The Impact on Psychological Contract violation on Employee Well-being and Organizational Cynicism

Abstract

This study investigates the impact of psychological contract breaches on both individual and organizational levels, with a particular focus on quiet quitting as an individual behavioral response and organizational cynicism as a collective attitude among employees in the Egyptian aviation company’s sector. A sample of 150 employees participated by completing a structured four-part questionnaire measuring psychological contract breach, quiet quitting, and cynicism. This study advances psychological contract theory by framing quiet quitting as a contemporary behavioral response and organizational cynicism as a shared attitudinal consequence of contract breaches. It further contributes a gender-sensitive lens and contextual depth by exploring these phenomena within the Egyptian aviation sector, an environment largely overlooked in current scholarship. The findings reveal that breaches of psychological contract significantly influence both quiet quitting and cynicism. Notably, the impact is more pronounced at the individual level than at the organizational level and stronger among male employees compared to female employees. The results are discussed in relation to existing literature, with attention to theoretical and practical implications, as well as research limitations addressed in the conclusion. One of the limitations of this study is that the result only applies to the employee from the civil aviation sector and the number of samples is small.