Alienation and its correlates: A meta-analysis

•Examines relationship between alienation and potential predictors.•Examines relationship between alienation and potential outcomes.•Examine theoretical proposition that job involvement is obverse of alienation.•Empirically clarifies ambiguities of construct.

We provide a meta-analysis of alienation, outlining the extent to which it is predicted by individual differences (need for achievement), role stressors (role conflict), leader dimensions (initiating structure), and aspects of the work context (formalization). We also examine its relationship with outcomes such as employee attitudes (job satisfaction), performance (task performance), withdrawal (absenteeism), and side effects (drinking). We examined these relationships based on data from 45 primary studies and 227 statistically independent relationships. Our meta-analysis provides cumulative evidence for effect sizes across multiple settings and respondents, clarifies ambiguous aspects of the construct, and presents more information on the extent to which alienation can be seen as the opposite of job involvement.