Evaluating Ethical Intentions of Individual Employees in Organizations--Evidence from the New Generation.

• Main Authors: Fang, Miao-Ling, 方妙玲
• Other Authors: Chen, Ming-Shiun
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2003
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/82234029570152523409

博士 === 國立臺北大學 === 企業管理學系 === 92 === Employees face an array of moral issues in their everyday decision-making. This present study is an attempt to better understand the ethical considerations of employees when they are faced with ethical dilemmas. A comprehensive review of the literature on ethical decision-making models in the workplace is presented. This article proposes an integration model containing a new set of variables. Ajzen’s (1991) theory of planned behavior (TPB) grounded our theoretical framework. The theory of planned behavior posits that a person’s intention to perform a behavior is the immediate determinant of the action. Intentions are shaped by attitudes toward the behavior, social norms, and perceived control over the behavior. This study examines the influence of independent variables on ethical or unethical behavior determination (intentions). The independent variables include attitude toward the behavior, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, and ethical principles. Ethical principles are based on Kohlberg’s conclusions in the Psychology of Moral Development (1984). A person’s stages of ethical principles include egoism, mutual interpersonal expectations, and universal ethical principles. Attitudes toward performing a behavior are a function of feelings toward the behavior and moral intensity. The relationship between feelings toward the behavior and decision intentions is mediated by attitude toward the behavior. The relationship between moral intensity and decision intentions is mediated by attitude toward the behavior. There are four dimensions of ethical work climate existed within the organization: instrumental, caring, rules, and law and code. The relationship between ethical work climate and decision intentions is mediated by social norms and perceived control over the behavior. The moderating variable includes three types of relationships (positive instrumental ties, negative instrumental ties, and expressive ties). Using a scenario methodology, this study designed three decision-making scenarios varying the proximity of relationship to explore factors influencing the ethical decisions in which workers may be asked to make. The study was conducted in a field setting using survey methodology. The sample was limited to new generation workers those who were born between 1968 and 1983 and were currently employed by a company. Data were collected from 1042 workers on the various components of the theories and used to assess the influence of attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control on intentions. Hierarchical regression, ANOVA, MANOVA, and LISREL were conducted on this data to test the hypotheses describing the relationship between dependent variables and independent variables. The main research results are summarized in eight points. In summary, these analyses indicated that the attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, and ethical principles contributed to explained variance for the new generation workers decision intentions for positive instrumental ties and negative instrumental ties situations. The present study ends with a discussion of the implications that the arguments presented in this study are for academic research and managerial practice.