Differential Reactions to Men's and Women's Counterproductive Work Behavior

• Main Author: Way, Jason Donovan
• Format: Others
• Published: Scholar Commons 2011
• Subjects: Aggression; Counterproductive Work Behavior; Gender Differences; Performance Evaluation; Stereotypes; American Studies; Arts and Humanities; Psychology
• Online Access: http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/etd/3404; http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4599&context=etd

This purpose of this study was to examine the effect that employee gender might have on performance ratings. Specifically, it was thought that negative performance episodes, such as aggressive behavior, might have less of an effect on performance ratings for males compared to females because males have a stereotype of being more aggressive. Additional hypotheses examined how different types of negative performance affected perceptions that the employee was behaving according to their gender ideal, and whether people judged male and female aggressiveness differently. To this end, 134 undergraduate students participated in a 2 x 3 design experiment where they read about a hypothetical server in a restaurant who had committed various negative behaviors at work. The results were, for the most part, not significant. The exception was that there were some slight group differences in how well the employees in the various conditions fit their gender ideal.