Relationships Between Moral Disengagement,Work Characteristics and Workplace Harassment

This study was undertaken to investigate whether work variables identified in theory and research as being related to employee experiences/behaviours add to the understanding and explain employees’ experiences of workplace harassment. The extent to which social cognitive theory (SCT), specifically moral disengagement, explains the processes by which work characteristics are related to harassment was also examined. The purpose of the study was to identify the presence of relationships among work characteristics, satisfaction, moral disengagement and workplace harassment. According to the results, employees with negative opinions of their work tended to experience negative affect and to believe that it is acceptable to harm others. The results of this study provide evidence of (1) relationships between harassment and several workplace characteristics and (2) the applicability of SCT to the explanation of how work characteristics relate to harassment.     

The Effects of the Dark Triad on Unethical Behavior

In the wake of a series of corporate scandals, there has been a growing call for authentic leadership in order to ensure ethical conduct in contemporary organizations. Authentic leadership, however, depends upon the ability to draw a distinction between the authentic and inauthentic leader. This paper uses Deleuze’s discussion of Platonism as a point of departure for critically scrutinizing the problem of authenticating the leader—drawing a distinction between authentic and inauthentic leaders. This will be done through a reading of Bill George’s book Authentic Leadership. Informed by Deleuze’s inverted Platonism, the paper challenges the practice by which authentic leaders are distinguished from inauthentic leaders. In conclusion, the paper suggests that an adequate concept of authentic leadership should consider how ethics can occur when the authentic leader is able to critically reflect his or her own value-commitments.     

The Effects of Victim Anonymity on Unethical Behavior

We theorize that victim anonymity is an important factor in ethical decision making, such that actors engage in more self-interested and unethical behaviors toward anonymous victims than they do toward identifiable victims. Three experiments provided empirical support for this argument. In Study 1, participants withheld more life-saving products from anonymous than from identifiable victims. In Study 2, participants allocated a sum of payment more unfairly when interacting with an anonymous than with an identifiable partner. Finally, in Study 3, participants cheated more from an anonymous than from an identifiable person. Anticipated guilt fully mediated these effects in all three studies. Taken together, our research suggests that anonymous victims may be more likely to incur unethical treatment, which could explain many unethical business behaviors.     

Influence of Personal Values and Value Congruence on Unethical Practices and Work Behavior

The study examines whether (a) personal and organizational values differ in private and public sectors, and (b) personal values and value congruence – the extent of matching between personal and organizational values – influence unethical practices and work behavior. Three hundred and forty middle-level managers from four manufacturing organizations rated 22 values as guiding principles to them to identify their personal values. In order to index organizational values, 56 top-level managers of the same organizations rated how important such values were to the organization. Results revealed that the important shared values among managers of private and public sectors are product quality and customer service. Congruence between personal and organizational values is found to be higher in the private sector compared to the public sector. Middle-level managers in the private sector shared the organizational values more than the managers in the public sector. Irrespective of the type of organizations and age of managers, personal values more potently and consistently decreased unethical practices and increased work behavior compared to value congruence. Hiring managers emphasizing personal values can demote unethical practices and promote work behavior.     

The Effects of Transgressor Sex on Judgments of Unethical Behavior

This study investigated the effect of gender stereotypes on evaluator judgments of unethical behavior. Subjects were working adults who completed a mailed survey in which they evaluated unethical behavior depicted in written scenarios. Sex of the transgressor in the scenarios was manipulated. Both quantitative and qualitative analyses indicated that there are no stable differences in evaluations of men and women across scenarios. These results suggest that evaluators do not hold different standards of ethical behavior for men and women, they do not make different causal attributions for the behavior of men and women, nor do evaluators treat men and women differently when an ethical transgression has been committed.     

Self-Construal and Unethical Behavior

We suggest that understanding unethical behavior in organizations involves understanding how people view themselves and their relationships with others, a concept known as self-construal. Across multiple studies, employing both field and laboratory settings, we examine the impact of three dimensions of self-construal (independent, relational, and collective) on unethical behavior. Our results show that higher levels of relational self-construal relate negatively to unethical behavior. We also find that differences in levels of relational self for men and women mediate gender differences in unethical behavior. We discuss both the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.     

