Research On Process From Citizenship Behavior To Constructive Deviance Behavior:the Perspective Of Moral Licensing

Under the background of economy transformation,the rapid change of external environment brings new challenges and requirements to enterprises.The traditional management mode relying on organizational rules and regulations,in some cases,hinders the development of the company.In this case,constructive deviance behavior(CDB),which is performed by the employee in violation of important norms and regulations according to the requirements of the external environment,plays an important role in the enterprise's rapid response to the requirements of the environment and the promotion of organizational competitiveness.Although the employees perform CDB with the good intention of promoting the interests of the organization,they often fall into a moral dilemma in the decision-making process because CDB has a nonethical aspect.Since CDB is rife with ethical concern in the decision-making process,we can study the cause and the occurrence of CDB in ethical decision making models.Moral licensing theory proposes that individuals' past morally acts can license subsequent moral dilemma behaviors,even immoral behaviors,through the mechanism of moral credentials and moral credits.Moreover,except for the individuals' own morally behaviors,their group members' past behavior can also establish individuals' moral licensing.Given this,according to moral licensing theory,it is of great practical and theoretical value to explore the boundary conditions and mechanism of organizational citizenship behavior(OCB),team citizenship behavior(TCB)and CDB.By doing so,we hope can enrich the research of CDB,and provide valuable enlightenment for management practice.This paper first reviews and summarizes the relevant literature,including three parts.The first part discusses the conceptual connotation,antecedents and occurrence mechanisms of CDB.The second part reviews the influence of TCB and OCB on employee behavior.The third part reviews the mechanisms,sources of moral licensing and the research progress of moral licensing in the management.On the basis of summarizing the existing literature,this study explores the boundary condition and the effect of OCB on CDB from the moral credentials perspective;the boundary condition and the effect of OCB on CDB from the moral credits perspective;and when and how TCB has an influence on CDB.Combined moral credentials perspective and social information processing theory,Study 1 explores the moderating role of environmental dynamics and the mediating role of moral justification in the relationship between OCB and CDB.A scenario experiment and two-stage questionnaire survey are used to verify the model.Specially,the experimental design with 122 MBA subjects is conducted by using 2 *2 between-subject design,and the survey is conducted by collecting data from 297 samples in two times.The results show that,as we expected,OCB doesn't directly affect CDB,but the interaction between OCB and environmental dynamics positively influence moral justification and CDB,and moral justification mediates the relationship between the interaction and CDB.According to moral credits perspective,Study 2 deliberates the moderating role of intrinsic motivation toward OCB and the mediating role of moral self-image in the relationship between OCB and CDB.Study 2 also use scenario experiment and questionnaire survey to verify the model.In the scenario experiment,a single-factor intergroup experiment is conducted by collecting 102 valid samples.The survey in Study 2 is adopted the same data source with Study 1.The results show that the direct relationship between OCB and CDB is nonsignificant,but is positively related to moral self-image.Intrinsic motivation can enhance the positive relationship between OCB and moral self-image,and the interaction between OCB and intrinsic motivation can promote CDB.Besides,moral self-image plays an intermediary role in the relationship between the interaction and CDB.Study 3 examines the multilevel moderating effect and mediating effect of TCB on CDB from the moral credentials perspective.The study collects two-stage data on 365 employees in 54 teams.Hierarchical linear modeling results reveal that the interaction between TCB and environmental dynamics positively affects CDB and moral justification,in which moral justification plays an intermediary role.The triple regulatory effect of team identification is not supported.The innovation points of this study are as follows.First,previous studies adopt the framework and theory perspective of general deviant behavior to explore the antecedents and occurrence mechanism of CDB.This paper explores the mechanism from OCB,TCB to CDB using the moral licensing theory,which highlights the moral ambiguity of CDB.It not only expands the moral licensing perspective to study CDB,but also enriches the study on positive aspects of moral licensing.Second,CDB makes employees face moral dilemma in work.Previous studies about the influence of OCB on moral dilemma behavior have inconsistent conclusions.This study suggests that the level of environmental dynamics can explain this inconsistency.The level of environmental dynamics activates different psychological mechanisms by influencing others' moral cognition of constructive deviant behavior,and then influences the relationship from OCB,TCB to CDB.Through empirical studies,this study reveals that the relationship between OCB and constructive deviant behavior is depended on the contingency of the external environment.Moreover,the motivation of moral behavior also affects the relationship between OCB and CDB.Thirdly,moral licensing can work through the mechanism of moral credentials and moral credits.Most previous studies have focused on one mechanism,and few have discussed the boundaries about the two mechanisms.This study reveals the boundary conditions of moral credentials from situation factors,and moral justification can explain the process of the moral credentials.Meanwhile,the study uses behavior motivation to reveal the boundary conditions of moral credits,and moral self-image can explain the process of the moral credits.Fourthly,it enriches the source of moral licensing from the group level.Previous research mainly regard individual's own moral behavior as the source of moral licensing.In response to the call of Klotz and Bolino(2013),this research suggests that moral behavior at the team level(such as TCB)can also enable the actors to acquire moral licensing.Although the role of CDB in management practice is controversial,in many cases,such as when the company's rules and regulations are in a solid state or when the company is in urgent need of major changes,the company should strongly advocate CDB.Specifically,the practical significance of this paper lies in: Firstly,because organizational citizenship behavior can promote CDB under certain conditions,enterprises need to take a whole and dynamic perspective to manage employee behaviors.Specially,since CDB is a sensitive behavior,if organizations encourage employees to break rules directly,which can make employees to feel that organizational regulations is unimportant.Subsequently it leads to anomie of organization management.Instead,encouraging OCB let employees get enough moral resources to carry out CDB can avoid this kind of contradiction.Secondly,considering the mediation of moral self-image and moral justification,and citizen behavior at the individual and team levels is not the only source of moral self-image and moral justification,organizations can enhance moral self-image and moral justification by other means.Thirdly,according to the boundary conditions of moral credentials and moral credits,it is suggested that if managers want to encourage CDB,they need to reinforce the employees' awareness of environmental dynamics,such as frequently introducing the competition situation faced by the company to the employees.At the same time,when encouraging employees to perform OCB,managers should avoid providing too many external incentives for employees to carry out OCB.Employees practice in OCB for internal motivation,so that they can obtain sufficient moral capital to do CDB.Finally,managers should pay attention to the spillover effect of the team's overall behaviors on individual behavior.Therefore,by encouraging ethical behavior at the team level,individuals can be empathetic and can indirectly obtain moral capital to promote CDB.