Justifying Leadership: A Social Cognitive Approach to Understanding and Predicting Egotistic and Philanthropic Leadership

This study extends the current literature on egotistic and philanthropic leadership by considering the role of social cognition in explaining self-serving versus collective- serving leadership behaviors. Specifically, this study proposed that the overt traits and behaviors that constitute egotistic and philanthropic leadership are surface manifestations of the justification mechanisms (JMs) stemming from uninhibited and inhibited power motives. Thus, the purpose of this study was to identify the JMs that egotistic leaders rely on to enhance the rational appeal of self-serving influence behaviors and the JMs that philanthropic leaders rely on to enhance the rational appeal of collective-serving influence behaviors. Additionally, this study aimed to develop and validate a conditional reasoning test designed to measure these JMs. It was hypothesized that the extent to which individuals’ rely on egotistic justifications mechanisms to rationalize behavior would be positively related to the extent to which they use hard influence tactics and manipulative influence tactics. Furthermore, it was also hypothesized that the extent to which individuals’ use philanthropic justifications mechanisms to rationalize behavior would be positively related to the extent to which they use soft influence tactics and rational persuasion to influence others. Preliminary support was found for the relationship between the egotistic JMs and self-serving influence behaviors and for the relationship between the philanthropic JMs and collective-serving influence behaviors. Thus, the initial validity evidence for using the conditional reasoning methodology in the prediction of egotistic and philanthropic leadership behaviors was promising

Reciprocity: An Antecedent to Fraud Compliance and Unethical Behavior

There is a constant stream of headlines in the news about fraud schemes swindling people out of their hard-earned money. When analyzing these schemes, it can be difficult to see why these scams work so well time after time. Often, the potential payoff to the victim is farfetched or even impossible to a third party looking at the situation after the fact. Why would someone comply with a fraudulent request with such an implausible benefit to themselves or maybe even seemingly no benefit? One of the tools utilized by unscrupulous scam artists is the social norm of reciprocity. Simply stated, the social norm of reciprocity is that we feel obligated to repay those who have provided a favor to us. This dissertation will investigate reciprocity and its power to influence people to comply with requests, where there are clear red flags they should run or at least ask clarifying questions to avoid being taken advantage of

The Role of Ethical Evaluation of Corporate Social Responsibility in the Perception of Corporate Hypocrisy, the Intention of Opinioned Communication and Behavior toward a Firm

Corporate hypocrisy refers to publics\u27 negative perception of CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) as a result of ethical attribution of CSR to normative ethics, and thus can be a useful indicator of the disappointing and ineffective role of CSR programs geared toward raising publics\u27 goodwill toward a firm. However, scant scholarly effort has been made to explore the concept of corporate hypocrisy in relation to corporate issues and crises, publics\u27 ethical orientation, cultural and national influence, and polarized sentiments toward global business in the media landscape. These aspects collectively constitute the unpredictable, uncontrollable public opinion, in particular the opinion of the socially minded general public, and these aspects thus generate a turbulent business arena across the globe. To fill this void, this dissertation concurrently conducted two sets of research: one used a survey methodology on a real company\u27s CSR case and the other used an experimental method. First, Study 1 aimed to investigate how the perception of corporate hypocrisy connects publics\u27 ethical attribution of CSR to subsequent positive/negative opinioned communication intention and pro-firm behavioral intention. With special attention to deontology and consequentialism in normative ethics of philosophy, the current study was to empirically test a theoretical model of perceived corporate hypocrisy with two causal antecedents (i.e., the evaluation of self-orientation and other-orientation in CSR), and the mediating role of corporate hypocrisy between such antecedents and subsequent publics\u27 communication and behavioral intention toward a firm. Personal ethical orientation was suggested to moderate effects of corporate hypocrisy on dependent measures. Moreover, to explore the cultural and national effect in the theoretical model, this study compared U.S. and Korean data. To this end, a survey using a real company CSR case was conducted via Internet with a convenient sample (n = 603; the U.S.=406, Korea=256), including the general population (n=456) and a Northeastern university\u27s student and alumni population (n=147). Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to empirically test the hypothesized mediation model of corporate hypocrisy. The results indicate several key issues regarding the role of ethics on the strategic CSR communication. First, this study found sound measurement reliability and validity of the proposed four-item scale of four dimensions in ethical CSR evaluation (i.e., self-interested motives, self-interested outcomes, altruistic motives and altruistic outcomes). Further, this study also proposed a self-developed seven-item scales for deontology and consequentialism with acceptable reliability and validity as indicators of personal ethical orientation in the context of public\u27s ethical judgment of global business practices. The current study also found significant mediation effects of corporate hypocrisy between ethical CSR evaluation and publics\u27 communication and behavioral intention based on positive and negative opinions formed through CSR evaluation. Also, as assumed, personal ethical orientation and cultural/national difference were found to significantly moderate the role of corporate hypocrisy on dependent measures. Study 2 aimed to test the theoretical validity of the attitudinal and behavioral influence of personal ethical orientation (i.e., deontology vs. consequentialism) and media framing of CSR approach (i.e., self-oriented CSR vs. other-oriented CSR); an experiment study (n=603) was conducted online for study 2. For the U.S. samples, the university student and alumni population was recruited (n= 347), and for the Korean samples, the general population (n=256) was recruited via an online survey system. Study 2 also found significant effects of personal ethical orientation and media framing. Deontological publics were more influenced by media framing of CSR approach rather tha n consequentialist publics; more significant was the differing interaction effect across nationalities. The Korean samples were more prone to be affected by media framing of CSR approach depending on their ethical orientation than the U.S. samples. To summarize, across the findings of the two studies, deontological publics showed more ethically idealistic and rigorous traits whereas consequentialist publics displayed a more pragmatic and business-friendly inclination in CSR judgment. This result highlighted the role of virtue ethics perceived from corporate motives and outcomes of CSR, which can play a part in forming publics which have certain opinions toward global business and its CSR activities. Also, the findings indicated that these ethical traits can be related to the cultural and national background of publics targeted in the global market; thus CSR strategy should take the ethical and cultural traits of target publics into account. Limitations and suggestions for future research were discussed with implications for both public relations scholarship and practices

