The ripple effect of martial law: Unveiling the path to unethical behaviour

Although research suggests immoral governmental actions can generate psychological strain, little is known about how individuals' continued rumination about such events disrupts recovery and influences unethical behaviour at work. To address this, we examine how rumination about a president's martial law declaration—rather than the declaration itself—shaped employees' daily recovery and workplace behaviour. Grounded in self-regulation theory, we propose a process where rumination about martial law disrupts citizens' recovery at home (sleep quality), which in turn leads to unethical behaviours at work. We collected daily diary data over eight workdays during the politically volatile period between the president's declaration of martial law and his impeachment, allowing us to capture short-term fluctuations in recovery and behaviour. The final sample consists of 1296 observations from 162 male participants. Our findings show daily rumination about martial law—triggered by political uncertainty—had a within-person indirect effect on unethical behaviour via poor sleep quality. Additionally, we examine the moderating roles of constructive patriotism and affective commitment on self-regulatory processes. Our results reveal constructive patriotism amplified the negative effect of rumination about martial law on poor sleep quality, while affective commitment buffered the detrimental impact of poor sleep quality on unethical behaviour.