Morela Hernandez

An integrative process model of leadership: examining loci, mechanisms, and event cycles.

Utilizing the locus (source) and mechanism (transmission) of leadership framework (Hernandez, Eberly, Avolio, & Johnson, 2011), we propose and examine the application of an integrative process model of leadership to help determine the psychological interactive processes that constitute leadership. In particular, we identify the various dynamics involved in generating leadership processes by modeling how the loci and mechanisms interact through a series of leadership event cycles. We discuss the major implications of this model for advancing an integrative understanding of what constitutes leadership and its current and future impact on the field of psychological theory, research, and practice.

It’s Only a Matter of Time Death, Legacies, and Intergenerational Decisions

Intergenerational decisions affect other people in the future. The combination of intertemporal and interpersonal distance between decision makers in the present and other people in the future may lead one to expect little intergenerational generosity. In the experiments reported here, however, we posited that the negative effect of intertemporal distance on intergenerational beneficence would be reversed when people were primed with thoughts of death. This reversal would occur because death priming leads individuals to be concerned with having a lasting impact on other people in the future. Our experiments show that when individuals are exposed to death priming, the expected tendency to allocate fewer resources to others in the future, as compared with others in the present, is reversed. Our findings suggest that legacy motivations triggered by death priming can trump intergenerational discounting tendencies and promote intergenerational beneficence.

Cultivating Follower Trust: Are All Leader Behaviors Equally Influential?

We draw on the relevant extant literatures to examine the pathways to building trust through leader behaviors with three distinct emphases: the leader (personal leadership), the leader-follower relationship (relational leadership), and the situation (contextual leadership). We test this model using experimental data collected from experienced managers (Study 1) and field data collected from the peers and direct reports of business executives (Study 2). The results from these two studies both build on and challenge current views in the trust and leadership literatures about how leaders influence trust. Consistent with past literature, our findings indicate that various leadership behaviors appear to directly promote follower trust when analyzed independently. However, when these behaviors are analyzed jointly, relational leadership behaviors were found to mediate the effects of personal and contextual leadership behaviors on follower trust. The implications for theory and practice are discussed.

Pushing the boundaries: A review and extension of the psychological dynamics of intergenerational conflict in organizational contexts

We review previous research on intergenerational conflict, focusing on the practical implications of this research for organizational leaders. We explain how the interaction between the interpersonal and intertemporal dimensions of intergenerational decisions creates the unique psychology of intergenerational decision-making behavior. In addition, we review the boundary conditions that have characterized much of the previous research in this area, and we examine the potential effects of loosening these constraints. Our proposals for future research include examination of the effect of intra-generational decision making on intergenerational beneficence, consideration of the role of third parties and linkage issues, investigation of the effects of intergenerational communications and negotiation when generations can interact, examination of the role of social power in influencing intergenerational interactions, investigation of the interaction between temporal construal and immortality striving, and exploration of the ways in which present decision makers detect and define the intergenerational dilemmas in their social environments.

Toward an Understanding of Psychological Distance Reduction between Generations: A Cross-cultural Perspective

We explore how cultural factors at both socio-economic and psychological individual levels affect the present generations beneficence toward future generations in organizations and society. We examine how socio-economic mechanisms may influence the present generations focus on the future consequences of their decisions. In addition, we examine how self-construals in different cultures might result in different mechanisms underlying the reduction of psychological distance between generations in different cultures. Implications of our cross-cultural analysis to intergenerational decision making within the context of group research in general are discussed.

The role of proximal social contexts: Assessing stigma-by-association effects on leader appraisals

Prior research suggests that segregation in the U.S. workplace is on the rise (Hellerstein, Neumark, & McInerney, 2008); as such, leaders are more likely to lead groups of followers composed primarily of their own race (Elliot & Smith, 2001; Smith & Elliott, 2002). Drawing from theory on stigma-by-association, the authors posit that such segregated proximal social contexts (i.e., the leaders group of followers) can have detrimental effects on leader appraisals. Specifically, they argue that leaders of mostly Black follower groups experience stigmatization based on race stereotypic beliefs, which affects how they are viewed in the eyes of observers. The results of a large field study show performance evaluations generally tend to be lower when the proportion of Black followers is higher. Moreover, 3 experiments demonstrate that the impact of proximal social contexts extends to other outcomes (i.e., perceptions of market value and competency) but appears limited to those who are less internally and externally motivated to control their prejudice. Taken together, these findings explain how workplace segregation systematically can create a particular disadvantage for Black leaders.

