Role of Schadenfreude and Attributional Styles in Organizational Citizenship Behavior of Employees

Abstract

The present study aimed to explore the role of schadenfreude and attributional style in organizational citizenship behavior among employees of research organization and telecommunication companies. It was also attempted to explore the role of various demographics (gender, age, type or organization, and job experience) in relation to major constructs of the sstudy. A convenient sample of (N=300) comprised of both male and female workers working in both type of organizations. Measures of Schadenfreude Scale (Batool, 2013), Attributional Style Questionnaire (Peterson et al., 1982) and Organizational Citizenship Behavior Scale (Podaskoff, MacKenzie, Moorman & Fetter, 1990) were used to assess schadenfreude inclinations attributional styles and pro-social behavior in organization respectively. Results showed that schadenfreude was negatively associated with organizational citizenship behavior and internal attributional style and positively associated with external attributional style. Organizational citizenship behavior was negatively associated with the external attributional style and positively associated with internal attributional style. Male employees showed more inclination for schadenfreude and lesser organizational citizenship behavior as compare to the female employees. However non-significant findings were observed to gender on attributional styles. Old age employees have more inclination towards schadenfreude and lesser towards organizational citizenship behavior. Old age employees are more inclined towards external attribution styles and lesser towards the internal attributional styles as compare to the young and new employees. Private organization’s employees are more inclined towards organizational citizenship behavior and lesser towards schadenfreude as compare to the employees of public organizations. However private organizations employees are more inclined towards the internal attribution style and lesser towards the external attributional styles as compare to the public origination’s employees.