When team members’ values differ: The moderating role of team leadership

Integrating theory and research on values, diversity, situational strength, and team leadership, we proposed that team leadership moderates the effects of values diversity on team conflict. In a longitudinal survey study of national service teams, we found significant, but opposite, moderating effects of task-focused and person-focused leadership. As predicted, task-focused leadership attenuated the diversity–conflict relationship, while person-focused leadership exacerbated the diversity–conflict relationship. More specifically, task-focused leadership decreased the relationship between work ethic diversity and team conflict. Person-focused leadership increased the relationship between traditionalism diversity and team conflict. Team conflict mediated the effects of the interactions of leadership and values diversity on team effectiveness.     

Interpersonal Counterproductive Work Behaviors: Distinguishing Between Person-Focused Versus Task-Focused Behaviors and Their Antecedents

Purpose

This study proposes a nuanced perspective for conceptualizing interpersonal counterproductive work behaviors (ICWBs) by distinguishing them into behaviors that hinder other workers’ task performance (task-focused ICWBs), and those that are personal in nature (person-focused ICWBs). A relational stress perspective is adopted to examine work-based dependence relational stressor and negative-affect relational stressor as predictors of each category of behavior, with trait competitiveness as a moderator.

Design/Methodology/Approach

Deductive and inductive approaches were used to generate items measuring each type of ICWBs, and the two-factor ICWB structure was validated using data from 136 respondents. Data from a different sample of 125 employees from two organizations were used to test the hypothesized model.

Findings

Work-dependence relational stressor predicted task-focused ICWBs, while negative-affect relational stressor predicted both forms of ICWBs. Trait competitiveness moderated these relationships in different ways.

Implications

This study addresses researchers’ call for fine-grained research that examines specific forms of CWBs and their underlying causes. It demonstrates that ICWBs can go beyond the traditional person-focused behaviors that target other workers’ well-being, to encompass task-focused behaviors that directly impact their performance. By revealing that different relationships at work predict such behaviors, this study informs organizations on how to manage and deter such behaviors among employees.

Originality/Value

This is the first study to distinguish ICWBs into those that are task-focused and person-focused, to provide a validated measure of these two types of behaviors, and to propose and test a model where workplace relationships differently predict such behaviors, moderated by individual’s competitiveness.     

Parents' Empathic Responses and Pain and Distress in Pediatric Patients

We investigated the relationship between parents' empathic responses prior to their children undergoing cancer treatment procedures and children's pain/distress during the procedures. We hypothesized: (1) parents' empathic distress would be positively associated with children's pain/distress, (2) parents' empathic concern would be negatively associated with children's pain/distress; and (3) parents' enduring dispositions and social support would be associated with their empathic responses. Parents completed: (1) measures of dispositions and perceived social support several weeks before their children underwent the procedures, and (2) state measures of empathic distress and empathic concern just before the procedures. Empathic distress was positively associated with children's pain; empathic concern was negatively associated with children's pain/distress. Predictions about dispositions and social support were also substantially confirmed.     

Relation between humor and empathic concern

A series of studies have shown that humor is associated with close interpersonal relationships and effective in reducing stress, which in turn enhances empathy. Therefore, it was hypothesized that humor and empathic concern would be positively correlated. The Empathic Concern subscale of the Empathy Questionnaire, the Coping Humor Scale, the Multidimensional Sense of Humor Scale, and the Situational Humor Response Questionnaire were given to 124 subjects. Scores on the Empathic Concern subscale were significantly correlated with those on each of the humor scales. Types of humor may be an important variable in the relationship between empathic concern and humor. Both humor and empathic concern are associated for people with emotional intelligence who use these to interact effectively with other individuals. As such, it was suggested that exploration would yield a relation between humor and emotional self-awareness, which is also associated with emotional intelligence.     

