| Author: | Xia, Ying |
| Title: | Is paternalistic leadership challenge or hindrance? : congruence effect and incongruence effect of authoritarianism and benevolence on employee outcomes |
| Advisors: | Shaw, Jason (MM) |
| Degree: | Ph.D. |
| Year: | 2018 |
| Subject: | Hong Kong Polytechnic University -- Dissertations Leadership Management |
| Department: | Department of Management and Marketing |
| Pages: | 114 pages : color illustrations |
| Language: | English |
| Abstract: | Although some consensus has been reached that paternalistic leadership combines two key dimensions-authoritarianism and benevolence, it is still unclear whether paternalistic leaders should maintain congruence between authoritarianism and benevolence or not. Prior studies have created a dilemma for paternalistic leaders that should leaders enhance authoritarianism and benevolence simultaneously or maximize only benevolence. Drawing on the transactional stress model, I examine the congruence and incongruence effects of the combination of authoritarianism and benevolence on employees' challenge stress and hindrance stress, which in turn influences follower's attitude (i.e., turnover intention) and job performance outcomes. This study hypothesized that congruence between authoritarianism and benevolence can lead to higher challenge stress appraisal (also lower hindrance stress appraisal) than the incongruence between them does. Challenge stress is higher when the leader's authoritarianism is in congruence with benevolence at a high level than it is when they are in congruence at a low level, while hindrance stress is lower when the congruence level is high than it is low. Subordinates' hindrance stress is higher (challenge stress is lower) when a leader's authoritarianism is higher than benevolence than it is when a leader's benevolence is higher than authoritarianism. Further, I proposed the mediating effect of challenge stress and hindrance stress in the relationship between paternalistic leadership and employee outcomes. These hypotheses were examined using a sample of 252 supervisor-employee dyads from two manufacturing companies in China. This study adopted hierarchical regression method and polynomial regression method to test the hypotheses, and I created a block variable by combining the polynomial terms to test the indirect effects of challenge stress and hindrance stress. The results showed that the congruence between benevolent leadership and authoritarian leadership is critical to consider in predicting hindrance stress. Challenge stress will be high when authoritarianism and benevolence are all in high level. The asymmetrical incongruence effects were supported in the relationship between paternalistic leadership and hindrance stress, which means hindrance stress was lower when benevolence was higher than authoritarianism than it was when authoritarianism was higher than benevolence. Moreover, the mediating results indicate that challenge stress is an important mechanism in explaining the interplay of paternalistic leadership and performance, and hindrance stress is an important mechanism in explaining the interplay of paternalistic leadership and turnover intention. The post hoc analyses findings didn't find the congruence effects between the combination of benevolence and authoritarianism and outcome variables. This dissertation intends to provide theoretical and practical implications for paternalistic leadership and stress-related research. |
| Rights: | All rights reserved |
| Access: | open access |
Files in This Item:
| File | Description | Size | Format | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 991022189458603411.pdf | For All Users | 1.37 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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