The Moderating Roles of Masculinity-Femininity and Individualism-Collectivism for Peer Fairness

Abstract

Globalization of business, expatriation, and immigration highlight the importance of studying cultural values, while the increasing number of team-based systems and flatter hierarchies emphasize the investigation of peer fairness. The most popular cultural value dimension is individualism-collectivism. Interestingly, integrative research on cultural values and fairness often proposes competing hypotheses for the moderating role of individualism-collectivism. Some scholars argue that individualism strengthens fairness effects, whereas others argue that collectivism strengthens fairness effects. To clarify these competing hypotheses, we investigate the cultural value dimension masculinity-femininity as moderator for the moderating influence of individualism-collectivism on peer fairness effects. To test our double moderation model, we conducted a survey study with 254 team members, who came from a variety of organizations and countries. Our findings show that the relationship between peer fairness and organizational citizenship behavior is stronger for team members who have aligned cultural values (individualism and masculinity; collectivism and femininity). In contrast, the relationship between peer fairness and organizational citizenship behavior becomes non-significant when members have non-aligned values (individualism and femininity; collectivism and masculinity). We conclude with implications for practice and future research.