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Predictors of Organizational Citizenship Behavior: Ethical Leadership and Workplace Jealousy

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Abstract

This study examined the relationships of perceived ethical leadership, workplace jealousy, and organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) directed at individuals (OCBI) and organizations (OCBO). Survey responses were collected from 491 employee-coworker pairs from 33 hospitals in Taiwan. The employees provided assessments of their perceived ethical leadership and the workplace jealousy they experienced, while the coworkers provided information about the employees’ OCBI and OCBO. In the hypotheses testing, perceived ethical leadership was found to be negatively related to employees’ workplace jealousy and jealousy was negatively related to their OCBI and OCBO. Workplace jealousy partially mediated the effect of ethical leadership on OCBI and OCBO. In addition, perceived ethical leadership was found to have a moderation effect on the jealousy-OCBI/OCBO relationship. This study contributes to the literature of ethical leadership as well as to the literature of OCB by relating workplace jealousy to OCB and by making sense of the effects of ethical leadership on OCB through the mediation of jealousy and through the moderation of ethical leadership on the jealousy-OCB relationship.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Management Science, National Chiao Tung University, 1001 University Road, 300, Hsinchu, Taiwan

    Yau-De Wang & Wen-Chuan Sung

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  1. Yau-De Wang
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  2. Wen-Chuan Sung
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Correspondence to Yau-De Wang.

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Wang, YD., Sung, WC. Predictors of Organizational Citizenship Behavior: Ethical Leadership and Workplace Jealousy. J Bus Ethics 135, 117–128 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-014-2480-5

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