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1 – 10 of 617In this paper, I synthesize the prior psychology literature on ego depletion and apply this literature to an auditing setting. Ego depletion refers to a reduced desire or ability…
Abstract
In this paper, I synthesize the prior psychology literature on ego depletion and apply this literature to an auditing setting. Ego depletion refers to a reduced desire or ability to use self-control in task performance due to using self-control on prior tasks. I focus on the likely causes and consequences of depletion in an auditing setting, as well as means of mitigating depletion and recovering self-control resources. While ego depletion theory is prevalent in the psychology literature, little is known about whether or how ego depletion affects professionals on meaningful task performance. As a result, this synthesis is aimed at stimulating future ego depletion research in accounting, and specifically auditing, by surveying existing literature and applying this literature to an auditing setting. Further, I develop 13 questions for future research to investigate. My synthesis reveals that ego depletion likely has a pervasive effect in an auditing setting, and can hinder auditors’ judgment and decision-making (JDM) quality. Therefore, this synthesis helps to provide a greater understanding of the impact of auditing tasks on individuals, and refines both auditor JDM and ego depletion theories.
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Zubair Akram, Saima Ahmad, Umair Akram, Abdul Gaffar Khan and Baofeng Huo
This study aims to examine the relationship between abusive supervision and workplace incivility using a dual theoretical framework. First, it draws on the ego depletion theory to…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine the relationship between abusive supervision and workplace incivility using a dual theoretical framework. First, it draws on the ego depletion theory to investigate the relationship between abusive supervision and incivility by exploring the mediating role of ego depletion. Second, it integrates the job demands–resources model with the ego depletion theory to examine how perceived co-workers’ support functions as a buffer in mitigating the effects of ego depletion on incivility.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors tested our moderated mediation model using hierarchical linear modeling through an experience-sampling study based on data collected from a participants across five consecutive workdays.
Findings
The findings reveal employees subjected to abusive supervision are more likely to experience a depletion of self-regulatory resources. Moreover, the authors found a positive association between ego depletion and workplace incivility, suggesting that diminished self-control resulting from abusive supervision contributes to a higher likelihood of engaging in uncivil workplace behaviors. In addition, perceived coworkers’ support emerged as a significant moderating factor that attenuates the indirect impact of abusive supervision on workplace incivility through ego depletion. Specifically, when perceived coworkers’ support is high, the negative influence of abusive supervision on ego depletion, and subsequently, on workplace incivility, is mitigated.
Originality/value
By exploring ego depletion as the underlying mechanism and boundary conditions imposed by perceived coworker support on the relationship between abusive supervision and workplace incivility, this research contributes to a nuanced understanding of the intricate dynamics of this relationship. Based on the research findings, the authors advocate that organizations should establish and integrate support services, such as counseling and employee assistance programs, to reduce the emotional turmoil caused by abusive supervision.
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Abdul Gaffar Khan, Yan Li, Zubair Akram and Umair Akram
Extant scholars identified negative workplace gossip as a social stressor that negatively influences employees’ behavior and attitude. Despite the burgeoning interest in workplace…
Abstract
Purpose
Extant scholars identified negative workplace gossip as a social stressor that negatively influences employees’ behavior and attitude. Despite the burgeoning interest in workplace stressors, limited studies have explored how the detrimental consequences of targets’ perceived negative workplace gossip spur their emotions and behaviors. Grounding on conservation of resources and ego depletion theories, this study aims to investigate why and how targets’ negative workplace gossip may contribute to trigger knowledge hiding. Specifically, the authors explore the underlying mechanism of personal ego depletion and boundary conditions of organizational justice to shed new light on the above process.
Design/methodology/approach
Using two time-wave survey, the authors collected 340 sample data from employees working in high-tech companies of China. Hierarchical regression analysis was used to examine hypothesized relationships of moderated mediation model.
Findings
The empirical results revealed that negative workplace gossip exacerbates knowledge hiding by increasing personal ego depletion. Furthermore, through testing moderated mediation model, the results showed that organizational justice (i.e. distributive and procedural justice) with the low presence moderates the stronger strength of the linkage between negative workplace gossip and personal ego depletion, and likewise, it also moderates the stronger effect of negative workplace gossip on knowledge hiding via personal ego depletion.
Practical implications
This study recommends several guidelines for managers and practitioners to mitigate negative gossip by strengthening organizational justice.
Originality/value
This study first enriches novel understanding in the literature between negative workplace gossip and knowledge hiding by using a new emotional mechanism (i.e. personal ego depletion). This research also contributes new insights by incorporating contextual boundary conditions (i.e. organizational justice) that have not been yet researched on negative gossip and knowledge hiding linkage.
