Impacts of peers’ unethical behavior on employees’ ethical intention: Moderated mediation by Machiavellian orientation
| Author | Jorge Linuesa‐Langreo,Pablo Ruiz‐Palomino,Alexis Bañón‐Gomis |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/beer.12210 |
| Published date | 01 April 2019 |
| Date | 01 April 2019 |
Business Ethics: A Eur Rev. 2019;28:185–205. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/beer
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© 2018 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
1 | INTRODUCTION
Despite recent , concerted effort s to establish formal ethic s policies
in organizatio ns (Ethics Resource Center, 2013; Inst itute of Business
Ethics, 2013, 2015 ), wor kplaces in which e mployees enga ge in
manipulative, self‐centered, unethical behaviors are still common
(Porath, 2015; Tian & P eterson, 2016; Williams , 2016). Even if formal
ethics mechanisms have been implemented, employees still observe,
although to a les ser extent, un ethical behav iors in their wor kplace
(Ethics Resource Center, 2015), including abusive and unfair treat‐
ment (Institut e of Business Ethic s, 2015). This is demot ivating for
many managers, who despite making serious efforts to implement
formal ethic s mechanisms do not get to re move these toxic, un ethical
behaviors comp letely, hence failin g to avoid the harm it may c ause
in terms of workpla ce well‐being (e.g. , low morale, high e motional
strain, App elbaum & Roy‐Gir ard, 2007; Kusy & Holl oway, 2009).
Thus, in draf ting an effec tive strateg y to remove these b ehaviors
from the workpl ace, managers need to under stand that beyond for‐
mal control mech anisms, other f actors have a signi ficant influe nce.
Control mecha nisms help limit unethical b ehaviors in the workplace
(Litzky, Eddles ton, & Kidder, 2006; Skinner, 1972), but they are not
sufficient ; reducing such behaviors a lso requires informal proce sses
that affect p ersonal cogni tions (Caspi & Rob erts, 20 01; Culiberg &
Mihelic, 2016; O’Fall on & Butterfield , 2011), as predicted by role set
Received:9Febr uary2017
|
Revised:26June2 018
|
Accepted:22Se ptember2018
DOI: 10 .1111/bee r.12210
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Impacts of peers’ unethical behavior on employees’ ethical
intention: Moderated mediation by Machiavellian orientation
Pablo Ruiz‐Palomino1,2 | Alexis Bañón‐Gomis3 | Jorge Linuesa‐Langreo1
1Departme nt of Business
Administration, University of Castilla‐La
Mancha, Cuenca, Spain
2Institute fo r Ethics in Communic ation and
Organizat ions (IECO), Valencia, Spa in
3Departm ent of Business
Organization, Polytechnic University of
Valencia, Valencia, Spain
Correspondence
Pablo Ruiz‐Palomino, Department of
Business Administration, University of
Castilla‐ La Mancha, Avenida d e los Alfares,
42, Cuenca, S pain; Institute for Et hics in
Communication and Organizations (IECO),
Valencia, Spain.
Email: Pablo.Ruiz@uclm.es
Funding information
Spanish Minis try of Economy and
Competitiveness and FEDER, Grant/Award
Number: Project ECO2016‐75781‐P
Abstract
Research suggest s a direct negative relationship betwe en peers’ unethic al behavior
and employees’ ethic al intention. But several possible me chanisms might explain this
relationship in more detail. For example, Machiavellianism is a personality trait char‐
acterized by interpe rsonal manipulati on and the use of unethic al means to achieve
certain self‐intereste d ends, whether us eful or pleasant. T his article ado pts an
Aristotelian under standing of philia, related to thr ee goods on which human relation‐
ships rest: usefu l, pleasant, and honest. We propos e that Machiavellianism, a self‐in‐
terested, pragm atic personality orient ation, might explicate the re lationship between
peers’ unethic al behavior and ethic al intention. The res ults of a struc tural equation
model applied to a sa mple of 436 banking em ployees in Spain reveals t hat
Machiavellianism par tially mediates the relationsh ip between peers’ unethic al behav‐
ior and employees’ ethi cal intention. We also fin d that with a greater level of pe ers’
unethical behavio r, the negative effect of Ma chiavellianism on ethic al intention in‐
creases, and that wh en peers’ unethical behavior is nonex istent, the negative effect
of Machiavellianism on ethic al intention disappears. These fi ndings advance current
literature by revealing th at unethical peers can indirec tly influence ethical intention,
through shaping Mac hiavellianism. Our stu dy is also the firs t to show that pairing
high Machiavellians with et hical peers can help to cancel out th e negative influence
of Machiavellianism on ethical intention.
