Valentino E Chai, Benjamin A Converse, Stephen M Garcia, Patricia Chen
{"title":"Amicable rivalries and hostile rivalries: Divergent profiles of motivation and unethical conduct.","authors":"Valentino E Chai, Benjamin A Converse, Stephen M Garcia, Patricia Chen","doi":"10.1037/apl0001353","DOIUrl":"10.1037/apl0001353","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Rivalries motivate competitive performance but can also increase unethical intentions. Although extant theorizing treats this moral-motivational trade-off as inevitable, we show that rivalry's effect on unethical intentions depends on the tenor of the rivalry. Colder competitive relationships (hostile rivalries) exhibit the competitive profile documented in the literature: stronger motivation and increased unethical intentions. But warmer competitive relationships (amicable rivalries) involve a different competitive profile: stronger motivation without increased unethical intentions. Study 1 supported the assumption that participants could identify both amicable and hostile rivalries in their lives. These different rivalries evoked different judgments of warmth, but they did not differ in relationship duration, importance, or competitive domain. Study 2 demonstrated that amicable and hostile rivalries involve higher motivation compared to nonrival competition, but only hostile rivalries provoked stronger unethical intentions. This divergence can be partly explained by individuals' relative focus on the outcome of winning versus the process of competing against hostile (relative to amicable) rivals (Studies 2 and 3). Prompting participants to reflect on the value they derive from the process of competing against their hostile rival significantly reduced unethical intentions (Study 3). These findings encourage more nuanced theorizing about rivalry and identify pathways for organizations to leverage the motivational benefits of rivalry without the ethical trade-offs. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":" ","pages":"848-860"},"PeriodicalIF":6.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146165544","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The referral penalty: Decreased perceptions of merit undermine helping behavior toward referred employees.","authors":"Teodora K Tomova Shakur, Rellie Derfler-Rozin","doi":"10.1037/apl0001352","DOIUrl":"10.1037/apl0001352","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Employee referrals are commonly used by organizations due to their numerous benefits. However, it remains unclear how organizational incumbents, who are uninvolved in the hiring process, perceive and react to referral beneficiaries. Although traditional views suggest that the presence of a referral signals merit, incumbents' perceptions may differ. We theorize that incumbents are more likely to <i>perceive</i> referral beneficiaries as less merited than nonreferred employees due to perceived legitimacy concerns stemming from a simplified view that reliance on network contacts de facto compensates for lower qualifications. Drawing on equity theory, we then theorize that lower merit perceptions lead to less positive and more negative behaviors toward referral beneficiaries as an attempt to restore the equilibrium between beneficiaries' perceived inputs (e.g., driven by perceived lower merit) and outputs (e.g., being on payroll). Sampling employees from industries in which referrals are normative (Study 1a) and from a cultural context that is positively predisposed toward referrals (Study 1b) confirmed our theorizing. In a subsequent study, aiming to enhance the generalizability of our findings, we found supporting evidence for perceived equity violations, leading incumbents to engage in corrective behaviors toward referral beneficiaries (Study 2). Finally, testing our hypotheses more conservatively, we found that negative attributions toward referral beneficiaries persisted even when the referred employees had demonstrated high performance, thereby underscoring the robustness of our findings (Study 3). This article elucidates important unintended consequences of one of the most widely used recruitment methods-employee referrals-and draws implications for both theory and practice. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":" ","pages":"882-900"},"PeriodicalIF":6.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146213276","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sharing is ethicizing: Examining the impact of sharing observed unethical behavior with family members on ethical voice at work.","authors":"Anjier Chen, Ke Michael Mai, Yamon Min Ye","doi":"10.1037/apl0001356","DOIUrl":"10.1037/apl0001356","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>\"It takes a village\" to build an ethical workplace, and employees who witness unethical behavior in the workplace play a crucial role in alerting organizations to wrongdoing and preventing its recurrence. While prior research has primarily focused on personal and intraorganizational factors shaping observer responses to workplace unethical behavior, the potential influence of <i>extraorganizational</i> factors has been largely overlooked. Recognizing that employees often share workplace experiences with close others, such as their family members, we explore how the extent of sharing with family members influences employee responses to observed unethical behavior. Integrating the functional perspective of rumination and social sharing research, we theorize that the extent of sharing with family members increases observer reflective rumination about the unethical behavior and their tendency to engage in ethical voice at work. We found empirical evidence in two critical incident surveys (Studies 1 and 4), an experiment (Study 2), and a cross-lagged panel survey (Study 3). Finally, we discuss the theoretical and practical implications of this research. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":" ","pages":"916-939"},"PeriodicalIF":6.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146165559","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Ryan S Grant, Kristen M Shockley, Fadel K Matta, Malissa A Clark