Altruism and egoism: prosocial motivations for helping depend on relationship context

Findings from the current study suggest that the link between helping and empathic concern—a hypothesized motivator of altruistic behavior—may be more pronounced in the context of kinship relationships than among strangers. Participants expressed their willingness to help a kin‐member or stranger in specific need situations. Putative mediators of helping (empathic concern, general negative affect, perceptions of oneness) were measured. Empathic concern appeared to partially mediate effects of relationship context on willingness to help. Moreover, while controlling for egoistic motivators (negative affect, oneness), empathic concern was linked to participants' willingness to help a kin‐member but not a stranger. Findings suggest that factors motivating prosocial action in close relationships may be different from those that motivate helping among strangers. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Reading and Empathy

The relationship between reading and empathy was explored. Controlling for GPA and gender, reading variables were hypothesized as related to empathy; the relationship was expected to differ for males and females. For the complete sample, affective components were related to GPA but not reading. Perspective taking was related to reading appreciation but not GPA. For females, reading appreciation was related to perspective taking and empathic concern. For males, GPA and non-fiction reading were positively related, but both were negatively related to empathic concern. Results suggest reading may promote both academic achievement and social development. Findings and social implications are discussed.     

Forgiveness, Empathy and Gender—A Malaysian Perspective

Recent theorising has suggested that in non-Western collectivist contexts, the need for social harmony may play a greater role than empathy in motivating forgiveness, and that women may be more impacted than men by this cultural value. In this study, a sample of 233 Malaysian undergraduate students, 100 males and 133 females, recruited from four English-mediated universities completed the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI) and the Transgression-Related Interpersonal Motivations Inventory-12 (TRIM-12) to assess dimensions of empathy and forgiveness. Women exhibited greater empathic concern than men, but not greater perspective-taking. Men were less forgiving in terms of revenge-seeking behaviour, but men and women did not differ in avoidance of transgressors. The relationships between empathic concern and both facets of forgiveness were similar for men and women, as was the relationship between empathic concern and avoidance. However, the relationship between perspective-taking and avoidance was stronger among men than women. We found little support for the prediction that in this collectivist cultural context, perspective-taking would play a greater role than empathic concern in forgiveness. Further research is recommended to explore empathy and forgiveness in non-Western populations, with a need to take into account cultural factors.     

Empathic distress and concern predict aggression in toddlerhood: The moderating role of sex

Impaired empathy is an important risk factor of aggression, but results are contradictory in toddlerhood. The association between empathy and aggression may differ for empathic distress and empathic concern in response to empathy-evoking situations, and for boys and girls. Therefore, the current study investigated whether empathic distress and empathic concern at age 20 months (N = 133, 69 boys) predicted aggression at ages 20 and 30 months (N = 119, 62 boys), while taking a potential moderating effect of sex into account. Empathic behavior was observed during a distress simulation task 20 months post-partum. Physical aggression was assessed through maternal report, using the Physical Aggression Scale for Early Childhood. Linear regression analyses revealed sex differences in the associations between empathic distress and concern on the one hand and physical aggression at age 20 months on the other. Furthermore, physical aggression at age 30 months was predicted by the interaction of sex with empathic distress at age 20 months, while controlling for aggression at age 20 months. More empathic distress and concern were associated with less physical aggression in girls, but not in boys. The findings indicate that the prediction of physical aggression by empathic distress was more robust over time than for empathic concern. This study sheds new light on the intricate relationship between empathy, aggression, and sex from a developmental perspective.     

Coping Style as a Moderator of Perfectionism and Suicidal Ideation Among Undergraduate Students

Suicide is a serious and growing public health problem and remains an unnecessary cause of death globally. In Iran, the highest prevalence of acute and chronic suicidal ideation is among young people aged 16–24. This study investigates the relationship between coping style, two types of perfectionism, and suicidal ideation among undergraduates, and examines coping style as a moderator of the relationship between perfectionism and suicidal ideation. Multi-stage cluster random sampling was employed to recruit 547 undergraduate students aged 19–24 years from the Islamic Azad University of Karaj. Structural Equation Modelling indicated that suicidal ideation was negatively associated with adaptive perfectionism and task-focused coping but positively associated with emotion-focused coping, avoidance coping, and maladaptive perfectionism. Coping style (including the three styles of task-focused, emotion-focused, and avoidance coping) was found to moderate the relationship between perfectionism and suicidal ideation. The study advances understanding of the importance of coping style in this context and explains how perfectionism affects suicidal ideation.     

Empathy and the Self-Absorption Paradox II: Self-Rumination and Self-Reflection as Mediators Between Shame,Guilt, and Empathy

The present study tested the hypothesis that proneness to shame would predict self-rumination (and personal distress) whereas proneness to guilt would predict self-reflection (and perspective taking, and empathic concern). Results supported the majority of these predictions, and revealed that self-reflection mediates the relationship between guilt and perspective taking. Additional results provided some support for the hypothesis that self-rumination mediates the relationship between shame and personal distress. However, results also revealed that shame mediated the relationship between self-rumination and personal distress, suggesting that shame and self-rumination may feed each other within a reciprocal cycle that is likely to result in a maladaptive empathic response (i.e., personal distress). Empathic concern was associated with higher levels of guilt, but results failed to replicate earlier findings demonstrating a positive relationship between empathic concern and self-reflection. The present results replicate and extend past research and suggest several promising avenues for future research.     

