Journal of Business Ethics (2006) 67:407–419
DOI 10.1007/s10551-006-9034-4
The Effects of the Perceived Behavioral
Integrity of Managers on Employee
Attitudes: A Meta-analysis
ABSTRACT. Perceived behavioral integrity involves
the employee’s perception of the alignment of the
manager’s words and deeds. This meta-analysis examined
the relationship between perceived behavioral integrity
of managers and the employee attitudes of job satisfac-
tion, organizational commitment, satisfaction with the
leader and affect toward the organization. Results indi-
cate a strong positive relationship overall (average
r = 0.48, p<0.01). With only 12 studies included,
exploration of moderators was limited, but preliminary
analysis suggested that the gender of the employees and
the number of levels between the employee and the
manager are potential moderators of the relationship. In
the current sample of studies, country where the re-
search was conducted did not seem to have any mod-
erating effects. In addition to suggesting further
investigation of potential moderators, we call for re-
search that examines the relationship between behavioral
integrity and outcomes that include individual behavior
and organizational performance.
KEY WORDS: behavioral integrity, employee attitudes,
job satisfaction, managerial ethics, organizational com-
mitment, meta-analysis, systematic review, research
synthesis
Introduction
Since the year 2000, the business news has been
inundated with stories of misbehavior of senior
corporate officers who appear to be out for their
own gain. Allegations of the intentional misstate-
ment of earnings and insider trading, along with
pictures of lavish personal parties financed with
company dollars have all made the headlines. The
scandals at Enron, Tyco, and WorldCom have
Ó Springer 2006
Anne L. Davis
Hannah R. Rothstein
illustrated just how far some managers may stray
from the path of honesty and integrity, as well as the
considerable consequences for their entire organi-
zations and beyond.
Managers at lower levels may feel that there are
not any lessons to be learned from what these top
executives have done, because their own actions
are far removed from the large scale of these
wrongdoings. However, even small-scale unethical
acts can affect an organization and its members.
These effects may not be visible as they occur but
can manifest themselves in the attitudes and
behaviors of employees who observe them.
Unethical practices at lower levels may affect the
organization but much of what is written about this
in the popular press is based on anecdotal, rather
than scientific evidence. Much of it focuses on
formal ethics policies and codes of conduct
implying that communicating codes and policies is
the key to ensuring that organizational members act
ethically. Often the advice is prescriptive, telling
managers how they should act, but no hard evi-
dence is provided on why it is important. Empirical
evidence on the correlates of integrity may amplify
for managers the reasons why they should act with
integrity. This meta-analysis integrates the empirical
research on the relationship between the perceived
behavioral integrity of managers and the employee
attitudes of job satisfaction, organizational com-
mitment, satisfaction with the leader and affect
toward the organization.
Behavioral integrity
Becker (1998) was one of the first to refine the def-
inition of integrity to be more than just having
408 Anne L. Davis and Hannah R. Rothstein
principles and values. He described integrity as
‘‘...commitment in action to a morally justified set of
principles and values...’’ (Becker, 1998: 157). Simons
built upon this distinction and defined behavioral
integrity as ‘‘the perceived pattern of alignment
between an actor’s words and deeds’’ (2002: 19). This
definition holds the implicit assumption that the
words spoken are ethical. The implication is that
the better the alignment between words and deeds,
the greater credibility a manager has and the greater
trust an employee will have in the manager. Behav-
ioral integrity concerns the fit between what the
manager says and what the manager does, and in-
cludes the perception of managerial behavior that is
supportive of the organization’s mission and value
statements as well as employees’ perception that the
manager acts in accordance with how someone who
holds the position of manager ‘‘ought’’ to act. Fur-
ther, behavioral integrity includes the perception that
the manager’s behavior is in line with his or her
personal statements regarding values, priorities, and
management style. Employees look for managers to
follow through on what they have communicated to
employees. In the case where a manager does not
support the organization’s policies due to a conflict
with his or her own personal values, perceptions of
behavioral integrity are likely to be influenced by
what the manager has previously communicated
about how these conflicts should be reconciled, and
whether he or she follows through on those state-
ments. Behavioral integrity differs from the traditional
definition of integrity. The Merriam–Webster’s
Collegiate Dictionary (2003) defines integrity as the
‘‘firm adherence to a code of especially moral or
artistic values.’’ While an employee may not agree
with a manager’s values, high behavioral integrity can
still be demonstrated if the manager acts in accordance
with those espoused values.
