The whiplash effect: The (moderating) role of attributed motives in emotional and behavioral reactions to abusive supervision.
Abstract
Although extant research shows a clear link between abusive supervision and detrimental consequences for organizations and their members, the popular press and media are replete with suggestions that abusive supervision can be positive and motivating. Drawing from the social functional view of emotions and emerging research on attributed motives of abusive supervision, we examine this phenomenon, which we refer to as the whiplash effect -the notion that subordinates may display different emotional and behavioral reactions to supervisory abuse depending on their attributions for abuse. We conduct 3 studies to examine this effect at both the between- and within person level. Results from a multisource, time-lagged field study (between-person) and a laboratory-based experiment (between-person) indicate that when subordinates believe that the abusive supervisor is motivated by desires to cause harm (i.e., injury initiation attribution is higher), abusive supervision is more likely to engender anger, which, in turn, elicits more deviant behaviors and fewer organizational citizenship behaviors; however, when subordinates believe the abusive supervisor is motivated by desires to improve performance (i.e., performance promotion attribution is higher), abusive supervision is more likely to evoke guilt, which, in turn, elicits fewer deviant behaviors and more organizational citizenship behaviors. These results were then expanded in an experience sampling study (within-person), which al…
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Yu and Duffy's (2021) results revealed that employees' organizational citizenship behaviors can be enhanced by abusive supervision when a performance promotion attribution is made.
“and Yu and Duffy ' s (2021) results revealed that employees ' organizational citizenship behaviors can be enhanced by abusive supervision when a performance promotion attribution is made.”
From The evolution of leadership: Past insights, present trends, and future directions (2025) · cites this paper as Yu & Duffy, 2021
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- Authors
- Yu, L., & Duffy, M. K.
- Affiliations
- University of British Columbia (CA)
- University of Minnesota (US)
- Venue
- Journal of Applied Psychology
- Published
- 2021-05
- Volume
- 106
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 754-773
- ISSN
- 0021-9010 (ISSN-L)
- 1939-1854
- OpenAlex
- W3043581168
- Cited by
- 123
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 26 · 2025: 32 · 2024: 20 · 2023: 20 · 2022: 19 · 2021: 6
- FWCI
- 15.02
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Applied Psychology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- University of Minnesota
- University of British Columbia
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Workplace Violence and Bullying
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management › Job Satisfaction and Organizational Behavior
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Emotional Labor in Professions
- Keywords
- abusive supervision, attribution theory, anger, guilt, deviance, organizational citizenship behavior, emotional responses
- MeSH terms
- Aggression, Emotions, Employment, Humans, Motivation, Social Behavior
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