KEYWORDS
Aristotelian ethics, ethical intention, Machiavellianism, peers, philia, unethical be havior
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RUIZ‐PALOMINO et al.
theory (Merton, 1957), differential association theory (Sutherland &
Cressey, 1970), and social lea rning theory (Bandu ra, 1977).
Specifica lly, according to role set t heory (Mer ton, 1957), em‐
ployees enter into se ts of relations hips with other s, defined by
their status , such that those w ith authorit y or proximit y provide
significant b ehavioral clues. Simila rly, differential associati on theory
(Sutherland & C ressey, 1970) predicts t hat undiffere ntiated peopl e
(e.g., employees i n similar roles) define inti mate personal groups t hat
also exert signi ficant behav ioral influen ces. Finally, social l earning
theory (Ba ndura, 1977) predi cts that emp loyees learn vic ariously
from observ ing proximal oth ers, such as role m odels, whom t hey
emulate; obser vations of how proximal others get t reated also rep‐
resent powerf ul influences o n attitudes a nd behaviors (J iang, Gu,
& Tang, 2017). Thus, by obser ving proximal others and enga ging in
frequent inter actions with them, employee s learn how to act, even
in different sit uations. This explains how and w hy interactions with
peers repres ent such a signifi cant behavior al influence th at it can
even overwhelm formal, control‐based effects.
Research aff irms that peers—define d as social models most simi‐
lar to the self, from wh om people learn their be haviors and attitude s
(Jianget al.,2017)—rep resenta majorinflu enceonet hicalde cisions
(O’Fallon & Butte rfield, 2012). In par ticular, peers’ unet hical behavior
islikely toharm employees’ ethical intention(D eshpande &Joseph ,
2009; Lehner t, Craft, Sin gh, & Park, 2016; Stedham & Be ekun, 2013),
although the process through which this influence occurs remains
uncertain. Ethical intention, which constitutes the penultimate step
in decision‐mak ing processes (Rest, 1986), is the antici pated behav‐
ior that leads to hu man growth, re sts on univer sal moral pri nciples,
and seeks to be mo rally accept able within the l arger communit y. It
provides a sense of p urpose regar ding what is to be done ( Bright,
Alzola, Stansb ury, & Stavros, 2011) by signaling a true w ill to act vol‐
untarily in a nob le, honest manner (Rua, Law ter, & Andreassi, 2017;
Sison & Ferrero, 2015) . Considering t he presence of rat ionality and
free will in human i nteractions (Melé, 2012), a sim ple observation of
unethical behaviors is likely to be insufficient to determine ethical
intention, as oth er factors are likely to inter vene, including persona l
cognition (Casp i & Roberts , 2001; Gallardo ‐Pujol & Pereda , 2013;
Hauge, Skogst ad, & Einarsen , 2009; Pilch & Turska , 2015). In par‐
ticular, because m isconduct at wor k often involves on going, rather
than one‐time, behaviors (Ethics Resource Center, 2013), personal
cognition and th e related proces ses might exert a n influence. For
example, Mach iavellianism, reg arded as a cogniti ve feature (Al A ïn,
Carré, Fantini‐Hauwel, Baudouin, & Besche‐Richard, 2013) involving
a manipulative, calculative, self‐interested mindset (Shafer & Wang,
2018; Shome & Rao, 20 09), might intervene in the negat ive link be‐
tween peer s’ unethical behavior and e mployees’ ethical intent ion.
