Which of the following is not a benefit that a protégé receives from a mentoring relationship?

J Vocat Behav. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2011 Jun 1.

Published in final edited form as:

PMCID: PMC2855142

NIHMSID: NIHMS139247

Abstract

The authors examined the mediating role of perceived organizational support in the relationship between mentoring support received and work attitudes. Perceived organizational support partly mediated the relationship between specific types of mentoring support and job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment. Specifically, sponsorship, exposure and visibility, and role-modeling appear to be related to job satisfaction and organizational commitment through perceived organizational support. Perceived organizational support did not appear to mediate the relationship between other specific forms of mentoring support and job satisfaction and organizational commitment.

Keywords: Mentoring, Perceived Organizational Support, Career-related Functions, Psychosocial functions, Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, Turnover Intentions

Why Does Mentoring Work? The Mediating Role of Perceived Organizational Support

Organizational researchers have found that employees with mentors report higher levels of job satisfaction, organizational commitment, compensation and promotions (Allen, Eby, Poteet, Lentz, & Lima, 2004), showing the potential importance of having a mentor for achieving both subjective and objective career benefits. Despite this robust stream of research demonstrating the importance of mentoring relationships, the mechanism underlying the association between mentoring and protégé outcomes is largely unknown (e.g., Ragins & Verbos, 2007; Ramaswami & Dreher, 2007). The lack of attention given to examining why mentoring works represents a significant gap in the literature since in the absence of this information it is difficult, if not impossible, to build comprehensive causal models of the mentoring process (Bearman, Blake-Beard, Hunt, & Crosby, 2008).

The present study directly addresses the question of “why does mentoring work?” by drawing upon social exchange theory to propose that a key mechanism linking the receipt of mentoring support and work outcomes is perceived organizational support (POS) (Eisenberger, Huntington, Hutchison, & Sowa, 1986). The over-arching premise of the current study is that a mentor may be a lens through which the protégé develops beliefs about his or her organization, as has been suggested in the literature (Orpen, 1997) but not empirically examined. We focus on supervisory mentoring since it is distinct from leadership (Scandura & Williams, 2004), adds incremental variance to the prediction of work attitudes over and above leadership (Scandura & Schriesheim, 1994; Scandura & Williams, 2004), and often correlates more strongly with work attitudes than does non-supervisory mentoring (e.g., Payne & Huffman, 2005).

The present study extends mentoring scholarship in three important ways. First, we directly address the criticism that little is known about why mentoring works by examining POS as a potential mediator. Second, we provide a fine-grained investigation of why mentoring works by examining the relationship between specific types of career-related (e.g., sponsorship, exposure and visibility) and psychosocial (e.g., friendship, coaching) mentoring support and POS. Third, we bridge the mentoring, social exchange and POS literature to develop and test a parsimonious, theory-based model of the mentoring process. In so doing we set the groundwork for future research and theory development on mentoring relationships at work.

A Social Exchange Perspective on Mentoring

Social exchange theory rests on the assertion that individuals develop, maintain and exit relationships based on their perceived costs and benefits (Homans, 1974). As an individual benefits from a relationship this generates a norm of reciprocity where the person who is on the receiving end of an exchange feels compelled to reciprocate to balance out the social exchange (Emerson, 1981). In mentoring relationships, the benefits exchanged fit into the social exchange resource categories of emotional support, information, services, and status (Kram, 1985).

Protégés can receive two general types of benefits from the mentoring relationship, which we propose set in motion the social exchange process. The first protégé benefit is career-related support, which serves to advance the protégé’s career through the specific mentor support behaviors of sponsorship, coaching, protection, challenging assignments, and exposure and visibility. The second protégé benefit is psychosocial support, which provides protégés with a sense of social support, often serving to increase the protégé’s sense of competence, effectiveness, and belongingness. Friendship, role modeling, counseling, acceptance and confirmation are subsumed under psychosocial support (Kram, 1985).

Although the specific forms of mentoring support are grouped according to career and psychosocial support, the specific forms of support relate differentially to theoretically related constructs. Meta-analytic research finds corrected correlations between protégé perceptions of relationship satisfaction and mentoring received that range from .37 for career-related support to .62 for psychosocial support (Allen et al., 2004).There are also sizable differences in the magnitude of zero-order correlations between the specific types of mentoring support (e.g., exposure and visibility, protection, role modeling) and relationship satisfaction, with correlations ranging from a low of .14 for protection to a high of .70 for friendship (Ragins & Cotton, 1999). These findings indicate that the specific types of mentoring support are related, yet distinct, suggesting that it is important to use more fine-grained measures of mentoring support.