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Naseer Abbas Khan, Zhang Hui, Ali Nawaz Khan and Mohsin Ali Soomro
Leadership research is of interest to academics and practitioners in the construction industry. Based on the ego-depletion theory and authentic leadership theory, the current…
Abstract
Purpose
Leadership research is of interest to academics and practitioners in the construction industry. Based on the ego-depletion theory and authentic leadership theory, the current study aims to investigate the impact of women authentic leadership on leaders' emotional exhaustion and job engagement in the construction industry.
Design/methodology/approach
The data were gathered in two waves using a time lag approach. The responses of 276 women leaders-follower dyads from construction firms in China's eastern provinces were analyzed using a moderated mediation model.
Findings
Most of the proposed hypotheses were supported by the findings of this study, which showed that authentic leadership can reduce emotional exhaustion in women leaders and increase work engagement through ego depletion. Furthermore, the leader's sense of belonging, according to this study, moderates the mediating effect of ego depletion.
Research limitations/implications
This study can help managers, policymakers and human resource professionals think about authentic leadership and its impact on women leaders. Furthermore, ego depletion has an impact on the psychological well-being of authentic women leaders. The sense of belongingness of a leader is critical in buffering the negative effects of ego depletion for women in authentic leadership. Thus, women leaders in construction sector should be encouraged to express a sense of belonging to their followers, since this will improve their work engagement and lessen their emotional exhaustion.
Originality/value
This study is unique in that it examines the authentic behavior of women leaders in the Chinese construction sector, which is a challenging profession for women to work in as site managers. This study contributes to the literature on women in leadership by demonstrating how authentic leadership behavior influences the wellbeing and engagement of leaders. In addition, the study indicated that the effect of the mediator (ego depletion) and moderator (leader sense of belongingness) on the relationship between women's authentic leadership and the leader's own psychological wellbeing and job engagement was significant.
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Zubair Akram, Abdul Gaffar Khan, Umair Akram, Saima Ahmad and Lynda Jiwen Song
While the rapid adoption of information communication technologies (ICT) in organizations has been linked with a higher risk of cyberbullying, research on the influence of…
Abstract
Purpose
While the rapid adoption of information communication technologies (ICT) in organizations has been linked with a higher risk of cyberbullying, research on the influence of cyberbullying on interpersonal behaviors in the workplace remains limited. By drawing on the ego-depletion theory and the leader-member exchange (LMX) theory, this research investigates how, why and when workplace cyberbullying may trigger interpersonal aggression through ICT.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors collected data from 259 employees and 62 supervisors working in large ICT organizations in China through a multi-wave survey. The authors performed multilevel analysis and used hierarchical linear modeling to test the proposed moderated mediation model.
Findings
The results revealed that workplace cyberbullying has a significant and positive influence on interpersonal aggression in the workplace via ego depletion. The authors found that differentiation in LMX processes at group level moderates the indirect relationship between workplace cyberbullying and interpersonal aggression (via ego depletion). Furthermore, the positive indirect effect of workplace cyberbullying was found to be stronger in the presence of a high LMX differentiation condition in comparison to a low LMX differentiation condition.
Research limitations/implications
The data were collected from Chinese ICT organizations, which may limit the generalization of this study’s findings to other cultural and sectoral contexts.
Originality/value
This paper provides the first step in understanding how, why and when workplace cyberbullying triggers interpersonal aggression by investigating the role of ego depletion as a mediator and LMX differentiation as a boundary condition. This is the first study to empirically examine the relationships between workplace cyberbullying, ego depletion, LMX differentiation and interpersonal aggression in ICT organizations using multi-level modeling.
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Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to explore the influence of self-serving leadership on employees’ organizational deviance and its internal mechanism.
Design/methodology/approach
Through the data collected from 300 supervisor–employee dyads of five large enterprises in China, this research uses multilevel structural equation model to test the proposal hypotheses.
Findings
Results show that there is a positive relationship between self-serving leadership and employees’ organizational deviance, and ego depletion plays a mediating role between them. Moreover, this research also found that the relationship between self-serving leadership and ego depletion and the indirect effect of self-serving leadership on employees’ organizational deviance through ego depletion are negatively moderated by power distance orientation.
Originality/value
This study found a new antecedent variable of employees’ organizational deviance-self-serving leadership, and based on the ego depletion theory, deeply reveals the internal mechanism of self-serving leadership influencing employees’ organizational deviance, which has some enlightening significance for relevant theoretical research and management practice. In addition, this study also has unique advantages in data collection and analysis methods.
