decline precipitously by the 1990s. More people cited early motivation theory and less people attempted to develop it. Only a few scholars noticed that motivation preference is an important factor of motivation, furthermore, nobody defined it definitely. A person is motivated deeply by the instruments that he prefers rather than others. If organizations know employees’ motivation preference, they can find effective ways to inspire employees. But there is a lack of valid instrument to measure employees’ motivation preference and relevant theories. The most important contribution of this study is developing a scale to measure motivation preference.

Firstly, this paper defined motivation preferences after reviewing relevant literatures. Secondly, we designed a 37-item scale based on Maslow’s theory (1943, 1954) to measure motivation preference. In exploratory factor analysis (Lianke, 2002), we found three factors better than five factors, and these three factors were strongly related with existence needs, relatedness needs and growth needs respectively. That is to say, Alderfer’s theory (1967, 1969) explains motivation preference rightly than Maslow’s theory. Thirdly, we modified motivation preference scale and replaced 37-item scale with 13-item scale. In confirmatory factory analysis, all results supported 13-item scale. Hypothesis 1 was supported, motivation preference can be characterized by existence needs, relatedness needs and growth needs.

ERG theory is one of the most important motivation theories in the world. Existence needs, relatedness needs and growth needs are widely accepted and are studied in some fields. Alderfer (1972) developed a questionnaire to find how individual stand in need satisfaction according to the ERG theory. Organization can find effective instrument to evaluate employees’ needs. Motivation preference is characterized by needs, so we can cognize and study motivation preference easily and deeply based on ERG theory. Steers (2004) complained that few articles focused on genuine theoretical developments in motivation theory over the past decade. This study defined motivation preference and developed a scale to measure it. Motivation preference will be a new focus of motivation study in the future.

Motivation preference relate to gender? Motivation preference relate to personality? If there are some special correlations between them, considering gender and personality to study mechanism of motivation preference is very meaningful. This study presented two hypotheses: Hypothesis 2, in which there is a significant association between gender and motivation preference; Hypothesis 3, in which there is a significant association between personality and motivation preference. Results in Table 3 showed that there are only two correlations: one is the association between MPG and gender; the other is the association between MPG and personality types. Hypothesis 2 and hypothesis 3 were partially supported. The second contribution of this study is that gender and personality aren’t ideal factors to study mechanism of motivation preference. Future studies should find which factors are strongly related to motivation preference and what relationships between them. Furthermore, discovering mechanism of motivation preference is a crucial direction of motivation study.

Large numbers of studies confirmed that different gender or different personality types are different in many fields. Will these differences exist on motivation preference? Hypotheses 4, 5 and 6 focused on this question. The results of the MANOVA test indicated that motivation preference of gender on MPE and MPG were significant differences and motivation preference of personality on MPR and MPG were significant differences. Hypothesis 4 and hypothesis 5 were supported. This study drew some conclusions from post hoc Scheffe test: Man liked MPE and MPG more than woman did; A-type liked MPR more than S-type did; R-type liked MPG more than S-type and E-type did; A-type liked MPG more than S-type and E-type did.

All respondents are Chinese. China is one of the earliest civilized countries in the world and has its own spiritual tradition. Confucianism is the primary thought in China, which constitutes the Chinese cultural context. China is changing, but some thought of Confucianism still influences Chinese people’s way of thinking and action. For example, three cardinal guides (ruler guides subject, father guides son and husband guides wife) teach Chinese to perform his part aright in these relationships. Three cardinal guides have been denied by modernists, but Chinese still accept that male and female play different roles. Man always has primary responsibility for family. Under life stress, man think of existence and thirst for growth more than woman does, so man’s MPE and MPG is higher than woman’s. Organization uses incentive methods that are related to existence and growth will motivate male more effectively than female.

RIASEC personality types are reflected in occupational interest preferences and skills, and the relations among the types. These six types have received extensive examination (Prdiger, 1982; Rounds & Zevon, 1983; Holland, 1985; Gati, 1991; Rounds & Tracey, 1993, 1995). A-type perceives himself as expressive, original, intuitive, nonconforming, introspective, independent, and disorderly. A-type pursue free and avoid confine, he doesn’t care about any other person’s feeling. S-type perceives himself as liking to help others and understanding others. Human relations are important part of his life. S-type’s MPR is stronger than A-type’s.

