Integrating modern research on social courage via psychological contract theory: direct and interactive effects of work engagement and moral disengagement
Journal of Organizational Effectiveness: People and Performance
ISSN: 2051-6614
Article publication date: 28 May 2024
Abstract
Purpose
The current article integrates four prominent directions of modern research on workplace social courage. We (1) apply a novel framework, psychological contract theory, to identify (2) work engagement and moral disengagement as potential antecedents of social courage, (3) unethical pro-organizational behaviors as a possible duplicitous outcome of these antecedents and (4) moderating effects of moral disengagement on the relations of work engagement with these outcomes.
Design/methodology/approach
We perform a two-wave survey study (n = 347), wherein antecedents are measured at Time 1 and outcomes are measured at Time 2 (one week later).
Findings
We support that work engagement and moral disengagement significantly relate to both workplace social courage and unethical pro-organizational behaviors. We also support that moral disengagement moderates the relation of work engagement with unethical pro-organizational behaviors but not workplace social courage.
Practical implications
We highlight that work engagement can be a possible avenue to promote workplace social courage, but organizations should monitor any interventions because it may also promote unethical pro-organizational behaviors for those who are morally disengaged. We also contend that the current results support the “resiliency of courage” by discovering a nonsignificant moderating effect, providing further support for this broadly replicable aspect of workplace social courage.
Originality/value
We discuss how these findings support psychological contract theory as a viable lens to understand workplace social courage, and we call on future researchers to apply the theory to identify further relations of the construct.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
Compliance with Ethical Standards: The authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose.
All research procedures were approved by the IRB of the primary author’s institution.
Informed consent was not obtained. All procedures were conducted over the internet, and obtaining informed consent would be the only identifying information that would link participants to the study. To ensure maximum confidentiality and anonymity, it was decided to not obtain participants’ informed consent.
Citation
Howard, M.C. and Kasprzyk, M. (2024), "Integrating modern research on social courage via psychological contract theory: direct and interactive effects of work engagement and moral disengagement", Journal of Organizational Effectiveness: People and Performance, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/JOEPP-06-2023-0254
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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