The Moderating Role of Altruism Behavior and Intrinsic Motivation in Effect of Knowledge Psychological Ownership on Knowledge Hidden Behavior (Case Study: Teachers in Aran & Bidgol City)

Purpose: With extensive changes in educational environments, such as changes in students' needs, different teaching methods, changes in the characteristics of educational environments, and changes in teachers' demands, the need to acquire new knowledge is of great value and encourage teachers to actively participate in the yourself knowledge sharing process with colleagues seems essential, because acquiring new knowledge can have a positive effect on the level of learning, creativity, innovation, readiness for change and flexibility of teachers and increase their job success. But despite the many benefits inherent in knowledge sharing, many teachers refuse to share their knowledge with others. Hiding knowledge is a relatively common phenomenon in educational organizations and schools, which leaves destructive effects. Teachers for various reasons, may not share the knowledge related to their job with other colleagues and in some cases, hide the knowledge from them. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate the effective variables on reducing knowledge hiding in the organization. It is likely that variables such as psychological ownership of knowledge, altruistic behavior and intrinsic motivation are effective in increasing or decreasing knowledge hiding. Thus the purpose this research was the moderating role of altruism behavior and intrinsic motivation in effect of knowledge psychological ownership on knowledge hidden behavior in teachers.
Methodology: Type of research, descriptive correlation and statistical population including teachers in Aran & Bidgol City that sample size was obtained equal to 250 people through the Monte Carlo model. The research tool included four questionnaires of psychological ownership of knowledge, altruism, internal motivation and knowledge hidden. The validity of the questionnaires was confirmed as construct, convergent and divergent. The reliability of questionnaires was obtained through Cronbach’s alpha for psychological ownership 0.74, altruism 0.77, intrinsic motivation 0.84 and knowledge hidden 0.71. The data analysis of the research was done at two levels of descriptive and inferential statistics by using SPSS version 26 and Smart Pls software.
Results: The results showed that the mean of variables of psychological ownership and knowledge hidden were lower than criterion score and altruism and internal motivation were higher than criterion score. The path coefficient of variables showed that psychological ownership with (Beta=0.24) has a positive & significant effect on knowledge hidden, altruism (Beta=-0.17) and intrinsic motivation (Beta=-0.16) has a negative & significant effect on knowledge hidden.
Conclusion: Considering the positive and significant effect of intrinsic motivation and altruistic behavior in reducing the negative effect of psychological ownership of knowledge in knowledge hidden behavior, it can be seen that the moderating role of intrinsic motivation and altruistic behavior in reducing knowledge hidden behavior is significant and confirmed. Because motivation theory emphasizes the motivations that lead people to exchange knowledge and broadly determines knowledge behaviors, and altruistic behaviors consist of helping colleagues in the performance of their duties. That is, if teachers who have a high sense of psychological ownership may hesitate to exchange and share knowledge when requested due to internal motivation and altruistic behavior. Thus, it can be said that hiding or sharing knowledge depends not only on the level of one’s property relative to the purpose of ownership, but also on internal motivation and altruistic behavior. To prevent this phenomenon among teachers, the sense of collective ownership instead of individual ownership should be strengthened among teachers.