Multi-level Longitudinal Dynamics Between Procedural Justice and Interpersonal Helping in Organizational Teams

Abstract

Procedural justice (PJ) is a meaningful predictor of prosocial behavior. This study expands prior studies by theorizing and empirically validating the potential multi-level effects of PJ on the helping behavior of group members. Specifically, we examined the effects of individual PJ perceptions and group-level PJ climate on helping behavior. We further propose theoretically plausible mediators of the PJ-helping relationship and the potential moderating functions of the PJ climate strength. We employed multi-wave data collected from 1,064 employees in 107 work teams over a three-year period to test the multi-level effects of PJ on helping behavior. Results of the multi-level analysis showed that PJ climate enhances helping behavior by two intervening processes, namely, the group-level coworker trust climate and individual-level organizational commitment. Moreover, the level and strength of PJ climate served as cross-level moderators that amplify the individual-level effect of PJ perceptions on helping behavior. By employing a three-wave time-lagged design, this study demonstrated the interplay between PJ perceptions and PJ climate, which induced changes in the helping behavior of group members by multi-level mediating and moderating processes that unfold over a substantial period of time. This study theorized and empirically validated multi-level processes involving PJ as a predictor of individual helping behavior by specifying the intermediate mechanisms and boundary conditions that account for these unexplored interpersonal phenomena. The use of multi-wave data revealed the temporal development of this multi-level dynamics in organizational teams.