Mentoring Support as a Predictor of POS

POS is defined as a social exchange relationship that results from exchanges between an employee and his or her employing organization. Specifically, when employees believe that the organization is committed to them, they feel obligated to be committed to the organization (Eisenberger et al., 1986). Actions on the part of organizational agents lead employees to personify the organization and develop perceptions about how the organization values them. Empirical research supports this assumption by finding that POS mediates the relationship between leader-member exchange (LMX; Graen & Scandura, 1987) and work attitudes and behaviors (Eisenberger et al., 2002; Wayne, Shore, Bommer, & Tetrick, 2002). While mentoring has not been examined in relation to POS, it seems reasonable to argue that supervisory mentors may also be viewed as agents of the organization. In fact, Orpen (1997) speculated that seeing the mentor as a representative of the organization is the reason mentoring leads to increased organizational commitment, although this idea has not been examined empirically.

According to Eisenberger et al. (1986), in order for POS to develop, the employee must perceive an organizational agent’s actions as discretionary. Mentoring may be a specific type of discretionary prosocial behavior (Allen, 2004). Moreover, the specific types of career-related and psychosocial support that are provided to a protégé are unique currencies of exchange in a mentoring relationship rather than resources that are universally provided to all subordinates (Ensher et al., 2001). We propose that through supportive interactions with mentors, protégés may develop perceptions about whether or not the organization cares for their well-being. This can happen through the receipt of career-related and psychosocial mentoring.

Career-related mentoring functions help prepare protégés for career development in the organization, increase the protégé’s sense of professional competence, and demonstrates the mentor’s commitment to helping the protégé (Kram, 1985). Both sponsorship and exposure and visibility involve the mentor providing public support for the protégé. This can come in the form of actively nominating the protégé for desirable lateral moves and stretch assignments (sponsorship) or by introducing the protégé to other influential senior individuals in the organization (exposure and visibility). Coaching support can also enhance career development by teaching the protégé how to effectively navigate in the organization by providing information on how to accomplish work tasks, receive recognition, and meet one’s career aspirations. Challenging assignments can also support career development by providing opportunities for new learning, especially when coupled with feedback and technical support. Finally, protection involves the mentor taking credit or blame in controversial situations, intervening on behalf of the protégé in potentially career-damaging situations, and shielding the protégé from high visibility assignments where the risk of failure is high or the protégé is ill-equipped for the task. Career-related support from the mentor may foster positive attitudes towards the mentor, which in turn contributes to the belief that the organization cares about the protégé’s well-being. Likewise, by preparing the protégé for long-term positive organizational experiences, career-related mentoring support is likely to signal to the protégé that the organization is invested in his or her career development, which again should facilitate the development of POS.

Psychosocial support may also predict protégé POS since these mentor behaviors enhance a protégé’s sense of professional identity and competence. Acceptance and confirmation offered by the mentor helps the protégé derive a sense of positive self-regard and builds trust in the mentoring relationship. Counseling support from the mentor also fosters positive self-views by helping the protégé explore personal concerns that may interfere with his or her ability to feel comfortable in the organization. Friendship creates positive social experiences at work and allows the protégé to feel like a peer with a more senior organizational member, which can positively impact protégés’ perceptions of authority figures in the organization (Kram, 1985). Finally, with role modeling, the protégé comes to identify with the mentor and the mentor becomes a person that the protégé admires and respects. Over time the positive affective attitude associated with a sense of trust, camaraderie, and respect that characterizes a mentoring relationship marked by high psychosocial support may generalize to protégé beliefs about the organization as a whole such that the protégé feels that the organization also cares about his or her well-being and is deserving of respect and trust. This leads us to the first set of predictions:

• Hypothesis 1: Career-related mentoring support in the form of sponsorship, coaching, protection, challenging assignments, and exposure and visibility is positively related to POS.

• Hypothesis 2: Psychosocial mentoring support in the form of friendship, role modeling, counseling, and acceptance and confirmation is positively related to POS.

