When expressing forgiveness backfires in the workplace: victim power moderates the effect of expressing forgiveness on transgressor compliance |
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Authors: | Michelle Xue Zheng Marius van Dijke Jayanth Narayanan David De Cremer |
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Institution: | 1. Department of Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management, China Europe International Business School (CEIBS), Shanghai, China;2. Business and Society Department, Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University, Rotterdam, the Netherlands;3. Division of Human Resource Management, Nottingham Business School, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, UK;4. Department of Organizational Behavior and Leadership, International Institute for Management Development (IMD), Lausanne, Switzerland;5. Department of Management and Organisation, Business School, National University of Singapore, Singapore;6. Organisational Behaviour &7. Information Systems Group, Judge Business School, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK |
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Abstract: | Expressing (vs. withholding) forgiveness is often promoted as a beneficial response for victims. In the present research, we argue that withholding (vs. expressing) forgiveness can also be beneficial to victims by stimulating subsequent transgressor compliance – a response that is valuable in restoring the victim’s needs for control. Based on deterrence theory, we argue that a victim’s withheld (vs. expressed) forgiveness promotes transgressor compliance when the victim has low power, relative to the transgressor. This is because withheld (vs. expressed) forgiveness from a low-power victim elicits transgressor fear. On the other hand, because people are fearful of high-power actors, high-power victims can expect high levels of compliance from a transgressor, regardless of whether they express forgiveness or not. A critical incidents survey (Study 1) and an autobiographic recall study (Study 2) among employees, as well as a laboratory experiment among business students (Study 3), support these predictions. These studies are among the first to reveal that withholding forgiveness can be beneficial for low-power victims in a hierarchical context – ironically, a context in which offering forgiveness is often expected. |
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Keywords: | Power forgiveness compliance fear deterrence theory |
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