Self-Construal And Organizational Context: Interactive Effects On Harming And Helping Workplace Behaviors

Abstract

This dissertation a) investigated the direct relationship between self-construal and unethical behavior which benefits an individual employee, their workgroup, and/or their organization, b) explored self-construal's part in the social processes within which unethical acts are often entangled (specifically social identification and (un)ethical leadership), and c) assessed the relationship between self-construal and prosocial workplace behavior, to create a comprehensive framework describing when self-construal will have beneficial and detrimental effects within organizations. I utilized a mixed research design consisting of a field study (Study 1) and two randomized experiments (Studies 2 & 3). Study 1 tested the model with a field survey, Study 2 tested the mediated effect of self-construal on pro-group unethical behavior while randomly manipulating the moderating factor of social identification. Study 3 replicated results from Study 1 for the moderating effect of (un)ethical leadership on the self-construal --> pro-group unethical behavior relationship.