The Relationship between POS and Work Attitudes

Eisenberger et al. (1986) proposed that when employees believe that the organization cares about their well-being, they will feel obligated to help out the organization, which is reflected in the employees’ increased affective organizational commitment. Empirical research provides support for this assumption, indicating that affective organizational commitment is one of the strongest consequences of POS (Rhoades, Eisenberger, & Armeli, 2001; Wayne et al., 2002). Research has also established the link between POS and job satisfaction (Rhoades & Eisenberger, 2002). Job satisfaction is typically seen as one of the antecedents of organizational commitment since individuals need to feel satisfied with their job before they can feel committed (Mathieu & Hamel, 1989). Replicating previous research, we predict:

• Hypothesis 3: POS is positively related to affective organizational commitment.

• Hypothesis 4: POS is positively related to job satisfaction.

• Hypothesis 5: Job satisfaction is positively related to organizational commitment

Finally, empirical research provides strong evidence indicating that job satisfaction and organizational commitment have unique predictive relationships with turnover intentions (Tett & Meyer, 1997). Turnover intentions are an important outcome variable, as intent to quit is perhaps the strongest predictor of actual turnover (Griffeth, Hom, & Gaertner, 2000). Based on this line of research, we offer a final replication of past research:

• Hypothesis 6: Job satisfaction and organizational commitment are negatively related to turnover intentions.

Method

Sample

A total of 910 participants were initially recruited to participate in a larger nationwide study and the final sample consisted of 733 substance abuse counselors working in 27 Community Treatment Programs (CTPs) across the United States. This represents an 80% response rate. Researchers traveled to a total of 87 different locations over the course of several months to collect data. Most counselors were Caucasian (60%) and female (64%). The modal level of education was a Masters or professional degree. The average age of study participants was 43 years. Half of the surveyed substance abuse counselors had licensure or certification in substance abuse. On average, each counselor had spent 9.9 years in the behavioral health field and had been in their current position for 4.1 years.

Measures

Mentoring support received

We focused on the mentoring relationship that exists between substance abuse counselors and clinical supervisors. Clinical supervisory relationships occur among individuals in health-related human service occupations such as drug counseling, marriage and family therapy, and clinical psychology and, like other supervisory mentoring relationships, are designed to help protégés develop personally and professionally (Culbreth, 1999; Pearson, 2000). In the substance abuse profession, the clinical supervisory relationship is described as a mentoring relationship (Powell & Brodsky, 1993). The average length of time in the supervisory mentoring relationship was 2.6 years. Cross-sex dyads composed 43.7% of the sample, and cross-race dyads composed 45.0% of the sample. Mentoring career and psychosocial functions (Kram, 1985) within these relationships were measured using Ragins and McFarlin’s (1990) scale, which is measured on a 1 (Strongly Disagree) to 5 (Strongly Agree) Likert response scale. The coefficient alphas for the career-related support functions were .91 for challenging assignments, .91 for coaching, .88 for exposure and visibility, .86 for protection, and .90 for sponsorship. The coefficient alphas for the psychosocial support functions were .92 for acceptance-and-confirmation, .91 for counseling, .92 for role modeling, and .94 for friendship.

Work attitudes

We used Eisenberger, Cummings, Armeli, and Lynch’s (1997) 8-item short measure of perceived organizational support, which measures the extent to which individuals feel as though their organization cares about them. An example item is “My organization cares about my opinions.” Coefficient alpha was .91. Smith’s (1976) 6-item measure was used to measure job satisfaction. An example item is “I enjoy nearly all the things I do in my job” and coefficient alpha was .80. Affective organizational commitment was assessed using Meyer, Allen, and Smith’s (1993) 6-item measure of the extent to which individuals feel an emotional attachment to their organization. An example item is “This organization has a great deal of personal meaning to me.” Coefficient alpha was .85. Finally, turnover intentions were measured using Cammann, Finchman, Jenkins, and Klesh’s (1979) 3-item measure. An example item is “I often think about quitting my job” and coefficient alpha was .93. We used a 1 (Strongly Disagree) to 5 (Strongly Agree) Likert response scale for all measures.

Results

Descriptive statistics and zero-order correlations for the variables included in the proposed model are shown in Table 1. Consistent with hypotheses 1 and 2, the mentoring functions were positively related to POS. In addition, POS was positively correlated with job satisfaction and organizational commitment, and negatively related to turnover intentions.

