Journal of Applied Psychology

Paluch, Rebecca M.; Shum, Vanessa

doi: 10.1037/apl0001106pmid: 37289529

In response to calls for greater diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the workplace, many organizations have implemented a leadership role dedicated to advancing DEI. Although prior research has found that the traditional leader is associated with being White, anecdotal evidence suggests DEI leader roles are predominantly held by non-White individuals. To examine this contradiction, we draw on social role and role congruity theories to conduct three preregistered experimental studies (N = 1,913) and explore whether the DEI leader role diverges from the traditional leader role such that observers expect a DEI leader to be non-White (i.e., Black, Hispanic, or Asian). Our findings indicate that DEI leaders are generally presumed to be non-White (Study 1) and that observers perceive traits associated with non-White, rather than White, groups correspond more strongly with traits required for the DEI leader role (Study 2). We also explore the effects of congruity and find non-White candidates receive stronger leader evaluations for a DEI leader role and that this relationship is mediated by nontraditional, role-specific traits (i.e., commitment to social justice and suffered discrimination; Study 3). We conclude by discussing the implications of our work for DEI and leadership research as well as for work drawing on role theories.

Hetrick, Andrea L.; Haynes, Nicholas J.; Clark, Malissa A.; Sanders, Katelyn N.

doi: 10.1037/apl0000552pmid: 37289526

Most work–family conflict (WFC) research does not theorize, hypothesize, or empirically test phenomena at the dimension level. Instead, researchers have predominantly used composite-level approaches based on the directions of WFC (work-to-family and family-to-work conflict). However, conceptualizing and operationalizing WFC at the composite level instead of at the dimension level has not been confirmed as a well-founded strategy. The goal of the current research is to explore whether there is theoretical and empirical evidence in the WFC literature to support the importance of dimension-level theorizing and operationalization when compared to composite-level approaches. To advance theory related to the dimensions of WFC, we begin by reviewing WFC theories and then demonstrate the relevance of resource allocation theory to the time-based dimension, spillover theory to the strain-based dimension, and boundary theory to the behavior-based dimension. From this theorizing, we highlight and meta-analytically test the relative importance of specific variables from the WFC nomological network that are theoretically connected to each dimension: time and family demands for the time-based dimension, work role ambiguity for the strain-based dimension, and family-supportive supervisor behaviors and nonwork support for the behavior-based dimension. Reviewing and drawing from bandwidth-fidelity theory, we also question whether composite-based WFC approaches are more appropriate for broad constructs (i.e., job satisfaction and life satisfaction). The results of our meta-analytic relative importance analyses generally support a dimension-based approach and overall follow the pattern of results expected from our dimension-level theorizing, even when broad constructs are considered. Theoretical, future research, and practical implications are discussed.

Li, Yolanda Na; Law, Kenneth S.; Zhang, Melody Jun; Yan, Ming

doi: 10.1037/apl0001141pmid: 37824268

This research aims to understand why both low and high subordinate performance can induce abusive supervision. Drawing on the framework of affective events theory and research on anger and envy, we posit that low performance incurs abuse due to supervisor anger, whereas high performance elicits abuse due to supervisor envy. More specifically, subordinate performance has a decreasing curvilinear relationship with supervisor anger (i.e., a negative effect that gradually dissipates) and an increasing curvilinear relationship with supervisor envy (i.e., a positive effect that gradually emerges). Through supervisor anger and envy, subordinate performance therefore presents different curvilinear indirect relationships with abusive supervision. The results from two vignette-based experiments and a multiwave, multisource field study support these hypotheses. We further find that supervisor comparison orientation augments the curvilinear emergence of supervisor envy and ensuing abuse in response to higher subordinate performance. However, regardless of their level of performance orientation, supervisors are prone to higher anger and subsequent abusive supervision in response to lower subordinate performance.

