A field study was performed examining the influence of situational constraints on the job performance of 368 finance company cashiers. Increasing levels of contextual constraint (as rated by a cashier's immediate supervisor) were negatively related to supervisory performance ratings, self-appraisals, and objective performance criteria. No differences were in evidence in the degree ofperformance variation found in high and low constraining task environments. Constraints were also found to be weakly related to ancillary measures of cashier work load.
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