Understanding Why Workers Engage in Rude Behaviors: A Social Interactionist Perspective

摘要

Interpersonal deviance is a form of counterproductive workplace behavior that is directly harmful to other individuals within an organization (Bennett and Robinson 2000). We argue that an important piece to understanding why deviance occurs is to go straight to the source-by asking individuals why they did it. Using Felson and Tedeschi's (1993) social interactionist perspective of aggression and violence as a theoretical frame, the purpose of the current study was to explore individuals' justifications for engaging in interpersonal deviance. The sample for this study consisted of 291 full-time working individuals obtained through an online service. Constructs were measured through the use of a web-based survey. Iterative K-means cluster analyses revealed interesting patterns that demonstrate the differential importance of power, retaliation, and having "no reason" in the decision to be deviant.