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This research sought to examine the potential association between workers’ financial worry and counterproductive work behavior. Based on the basic psychological need theory, we propose that psychological need satisfaction explains this relationship and we position this volitional pathway as an alternative to a cognitive capacity pathway based on the cognitive load theory.

We conducted a two-week interval-lagged survey study with three measurement points among 180 US workers. The mediation models were tested using structural equation modeling.

The results support the conclusion that, while cognitive capacity could have an impact on counterproductive work behavior, its mediating effect is less strong than that of need satisfaction.

Based on the results, we recommend that organizations design their compensation and benefits system to shield employees from financial worries. At the same time, we advise offering the employees who do experience financial worries assistance in managing their budgets and offering other forms of financial coaching.

This study is innovative because we show that the negative effects of financial worry extend much further than initially thought and affect not only employees' cognition but also their motivation.