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Yuanyuan Lan, Xiaoyan Zhang, Hui Deng, Zheng Yang and Yuhuan Xia
Drawing on ego depletion theory, this study aims to provide insights into the effect of work-family conflict on the high-speed railway (HSR) drivers’ safety performance by…
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing on ego depletion theory, this study aims to provide insights into the effect of work-family conflict on the high-speed railway (HSR) drivers’ safety performance by examining the mediating role of ego depletion and the moderating roles of work-family centrality and supervisor safety support.
Design/methodology/approach
In total, 243 HSR drivers from 7 railway bureaus in China were surveyed. Structural equation modeling was used to test the hypotheses.
Findings
Both work-to-family conflict and family-to-work conflict have direct and positive effects on HSR drivers’ ego depletion and indirect effects on both safety compliance and safety participation via ego depletion. Moreover, both the direct effect of work-family conflict on ego depletion and its indirect effect on safety performance are moderated by work-family centrality. Supervisor safety support plays a buffering role in the relationship between ego depletion and safety performance.
Originality/value
This study examined the relationship between work-family conflict and safety performance based on the perspective of ego depletion theory. The findings testify to the importance of reducing work-family conflict among HSR drivers pursuant to maximizing safety.
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Jinqiang Zhu, Lu Xin and Mengyi Li
This study aimed to investigate the underlying boundary conditions under which boundary-spanning behaviour has a positive or negative effect on innovative behaviour.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aimed to investigate the underlying boundary conditions under which boundary-spanning behaviour has a positive or negative effect on innovative behaviour.
Design/methodology/approach
A multi-wave and multi-source research design was adopted to collect data. Data were analysed using the multilevel structural equation modelling and latent moderated structural equation approach.
Findings
The results showed that boundary-spanning behaviour was significantly and negatively associated with employees' innovative behaviour via ego depletion when employees' intrinsic motivation or organisational support was low. Additionally, boundary-spanning behaviour was significantly and positively associated with employees' innovative behaviour via ego depletion when employees' intrinsic motivation or organisational support was high.
Originality/value
This research suggests that the consequences of boundary-spanning behaviour are conditional, explaining the contrasting conclusions in this regard.
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Jie Yin, Yingchao Ji and Yensen Ni
As supervisor incivility and its negative effect may impact employees’ psychological health and even the sustainable development of hospitality enterprises, this study aims to…
Abstract
Purpose
As supervisor incivility and its negative effect may impact employees’ psychological health and even the sustainable development of hospitality enterprises, this study aims to explore the channels through which it affects employee turnover intention in China’s hospitality industry and suggest possible mitigation measures.
Design/methodology/approach
This study adopted exploratory factor analysis, measurement model analysis and the mediation and moderation model and used SPSS and PROCESS for the analysis.
Findings
This study found that the impact of supervisor incivility on the employees’ turnover intention would be through employees’ ego depletion and revealed that organizational support would alleviate such a negative effect. However, organizational support might not mitigate the impact of supervisor incivility on the employees’ ego depletion, which is inconsistent with previous studies. This study inferred that organizational support might be somewhat related to organizational pressure, thereby enhancing the impact of supervisor incivility on the employees’ ego depletion.
Research limitations/implications
This study not only enriches incivility literature but also suggests new insights into the mixed role of organizational support.
Originality/value
Unlike previous studies that mainly focused on workplace pressure from colleagues or customers, this study broadens our understanding of the employees’ turnover intention affected by supervisors’ workplace incivility and the mixed role of organizational support.
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Hongling Yang, Zhibin Lin, Xiao Chen and Jian Peng
This study aims to explore whether and how workplace loneliness leads to cyberloafing and the role of leader problem-focused interpersonal emotion management in buffering this…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to explore whether and how workplace loneliness leads to cyberloafing and the role of leader problem-focused interpersonal emotion management in buffering this relationship.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on ego depletion theory, the authors propose that employees' workplace loneliness leads to cyberloafing via ego depletion, while leader interpersonal emotion management (i.e. leadership behavior targeted at managing employees' negative emotions) can help to alleviate the situation. To test this study’s predictions, the authors collected multisource data at three time points from a sample of 219 employee–colleague dyads.
Findings
The results show that workplace loneliness is positively related to cyberloafing and that ego depletion mediates this relationship. Leader problem-focused interpersonal emotion management weakens the relationship between workplace loneliness and ego depletion and the indirect relationship between workplace loneliness and cyberloafing via ego depletion such that the above relationships are weak (versus strong) when leader problem-focused interpersonal emotion management is high (versus low).
Originality/value
The study results suggest that workplace loneliness is an important hidden danger that leads to cyberloafing because lonely employees suffer more from ego depletion. Leaders' interpersonal emotion management strategy serves as a potential buffer for such a negative effect.
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