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Examining the moral grey zone: The role of moral disengagement, authenticity, and situational strength in predicting unethical managerial behavior
Author(s) -
Knoll Michael,
Lord Robert G.,
Petersen LarsEric,
Weigelt Oliver
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
journal of applied social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.822
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1559-1816
pISSN - 0021-9029
DOI - 10.1111/jasp.12353
Subject(s) - psychology , moral disengagement , situational ethics , social psychology , harm , covert , context (archaeology) , disengagement theory , gerontology , paleontology , linguistics , philosophy , medicine , biology
In the business context, there is a broad spectrum of practices that potentially harm others, yet might benefit the organization. We examined the influence of individual and situational differences in predicting (un)ethical behavior in these moral gray zones using an in‐basket exercise that included covert moral issues in which managers could give unethical instructions to their followers. Results show that individual differences in moral disengagement directly predicted unethical behavior and functioned as a mediator of the relationship between authenticity and unethical behavior. Furthermore, effects differed in weak compared to strong situations. Study 2, replicated the results from Study 1, developed a direct test of the situational strength hypothesis, and showed that high versus low situation strength moderated the relation of moral disengagement to unethical behavior.