Why am I still doing this job? The examination of family motivation on employees’ work behaviors under abusive supervision
| Pages | 378-402 |
| Published date | 05 March 2018 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/PR-07-2016-0162 |
| Date | 05 March 2018 |
| Author | Hussain Tariq,Donghong Ding |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Global HRM |
Why am I still doing this job? The
examination of family motivation
on employees’work behaviors
under abusive supervision
Hussain Tariq and Donghong Ding
Department of Business Administration,
University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
Abstract
Purpose –Synthesizing theories of prosocial motivation and action identification, the purpose of this paper
is to test several hypotheses associating abusive supervisory behavior with employees’work behaviors via
intervening variables, i.e., intrinsic motivation and family motivation.
Design/methodology/approach –The two-study examination of outcomes of abusive supervision
stands in contrast to prior research, which has primarily focused on family motivation that influences
supervisor-subordinate relationship. A lagged survey study at a Fortune 500 company and an experience
sampling study at multi-organizations located in Anhui province of People’s Republic of China (PRC) support
the moderated-mediation motivational model.
Findings –In the first study, designed as a lagged survey study, the authors found that abusive supervision
is negatively associated with employees’job performance and positively associated with employees’turnover
intentions. As anticipated, the results also found that family motivation moderates the direct relationship
between abusive supervision and employees’work behaviors. Furthermore, these results were then replicated
and expanded in an experience sampling study. Consistent with the predictions, the authors found that
intrinsic motivation acts as a mediator between abusive supervision and employees’work behaviors and
family motivation has the capacity to compensate for the absence of intrinsic motivation.
Research limitations/implications –Although the paper contributes to leadership and motivation
literature, there are several noteworthy limitations to be discussed in the future. The subjective measurement,
the validity of abusive supervision in the Chinese context and generalizing of the study in western countries
are the key limitations of the study. Moreover, the authors measure abusive supervision only on high/low
frequency based rather than high/low intensity. Hence, there is a possibility that intensity and frequency have
dissimilar effects.
Originality/value –The study with meaningful implications on motivation and leadership research
concludes that family as a powerful source of motivation encourages subordinates’job performance and
discourages employees’turnover intentions at the workplace, even under abusive supervision.
Keywords China, Job performance, Intrinsic motivation, Quantitative, Turnover intentions,
Abusive supervision, Family motivation
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
There is a wide consensus about the role of leadership (supervision) in shaping employees’
behaviors, leading to effective human resource (HR) management. Therefore, understanding
what leadership actually is, is important at the outset. Yukl (2006) elucidated leadership as
one’s ability or capacity to have an impact on a group of individuals headed for the
attainment of shared goals. Consistent with this definition, prior research on leadership has
concentrated on the optimistic behavior of leaders that engender encouraging and
affirmative employees’work behaviors and attitudes that ultimately lead to organizational
effectiveness (Aryee et al., 2007; Arnold et al., 2007; Gilbreath and Benson, 2004). In recent
Personnel Review
Vol. 47 No. 2, 2018
pp. 378-402
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0048-3486
DOI 10.1108/PR-07-2016-0162
Received 15 July 2016
Revised 17 August 2016
14 November 2016
5 March 2017
22 April 2017
Accepted 4 June 2017
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0048-3486.htm
The authors would like to thank Weng Qingxiong for many helpful comments on an earlier draft.
Finally, the authors would like to acknowledge the support of Natural Science Foundation of China
(Project No. 71373251; No. 71422014).
378
PR
47,2
decades, variety of researchers (e.g. Zhang and Liao, 2015; Aryee et al., 2007; Jian et al., 2012;
Xu et al., 2012; Zhao et al., 2013; Lu et al., 2012) have focused on abusive supervision, which
is generally conceived as the dark side of leadership (Zhang et al., 2012); Tepper (2000)
conceptualized abusive supervision as “subordinates’perception of the extent to which
supervisors engage in the sustained display of hostile verbal and nonverbal behaviors,
excluding physical contact”(p. 178). Similarly, a number of research studies (e.g. Liu et al.,
2012; Tepper et al., 2009; Keashly, 1998; Hoobler and Brass, 2006; Xu et al., 2012) have
characterized abusive supervisory behaviors as humiliating or embarrassing subordinates
in front of others, threating to fire from job, lurid and angry tantrums, bullying others, the
silent treatment, taking advantage of other’s achievements or attainments and making
aggressive eye contact.
As a typical indication of destructive leadership (Zhang and Liao, 2015; Zhang et al.,
2012) and being persuasive in organizations (Xu et al., 2012), abusive supervision has
detrimental side effects on subordinates and organizations (Tepper, 2007; Jian et al., 2012).
Approximately 14 percent of US employees are victims of abusive supervision
(Schat et al., 2006). Therefore, abusive supervision is an organizational and social problem
that warrants continued examination (Tepper, 2007). Prior studies have reported that
abusive supervision accelerates turnover intentions (Tepper, 2000), psychological
distress (Harvey et al., 2007), work-family conflicts (Hoobler and Brass, 2006), and
discourages subordinate’s creativity (Liu et al., 2012), interactional and procedural justice
(Zellars et al., 2002), job satisfaction (Tepper, 2000), job performance (Xu et al., 2012;
Priesemuth et al., 2014), and subordinate’s trust (Xiaqi et al., 2012). Based on the above
arguments, we argue that abusive supervision affects organizations’cost and
effectiveness in maintaining its competitive advantage through the HR.
One empirical study (Liu et al., 2012) has built up a trickle down model to unveil
cascading effects of abusive supervision. While this study contributes to the literature and
addition to our knowledge, it has several limitations, out of which one limitation will be
addressed in our study. Authors did not empirically examine possible psychological
mechanism and have made the only theoretical argument to conceptualize that abusive
supervision undermines employee’s intrinsic motivation and ultimately affects employees’
creativity. Empirical evidence is needed to support the theoretical argument made by
Liu et al. (2012). Following this, we developed a mediated motivational model through which
we empirically tested the indirect effects of abusive supervision on its subordinates’work
behaviors through intrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation can be stated as an employee’s
passion to put his/her efforts for the sake of enjoyment in the task itself (Menges et al., 2017;
Ryan and Deci, 2000). Employee’s intrinsic motivation may get sabotaged through a
negative social setting (Amabile, 1996). Thus, to address the limitation of Liu et al. (2012), we
propose intrinsic motivation as an important underlying mechanism that explains the
indirect relationship of abusive supervision on subordinates’work behaviors.
Prior findings suggest that victims of abusive supervision are frustrated (Hoobler and
Brass, 2006), whereby abused subordinates may engage in their work to support their
dependents at home. Little is known, however, of how family motivates employees to do
work under abusive supervision. Given that family motivation, conceptualized as a desire
to work for supporti ng one’s family, is a key construct of motivation to do work under
abusive supervision, we propose that family motivation may be a crucial underlying
moderator that transforms the direct negative relationship between abusive supervision
and employees’work behaviors. From the perspective of action identification theory,
Menges et al. (2017) argued that a strong motivation to work for family delivers a reason
enough for doing unpleasant or hostile work. Despite massive literature on abusive
supervision, Zhang and Liao (2015) highlight that prior studies have been executed in a
piecemeal manner and omitted some crucial outcomes of abusive supervision such as
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Employees’
work
behaviors
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