The More You Care, the Worthier I Feel, the Better I Behave: How and When Supervisor Support Influences (Un)Ethical Employee Behavior

• Published in: Journal of business ethics Vol. 153; no. 3; pp. 615 - 628
• Main Authors: Sguera, Francesco, Bagozzi, Richard P., Huy, Quy N., Boss, R. Wayne, Boss, David S.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer 01.12.2018; Springer Netherlands; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Behavior; Business and Management; Business Ethics; Citizenship; Corporate culture; Education; Employee behavior; Ethics; Job performance; Management; Mixed methods research; Organizational citizenship behaviour; Philosophy; Quality of Life Research; Satisfaction; Self esteem; Supervisors; Workplaces; Ethical and unethical employee behavior; Task satisfaction; Supervisor-based self-esteem; Perceived supervisor support; Organizational citizenship behavior; Counterproductive workplace behavior
• ISSN: 0167-4544; 1573-0697
• DOI: 10.1007/s10551-016-3339-8

This article investigates the effects of perceived supervisor support on ethical (organizational citizenship behaviors) and unethical employee behavior (counterproductive workplace behavior) using a multi-method approach (one experiment and one field survey with multiple waves and supervisor ratings of employees). Specifically, we test the mediating mechanism (i.e., supervisor-based self-esteem) and a boundary condition (i.e., employee task satisfaction) that moderate the relationship between support and (un)ethical employee behaviors. We find that supervisor-based self-esteem fully mediates the relationship between supervisor support and (un)ethical employee behavior and that employee task satisfaction intensifies the relationship between supervisor support and supervisor-based self-esteem.