Chiang, Jack Ting-Ju; Liu, Haiyang; Fehr, Ryan; Wang, Zheng; Huang, Qianyao

doi: 10.1037/apl0001108pmid: 37410407

Moral identity, a construct that captures how individuals view themselves relative to moral attributes, has received widespread attention in the organizational sciences. This article builds on the existing moral identity literature by examining the mechanisms and boundary conditions of leader moral identity’s impact on the punishment of misconduct. Drawing on multiple literatures, we specifically argue that leader moral identity is positively related to the punishment of misconduct under the condition of higher cognitive load. Furthermore, we identify moral anger as a key mechanism. The theorized model was tested across three studies: a study of civil judges’ court rulings (Study 1), a study of managers’ tendencies to punish their employees’ misconduct (Study 2), and an experiment that manipulated cognitive load while testing the intermediary role of moral anger (Study 3). Results offered convergent support for our model, shedding new light on the impact of moral identity on leaders in the workplace. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.

David, Emily M.; Volpone, Sabrina D.; Avery, Derek R.; Johnson, Lars U.; Crepeau, Loring

doi: 10.1037/apl0001109pmid: 37289528

Though we would like to believe that people universally consider workplace mistreatment to be an indicator of injustice, we describe why bystanders can react to justice events (in this study, vicariously observing or becoming aware of others being mistreated) with diverging perceptions of organizational injustice. We show that a bystander’s gender and their gender similarity to the target of mistreatment can produce identity threat, which affects whether bystanders perceive the overall organization to be rife with gendered mistreatment and unfairness. Identity threat develops via two pathways—an emotion-focused reaction and a cognitive-focused processing of the event—and each pathway distally relates to different levels of bystanders’ justice perceptions. We test these notions in three complementary studies: two laboratory experiments (N = 563; N = 920) and a large field study (N = 8,196 employees in 546 work units). Results generally show that bystanders who are women or similar in gender to the target of mistreatment reported different levels of emotional and cognitive identity threat that related to psychological gender mistreatment climate and workplace injustice following the incident as compared to men and those not similar in gender to the target. Overall, by integrating and extending bystander theory and dual-process models of injustice perceptions, through this work, we provide a potentially overlooked reason why negative behaviors like incivility, ostracism, and discrimination continue to occur in organizations.

Matusik, James G.; Poulton, Emily C.; Ferris, D. Lance; Johnson, Russell E.; Rodell, Jessica B.

doi: 10.1037/apl0001110pmid: 37289531

The PCMT model of organizational support conceptualizes organizational support as consisting of four forms that differ in terms of their perceived target and ascribed motive. Across six studies (n = 1,853), we create and validate a psychometrically reliable scale that captures these four forms of organizational support, as well as offer a theoretical advancement to the organizational support literature. In particular, the first five studies involve content validation; assessment of factor analytic structure; tests of test–retest reliability and measurement invariance; and establishment of discriminant, convergent, and predictive validity. The final study involves deployment of the validated, 24-item scale in the field and illustrates that the four different forms of organizational support differentially predict the discrete dimensions of job burnout, the effects of which spillover and crossover into the home domain. This investigation thus offers both empirical and theoretical contributions. Empirically, we provide applied psychologists with an instrument for measuring the four forms of organizational support, enabling the emergence of new lines of research. Theoretically, we illustrate that the content and characteristics associated with the different forms of organizational support are important considerations as conceptual alignment between the type of organizational support perceived and the well-being outcome under study enhances the support’s predictive validity.

Di Stasi, Matteo; Templeton, Emma; Quoidbach, Jordi

doi: 10.1037/apl0001136pmid: 37824271

How much should you talk, pause, or interrupt your counterpart in negotiations? The present research zooms out on the macrostructure of negotiation conversations to examine how systematic differences in conversation dynamics—the structural and temporal patterns that arise from the presence or absence of speech between interlocutors—relate to objective and relational outcomes at the bargaining table. We examined 38,564 speech turns from 239 online negotiation recordings and derived, for each negotiator (N = 380), 16 measures pertaining to seven dimensions of conversation dynamics: speaking time, turn length, pauses, speech rate, interruptions, backchannels, and response time. Network analyses reveal that many of these measures are interconnected, with clusters of variables suggesting broad differences in negotiators’ propensity to “talk vs. listen” and to mimic their counterparts. Regression and Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO) analyses further show that several measures uniquely predict objective and relational outcomes in videoconference negotiations. At the objective level, negotiators who speak more, faster, and with fewer pauses tend to get better deals. At the relational level, negotiators who refrain from interrupting and display more dynamic turn length (i.e., low similarity over successive turns) are better liked. Taken together, the results suggest that conversation dynamics could make or break deals.