{"title":"What's your 5 to 9? Antecedents and outcomes of profiles of daily recovery experience trajectories across the evening.","authors":"Ryan S Grant, Kristen M Shockley, Fadel K Matta, Malissa A Clark","doi":"10.1037/apl0001354","DOIUrl":"10.1037/apl0001354","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Every day at work employees are faced with resource depleting demands, necessitating recovery after work to avoid health and well-being detriments. Recovery theory and empirical results suggest that the four main recovery experiences that underlie employee recovery-psychological detachment, relaxation, mastery, and control-can occur concurrently. At the same time, each of these recovery experiences are dynamic and change across the evening. However, previous recovery research has not investigated and empirically examined both notions at the same time. Using a combined person-centered, dynamic approach across two experience sampling studies, we examine daily profiles of trajectories of all four recovery experiences across an entire evening after work. We also examine how daily job demands and resources relate to these profiles, and how profile membership relates to next-day work and well-being outcomes. Results revealed three profiles of recovery experience trajectory combinations that were predicted by job demands and resources. Results also revealed that having psychological detachment, relaxation, and control experiences early and often across the evening results in the most optimal daily recovery process for next-day well-being. This work represents an important stride forward as it is the first to examine <i>how</i> the recovery process unfolds, along with providing practical recommendations for how employees should best recover daily. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":" ","pages":"861-881"},"PeriodicalIF":6.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12904252/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146165513","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Huiyao Liao, Tammy D Allen, Zhaopeng Liu, Thomas Ptashnik, I-Heng Ray Wu
{"title":"Uncovering a motherhood advantage: How parenthood impacts perceptions of the meaning of work and work outcomes.","authors":"Huiyao Liao, Tammy D Allen, Zhaopeng Liu, Thomas Ptashnik, I-Heng Ray Wu","doi":"10.1037/apl0001355","DOIUrl":"10.1037/apl0001355","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Working parents constitute a substantial segment of the workforce. Nevertheless, misconceptions surrounding how parental role impacts working parents, particularly working mothers, have perpetuated stigma and workplace discrimination. To better understand the contributions of parents in professional contexts, we developed the construct of <i>family-centered symbolic meaning of work (FCSMW),</i> which captures individuals' cognitive orientation to construe work meaning through its symbolic relevance to family. Specifically, it refers to individuals' perception of their work as a vehicle for expressing their professional ethics and principles to their family and serving as role models. We then draw upon self-construal theory to theorize that, in comparison to nonparents, working parents are more likely to develop higher FCSMW. We further posit that the positive association between parental status and FCSMW is more pronounced for women than for men. Additionally, we argue that FCSMW positively correlates with employees' display of exemplary behaviors at work, such as increased work effort and organizational citizenship behavior. Finally, we propose that the indirect effects of parental status on work outcomes via FCSMW are stronger for women than men. To assess our proposed model, we first developed and validated a scale for measuring FCSMW. We then tested our hypotheses using three sets of data: two multisource, field samples from China, and one field sample from the United States, all of which supported our hypotheses. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":" ","pages":"827-847"},"PeriodicalIF":6.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146213264","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Catherine E Kleshinski, Savannah L Asay, Trevor Watkins, Stephen H Lee, Satish Krishnan
{"title":"Socially rewarded or penalized at work? The mixed reputational implications of disclosing one's positive nonwork events on social evaluations and workplace gossip.","authors":"Catherine E Kleshinski, Savannah L Asay, Trevor Watkins, Stephen H Lee, Satish Krishnan","doi":"10.1037/apl0001358","DOIUrl":"10.1037/apl0001358","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Existing research implicitly assumes that disclosing one's positive events-known as capitalization-is socially valuable in the workplace because such events are work-related and therefore relevant to coworkers and organizational goals. Indeed, management research has focused on how disclosers of positive work events and their coworkers feel about themselves. Broadening the focus of workplace capitalization to disclosure of positive <i>nonwork</i> events, which we refer to as <i>nonwork-work interpersonal capitalization</i>, we draw from boundary theory to investigate whether disclosers gain and/or lose social value at work because such capitalization is evaluated against normative expectations around the work-nonwork boundary. Specifically, we theorize that nonwork-work interpersonal capitalization carries mixed reputational implications for disclosers in terms of how they are evaluated by coworkers (i.e., perceived as other-focused and/or distracted from work) and, in turn, how coworkers spread evaluative information of disclosers to others (i.e., in terms of positive and/or negative workplace gossip about disclosers). Moreover, we propose that such reputational implications will be moderated by the discloser's workplace status. We test our model using a source- and time-separated field study (Study 1) and an experimental causal chain design (Study 2). Both studies showed that disclosers of positive nonwork events are more likely to be perceived as other-focused and thereby become targets of positive gossip. Across both studies, the effect of nonwork-work interpersonal capitalization on being perceived as distracted was stronger for lower status employees, who in turn were more likely to be gossiped about negatively. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":" ","pages":"940-954"},"PeriodicalIF":6.