Table 1

Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations

Note. All correlations were significant at the p < .01 level. All variables were measured using a 1 to 5 response scale. n = 733

LISREL 8.7 was used to test the proposed model, and multiple fit indices were used to evaluate the fit of the model data (Hu & Bentler, 1998; Hu & Bentler, 1999; Lance & Vandenberg, 2001). We examined 2, the standardized root mean squared residual (SRMSR), the Tucker-Lewis index (TLI), and the comparative fit index (CFI). We adhered to Anderson and Gerbing’s (1988) recommended 2-step approach for testing full SEM models and tested our measurement model first. Through confirmatory factor analysis, we specified a measurement model where challenging assignments, coaching, exposure and visibility, protection, sponsorship, acceptance-and-confirmation, counseling, role modeling, friendship, POS, affective organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and turnover intentions were allowed to correlate with one another, but no associations between the variables were proposed. The measurement model was found to fit the data (χ2[1049] = 2880.71, p < .01, SRMSR = .047, TLI = .98, CFI = .99) according to the stringent cut-off criteria proposed by Hu and Bentler (1998; 1999).

The proposed model fit the data (χ2[1077] = 2989.15, p < .01, SRMSR = .061, TLI = .98, CFI = .99). Before championing the theoretical model, however, it is important to test alternative, competing models (Tomarken & Waller, 2003). Research suggests that there is a direct relationship between mentoring and job satisfaction and organizational commitment (Allen et al., 2004). Thus, we added paths from challenging assignments, coaching, exposure and visibility, protection, sponsorship, acceptance-and-confirmation, counseling, role modeling, and friendship to both job satisfaction and affective commitment (Figure 1). The alternative model was found to fit the data (χ2[1059] = 2941.03, p < .01, SRMSR = .059, TLI = .98, CFI = .99).

Proposed model of perceived organizational support mediating the relationship between mentoring functions and job attitudes

Note. Spon = Sponsorship, Coac = Coaching, Prot = Protection, Chal Assi = Challenging Assignments, Exp Vis = Exposure and Visibility, Frien = Friendship, Role Mod = Role Modeling, Coun = Counseling, Acc Conf = Acceptance and Confirmation, POS = Perceived Organizational Support, Job Sat = Job Satisfaction, Org Com = Organizational Commitment, Turn Int = Turnover Intentions.

To determine the best-fitting model, we calculated chi-square difference values and found that the difference in chi-square values between the hypothesized model and the alternative model was statistically significant (Δχ2 = 48.12, Δdf = 18, p < .05). Closer inspection of the alternative model showed that seven of the paths from mentoring functions to job satisfaction and organizational commitment were significant. Thus, we chose to champion the alternative model. The path coefficients associated with the alternative model are shown in Figure 1.

Hypothesis 1 was weakly supported. As mentors provide more sponsorship and more exposure and visibility to their protégés, protégés perceive their organizations to be more supportive and more concerned with their well-being (Figure 1). On the other hand, as mentors provided more protection to their protégés, protégés perceived less organizational support. This relationship appears to be a suppressor effect. Hypothesis 2 was partially supported. Role modeling was positively related to protégés perceptions of organizational support (Figure 1).

As expected, hypotheses 3 and 4 were both supported (Figure 1). When protégés believe that their organizations care about them, they feel higher levels of job satisfaction and commitment to the organization. Hypothesis 5 was that job satisfaction would predict organizational commitment, and we found support for this relationship as well (Figure 1). Finally, Hypothesis 6 was supported (Figure 1). As employees feel more satisfied at work and committed to their organizations, they tend to think less about leaving their current position.

Discussion

The present study investigated one reason why mentoring works; namely, that the receipt of mentoring support sets in motion a social exchange process whereby perceptions of organizational support are generated, which in turn predict positive protégé work attitudes. Three main conclusions can be reached from this study. First, POS appears to be a reasonable explanatory mechanism for understanding why some career-related types of mentoring support behaviors predict protégé job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment. Second, meaningful differences were found when examining the relationship between different types of mentoring support (e.g., friendship) and POS. This suggests that the mechanisms linking the receipt of mentoring to protégé outcomes may be more complex than originally expected and underscores the importance of taking a fine-grained perspective on mentoring support received in efforts to understand why mentoring works. Third, specific aspects of both career-related and psychosocial mentoring support related to POS, indicating that, while other mechanisms may be operating, POS may be important in understanding why certain mentoring functions work.