Deng, Hong; Guan, Yanjun; Zhou, Xinyi; Li, Yixuan; Cai, Di; Li, Nan; Liu, Bing

doi: 10.1037/apl0001143pmid: 37824272

Research on mentoring programs has portrayed them almost exclusively beneficial for newcomer retention. Drawing from the social cognitive model of career management and the boundaryless career perspective, we depart from this predominant view and examine the “double-edged sword” effects of career support mentoring on newcomer turnover. We propose that career support mentoring received by newcomers is likely to elicit both internal proactive socialization and external career self-management, which act as countervailing forces driving newcomer turnover in opposite directions (i.e., the retention pathway and the unintended detrimental pathway). We further propose that the organizational role of the mentor—supervisor versus nonsupervisor—is critical in determining which pathway prevails. We conducted two multiwave newcomer studies to test our hypotheses. In Study 1 (N = 495), we found that received career support mentoring was associated with lower newcomer turnover probability through the serial mediation of internal proactive socialization and perceived internal marketability but higher newcomer turnover probability through the serial mediation of external career self-management and perceived external marketability. In Study 2 (N = 193), we found that received career support mentoring was associated with lower newcomer turnover intention through the serial mediation of internal career advancement expectation and internal proactive socialization but higher newcomer turnover intention through the serial mediation of external career advancement expectation and external career self-management. In both studies, the unintended detrimental pathway was significant only when a newcomer’s mentor was not a supervisor.

von Allmen, Nicola; Hirschi, Andreas; Burmeister, Anne; Shockley, Kristen M.

doi: 10.1037/apl0001105pmid: 37289532

A growing body of intervention studies is concerned with improving the work–nonwork interface. Extant work–nonwork interventions are diverse in terms of content and effectiveness. We map these interventions onto work–nonwork theories that explain why the interventions should improve proximal work–nonwork outcomes (i.e., conflict, enrichment, balance). Our resulting integrative framework suggests that interventions can affect work–nonwork outcomes via distinct mechanisms, which can be delineated according to their (a) content valence (i.e., increasing resources/positive characteristics or decreasing demands/negative characteristics); (b) locality (i.e., personal or contextual factors); and (c) domain (i.e., work, the nonwork, or the boundary-spanning). We further provide a meta-analytic review of the efficacy of such interventions based on 6,680 participants within 26 pre–post control group design intervention studies. The meta-analytic results reveal an overall significant main effect across all identified interventions for improving proximal work–nonwork outcomes. When comparing different kinds of interventions aimed at increasing resources, we found beneficial effects for interventions targeting personal resources over contextual resources and interventions in the nonwork domain compared to interventions in the work or boundary-spanning domain. We conclude that work–nonwork interventions effectively improve the work–nonwork interface and discuss theoretical and practical implications of the more substantial effects and potential advantages of interventions aimed at enhancing personal resources in the nonwork domain. Finally, we provide concrete recommendations for future research and elaborate on the type of studies we would like to see in terms of interventions targeting the reduction of demands, for which we found only a limited number of studies.

Frieder, Rachel E.; Ellen, B. Parker; Kapoutsis, Ilias

doi: 10.1037/apl0001107pmid: 37307361

The prevailing perspective in the organizational politics literature is that political skill facilitates heightened employee performance. Indeed, meta-analytic results have consistently found a positive relationship between political skill and both task and contextual performance. However, the literature has neglected the possibility of a contingent relationship between political skill and employee performance, despite arguments that organizations are political arenas in which employees also need political will. This is problematic because although politics are described as an ever-present facet of organizations, the extent to which work environments are politicized varies (Pfeffer, 1981), and such contexts can either constrain or enhance organizational behavior (Johns, 2006, 2018). Therefore, underpinned by the multiplicative framework of performance (i.e., P = f(M × A × C); Hirschfeld et al., 2004), we argue that the effects of political skill on employee task and contextual performance are contingent upon employee political will and the degree to which the work context is politicized. Results from a sample of working adults and their supervisors provided support for our hypothesis. Namely, political skill and political will interacted to predict heightened levels of task performance and citizenship behavior within more political contexts, but not within less political contexts. The contributions of this study to the politics literature are discussed commensurate with this study’s associated strengths and limitations.