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146213272","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Supplemental Material for Unveiling the Hidden Hazards: Exploring the Unintended Consequences of Legal Changes on Employee Injuries","authors":"","doi":"10.1037/apl0001387.supp","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0001387.supp","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":"32 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":9.9,"publicationDate":"2026-06-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148379777","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Grateful leaders and attentive followers: How grateful attention transmits the cascade of gratitude expressions to strengthen coworker relationships.","authors":"Lauren R Locklear,Meghan E Kane,Mark G Ehrhart","doi":"10.1037/apl0001398","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0001398","url":null,"abstract":"Leader gratitude expressions are widely viewed as a powerful tool to build relationships with and foster the well-being of followers. The present research moves beyond the impact of that gratitude to address whether and how leader gratitude spreads beyond immediate subordinates to influence others throughout the organizational hierarchy. Existing perspectives suggest that leader behaviors may spread via behavioral imitation or emotional contagion, yet gratitude-an appraisal-dependent emotion-likely requires distinct cognitive processes to propagate. Integrating gratitude research with social information processing theory (Salancik & Pfeffer, 1978), we propose a novel pathway of gratitude trickle-down effects, grateful attention, defined as the allocation of attention toward gratitude-inducing stimuli in the workplace, including interpersonal and environmental cues. We argue that witnessing leader gratitude expressions shapes followers' attentional deployment, increasing followers' recognition of benefaction events and promoting their own gratitude expressions, which subsequently improves the quality of their relationships with coworkers. Across two preregistered field studies and a preregistered yoked experimental causal chain study, we competitively test grateful attention alongside social learning (leader emulation) and emotional contagion (felt gratitude). Results consistently demonstrate that grateful attention uniquely transmits the cascading effects of leader gratitude expressions beyond traditional behavioral and emotional explanations. These findings advance theory by identifying an information processing function of gratitude and clarify how leader gratitude expressions can catalyze the spread of gratitude throughout organizations. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":"179 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":9.9,"publicationDate":"2026-06-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148298877","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Scoring employment interviews with large language models: Evaluation design components, validity investigations, and best practice recommendations.","authors":"Kayden Stockdale, Louis Hickman, Siyi Liu","doi":"10.1037/apl0001396","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0001396","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Recently, supervised machine learning models served as alternatives to humans for scoring open-ended assessments, including employment interviews. More recently, large language models (LLMs) emerged as alternative raters that do not require task-specific training data. However, interview evaluation design considerations have predominantly been conceptualized for human raters, and thus, it is unclear whether the psychometric benefits of interview evaluation best practices generalize to LLM raters. Additionally, LLM raters introduce novel evaluation design decisions that could be psychometrically consequential. We investigated the effects of several LLM rater evaluation practices-specifically, prompt design, model selection, hyperparameters, and number of interviewers-on the LLM interview scores' psychometric properties in two interview data sets. In the first, interviewee Big Five personality traits were evaluated (<i>N</i> = 954). In the second, interviewees' question responses were evaluated on the targeted construct on Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scales (<i>N</i> = 144). We then investigated the LLM scores' intrarater reliabilities, test-retest correlations, convergent, discriminant, and criterion evidence of validity, group differences, and measurement bias. We compared this evidence, when possible, to the same evidence for human raters and supervised machine learning models. The results suggest that ensembles of larger, newer LLMs using prompts with detailed construct information hold potential for scoring employment interviews with psychometric properties comparable to or superior to supervised machine learning models and single human raters. We detail the reasons that organizations may want to be cautious in adopting LLMs for scoring high-stakes open-ended assessments, but since organizations have already begun adopting them, we also offer best practice recommendations. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.7,"publicationDate":"2026-06-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148277440","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Fenghao Andrew Wang, Xiaofei Hu, Chu-Ding Ling, Wu Liu
{"title":"A profile analysis of leader interpersonal emotion management strategies.","authors":"Fenghao Andrew Wang, Xiaofei Hu, Chu-Ding Ling, Wu Liu","doi":"10.1037/apl0001382","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0001382","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Research on interpersonal emotion regulation has illuminated how leaders can use four interpersonal emotion management (IEM) strategies-situation modification, cognitive change, attentional deployment, and modulating the emotional response-to help regulate subordinates' emotions and manage their work outcomes. However, this literature remains theoretically incomplete, because it has largely examined these strategies in isolation, overlooking the extent to which they coexist and interact in shaping subordinates' attributions and behaviors. To address this limitation, we adopt a person-centered approach to examine how leaders combine IEM strategies in distinct dyadic patterns (i.e., profiles) within leader-subordinate relationships. Drawing on the social role framework of interpersonal affect regulation and attribution theory, we further investigate the antecedents and outcomes of these patterns. Across four studies, we identify five stable dyadic IEM patterns-adaptive, moderate, inactive, pragmatic, and moderate-pragmatic-with the first four patterns emerging consistently across all four studies, and all five patterns emerging in three of the studies. We find these patterns are distinguished by dyadic-level leader IEM motives (i.e., coaching, compassion, and instrumentality motives) and are associated with distinct subordinate behavioral responses, such as organizational citizenship behavior and interaction avoidance toward the leader. Given the widely acknowledged prevalence and significance of emotions in the workplace, these findings have vital implications for theory and practice on IEM within organizations. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).</p>","PeriodicalId":15135,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Applied Psychology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.7,"publicationDate":"2026-06-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148277517","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}