Individual Differences in the Acceptability of Unethical Information Technology Practices: The Case of Machiavellianism and Ethical Ideology

Winter, Susan J.; Stylianou, Antonis C.; Giacalone, Robert A.

doi:10.1007/s10551-004-1772-6

Cited by 99 publications

(70 citation statements)

References 68 publications

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“…As current empirical research on Mach is still sparse, this study adds to our overall understanding of how those with negative personality traits act in organizations in general and respond to different organizational settings (see also the limited but steadily growing research in the area of business ethics on this topic: Dahling et al 2012;Ricks and Fraedrich 1999;Schepers 2003;Winter et al 2004). Yet, we further specified the relationship between these variables by proposing a mediation model in which employee Mach was related to stress and CWB via employee lack of trust in the leader.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Birds of a Feather can Butt Heads: When Machiavellian Employees Work with Machiavellian Leaders

2016

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Machiavellians are manipulative and deceitful individuals willing to utilize any strategy or behavior needed to attain their goals. This study explores what occurs when Machiavellian employees have a Machiavellian leader with the same negative, manipulative disposition. We argue that Machiavellian employees have a negative worldview and are likely to trust their leaders less. This reduced trust likely results in these employees experiencing higher stress and engaging in more unethical behavior. In addition, we expect these negative relationships to be exacerbated when such followers experience Machiavellian leadership. Thus, we test a moderated mediation model assessing whether Machiavellianism affects employees and whether combining Machiavellian leaders and Machiavellian employees is toxic in the sense of exacerbating the negative impact of Machiavellianism on employee trust. Results do not support the proposed conditional indirect effect of trust for either stress or unethical behavior. Instead, we find a conditional direct effect of employee Machiavellianism on both trust and stress: When Machiavellian employees have Machiavellian leaders, their trust in their leader significantly decreases, and their level of stress significantly increases. We also find support for an unconditional indirect effect of trust for employee stress (but not for unethical work behaviors), Machiavellianism in employees relates to stress via lowered trust in the leader. For unethical behavior, we only find a main effect of employee Machiavellianism.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Birds of a Feather can Butt Heads: When Machiavellian Employees Work with Machiavellian Leaders

2016

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“…For example, it has become almost cliché to declare young adults to have diminished or no privacy expectations, yet, when examined closely, young adults are found to have privacy norms that differ from older adults while retaining strong expectations of privacy (Hoofnagle et al 2010). Similarly, individuals who do not agree with the analyst's definition of privacy are presumed to not find privacy important (e.g., Acquisti and Grossklags 2005) or to be unethical (Winter et al 2004). Instead, researchers and organizations should ask what are the privacy expectations of the users, customers, or employees in this situation?…”

Section: Implications For Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding Privacy Online: Development of a Social Contract Approach to Privacy

2015

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Recent scholarship in philosophy, law, and information systems suggests that respecting privacy entails understanding the implicit privacy norms about what, why, and to whom information is shared within specific relationships. These social contracts are important to understand if firms are to adequately manage the privacy expectations of stakeholders. This paper explores a social contract approach to developing, acknowledging, and protecting privacy norms within specific contexts. While privacy as a social contract-a mutually beneficial agreement within a community about sharing and using information-has been introduced theoretically and empirically, the full impact on firms of an alternative framework to respecting the privacy expectations of stakeholders has not been examined. The goal of this paper is to examine how privacy norms develop through social contract's narrative, to redescribe privacy violations given the social contract approach, and to critically examine the role of business as a contractor in developing privacy norms. A social contract narrative dealing specifically with issues of privacy is an important next step in exploring a social contract approach to privacy. Here, the narrative is used to explain to analyze the dynamic process of privacy norm generation within particular communities. Based on this narrative, individuals within a given community discriminately share information with a particular set of obligations in mind as to who has access to the information and how it will be used. Rather than giving away privacy, individuals discriminately share information within a particular community and with norms governing the use of their information. Similar to contractual business ethics' impact on global commerce in explaining how and why norms vary across global contexts, the social contract approach to privacy explains how and why norms vary across communities of actors. Focusing on agreements around privacy expectations shifts the responsibility of firms from adequate notification to the responsibility of firms as contractors to maintain a mutually beneficial and sustainable solution.

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“…Chinese managers are reportedly more favorable towards bribery and kickbacks if they score higher on relativism (Tian 2008). In another study, relativists are shown to be more accepting of violating property rights (Winter et al 2004). Business undergraduates at a U.S. university who score higher on relativism score lower on corporate social responsibility, the extent to which they take the wider social impact of their business into account instead of just caring about profits and stockholders (Kolodinsky et al 2010).…”

Section: Confidencementioning

confidence: 97%

Varying versions of moral relativism: the philosophy and psychology of normative relativism

Quintelier

Fessler

2011

Biol Philos

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Among naturalist philosophers, both defenders and opponents of moral relativism argue that prescriptive moral theories (or normative theories) should be constrained by empirical findings about human psychology. Empiricists have asked if people are or can be moral relativists, and what effect being a moral relativist can have on an individual's moral functioning. This research is underutilized in philosophers' normative theories of relativism; at the same time, the empirical work, while useful, is conceptually disjointed. Our goal is to integrate philosophical and empirical work on constraints on normative relativism. First, we present a working definition of moral relativism. Second, we outline naturalist versions of normative relativism, and third, we highlight the empirical constraints in this reasoning. Fourth, we discuss recent studies in moral psychology that are relevant for the philosophy of moral relativism. We assess here what conclusions for moral relativism can and cannot be drawn from experimental studies. Finally, we suggest how moral philosophers and moral psychologists can collaborate on the topic of moral relativism in the future. Keywords moral relativism; moral psychology; experimental ethics; normative ethics; tolerance Moral Relativism and its oppositesThe goal of this paper is to integrate recent naturalist philosophical and moral psychological work on moral relativism. Philosophers draw distinctions between cultural and individual relativism, and between extreme and moderate moral relativism, and ask what moral prescriptions are in accordance with human psychology. However, moral psychologists generally do not employ these distinctions, making it difficult to examine the extent to which their research findings can or cannot be compared to various philosophical positions. We aim to bridge this disciplinary divide and integrate this conceptual landscape in contemporary and future research. Where appropriate, we will MANUSCRIPT CURRENTLY UNDER REVIEW. PLEASE DO NOT CITE OR CIRCULATE WITHOUT PERMISSION.

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Individual Differences in the Acceptability of Unethical Information Technology Practices: The Case of Machiavellianism and Ethical Ideology

Cited by 99 publications

References 68 publications

Birds of a Feather can Butt Heads: When Machiavellian Employees Work with Machiavellian Leaders

Birds of a Feather can Butt Heads: When Machiavellian Employees Work with Machiavellian Leaders

Understanding Privacy Online: Development of a Social Contract Approach to Privacy

Varying versions of moral relativism: the philosophy and psychology of normative relativism

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