Building sense out of situational complexity The role of ambivalence in creating functional leadership processes

There is growing consensus among scholars that the organizational environment has become increasingly complex, dynamic, and socially demanding. Leaders and followers navigate through a cognitive paradox where assessments of the situation can be at once cognitively overpowering and cognitively deceiving. In this article, we propose that complex situations can lead to ambivalence, a psychological state caused by contrasting evaluative orientations toward an object or situation. We propose that ambivalence can become a functional cognitive process that provides cognitive discomfort and fluidity for joint contextual interpretation when leaders and followers share ambivalent cognitive states. We develop a theoretical model of how this process unfolds, highlighting how and when situational complexity can trigger leader and follower ambivalence leading to distinct interpretative processes. Taken together, we explain how ambivalence can facilitate collaborative contextual interpretation within complex situations. In so doing, we advance the current understanding of ambivalence by explicating its role in creating functional leadership processes.

Identified ambivalence: When cognitive conflicts can help individuals overcome cognitive traps.

In this article we investigate the functional effects of ambivalence on decision-making processes. We build on the misattribution literature and recent work on ambivalence to propose that individuals who properly identify the causes of their ambivalence (i.e., identified ambivalence) can systematically process relevant situational cues to make more effective decisions. The results of 4 studies demonstrate that individuals experiencing identified ambivalence are less influenced by cognitive biases (i.e., the framing effect, availability bias, and conjunction bias) than individuals experiencing no ambivalence or felt ambivalence. Notably, we find that contextual awareness accounts for the effect of identified ambivalence on decision effectiveness. We then investigate the role of trait self-control as a specific contingency in our model; our results indicate that identified ambivalence leads to effective decisions when individuals are low in trait self-control. Taken together, we advance theory and offer robust, consistent empirical evidence that explains why and how ambivalence can result in functional outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record

An Examination of the Temporal Intricacies of Job Engagement

In this article, we theoretically develop and test the temporal intricacies of job engagement. Drawing on the attention view of social cognition, we examine the interplay of employees’ temporally relevant perspectives of fit (i.e., retrospected, current, and anticipated) within their ongoing membership to the organization. Utilizing field data gathered from a large multinational company over multiple time periods, we found support for a conditional indirect effect model. Specifically, our findings showed that current needs-supply (NS) fit accounted for two of the previously investigated antecedents of job engagement (i.e., psychological meaningfulness and safety), especially when organizational identification was low. Moreover, anticipated perceptions of NS fit fully mediated the influences of psychological meaningfulness and availability on job engagement. The mediating effect relating to psychological availability was also especially pronounced when organizational identification was low. By shedding light on employees’ temporally constructed psychological experiences, our research suggests that job engagement is not only affected by employees’ contemporaneous understandings of their jobs but also influenced by their perceptions of anticipated opportunities.

Trust and Employment Negotiations: The Importance of Feeling in Control

Two studies examined the effects of open communication and perceived control on interpersonal trust in employment negotiations. In a simulated negotiation, participants adopted the role of job applicant and encountered a series of offers (concessions) from their prospective manager. Information disclosed by their prospective manager varied creating different degrees of openness. As well, in Study 1 participants evaluated each offer (or concession) and their level of trust in their prospective manager at each stage of the bargaining process creating an impression of control; in Study 2 participants made these assessments after the negotiation. Taken together, the results of these studies showed that perceived process control was more important than information disclosure, in the formation of trust in negotiations. Moreover, trust was contingent upon evidence of process control despite the managers openness, or willingness, to share information with the applicant. Furthermore, the more trust was attributed to the manager, the more likely the applicant was to find the job offer attractive and subsequently accept the job offer. The implications of these findings for negotiation theory and research are discussed.