R-type likes activities that entail the explicit, ordered, or systematic manipulation of objects, tools, machines, and animals, and values concrete things or tangible personal characteristics. A-type likes activities that entail the manipulation of physical, verbal, or human materials to create art forms or products, and values esthetic qualities. These two types don’t attach importance to self-esteem and self-actualization. S-type likes activities that entail the manipulation of others to inform, train, develop, cure, or enlighten, and values social and ethical activities and problems. E-type likes activities that entail the manipulation of others to attain organizational goals or economic gain, and values political and economic achievement. These two types desire to have ability to affect themselves and their environment. Therefore, S-type’s and E-type’s MPG is stronger than R-type’s and A-type’s.

The third contribution of this research is distinguishing the degrees of motivation preference among different groups which are categorized by gender or personality. Gender and personality are both important person’s traits, gender can be distinguished easily and personality can be measured with a lot of valid instruments. If organization knows motivation preference of different groups, organization can categorize employees by gender or personality and design special motivation mechanism to different groups. These motivation mechanisms must be effective, for employees are motivated easily for preference based on needs. Conclusions of this study will lead managers design motivation mechanism effectively. Further research should analyze each group’s motivation preference, compare difference among groups, and develop incentive methods based on motivation preference.

There were no significant difference of the interaction between gender and personality on motivation preference. Hypothesis 6 was rejected. This conclusion implies that organization needn’t categorize employees by gender and personality at the same time for motivation.

Finally, this paper studied basic theories of motivation preference which will develop study in this field. As we know, motivation preference is very important to motivate person but so few scholars incorporate it into their work. Basic theories are scarce which influences the development of motivation preference theory.

PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS

Overall, our findings suggest that managers can inspirit employees more efficiently based on analyzing motivation preferences. Employees will be motivated by unsatisfied needs. Employees’ motivation preferences imply the order of needs in their minds. If organization knows employees’ motivation preferences, effective motivation mechanism can be set up easily.

This study designed and tested a scale of motivation preference based on ERG theory. Organizations can use this scale to find out employees’ motivation preferences. That information is very useful to make incentive policies. Our findings provide insights into the relationship between gender and motivation preferences and that between personality and motivation preferences. We only find two correlations, but those results imply that motivation preferences relate to some factors. Managers must notice factors that strongly relate to motivation preferences, because those factors influence effects of incentive practices. Organizations must know what factors should be considered when they design their incentive mechanisms.

Additionally, this paper find differences of motivation preferences and those differences imply that motivation preferences are different among diverse employees. If managers identify diverse employees’ motivation preferences, they can design and carry out incentive policies effectively.

LIMITATIONS AND FUTURE RESEARCH

The implications of this study must be considered in light of its limitations. Firstly, we collected all data from Jiangsu province. Jiangsu has a long agricultural history and has formulated an industry system with sizable scale and complete categories. Its industrial product value has listed the first place in China for many years. Respondents’ answers were only representative thought of persons who live in relatively developed place in China. For studying motivation preference under Chinese context, future investigation ought to collect data from more places in China.

Secondly, we studied motivation preferences based on needs theory, but no literature proved needs induced motivation preferences. This paper only found motivation preferences were strongly related to needs, why and how didn't be analyzed here. However, results of this study contributed to motivation theory because of indicating a new direction of study. Future research could find the mechanism from needs to motivation preference, discovering the process is important to search a new way to study cause and effect of motivation.

Thirdly, authors focused on how employees liked incentive methods and neglected the relationship between preference and performance. That is to say, we only measured the degree of preference on motivation, but we didn't measure the degree of motivation. An employee prefers A to B, but B possibly motivates him more than A do. In the future, scholars should study the relationship between motivation preference and employee’s performance. If this relationship exists, employers can investigate employees’ motivation preference and design different incentive methods to different employees, which can improve employee’s performance enormously.

Finally, this research distinguished motivation preference between men and women, and among different personality types. These results are useful to human resource managers and professionals who design motivation programs. In fact, organizations always plan and practice different motivation programs to managers and non-mangers. Future research can compare motivation preference between managers and non-managers, because organizations consider position more than gender and personality.

APPENDIX A. Measures of motivation preference

Your preferences are measured on a five-point Likert-type scale respectively anchored by (1) strongly dislike, (2) dislike, (3) unsure, (4) like and (5) strongly like.

Motivation preference related to existence needs (MPE)

1. Base pay

2. Pensions

3. Insurance

Motivation preference related to relatedness needs (MPR)

4. Being accepted

5. Being respected

6. Friendly cooperation

7. Harmonious relationships

8. Open communication

Motivation preference related to growth needs (MPG)

9. Career development

10. Effective performance appraisals

11. Training and development

12. Participative management

13. Promotion

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