Workaholism and workplace incivility: a moderated dual-process model

Abstract

Despite the ubiquity of workaholism and workplace incivility, extant research lacks sufficient empirical support on the underlying mechanisms between them, which hinders curtailing the uncivil behavior of workaholics. To systematically investigate the underlying mechanisms, we proposed two mediators: emotional exhaustion and psychological entitlement. The former illustrates why workaholics engage in uncivil behaviors uncontrollably from the existing conservation of resources perspective, which captures the behavioral dimension of workaholism. The latter explains why workaholics engage in workplace incivility voluntarily from a novel moral licensing perspective, which captures the overlooked cognitive dimension of workaholism. Further, we incorporate supervisor-subordinate guanxi as a critical moderator that helps differentiate the above two mediators. Results across two studies suggested that supervisor-subordinate guanxi alleviates the indirect effects of workaholism on workplace incivility via emotional exhaustion, while magnifying the indirect effects via psychological entitlement. Overall, these findings provide evidence that workaholism can also psychologically free employees to engage in subsequent uncivil behaviors.