Linking Cyber Incivility With Job Performance Through Job Satisfaction: The Buffering Role of Positive Affect

PSI CHI JOURNAL OF PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH ABSTRACT. Incivility at work has the potential to impact both individual (e.g., psychological health) and organizational outcomes (e.g., job performance and turnover). In line with Affective Events Theory, the current study proposed a moderated mediation model wherein employee job satisfaction would mediate the relation between cyber incivility and job performance, and trait positive affect would buffer the negative impact of cyber incivility on performance. Two-hundred twenty participants completed measures of cyber incivility, job satisfaction, job performance, positive affect, negative affect, and quantitative workload. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that cyber incivility was negatively related to job satisfaction (ß = -.19, p = .006), as well as job performance (ß = -.14, p = .037), while controlling for negative affect. Additionally, results of mediation analyses indicated that job satisfaction served as a mediator of the cyber incivility-job performance relationship because employees who experienced cyber incivility reported lower job satisfaction, which was linked with lower job performance (indirect effect = -.020, 95% CIs = -.041, -.009; Sobel z = -2.36, p = .02). Trait positive affect moderated the relationship between cyber incivility and job performance such that the performance of those individuals with higher positive affect was not as negatively impacted by the cyber incivility as individuals with lower positive affect (b = .08, p = .044). The results are discussed in terms of their implications for the wired 21st century world of work. Linking Cyber Incivility With Job Performance Through Job Satisfaction: The Buffering Role of Positive Affect