Study of Organizational Elements and Collective Guilt defining Organizational Misconduct Behavior

2004 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary

• Project/Area Number: 15530408
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Social psychology
• Research Institution: Japan Women's University
• Principal Investigator: HOMMA Michiko Japan Women's University, Faculty of Integrated Arts and Social Sciences, Professor, 人間社会学部, 教授 (40083216)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): KAZAMA Fumiaki Junnmonnji University, Faculty of Human Life, Lecturer, 人間生活学部, 講師 (20276760)
• Project Period (FY): 2003 – 2004
• Keywords: organizational misconduct behavior(OMB) / Organizational crime / Collective guilt / Lack of social justice / 情報交換の少なさ / 社会的公正

Research Abstract

Industrial organizations or corporate organizations have been demanded to comply with laws and foster morality within the organizations as their social responsibility so strongly as today, because of some industrial organizations having been committed to crime.
Such a misconduct or corruption within a company (OMB) is not a crime for an individual's benefits (slowdown, work absence), that is, a job crime, but an illegal act to achieve an organizational goal (corporate profits) as a constituent member of an organization. The aims of this project were examined conducting a survey on the employees of the company committed organizational misconduct case. 1 Examining a feeling of collective guilt felt by not only parties involved the OMB, but other employees of the same organization for this case as the emotion felt as a member of an organization. 2 Clarifying organizational elements affected OMB and clarifying group identification of employees as well as guilt felt for the case as employees. The results were following. 1 Feeling of collective guilt showed that explained member's feeling for OMB in other group member. 2 Group identification corrected with feeling collective guilt. 3 Although the organizational elements could not be showed to contribute to collective guilt significantly, low out of group recognition, low social justice and lack of information exchange were examined negatively contributing to collective guilt. These results were presented on International congress of psychology at Beijing.