Consumer Response to Unethical Corporate Behavior: A Re-Examination and Extension of the Moral Decoupling Model

This research replicates Bhattacharjee et al. (J Consum Res 39(4):1167–1184, 2013) moral decoupling model and extends the original along the dimensions of theory, method, and context. Adopting a branding perspective and focusing on the corporate domain rather than the public figures investigated by Bhattacharjee and colleagues, this research examines the proposition that consumers dissociate judgments of morality from judgments of performance to justify purchasing from companies deemed to act immorally. The original study is further extended by applying the model in a different cultural context and employing a more realistic stimulus to establish external and ecological validity. The results of the replication generally support the original findings, in particular, under conditions of higher product involvement, a theoretical extension.     

Negative Affect and Counterproductive Workplace Behavior: The Moderating Role of Moral Disengagement and Gender

There has been growing scholarly interest in understanding individual-level antecedents of counterproductive workplace behavior (CWB). While researchers have found a positive relationship between individuals’ negative affect and engagement in CWB, to date, our understanding of the factors which may affect this relationship is limited. In this study, we investigate the moderating roles of moral disengagement and gender in this relationship. Consistent with our hypotheses, we found that individuals with a greater tendency to experience negative emotions were more likely to engage in CWB when they had a higher propensity to morally disengage. Moreover, we found that this interacting relationship varied across men and women. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our findings and offer avenues for future research.     

Unethical and Unwell: Decrements in Well-Being and Unethical Activity at Work

Previous research on unethical business behavior usually has focused on its impact from a financial or philosophical perspective. While such foci are important to our understanding of unethical behavior, we argue that another set of outcomes linked to individual well-being are critical as well. Using data from psychological, criminological, and epidemiological sources, we propose a model of unethical behavior and well-being. This model postulates that decrements in well-being result from stress or trauma stemming from being victimized by, engaging in, or witnessing unethical behavior, or even from being associated with individuals involved in such behavior.     

Moral Disengagement in Processes of Organizational Corruption

This paper explores Albert Bandura's concept of moral disengagement in the context of organizational corruption. First, the construct of moral disengagement is defined and elaborated. Moral disengagement is then hypothesized to play a role in the initiation of corruption by both easing and expediting individual unethical decision-making that advances organizational interests. It is hypothesized to be a factor in the facilitation of organizational corruption through dampening individuals’ awareness of the ethical content of the decisions they make. Finally, it is hypothesized to contribute to the perpetuation of corruption in organizations, because if individuals who have a greater propensity to morally disengage are more likely to make decisions that advance organizational interests regardless of the ethicality of those decisions, they may also be rewarded for those decisions in terms of organizational advancement. Together these studies form an argument that moral disengagement plays an important role in processes of organizational corruption.     

A Moral Cleansing Process: How and When Does Unethical Pro-organizational Behavior Increase Prohibitive and Promotive Voice

Journal of Business Ethics - In this study, we draw on moral cleansing theory to investigate the consequence of unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB) from the perspective of the actors....     

道德解脱和惩罚知觉对伦理决策的影响

道德解脱和惩罚知觉是管理者伦理决策中的脱离机制和约束机制,文章通过有调节作用的中介关系模型,分析了道德解脱和惩罚知觉对管理者伦理决策过程的影响,比较了组织有利和组织有害伦理决策中,管理者在伦理判断和伦理行为意向上的差异。结果表明道德解脱是管理者伦理判断的重要前因变量,惩罚知觉和伦理判断及其交互项都会对伦理行为意向产生影响,惩罚知觉在管理者伦理判断低时效应更明显;此外,管理者在组织有利情境下的伦理判断和伦理行为意向要显著低于组织有害情境。本研究对理解管理者伦理决策的潜在心理过程有积极贡献。     

Effects of Organizational Embeddedness on Unethical Pro-organizational Behavior: Roles of Perceived Status and Ethical Leadership

Journal of Business Ethics - This study examines why individuals who are deeply embedded in the organization may engage in unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB). Drawing from social identity...     