Relational correlates of interpersonal citizenship behavior: a social network perspective

This study examines the role of social network ties in the performance and receipt of interpersonal citizenship behavior (ICB), one form of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). A field study involving 141 employees of a manufacturing firm provided evidence that social network ties are related to the performance and receipt of ICB. Results support hypothesized relationships, which are based on social exchange theory, suggesting strength of friendship is related to performance and receipt of ICB. Support was also found for impression management-based hypotheses suggesting that asymmetric influence and 3rd-party influence are related to the performance and receipt of ICB. These relationships were significant when controlling for job satisfaction, commitment, procedural justice, hierarchical level, demographic similarity, and job similarity. Implications and directions for future research are addressed.     

Principle of Care and Giving to Help People in Need

Theories of moral development posit that an internalized moral value that one should help those in need—the principle of care—evokes helping behaviour in situations where empathic concern does not. Examples of such situations are helping behaviours that involve cognitive deliberation and planning, that benefit others who are known only in the abstract, and who are out‐group members. Charitable giving to help people in need is an important helping behaviour that has these characteristics. Therefore we hypothesized that the principle of care would be positively associated with charitable giving to help people in need, and that the principle of care would mediate the empathic concern–giving relationship. The two hypotheses were tested across four studies. The studies used four different samples, including three nationally representative samples from the American and Dutch populations, and included both self‐reports of giving (Studies 1–3), giving observed in a survey experiment (Study 3), and giving observed in a laboratory experiment (Study 4). The evidence from these studies indicated that a moral principle to care for others was associated with charitable giving to help people in need and mediated the empathic concern–giving relationship. © 2016 The Authors. European Journal of Personality published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of European Association of Personality Psychology     

With or Without Empathy: Primary Psychopathy and Difficulty in Identifying Feelings Predict Utilitarian Judgment in Sacrificial Dilemmas

Drawing from research on moral judgment and affective dysfunction, we examined how trait psychopathy and alexithymia, which are characterized as empathic deficits, relate to utilitarian moral judgments in sacrificial dilemmas. As predicted, primary and secondary psychopathy traits and alexithymia were associated with reduced empathic concern. However, primary psychopathy and difficulty identifying feelings (one of three alexithymia traits), but not secondary psychopathy and other two alexithymia traits, were associated with utilitarian judgments. Moreover, hierarchical regression analysis showed that primary psychopathy, difficulty identifying feelings, and empathic concern made unique contributions to the prediction of direct harm on the victim, whereas alexithymia traits made weaker contributions. Although the lack of affective empathy is found in psychopathy and alexithymia, the process through which the two traits lead to utilitarian judgment in sacrificial dilemmas may be distinct. The present findings add to the growing literature, contributing to a fuller picture of the relationship between empathy, trait psychopathy, and alexithymia.     

PREDICTORS OF EMPATHIC ABILITY IN AN ORGANIZATIONAL SETTING: A RESEARCH NOTE

This study examined the relationships between selected context variables and empathic ability. The specific purpose was to determine the relative strengths of association between intimacy, status difference, trust, and empathic ability. A correlational analysis was applied to the data collected from 29 pairs of supervisors and subordinates in a Denver financial organization. Results indicated that trust was the context variable most strongly associated with empathic ability. Intimacy and status difference were only slightly related to empathic ability. Discussion centered on the implications of the inverse relationship between trust and empathic ability.     

Gender Roles and Empathic Accuracy: The Role of Communion in Reading Minds

Although empathic accuracy is considered a stable skill, few individual difference measures consistently predict performance on Ickes’ (e.g., 2001) empathic accuracy measure. Because past work has shown that women are more empathically accurate than men when female gender roles are made salient before an empathic accuracy task, we hypothesized that self-reported communion and related variables might predict empathic accuracy. Participants (194 undergraduates) from a northwestern U.S. university completed an empathic accuracy task and self-report measures of communion and empathy. Communion and empathic concern predicted greater empathic accuracy, but only after controlling for socially desirable responding. The role of communion in empathic inference is discussed, along with the need to include measures of social desirability when examining correlates of empathic accuracy.     

