Emerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services. Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation.
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the mediating role of silence as a link between punishment, communication opportunities and stress.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors conducted a survey among 1,015 highly skilled employees of South Korean companies using a self-administered instrument. In total, 748 questionnaires were received from the 1,015 participants. Of these, 61 questionnaires were incomplete and were discarded; the remaining 687 questionnaires were used in the analysis.
Findings
The results revealed that punishment and communication opportunities are significantly associated with silence. Silence showed a positive relationship with stress, and it mediates the relationship between punishment and stress. Meanwhile, findings indicate that silence does not mediate the link between communication opportunities and stress.
Research limitations/implications
This study investigates the unitary construct of silence. Therefore, the authors suggest future researchers examine the other forms of silence such as multidimensional construct of silence that focuses on the motives of individuals to be silent.
Practical implications
The study highlights the importance of establishing organizational ombudsman system, grievance procedures and employee management meetings to mitigate silence behavior. Moreover, the authors recommended management demonstrates their interest in shared information to avoid employee silence.
Originality/value
This study is the first to explore the mediating role of silence on the relationship between punishment and stress.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.