Machiavellianis m is a personalit y orientati on that involves a
pragmatic app roach to life (Rauthmann & Will, 2 011). This personal
orientation implies the use of unethical moves (Al‐Khatib, Al‐Habib,
Bogari, & Sala mah, 2016; Bass, Bar nett, & Brown , 1999; Craft,
2013; Dahling, Kugum cu, & Librizzi, 2 012; O’Fallon & But terfield,
2005; Shafer & Wang , 2018) to achieve self‐interests (Grove r & Enz,
2005; Kish‐G ephart, Harrison, & Treviño, 2010), wi th no regard for
the feelings , rights, or nee ds of other part ies (Tang & Tang, 2010).
Accordingly, Machiavellianism could be shaped in contexts in which
peers intermittently perform self‐interested acts during social in‐
teractions . Aristotle’s und erstandin g of philia, a concept which de‐
scribes human friendship in the Nicomachean Ethics (I, 8–9, Aristotle,
2004), helps to articulate this idea.
According to Aris totle’s concept of philia (Nicomac hean Ethics, I,
8–9, Aristotle, 2004), hum an relationships can be d escribed in terms
of the human goods b eing pursued, whether they a re useful, pleas‐
ant, or hones t. Useful and pleasant goods a re instrumental to other
types of goods , labeled mater ial (i.e., “extern al goods” and “goods
of the body”); h onest goods, embedde d in virtue and good in them‐
selves, constitute the virtues (“goods of the soul”) (Sison & Ferrero,
2015). Thus, in contex ts where peers beh ave unethically, by seeking
not honest, v irtuous goods, Mac hiavellian mindsets mig ht be forged.
Machiavellianis m involves a willingn ess to use unethic al means to
secure perso nal gains (O’Boyle, Forsy th, Banks, & McDaniel, 2012),
so it seems simila r to a personal out look that rega rds social inter‐
actions as a pathw ay to achieve materia l goods and hones t goods
as “dangerously dogm atic, impra ctical and ir responsible” (H arris,
2010, p.134). Therefore, pe ers’ unethic al behavior might i nfluence
employees’ ethi cal intention via Machiavellia nism. Furthermore, th e
negative effe cts of Machiave llianism on ethic al intention coul d be
strengthened by peers’ unethical behavior itself. Prior research sug‐
gests that th e context has great p otential to hampe r or encourage
decisions to act i n an (un)ethical manner (Al‐ Khatib et al., 2016) and
reveals that it can m oderate the effect of pers onal traits on ethical
judgments (De lerue & Hamid, 2015). Also, hi gh Machiavellians seem
more likely to adjus t their behavio r to the values imp osed by the
environment (Singhapakdi, 1993), including clues exhibited by peers
(Czibor & Berec zkei, 2012). Thus, wh en peers behave u nethically,
the effect of M achiavellianism o n ethical intent ion may be exacer‐
bated. We therefore , in this study, anticipate a mod erated mediation
effect of Mach iavellianism in th e link between p eers’ unethic al be‐
havior and employe es’ ethical intention.
Studying this mo derated mediation rela tionship can advance th e
current literature, in which most studies focus on investigating the
direct effe ct of peers on empl oyees’ (un)ethical b ehavior (Deshpan de
& Joseph, 200 9; Lehnert et al ., 2016; Stedham & Beeku n, 2013).
Thus, resear ch in the field is not c lear on whethe r this effect i s a
simple quest ion of mimicry or i f it also involves pe rsonal cogniti ve
elements. Also, extant research has not identified the precise con‐
ditions in which ce rtain per sonal features e xert greater or l ess in‐
fluence on ethic al intention, with the notab le exception of Dele rue
and Hamid (2015), tho ugh they do not consi der Machiavellia nism.
Therefore, to ad vance prior res earch, we stud y the mediating ro le
of Machiavellianis m between pee rs’ unethica l behavior and et hical
intention, buil ding on prior studies that uncove r this mediating role
of Machiavellianis m between vari ous other pers onal features a nd
ethical intent ion (Bass et al., 1999; Tang & Chen, 2008; Tang & Tang,
2010). Our study is th e first to analyze whether th e negative influ‐
ence of peers’ une thical behavior on ethica l intention relies on indi‐
rect mechani sms, specifical ly on shaping a Machiavel lian orientation.
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