Associations among Life Events,Empathic Concern,and Adolescents' Prosocial and Aggressive Behaviors Toward Specific Targets

The goal of the present study was to examine the links between life events and adolescents' social behaviors (prosocial and aggressive behaviors) toward specific targets and to examine how empathic concern may play a role in these associations. The study examined two hypotheses: both the mediating role of empathic concern and the moderating role of empathic concern. The sample included 311 high school students from the Midwest (M age = 16.10 years; age range = 14–19 years; 58.7% girls; 82.7% White, 13.6% Latino). The results demonstrated support for the moderation model as well as complex links between life events and prosocial and aggressive behaviors toward specific targets. The discussion focuses on the role of empathic concern in understanding how life events are ultimately associated with adolescents' social development.     

Gender Moderates the Relationship Between Empathy and Aggressiveness in Sport: The Mediating Role of Anger

This research investigated whether gender moderates, and anger mediates, the relationship between empathy (i.e., perspective taking and empathic concern) and aggressiveness in sport. In Study 1, perspective taking and empathic concern were negatively associated with aggressiveness, and this effect was stronger in women compared to men. In Study 2, perspective taking was a negative predictor of aggressiveness and antisocial behavior in sport, and anger mediated these relationships in women but not in men. Our findings suggest that empathy and emotion-based strategies targeted at reducing aggressiveness in sport need to be tailored for male and female athletes.     

Inferring the emotions of friends versus strangers: the role of culture and self-construal

Three studies examined cross-cultural differences in empathic accuracy (the ability to correctly infer another's emotional experience) within the context of different relationships. East-West cultural differences in self-construal were hypothesized to differentiate levels of empathic accuracy across relationship types. In contrast to the independent self prevalent among members of Western cultures, members of Eastern cultures generally view the self as interdependent with those with whom they have a relationship. Easterners, relative to Westerners, are more concerned with the thoughts or feelings of close others and less concerned with the thoughts or feelings of those with whom they have no relational link (i.e., strangers). Across three studies, the authors found that East Asians, compared with European Americans, made more accurate inferences regarding the emotions of close others (i.e., friends), but less accurate inferences regarding the emotions of strangers. Furthermore, individual differences in interdependent self-construal among East Asians predicted the degree of empathic accuracy.     

Direct and Indirect Associations of Empathy,Theory of Mind,and Language with Prosocial Behavior: Gender Differences in Primary School Children

The authors examined the contributions of empathic concern, perspective taking, theory of mind (ToM), and receptive language to prosocial behavior in a sample of primary school children between 8 and 11?years old. Results showed that empathic concern, perspective taking, and ToM had direct positive effects on prosocial behavior. Girls exhibited higher levels of empathic concern and prosocial behavior; furthermore, gender moderated the observed associations, as perspective taking and ToM were positively and significantly associated with prosocial behavior in boys but not in girls. Last, two indirect paths were detected: empathic concern partially mediated the relation between perspective taking and prosocial behavior, and receptive language had an indirect effect on prosocial behavior by increasing ToM ability. Implications for understanding the impact of the four social-cognitive skills on children’s prosocial development are discussed.     

Investigating associations between empathy, morality and psychopathic personality traits in the general population

Although atypical moral and empathy processing are considered core features of psychopathic personality, little is known about how these constructs are associated with psychopathic traits in the general population. One-hundred and twenty-four adult males from the community were administered the Self-Report Psychopathy Scale 4 Short Form, as well as a wide battery of affect, empathy and morality tasks and questionnaires. Our findings indicate that both core affective-interpersonal, as well as lifestyle-antisocial features of psychopathy are associated with weaker empathic responses to fearful faces. However, only the unique variance of the affective-interpersonal features is associated with weaker empathic response to happy stories, lower propensity to feel empathic concern and less difficulty in making decisions on moral dilemmas. In contrast, the unique variance of the lifestyle-antisocial features is associated with greater propensity to feel empathic concern. These preliminary findings extend previous research and suggest that, while the joint variance between affective-interpersonal and lifestyle-antisocial features might drive some ‘deficits’ associated with psychopathy, there also appears also to be unique ‘deficits’ associated with the core affective-interpersonal features, particularly in relation to affective aspects of moral processing.