Understanding Deviance Spillover in Organizations

Abstract

Drawing on moral disengagement theory, we developed and tested a dual-stage moderated mediation model to explore the spillover effect of workplace deviance as well as the boundary conditions of the spillover. A two-wave survey was conducted on 231 supervisor-subordinate dyads. Results showed that (a) employee deviance increased abusive supervision, which triggered supervisor-directed aggression; (b) supervisor’s organizational embodiment strengthened the positive relationship between employee deviance and abusive supervision; (c) subordinate’s perspective taking weakened the positive relationship between abusive supervision and supervisor-directed aggression; (d) the indirect effect of employee deviance on supervisor-directed aggression through abusive supervision is most pronounced when supervisor’s organizational embodiment is high and subordinate’s perspective taking is low. The findings suggest how organizational embodiment and perspective taking may influence the spillover effect among different forms of workplace deviance. Implications for how to handle the spillover effect of workplace deviance are also discussed. Key words: employee deviance; abusive supervision; organizational embodiment; perspective taking; spillover effect