Previous theorists (Eisenberger et al., 1986; Orpen, 1997) suggest that there may be individuals in organizations who serve as organizational agents to employees, and that interactions with these organizational agents may contribute to employees forming perceptions about how much the organization cares about them. Although it seems likely that mentors and the specific forms of support that mentors provide to their protégés may also contribute to employees’ perceptions of how much the organization cares about them, this study is the first to empirically test this relationship. In the current study, we directly assess what the mentors are giving to their protégés by measuring the specific types of psychosocial and career-related support provide, and what the protégés are giving back to the organization by assessing job satisfaction and organizational commitment. Thus, we contribute to the literature by providing a direct test of the exchange process that may occur in work relationships. Results from the current study suggest that protégés may, in fact, see their mentors as representatives of the organization. Specifically, it appears as though POS acts as a mediator for some forms of mentoring support, but not others, and that these relationships operate in different ways. By parsing out the different types of mentoring support rather than aggregating them into general career and psychosocial support factors, we found that sponsorship and exposure and visibility, which are classified as career-related support, and that role modeling, classified as a type of psychosocial mentoring support, were related to POS.

Forms of mentoring support and POS

One of the notable findings of the current study was the differential relationships that the various types of mentoring support displayed with POS. Sponsorship and exposure and visibility were both positively related to POS, indicating that when mentors are willing to publicly endorse their protégés to other important members of the organization, protégés may perceive that the organization cares about them. By contrast, protégés do not perceive coaching and challenging assignments to be indicators that the organization cares about them. Coyle-Shapiro and Conway (2004) note that different individuals may interpret the meaning of another’s actions in a social exchange in different ways. For example, a mentor may provide challenging assignments to a protégé due to the belief that the protégé has a great deal of talent. Some protégés may recognize this and view the challenging assignments as an indicator that the organization cares about and values them, whereas others may simply see the challenging assignment as additional work. Thus, one explanation for why challenging assignments and coaching were not related to POS is that employees may have different interpretations of these particular types of support received from their mentors. Protection was negatively related to POS. This appears to be a negative suppression effect, which occurs when the zero-order correlation between predictors and the criterion are positive, but the path coefficient between one or more of the predictors and the criterion is negative (Kline, 2005). As such, this finding should be interpreted cautiously.

Similarly, we hypothesized that the specific types of psychosocial mentoring support would all positively relate to POS, and found that one type of psychosocial support, role modeling, was positively related to POS. Counseling, acceptance and confirmation, and friendship were unrelated to POS. These findings indicate that protégés may not necessarily transfer their receipt of counseling, acceptance and confirmation, and friendship into feeling cared for by the organization. Whereas the career-related mentoring support items oftentimes directly refer to the organization (e.g., “uses his/her influence in the organization” and “helps me be more visible in the organization”), most of the psychosocial mentoring support items refer to the interpersonal relationship (e.g., “is someone I can trust” and “thinks highly of me”). It may be that protégés only see mentor behaviors that are related to the organization as indicative of the organization’s support. As such, for counseling, acceptance and confirmation, and friendship, there may be other explanatory mechanisms that help to explain these relationships.

An exception, however, is that there was a positive relationship between role modeling and POS. As has been supported in past research (e.g., Rhoades & Eisenberger, 2002), POS, in turn, relates to job satisfaction and affective organizational commitment, which negatively relate to turnover intentions. This apparent divergence of role modeling from the other psychosocial functions is not unprecedented. In fact, past research supported categorizing the role modeling mentoring function as separate from psychosocial mentoring (e.g., Scandura & Ragins, 1993).

Future Research

Examining the explanatory role of organizational justice perceptions in the relationship between mentoring and work attitudes may be an important area for future research. Although Scandura (1997) examined the relationship between organizational justice and mentoring, only procedural and distributive justice were examined. Interpersonal justice, a more recent addition to the justice literature, refers to the degree to which individuals are treated with dignity and respect by authorities (Bies & Moag, 1986) and may be an important explanatory mechanism for understanding more about the relationships between psychosocial support and work-related attitudes. In addition to looking at organizational justice perceptions, researchers may want to consider other reasons why mentoring works. Due to the psychosocial support functions mentors provide, employees with mentors may be better able to cope with the stress and demands of the organization, which makes them more likely to develop positive attitudes about the organization and their job (Scandura, 1997). Researchers also suggest that mentors help protégés become socialized (Ostroff & Koslowski, 1993), which has been shown to be related to positive organizational attitudes (Bauer, et al., 2007). In particular, examining ability to cope with stress and socialization may be better explanatory variables for psychosocial mentoring support.

