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Roles of gender and identification on abusive supervision and proactive behavior

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Abstract

Drawing upon social identity theory, we investigate how subordinates’ perceived insider status within an organization may relate to abusive supervision and their proactive behavior. In addition, based on social role theory, we examine the moderating role of subordinate gender in this framework. Using a sample of 350 supervisor–subordinate dyads from an IT group corporation, we found that abusive supervision was negatively related to subordinates’ proactive behavior, and that subordinates’ perceived insider status mediated this relationship. Results also show that subordinate gender moderated the negative relationship between abusive supervision and perceived insider status, such that it was stronger for female than for male subordinates. This study highlights the pivotal roles of subordinates’ gender and identification in the consequences of abusive supervision at work.

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Acknowledgment

We are grateful to Professor Alfred Wong and the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive and detailed comments during the revision process. We also appreciate the insightful feedback on previous drafts from Professor Ziguang Chen. This research was supported by grants from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (GRF no. PolyU 5445/12H).

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  1. Department of Management and Marketing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong

    Kan Ouyang & Wing Lam

  2. Alcatel-Lucent Shanghai Bell Company Limited, Shanghai, China

    Weidong Wang

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  1. Kan Ouyang
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Correspondence to Wing Lam.

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Ouyang, K., Lam, W. & Wang, W. Roles of gender and identification on abusive supervision and proactive behavior. Asia Pac J Manag 32, 671–691 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10490-015-9410-7

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