This paper attempts to place the role of transformational leadership within the stressor-strain process by investigating the potential indirect effects of the perceptions of transformational leadership on counterproductive work behaviors (CWBs) through its influence on perceptions of the communication climate and trust. Leaders perceived as being transformational will offer an ameliorating effect on employee appraisals of stressors (i.e., conflict). Non-task organizational conflict is a stressor that captures employees’ perceptions of conflict with co-workers attributable to organizational factors (e.g., unclear or contradictory policies). Previous studies have found this type of stressor to be associated with negative health and workplace outcomes. Counterproductive work behaviors are a form of workplace incivility in which employees engage in minor acts of retribution. Transactional theories of stress place particular importance on appraisal mechanisms to explain the experience of stress and subsequent engagement in CWBs. Volumes of literature in the field of leadership have suggested that transformational leaders have the ability to influence the ways employees make meaning of events at work. However, few studies have investigated the mechanisms by which employees’ appraisals of stressors are influenced. This study investigated the potential role of trust in leadership and communication climate as possible mechanisms. Organizational climate research focuses on how employees, through their social interactions, create and ascribe meaning to work events. Communication climate specifically focuses on the supportive and defensive qualities of an organization’s communicative norms and expectations. Previous research suggests trust to be a key factor in mitigating the experience of stressors and strains. Participants were primarily recruited from positions in higher education administration, using a sample of convenience, snowball sampling. Survey instruments were administered during two waves of data collection, for a full-panel sample of N = 123. Results suggested transformational leadership indirectly effected engagement in CWBs through its influence on the experience of non-task organizational conflict. Trust in leadership was not a significant predictor. Communication climate provided a mixed picture. While perceptions of a more supportive communication climate were associated with less conflict and fewer CWBs, the data did not support the indirect effects of transformational leadership through communication climate.

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Abstract The current study investigated the relationship between demands for organizational citizenship behaviors and future displays of organizational citizenship and counterproductive work behaviors. Such demands are conceptualized as workplace conditions that make it difficult for employees to complete their job (i.e., organizational constraints), performance failures of coworkers such as incomplete or incorrectly done tasks (i.e., coworker failure) and direct or indirect request from the supervisors to commit more organizational citizenship behaviors (i.e., supervisor pressure). Additionally, the effect of negative affectivity, hostile attribution bias, attributions of blame, and target specific scales of workplace behaviors were investigated. The design of the current study is prospective with a one week time lag between two self-report surveys. 464 employed U.S. residents were recruited through Amazon's M-Turk service. Of the initial 464 participants, 183 also completed the second survey a week later. New scales were created to assess coworker failure, supervisor pressure, attributions of blame, and target specific behaviors. The evidence from this study suggests that coworker failure and supervisor pressure are both antecedents to future displays of organizational citizenship behaviors and counterproductive work behaviors. Similarly, organizational citizenship behaviors preceded demands for organizational citizenship behaviors reported a week later. The results differed slightly when using target-specific scales of behavior. The hypotheses regarding individual differences and attributions of blame were not supported.

Abusive supervision research has found that subordinates engage in deviance following abuse despite the negative consequences of doing so. Why do individuals engage in deviance despite the expected sanctions? To explain this relationship a model is proposed based on moral licensing theory wherein the relationship of abusive supervision and subsequent negative voluntary work behaviors will be moderated by the extent to which subordinates performed positive voluntary work behaviors. In Study 1, I demonstrate that high organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) as rated by subordinates’ significant others significantly increased the relationship between abusive supervision and organizational deviance, while the relationship was not significant at low levels of significant other rated OCB. In Study 2 I replicate and extend this finding using time-lagged data, finding that in the context of abusive supervision, OCB directed at the supervisor at day t significantly increased the incidence of counterproductive work behaviors directed at the supervisor and organization at day t + 1. Implications for moral licensing and abusive supervision research are discussed.

Organizations have become increasingly concerned with developing and protecting their information security systems. Despite attempts to secure the information infrastructure, employees inside of organizations remain the largest source of threat to information cyber-security. While previous research has focused on behavioral and situational factors that influence cyber-security behaviors, the measurement of cyber behaviors and their relationship to other performance variables is poorly understood. The purpose of the present study is to 1) determine the underlying factor structure of a cyber-security behavior scale, 2) assess if individual personality traits predict four types of cyber-security behaviors: security assurance, security compliance, security risk, and security damaging behaviors, and 3) explore the relationship between citizenship and counterproductive work behaviors and cyber-security behaviors. Results indicate that cyber-security behavior can be separated into four distinct dimensions and that personality traits such as conscientiousness, agreeableness, and openness to experience are predictive of these behaviors. Additionally, positive cyber behaviors are related organizational citizenship behaviors, and potentially harmful cyber behaviors related to counterproductive work behaviors. This research has implications for using personality to predict cyber-security behaviors and reduce insider threat in the workplace.

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Counterproductive work behaviors are costly behaviors that individuals employ in retaliation to adverse stimuli in the workplace. This study specifically examined the relationship between perceived gender discrimination and counterproductive behaviors, using the variable of control as the mediator. This study also investigated the relationship between perceived gender discrimination and job turnover intentions as well as organizational commitment. Measures for perceived gender discrimination, control, counterproductive work behaviors, job turnover and organizational commitment were used to survey 97 participants on their workplace experiences and attitudes. It was found that perceived gender discrimination had a significant, positive correlation with counterproductive behaviors, as originally hypothesized. Perceived gender discrimination also had a significant negative correlation with organizational commitment. Control did not significantly correlate with counterproductive work behaviors, meaning it did not function as a mediator between counterproductive work behaviors and perceived gender discrimination, as hypothesized. The intent of this thesis was to examine perceived gender discrimination and control as antecedents of counterproductive behaviors. My findings suggest that perceived gender discrimination is correlated with these negative behaviors, thus promoting the importance of implementing programs to facilitate its reduction.

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