Donelson R. Forsyth

A meta-analysis of the Dark Triad and work behavior: a social exchange perspective.

We reviewed studies of the Dark Triad (DT) personality traits--Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy-and meta-analytically examined their implications for job performance and counterproductive work behavior (CWB). Relations among the DT traits and behaviors were extracted from original reports published between 1951 and 2011 of 245 independent samples (N = 43,907). We found that reductions in the quality of job performance were consistently associated with increases in Machiavellianism and psychopathy and that CWB was associated with increases in all 3 components of the DT, but that these associations were moderated by such contextual factors as authority and culture. Multivariate analyses demonstrated that the DT explains moderate amounts of the variance in counterproductivity, but not job performance. The results showed that the 3 traits are positively related to one another but are sufficiently distinctive to warrant theoretical and empirical partitioning.

Idealism, Relativism, and the Ethic of Caring

Abstract In this study, we investigated Gilligans (1982) theory of moral thought. Two hundred sixteen American college students (73% women and 20.5% black) completed two questionnaires designed to measure individual differences in personal moral philosophies. Analyses indicated that individuals who endorsed an ethic of caring also tended to have higher scores on the idealism scale of the Ethics Position Questionnaire, r = .53. Caring was also slightly correlated with the rejection of moral relativism, r = - .13. Individuals who espoused highly idealistic but nonrelativistic personal moral philosophies most strongly endorsed an ethic of caring. Sex differences among these students were conspicuously absent.

Personal Moral Philosophies and Moral Choice

Abstract The moral choices and post-transgression reactions of individuals who adopted varying personal moral philosophies were examined in an experimental setting that permitted the manipulation of the salience of moral norms and the nature of the consequences of ones actions. As predicted, the two situational variables had a strong impact on moral action; only 50.0% of the subjects chose to violate a moral norm when that norm was salient and they would personally benefit by their actions; this percentage increased to 76.2% in the other conditions. Personal ethical philosophies also influenced moral choices and post-transgression reactions, for more of the idealistic subjects chose to act immorally relative to the low idealists (91.66% vs 70.83%), and subjects who were low in both idealism and relativism were less likely to transgress a moral norm if they personally would benefit. The results lend support to the proposed interpersonal model of morality, particularly as applied to post-transgression reactions.

Moral Judgment The Influence of Ethical Ideology

In order to determine when ethical ideology influences judgments of morality, individuals who endorsed an absolutist, exceptionist, subjectivist, or situationist ideology morally evaluated an actor linked, at varying levels of responsibility, to positive or negative outcomes. As predicted, absolutists judged the actor more harshly than exceptionists, but only when the described actor has foreseen or intended to produce a highly negative consequence.

The Functions of Attributions

Four functions that attributions fulfill for the attributor are catalogued and described. Explanatory attributions promote an understanding of the social world through implicit attribution theories; predictive attributions facilitate the development of expectations concerning the likelihood offuture events; egocentric attributions meet self needs and reduce anxiety; and interpersonal attributions provide for the communication of social identity information to others. The importance of considering the functions of attributions is considered, and the implications of the functions approach for attributional asymmetries, the causelreason distinction, and arguments regarding the accessibility of higher-order cognitive processes are noted.

The Effects of Ethical Ideology on Moral Behavior

Summary The relationship between ethical ideology and moral behavior was investigated in two studies by tempting American college students (19 males and 61 females) to cheat on a test administered in a laboratory setting. Overall, students who adopted different ethical ideologies, as assessed by the 2 (relativistic vs nonrelativistic moral outlook) by 2 (idealistic vs pragmatic values) classification scheme of the Ethics Position Questionnaire (EPQ) behaved similarly. However, questionnaire ratings indicated (a) self-devaluation was most pronounced among absolutists (nonrelativistic and idealistic); (b) exceptionists (nonrelativistic and pragmatic) reported increased happiness the more they cheated; (c) situationists’ (relativistic and idealistic) self-ratings were not clearly related to the morality of their actions; and (d) subjectivists (relativistic and pragmatic) showed signs of fear of detection. Combined with previous data, these findings suggest variations in ethical ideology may predict individua...

Attributions, Affect, and Expectations: A Test of Weiner's Three-Dimensional Model

In a test of predictions derived from Weiners reformulated three-dimensional model of attributions, college students who had performed well or poorly on an examination reported the locus, stability, and controllability of the causes of their performance, their affective reactions, and their expectations. As is consistent with Weiners model, more positive affective reactions were reported by students who (a) felt they controlled the causes of their performance, (b) attributed success to internal factors or failure to external factors, and (c) attributed their outcomes to factors that were stable, controllable, and internal. Expectations, however, were related more to perceived locus of cause and controllability than to stability. The implications of attributions and perceived control in educational settings are discussed in relation to learned helplessness, expectations, and reactions to failure.

A Meta-analytic Test of Redundancy and Relative Importance of the Dark Triad and Five Factor Model of Personality

We examined the relationships between Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy-the three traits of the Dark Triad (DT)-and the Five-Factor Model (FFM) of personality. The review identified 310 independent samples drawn from 215 sources and yielded information pertaining to global trait relationships and facet-level relationships. We used meta-analysis to examine (a) the bivariate relations between the DT and the five global traits and 30 facets of the FFM, (b) the relative importance of each of the FFM global traits in predicting DT, and (c) the relationship between the DT and FFM facets identified in translational models of narcissism and psychopathy. These analyses identified consistent and theoretically meaningful associations between the DT traits and the facets of the FFM. The five traits of the FFM, in a relative importance analysis, accounted for much of the variance in Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy, respectively, and facet-level analyses identified specific facets of each FFM trait that were consistently associated with narcissism (e.g., angry/hostility, modesty) and psychopathy (e.g., straightforwardness, deliberation). The FFM explained nearly all of the variance in psychopathy (R(2) c  = .88) and a substantial portion of the variance in narcissism (R(2) c  = .42).

Bad Apples or Bad Barrels: An Examination of Group- and Organizational-Level Effects in the Study of Counterproductive Work Behavior

Research on counterproductive work behavior (CWB) has largely focused on the individual traits and perceptions that enhance or decrease CWB. Although useful, we propose that a multilevel perspective offers greater insight into CWB antecedents and outcomes by acknowledging the nested nature of the individual within the work group. We review the CWB literature and propose a testable multilevel model that incorporates individual, group, and organizational antecedents of CWB. We conclude with recommendations on alternative techniques to measuring individual CWB and its higher order antecedents.

Responsibility Diffusion in Cooperative Collectives

The authors examined questions about diffusion of responsibility in groups by asking group members to apportion responsibility for an outcome to each group member: Does responsibility diffuse more as groups increase in size but eventually level off in larger groups? Does responsibility diffuse equally, with each member getting an equal portion, or is it concentrated on certain individuals? Do group members apportion responsibility in ways that maximize their own self-esteem? Dyads attributed more responsibility to others after failure than success, but four-person groups tended to take the blame for failure. Overall, however, responsibility diffused in proportion to group size as group members concentrated more responsibility on some group members and withheld responsibility from others through specific role allocations. There was a significant degree of consensus in group members’ perceptions of individual members’ contributions to performance, but members generally felt they contributed more to the group than did other members.