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Abstract
Drawing upon conservation of resources theory, we develop and test a theoretical model that specifies how and when employee humor toward leaders affects leader abusive supervision. We propose that employee humor is negatively associated with leader abusive supervision via leader relational energy. Furthermore, the negative indirect relationship between employee humor and leader abusive supervision via leader relational energy is stronger for female leaders than for male leaders. An experiment and a multi-wave, multi-source field study provide substantial support for our hypotheses. Our findings contribute to the abusive supervision literature by identifying employee humor as a safe and effective bottom-up approach to prevent leader abusive supervision.
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; Yam, Kai Chi 3 ; Liu, Shengming 4 ; Qin, Xin 5 ; Tian, Guangdi 1 1 University of International Business and Economics, Business School, Beijing, China (GRID:grid.443284.d) (ISNI:0000 0004 0369 4765)
2 Beijing Normal University, Business School, Beijing, China (GRID:grid.20513.35) (ISNI:0000 0004 1789 9964)
3 National University of Singapore, Business School, Singapore, Singapore (GRID:grid.4280.e) (ISNI:0000 0001 2180 6431)
4 Fudan University, School of Management, Shanghai, China (GRID:grid.8547.e) (ISNI:0000 0001 0125 2443)
5 Sun Yat-Sen University, Sun Yat-Sen Business School, Guangzhou, China (GRID:grid.12981.33) (ISNI:0000 0001 2360 039X)