Research on the Self-Interested Risk of Unethical Pro-organizational Behavior and Its Mechanisms
ZHANG Yongjun，ZHAO Jun，LIU Zhiqiang
1. Henan University, Kaifeng， Hehan， China; 2. Zhongnan University of Economics and Law，Wuhan， China； 3.Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China
Abstract The “pro-organization” feature of Unethical Pro-organizational Behavior (UPB) is very deceptive, leading us to pay insufficient attention to its potential self-interested risk. Based on moral license theory and social cognition theory, this study builds a theoretical model and explores the influence of UPB on self-interested unethical behaviors. By a two-wave field data of 257 employees, we find individual UPB has a positive effect on his/her self-interested unethical behaviors, psychological entitlement and moral justification have a mediating effect respectively. Locus of control (LOC) has a different moderating effect on the relationship between UPB and psychological entitlement and moral justification, that is,
UPB has more positive effect on internal LOC individual psychological entitlement while it has more positive effect on external LOC individual moral disengagement. For external LOC individuals, UPB has more indirect effect on self-interested unethical behaviors via moral disengagement.
ZHANG Yongjun,ZHAO Jun,LIU Zhiqiang. Research on the Self-Interested Risk of Unethical Pro-organizational Behavior and Its Mechanisms[J]. Chinese Journal of Management, 2020, 17(11): 1642-.
