Recently, Feng Baoyi, Doctoral Student, and Lin Weipeng, Professor at the School of Management, Shandong University, published their latest research "Leader Humility and Follower Prosocial Behaviours: Integrating Three Theoretical Perspectives" in the Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, an international journal of management. The co-authors of the research are Professor Jia Jianfeng from Northeastern University and Feng Baoyi from Shandong University, and the corresponding authors are Professor Lin Weipeng and Assistant Professor Deng Yingxin from Beijing Institute of Technology. Shandong University is the first and corresponding author affiliation and the research is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China.
Humility is considered a core virtue for leaders, and past research has shown that Leader Humility promotes Prosocial Behaviours among Followers and explored its underlying theoretical mechanisms from different theoretical perspectives. However, because each theoretical mechanism has been studied separately and these theoretical mechanisms have not been systematically integrated, it is unclear whether the benefits of Leader Humility are the result of one or more mechanisms. In short, the current understanding of how Leader Humility affects Followers remains fragmented and lacks consensus. The research integrates three theoretical perspectives common to Leadership and Leader Humility, including the Social Cognitive Perspective, the Social Exchange Perspective, and the Social Identity Perspective, to systematically examine the effects of Leader Humility on different types of Prosocial Behaviours of Followers and the underlying mechanisms (see FIGURE 1 for the theoretical model).
The research tested the theoretical model through two field questionnaire surveys, and the results showed that the above three theoretical perspectives differed in explaining the strength and scope of the impact of Leader Humility on Follower Prosocial Behaviours. Among them, the Social Exchange Perspective demonstrated the strongest explanatory power and widest explanatory scope, followed by the Social Cognitive Perspective, while the Social Identity Perspective had a relatively small explanatory effect. By integrating the three theoretical perspectives and testing all three theoretical mechanisms simultaneously, the research reveals the major theoretical drivers of the impact of Leader Humility, reconciling the different prior theoretical perspectives. In addition, the research identifies the unique explanatory strength of each theoretical mechanism and compares the relative explanatory strengths of the three theoretical mechanisms by constructing an integrative model. Finally, the study encompassed multiple types of Prosocial Behaviours (including knowledge exchange, helping behaviours, and voice behaviours), revealing that Leader Humility may trigger different types of Prosocial Behaviours through different theoretical mechanisms.
Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology is an important leading international journal in management, which is an ABS/AJG-4 journal, JCR Q1 with an impact factor of 6.2. The journal is dedicated to publishing cutting-edge research in the field of Occupational and Organizational Management Psychology.