Mutually reinforcing systems

Human computation can be described as outsourcing part of a computational process to humans. This technique might be used when a problem can be solved better by humans than computers or it may require a level of adaptation that computers are not yet capable of handling. This can be particularly important in changeable settings which require a greater level of adaptation to the surrounding environment. In most cases, human computation has been used to gather data that computers struggle to create. Games with by-products can provide an incentive for people to carry out such tasks by rewarding them with entertainment. These are games which are designed to create a by-product during the course of regular play. However, such games have traditionally been unable to deal with requests for specific data, relying instead on a broad capture of data in the hope that it will cover specific needs. A new method is needed to focus the efforts of human computation and produce specifically requested results. This would make human computation a more valuable and versatile technique. Mutually reinforcing systems are a new approach to human computation that tries to attain this focus. Ordinary human computation systems tend to work in isolation and do not work directly with each other. Mutually reinforcing systems are an attempt to allow multiple human computation systems to work together so that each can benefit from the other's strengths. For example, a non-game system can request specific data from a game. The game can then tailor its game-play to deliver the required by-products from the players. This is also beneficial to the game because the requests become game content, creating variety in the game-play which helps to prevent players getting bored of the game. Mobile systems provide a particularly good test of human computation because they allow users to react to their environment. Real world environments are changeable and require higher levels of adaptation from the users. This means that, in addition to the human computation required by other systems, mobile systems can also take advantage of a user's ability to apply environmental context to the computational task. This research explores the effects of mutually reinforcing systems on mobile games with by-products. These effects will be explored by building and testing mutually reinforcing systems, including mobile games. A review of existing literature, human computation systems and games with by-products will set out problems which exist in outsourcing parts of a computational process to humans. Mutually reinforcing systems are presented as one approach of addressing some of these problems. Example systems have been created to demonstrate the successes and failures of this approach and their evolving designs have been documented. The evaluation of these systems will be presented along with a discussion of the outcomes and possible future work. A conclusion will summarize the findings of the work carried out. This dissertation shows that extending human computation techniques to allow the collection and classification of useful contextual information in mobile environments is possible and can be extended to allow the by-products to match the specific needs of another system

The perils of workplace recognition: antecedents and consequences of discomfort associated with being the target of threatening upward comparison

This dissertation explores theoretical links among interpersonal, perceptual, and situational variables and sensitivity about being the target of threatening upward comparisons (STTUC) within a workplace setting. It also investigates affective and behavioral responses outperformers may enact to decrease effects thought to be associated with STTUC. Because of the novelty of investigating STTUC in a field sample, the actual nature of the relationships among STTUC and the focal study variables were examined in multiple ways. Specifically, workplace outperformers’ interpersonal sensitivity, empathic concern, and competitive psychological climate, along with actual threat experienced by the outperformed, were all expected to increase the likelihood that outperformers would experience STTUC, and STTUC was, in turn, expected to result in the use of appeasement and avoidance behaviors, propensity for socially motivated underachievement, and decreased preference for public recognition. Additionally, direct linkages between the antecedents and consequences were expected, as well as post-hoc hypotheses predicting these direct relationships would actually be moderated by STTUC. Results suggested empathic concern, competitive psychological climate, and threat experienced by the outperformed were antecedents to STTUC and had direct relationships with many of the study’s consequences. STTUC was not found to be directly related to the study’s consequences, but it did serve as a moderating variable for the relationships between the antecedents interpersonal sensitivity, empathic concern, and threat and several of the consequences. These results provide researchers and practitioners with insights into which factors influence outperformers’ STTUC, as well as highlight the important role STTUC plays in determining outperformers’ reactions to being upward comparison targets

Voluntary contributions to public goods:A multi-disciplinary examination of prosocial behavior and its antecedents