Future research should investigate other types of interpersonal relationships, such as informal mentoring relationships and high-quality relationships with peers. POS theory stresses the importance of organizational agents, who convey information about the organization to employees, but little research has examined whether this is the case for important individuals besides supervisors. Employees have many different types of relationships at work with their mentors, peers, supervisors, subordinates, and customers. They may be gathering information about the organization from multiple organizational agents. Future research should examine other types of relationships at work, and look at the mediating influence POS might have between these relationships and work-related outcomes. For instance, relationships with peers may be particularly important to a new employee’s perceptions about the supportiveness of the organization, as new employees may interpret their early interactions with peers to be indicative of the organization’s intentions towards his or her well-being. In fact, research on organizational socialization indicates that social acceptance is the component of newcomer adjustment that is most strongly related to job satisfaction and organizational commitment (Bauer, Bodner, Erdogan, Truxillo, & Tucker, 2007). Thus, the current study demonstrated that POS is an important explanatory variable for some mentoring behaviors and suggests that POS may be important for other work relationships. In a similar vein, when employees experience positive relationships in organizations, they may form beliefs about not only the organization but also their mentor. Future research might compare the relative predictive power of mentoring support received on attitudes toward the organization versus attitudes toward the mentor.

Finally, the current study focused on work attitudes specific to each employee’s organization. Future research should look at work attitudes that are broader than job satisfaction and organizational commitment, such as perceptions of career success and external marketability. Other criterion variables, such as job performance, organizational citizenship behaviors, and turnover should also be examined. Research has demonstrated that mentoring is related to more objective measures of performance (e.g., Allen et al., 2004), however little research has been conducted to examine why mentoring is related to these variables. POS, organizational justice, and stress reduction, may be important explanatory variables.

Study Limitations

Like all research, this study had some limitations. Although the measure of mentoring used assesses resources received by the protégé, it may not be a complete assessment of the social exchange relationship, as the benefits to the mentor were not included. Also, the data used in the current study were cross-sectional, meaning that causal inferences cannot be made. Additionally, common method bias may have been a factor, as ratings of mentoring functions, perceived organizational support, and work attitudes were provided by the same individuals. Finally, we examined clinical supervisory mentoring relationships. Although these types of relationships are common in many health services professions, such as social workers, physical therapists, and even graduate school internships, they do represent a certain type of mentoring relationship. The findings are likely to generalize to other hierarchical supervisory relationships that have a strong mentoring component.

Implications and Conclusion

The reason mentoring works may be more complicated that initially expected. The current study demonstrates that explanatory variables, such as POS, are important for understanding the relationship between mentoring support and work attitudes, however, raised questions regarding what other explanatory mechanisms may be at play and how specific forms of mentoring support may have different reasons for relating to work outcomes. Understanding more about why mentoring works allows organizations to provide better formal mentoring experiences to employees. Specifically, in formal mentoring programs, individuals who will be a desirable representative of the organization should be chosen. The results of this study in conjunctions with research on negative mentoring experiences suggests that organizations should be careful about who they allow or encourage to mentor, as having a negative mentoring relationship might actually reflect poorly on the organization as a whole. Moreover, the current study found that mentoring support that was specific to the organization was related to POS. Thus, organizations should encourage managers to provide quality mentoring that is specific to the organization, which may in turn foster POS among participants.

One factor that distinguishes mentoring relationships from other types of interpersonal relationships is the career-related and psychosocial support that the mentor provides to the protégé. Understanding how these types of mentoring support relate to work outcomes is challenging because they are unique behaviors, with unique relationships to other variables. In the current study, we examined POS as a possible mediating mechanism in the mentoring - work attitudes relationships and found that POS explains why some types of support relate to work attitudes, but not others. Our findings underscore the importance of examining the specific forms of mentoring support. Examining the distinct types of mentoring support is essential for understanding when and why mentoring is related to work attitudes and behaviors.

Acknowledgments

This research was supported in part by a grant from the National Institutes of Health (R01DA019460-02) awarded to Lillian T. Eby. The opinions expressed are those of the authors and not the granting agency.

Footnotes

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