Upward social comparison toward proactive and reactive knowledge sharing: The roles of envy and goal orientations

Abstract

By integrating the social comparison and emotion literature, this study theorizes that upward social comparisons indirectly predict employees’ proactive and reactive knowledge sharing by eliciting benign and malicious envy, respectively. We further hypothesize that learning goal orientation (LGO) and performance goal orientation (PGO) moderate the indirect effects. Evidence from two studies, including data from 176 employee–supervisor dyads in various industries and an online scenario-based simulation, supported most of the hypotheses. For employees with a high LGO, upward social comparison had a significantly positive indirect effect on proactive knowledge sharing through benign envy. Conversely, for employees with a low PGO, upward social comparison exhibited a significantly negative indirect effect on reactive knowledge sharing via malicious envy. Our analysis revealed mostly positive implications of upward social comparison toward employees’ emotional reactions and knowledge sharing, emphasizing the unique role of social comparisons of abilities and performance in the workplace.