The four essays collected in this Ph.D. dissertation concern prosocial motivations in different social contexts, applying conceptual, experimental, and survey methodologies to investigate how the complex and diverse interaction between psychological attributes and the social environment shapes prosocial behaviors. The first essay provides a conceptual framework on how cognition links relevant stimuli with innate moralities to construct Public Service Motivation (PSM) and guild various social behaviors. The second essay builds on the first essay and provides empirical evidence for the essential role of innate moralities in shaping Public Service Motivation and affecting behavioral consequences. The third and fourth essay apply methods from experimental economics to investigate the role of contextual stimuli in affecting prosocial motivation in a lab experiment of the volunteer’s dilemma game. The third essay first extends the classic volunteer’s dilemma game and develops novel treatments to examine pro-social risk-taking and competitive behavior in a lab experiment. The fourth essay then incorporates the PSM theory in the extended volunteer’s dilemma game to explore the role of PSM in self-sacrifice behavior and its relationships with external contextual factors

Examining The Impact Of Leader Social Distance On A Multicultural Team

Leading multicultural teams is one of the main challenges faced by today’s leaders. The advantages often associated with multicultural teams (e.g., collaboration and integration of different knowledge, ideas, and approaches to a task) are often the major challenges in leading these teams. The literature on effective multicultural teams has identified leadership as an important factor for team effectiveness. Therefore, the goal of this study was to examine the effect of leader social distance in multicultural teams. A lab study was designed to test the impact of experimentally-manipulated leader social distance (socially close or socially distant) on the relationship between team member diversity and team affect, processes, and performance. Results varied for female and for male teams. Specifically, the nature of the interactions between leadership and team diversity depended on the specific cultural dimension measured and the gender of the team. In the end, the impact of diversity on culture in female teams was improved by close leaders (the relationships were positive), and worsened by distant leaders (the relationships were negative) for team affect, processes and viability. For male teams, the impact of diversity was always negative in both leader conditions; however, in distant leader conditions the relationship was more negative. Implications for theory and practice are discussed along with suggestions for future research

Positive vs. Negative Politics and Behavioral Intentions: An Experimental Examination

Despite research showing that politics can be beneficial, a commonly held perception is that politics are negative, harmful, and associated with adverse outcomes. The qualitative differences between positive and negative politics perceptions and their results are still mostly elusive. This research adds clarity by examining perceptual processes surrounding positive and negative politics perceptions. Using an experimental manipulation, behavior was held constant while political actor motivation was varied. The positive or negative inferred motives and attributions made of the actor related logically to the positive or negative nature of the politics perceptions. Further, attribution type was related to positive or negative political behavior intentions through politics perceptions. These results expand understanding of positive and negative political behavior and subsequent perceptions, giving emphasis to the importance of perceived motivation and attributions. It further demonstrates how these perceptions relate to political behavior intentions by the observers. In total, it indicates the importance of actor motivations, individual differences within the perceiver, and the political behavior itself in the processes surrounding positive and negative politics perceptions

Consumer evaluation and response to philanthropic advertising.

The integration of philanthropy into corporate advertising and sales promotion campaigns is becoming a popular persuasion tactic. Companies are now using product advertising to portray themselves as benefactors of charities and social causes. The underlying marketing premise is that a firm can do better by doing good. Philanthropic advertising can be grouped into two basic categories. One category ties consumer purchases to the corporate donation while the other communicates the firm\u27s benevolence without a purchase connection. Causes perceived by consumers as personally relevant receive more cognitive elaboration than those causes perceived to have little relevance. On the surface, philanthropic advertising appears to be a win-win situation. The firm achieves an additional sale, or enhances its image, and the charity receives needed financial support. However, little is known as to how these messages influence consumer perceptions, attitudes and purchase likelihood. This study examined the effects of different forms of philanthropic messages, with varying levels of personal relevance, on consumer perceptions and behavior. It addresses these issues from an attribution theory viewpoint. Specifically, this study suggests that, given varying combinations of philanthropic advertising and personal relevance, consumers form different perceptions of the firm\u27s altruism. These attributions influence consumer attitudes and purchase intentions. The study used an after-only, with control group, experiment to investigate the differential impact of the experimental factors. Two hundred and seventy-five graduate students responded to randomly assigned advertising stimuli and answered a questionnaire that measured their attitudes and purchase intentions. The initial hypothesis tests failed to show any significant results. Overall, subjects did not perceive any difference between the two types of philanthropic promotions. However, some effects emerged when the blocking factors were introduced. These results indicated that those who had a less favorable attitude toward business tended to respond unfavorably to philanthropic advertisements. Additionally, non-users of the product had more favorable responses for philanthropic advertisements than non-philanthropic advertisements. Messages of high personal relevance also produced more favorable responses than low relevance messages. Individuals who were not active contributors responded favorably to the purchase-linked messages. The results imply that these messages may have a different impact on various consumer segments. This message strategy can be useful in stimulating brand switching among current non-users