The push and pull between culture and integrity in the workplace: an ethical decision-making context

Abstract

Purpose

Multinational corporations encounter numerous challenges in making ethical decisions as they navigate diverse factors in every country where they conduct business. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no research has been committed to investigating the effects of one’s cultural perspectives and moral virtue. Building on a theoretical foundation recently laid out in the literature (i.e. the culture-influenced value-specific model), this study aims to investigate the relationship between components of national culture (i.e. power distance, individualism, uncertainty avoidance and masculinity) and the moral virtue of integrity.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper uses a quantitative analysis methodology conducted among 160 US-based workers to test a direct effect model of the relationship between national culture and integrity. The hypothesized relationships are examined using linear regression. Additional analysis includes reliability and representativeness analyses.

Findings

Direct effects support the hypotheses that a worker’s cultural perspectives affect integrity. Specifically, this study found that a worker’s cultural aspects of power distance, individualism and masculinity are negatively and significantly related to an individual’s level of integrity. Additionally, an individual’s level of uncertainty avoidance is positively related to integrity.

Originality/value

This study contributes to the literature and practice by demonstrating how the culture in which one resides has an impact on the level of integrity one holds and potentially exhibits in the workplace. These findings are significant in that they are among the first to consider culture and moral virtue in an ethical decision-making model. Furthermore, these findings open an additional pathway for research concerning ethical behavior in the workplace.