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Chapter 5 102 Table 5.5: Random effects meta-analysis of social support and performance k N r ρ se CI95 CR80 I 2 Q w Q b Community domain 5 866 .15 .18 .06 [ .06, .31] [ .00, .37] 72.54% 18.43 ** 0.25 General community 2 422 .20 .22 .18 [-.13, .58] [-.10, .55] 93.43% 15.23 *** 0.02 Host country nationals 2 275 .16 .20 .06 [ .09, .31] [ .09, .30] 0.00% 0.20 Family domain 8 1335 .17 .19 .05 [ .10, .28] [ .02, .35] 79.16% 41.96 *** General family 3 606 .19 .22 .09 [ .03, .40] [ .01, .42] 82.54% 11.27 ** 0.28 Spousal support 5 729 .15 .17 .07 [ .04, .31] [ .03, .38] 87.34% 25.73 *** Work domain 28 5045 .18 .21 .03 [ .16, .26] [ .03, .40] 92.28% 387.14 *** Mentoring 2 381 .18 .19 .06 [ .07, .30] [ .08, .29] 19.33% 1.24 9.45 Peer support 5 1376 .13 .17 .10 [-.03, .36] [-.12, .45] 97.01% 73.89 *** Supervisory support 7 920 .23 .26 .05 [ .17, .36] [ .10, .43] 66.46% 17.41 ** Cross-cultural training 4 435 .05 .06 .09 [-.10, .23] [-.16, .28] 70.43% 10.68 * Logistical support 2 170 .21 .24 .06 [ .13, .36] [ .14, .35] 0.00% 0.38 POS 14 3159 .20 .24 .07 [ .11, .37] [-.08, .56] 95.85% 212.18 *** POS adjustment 3 482 .06 .08 .06 [ .04, .19] [-.06, .21] 70.32% 6.68 * POS career 4 582 .15 .18 .04 [ .11, .25] [ .08, .27] 37.93% 4.90 POS financial 4 656 .11 .13 .03 [ .08, .19] [ .06, .21] 0.00% 1.78 Note: k = number of independent studies; N = total independent sample size; r = estimated correlation in the population; ρ = estimated true correlation in the population; se = standard error of the true correlation; CI95 = 95% confidence interval of the true correlation; CR80 = 80% credibility interval of the true correlation; I 2 = variance in true effect sizes as proportion of total variance; Q w = test of within-group homogeneity; Q b = test of between-group homogeneity; POS = perceived organizational support. * p < .05; ** p < .01; *** p < .001 5.5.1.4 Retention Table 5.6 displays positive meta-analytical estimates of associations between expatriate retention and social support from the family (ρ = .25) and work domain (ρ = .19), in line with Hypothesis 2d. Too few studies had examined community support in relation to retention. Similarly, we could only compare different actors/types of social support within the work domain. Support by supervisors (ρ = .26) and peers (ρ = .17) related significantly to expatriates’ retention, but mentoring had no significant association with retention. Career POS had the strongest association with retention (ρ = .28), followed by overall POS (ρ = .26), and financial POS (ρ = .19). Logistical support did not relate to retention but the credibility interval and the heterogeneity statistic suggested moderating effects of third variables. Cross-cultural training had a near zero correlation to retention. 5.5.2 Moderator Analyses 5.5.2.1 Agent Proximity Table 5.7 demonstrates that mobility status did not explain significant variance in the relationship between social support and expatriate adjustment. Nevertheless, the average effect of social support was considerably higher when social support was provided by HCNs (ρ = .25), rather than by expatriates (ρ = .13), which suggests that hypothesis 3a may be confirmed when more studies would be available. Hypotheses 3b through 3d could not be tested because too few studies had specified the mobility status of agents.