Public Service Motivation and Prosocial Rule-Breaking: An International Vignettes Study in Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands

Abstract

We theorize that people with high Public Service Motivation (PSM) are especially prone to engage in prosocial rule-breaking (PSRB) behavior, which ultimately leads to discriminatory practices, particularly for clients associated with positive affect. We conduct an original vignette study in three countries (Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands) with 928 observations in total. Our findings provide tentative behavioral evidence on a linear relationship between PSM and the likelihood of PSRB and a strong positive association with client likeability, which is an asymmetric relationship: Negative affect cues have a larger negative effect than positive affect cues have a positive effect on PSRB. Although our results vary across the three country studies regarding the effects of PSM, overall, the results imply that high-PSM individuals have a tendency to being more likely to engage in PSRB and that clients who are perceived as more favorable will receive a less strict application of bureaucratic rules compared to less favorable clients.

Going above and beyond for your Beliefs: the Effects of Ideological Psychological Contract Breach and Fulfillment on pro-Social Rule Breaking

“…For example, Shum et al (2019) found a negative relationship between moral courage and a specific form of PSRB-prosocial rule-breaking behaviors with a motive to help coworkers (i.e., PSBC)-in the hospitality industry. Weißmüller et al (2020) found a positive relationship between public service motivation and PSRB in public-sector employees.…”

“…In doing so, employees may break out of the organizational boundaries that restrict them from contributing directly or indirectly to the "cause"-going above and beyond to preserve their ideologies. For example, in the public sector, employees with higher public service motivation are more likely to engage in PSRB-namely breaking organizational rules to help the citizens that they believe need and deserve help (Weißmüller et al, 2020). Morrison (2006) identified a few significant predictors of PSRB-autonomy, risk-taking propensity and co-worker behavior.…”

Weißmüller & DeWaele (2021) - Would you Bribe your Lecturer? A Quasi-experimental Study on Burnout and Bribery in Higher Education

“…Adequate pretests of the treatment stimuli were conducted before the experiment was rolled out (Wilson & While, 1998). Prior studies on corruption-related issues using similar (quasi-)experimental study designs and vignette-based framing stimuli found small to medium-sized effects (see, e.g., Weißmüller et al (2020) or Ripoll and Ballart (2020)). In the prospect of small to mediumsized effects (Cohen's d ≤ 0.3; power = 0.8; α = 0.05), samples should comprise at least n = 176 respondents (Ellis, 2010), which has been achieved for each sample.…”

Would you Bribe your Lecturer? A Quasi-experimental Study on Burnout and Bribery in Higher Education

“…Adequate pretests of the treatment stimuli were conducted before the experiment was rolled out (Wilson & While, 1998). Prior studies on corruption-related issues using similar (quasi-)experimental study designs and vignette-based framing stimuli found small to medium-sized effects, see, e.g., Weißmüller et al (2020) or Ripoll and Ballart (2020). In the prospect of small to medium-sized effects (Cohen's d ≤ 0.3; power = 0.8; α = 0.05), samples should comprise at least n = 176 respondents (Ellis, 2010), which has been achieved for each sample.…”