Corporate Hypocrisy,Moral Disengagement And Counterproductive Work Behavior: Moderated Mediating Effect

Earning profits is always the main purpose for companies,but companies are placing more importance on social responsible activities in last decades.It can not only help companies build good images but also benefit social development if companies take their social responsibility actively.However,not every company can do what they say.For example,at 2009,the Chinese company Nongfu Spring had launched a campaign to donate 0.1 RMB when they sold one bottle of water,but the authenticity of the activity was questioned later.At September of 2015,the Volkswagen emissions scandal broke,which was a far cry from the energy conservation goals that Volkswagen had previously advertised.Corporate hypocrisy has been defined as the belief that a firm claims to be something that it is not.When companies say one thing and do another in CSR context,they run the risk of corporate hypocrisy,which may have negative effect on the whole society.Most previous researches mainly focused on the conception,framework or dimensions of corporation hypocrisy.On the contrary,this research pays attention to its effect on employees.As the implementers of corporation's strategy,employees may have complex emotions when they find the fact of corporate hypocrisy,thus leading to a series of reaction,for example,counterproductive work behavior(CWB).According to moral disengagement theory,employees will absolve themselves of responsibility for their counterproductive work behavior.While for those with high level of moral identity,this process will not be easy to conduct.In conclusion,the present study investigates the possibility between corporate hypocrisy and employees‘ behavior with a moderated mediation model.Based on social cognitive theory and moral disengagement theory,this model posits that the effect of corporate hypocrisy on employees‘ counterproductive work behavior is mediated by levels of moral disengagement,while the relationship between corporate hypocrisy and moral disengagement is moderated by moral identity.Moreover,the study divides CWB into organizational CWB(CWB-O)and interpersonal CWB(CWB-I)to get further results.The data was selected from 315 employees working in several Chinese companies from manufacture,finance and consulting industries.The results suggest that corporate hypocrisy will lead to CWB of employees.To be detailed,it will lead to more CWB-O than CWB-I.Moral disengagement plays a whole mediated role between corporate hypocrisy and CWB.Moral identity moderates this effect of corporate hypocrisy on moral disengagement,showing that this effect is relatively stronger for employees with low moral identity and relatively weaker for employees with high moral identity.The relationship between corporate hypocrisy and CWB is proved by this research.This study also suggests a research model which focuses on the bridging role of employee moral disengagement and moderator of moral identity.This study not only provides resources for further study,but also is useful for organizational practitioners.Companies should be warned of the negative influences of corporate hypocrisy and try to avoid the phenomenon of "say one word,do another" while improve employees‘ moral identity at the same time.This dissertation provides two innovation points.First,it is the first one to link corporate hypocrisy with employees' counterproductive work behavior,which expands the research of corporate hypocrisy‘s influence to internal stakeholder.Second,this paper connects organization's unethical behavior with individual's unethical behavior,while the factors of context and individual will both have a role in the model.