Narcissism and Counterproductive Work Behavior (CWB): Meta‐Analysis and Consideration of Collectivist Culture, Big Five Personality, and Narcissism's Facet Structure

Abstract

A recent review of the relationship between narcissism and CWB reported two key results: (a) narcissism is the dominant predictor of CWB among the dark triad personality traits, and (b) the narcissism–CWB relationship is moderated by ingroup collectivist culture (k = 9; N = 2,708; O'Boyle, Forsyth, Banks, & McDaniel, 2012). The current work seeks to enhance understanding of the narcissism–CWB relationship in five ways. First, we update O'Boyle et al.'s (2012) meta‐analysis to include over 50 per cent more data (k = 16; N = 4,424), and demonstrate that narcissism remains the largest unique predictor of CWB after controlling for the Big Five personality traits. Second, we reveal that O'Boyle and colleagues' inference of cross‐cultural moderation hinges on a single dataset from Bangladesh. Third, based on an original international dataset of on‐line respondents, we reaffirm that ingroup collectivist culture does moderate/weaken the narcissism–CWB relationship. Fourth, we show that the narcissism–CWB relationship is stronger in published (corrected r = .48) versus unpublished studies (corrected r = .15). Finally, we propose a new moderator of the narcissism–CWB relationship: narcissism's facets. One facet (Entitlement/Exploitativeness) relates positively to CWB, whereas another facet of narcissism (Leadership/Authority) relates negatively to CWB.

Can Emotional Stability Buffer the Effect of Job Stress on Deviant Behavior?

“…It is also probably beneficial that employers hire individuals who possess self-control because they tend to manage or regulate well their negative emotional reactions when encountering less than ideal situations. Even though there has been increasing interest in and progress on the effect of dispositional factors on employee behavior (Linton and Power, 2013;Michel and Bowling, 2013;Grijalva and Newman, 2015), many questions have yet to be answered, as indicated in the argument on the status of studies with respect to personality in personnel recruitment (Morgeson et al, 2007;Ones et al, 2007;Tett and Christiansen, 2007). Additionally, providing training to employees in emotion regulation when under stress may be useful.…”

Antecedents of Deviant Work Behavior: A Review of Research

“…Consistent with other research [16], employees may engage in CWB as a way to regulator their emotions and cope with work stressors. In a recent study [17], narcissism, a facet of the Big Five personality traits, has shown to be the dominant predictor of CWB after controlling for the other facets of personality.…”

Web of deceit: Relationships between the dark triad, perceived ability to deceive and cyberloafing

“…Grijalva & Newman, 2015;O'Boyle et al, 2012). For example, in two studies, a meta-analysis and an international primary data collection, Grijalva and Newman examined the relationship between narcissism and counterproductive workplace behaviours.…”

“…Building on the existing literature demonstrating links between the Dark Triad traits and CWBs (Grijalva & Newman, 2015;O'Boyle et al, 2012), and extending examination of personality and cyberloafing (e.g. Jia et al, 2013) to the Dark Triad traits, the current study presented a model to be evaluated using path analysis.…”

“…However, identifying the individual difference factors that contribute to an individual's cyberloafing, and the processes involved in that behaviour, might further inform corporate approaches to managing this behaviour, and facilitate means to reduce existing or future behaviour. The role of dark characteristics in CWBs is well-established (Grijalva & Newman, 2015;O'Boyle, Forsyth, Banks, & McDaniel, 2012), yet the application of these has not extended to the rapidly changing web connected workplace, or to cyberloafing behaviours that may in fact lack the harmful intent associated with traditional counterproductive workplace behaviours. The aim of this research was therefore to investigate whether dark personality characteristics predict an individual's cyberloafing behaviour in a vocational context, and the processes by which this occurs.…”