Methodological Issues in the Design of Online Surveys for Measuring Unethical Work Behavior: Recommendations on the Basis of a Split-Ballot Experiment

In recent years, there has been an increasing interest in unethical work behavior. Several types of survey instruments to collect information about unethical work behavior are available. Nevertheless, to date little attention has been paid to design issues of those surveys. There are, however, several important problems that may influence reliability and validity of questionnaire data on the topic, such as social desirability bias. This paper addresses two important issues in the design of online surveys on unethical work behavior: the response scale for questions regarding the frequency of certain types of unethical work behavior and the location of the background questions in an online survey. We present the results of an analysis of a double split-ballot experiment in a large sample (n = 3,386) on governmental integrity. We found that, when comparing response scales that have labels for all categories with response scales that only have anchors at the end, the latter provided answers with higher validity. The study did not provide support for the conventional practice of asking background questions at the end.     

When Moral Tension Begets Cognitive Dissonance: An Investigation of Responses to Unethical Pro-Organizational Behavior and the Contingent Effect of Construal Level

Journal of Business Ethics - Research on unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB) has predominantly focused on its antecedents, while overlooking how engaging in such behavior might affect...     

Corruption and Unethical Behavior: Report on a Set of Danish Guidelines

Corruption is defined as private individuals or enterprises who misuse public resources for private power and/or political gains. They do so through abusing public officials whose behavior deviates from the formal government rules of conduct. Ethical behavior is defined as individuals or enterprises adhering to a non-corrupt work or business practice. A review of the academic literature is conducted drawing on perspectives from the political, economic, and anthropological sciences. Insights from a Danish research program are reported on. This program identifies five different actions for dealing with corruption: (1) no action; (2) withdrawals from markets; (3) decentralized decision-making process; (4) establishment of an anti-corruption code; and (5) mutual commitment through integrity pact. The following aspects of ethical behavior should be regulated through an anti-corruption code: the company vis-à-vis political parties; gifts and entertainment expenses; political campaign contributions; and policy against small-scale corruption. Directions for future research are considered including the role of international organizations and multinational companies in fighting corruption and fostering ethical behavior; the role of countries and their governments; and the management systems.     

Unethical and Fraudulent Financial Reporting: Applying the Theory of Planned Behavior

This research applies the theory of planned behavior to corporate managers’ decision making as it relates to fraudulent financial reporting. Specifically, we conducted two studies to examine the effects of attitude, subjective norm and perceived control on managers’ decisions to violate generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) in order to meet an earnings target and receive an annual bonus. The results suggest that the theory of planned behavior predicts whether managers’ decisions are ethical or unethical. These findings are relevant to corporate leaders who seek to improve ethical work climates of organizations and to many regulators, accountants, corporate governance officials and investors.     

Moral Emotions and Unethical Bargaining: The Differential Effects of Empathy and Perspective Taking in Deterring Deceitful Negotiation

Two correlational studies tested whether personality differences in empathy and perspective taking differentially relate to disapproval of unethical negotiation strategies, such as lies and bribes. Across both studies, empathy, but not perspective taking, discouraged attacking opponents’ networks, misrepresentation, inappropriate information gathering, and feigning emotions to manipulate opponents. These results suggest that unethical bargaining is more likely to be deterred by empathy than by perspective taking. Study 2 also tested whether individual differences in guilt proneness and shame proneness inhibited the endorsement of unethical bargaining tactics. Guilt proneness predicted disapproval of false promises and misrepresentation. Empathy did not predict disapproval of false promises when guilt proneness was included in the analysis. The comparatively private nature of the sin of false promises suggests that private ethical breaches are more likely to be deterred by anticipated guilt, while ethical breaches with clear interpersonal consequences are more likely to be deterred by empathy.