There are several reasons why employees may
perceive that a manager’s words and deeds may not
be in alignment. These include the manager’s
requirement to respond to diverse constituencies, the
poorly integrated use of management techniques and
technologies, the manager’s ambivalence or confu-
sion regarding company policies and values, and a
manager’s personality traits (Simons, 2002). The
reason for misalignment is important to organizations
and researchers should endeavor to investigate why
the misalignment occurred. This meta-analysis,
however, will not focus on the behavioral anteced-
ents to the word-deed misalignment but rather on
the consequences of the misalignment.
Related constructs
Several constructs related to behavioral integrity are
discussed below in order to specifically identify what
is meant by behavioral integrity in this study.
Trust. A large body of research indicates that trust
is an important component in the employment
relationship. McAllister (1995) theorized that cog-
nition-based trust is based on a perception of an
individual’s reliability and dependability. He argued
that this perception is formed as a result of past
follow-through on commitments – a form of
behavioral integrity. In our view this suggests that
behavioral integrity is a component of trust, but that
they are not synonymous.
Credibility. Credibility is often discussed within
the persuasion literature. Here credibility refers to an
assessment of one’s believability. Credibility is con-
sidered to be a multidimensional construct com-
prised of the perceiver’s assessment of someone’s
relevant knowledge, genuineness, and good inten-
tions toward the perceiver. Behavioral integrity can
affect these last two components. Here again, our
view is that behavioral integrity is antecedent to the
development of credibility (Simons, 2002), but the
two are not identical.
Clearly behavioral integrity plays a role in the
formation of trust and in the development of cred-
ibility. Behavioral integrity is based on the past
pattern of alignment between words and deeds while
trust and credibility are relied upon to guide future
action. While behavioral integrity may be a required
antecedent condition to trust and credibility, it is not
a sufficient condition for the production of either.
For this reason, trust and credibility will neither be
considered as measures of behavioral integrity, nor as
dependent variables in the current meta-analysis.
Psychological Contracts. We believe that acting in
accordance with a psychological contract, should be
considered behavioral integrity. Rousseau (1989)
described a psychological contract as the perception
of an agreement between employee and employer. A
psychological contract comes about as the result of
one party’s belief that a promise of future return has
 Behavioral Integrity and Employee Attitudes
been made, that a contribution has been made, and
that an obligation to provide future benefits has been
created. Note that psychological contracts are based
on beliefs and perceptions. While an employee may
believe that both parties have made promises and
that both parties have agreed to the contract terms, a
common understanding of those contract terms may
not necessarily be present.
Psychological contracts may emerge as a result of
overt promises, witnessing other employees’ expe-
riences, a belief that the manager will act fairly or in
good faith, or from the pattern of past exchanges.
Violation of a psychological contract is considered a
broken promise where the words and deeds of the
employer do not align (Robinson and Rousseau,
1994) and, thus fits our conceptualization of
behavioral integrity.
Attitudinal correlates
The purpose of this meta-analysis was to cumulate the
results from the empirical research that is available to
examine the relationship between the degree of
behavioral integrity of managers and the attitudes of
employees within the organization. The original in-
tent was to investigate both behavioral and attitudinal
correlates. However, empirical research is sparse in
the area of behavioral correlates, and we were able to
identify only two studies. One included absenteeism
and in-role performance (Johnson and O’Leary-
Kelly, 2003) and the other included bottom-line
achievement (Parry and Proctor-Thomson, 2002).
Johnson and O’Leary-Kelly (2003) found a significant
positive correlation between psychological contract
breach and absenteeism (r = 0.27) and a significant
negative correlation between psychological contract
breach and in-role performance (r = )0.33). Parry
and Proctor-Thomson’s (2002) study, using the
Perceived Leader Integrity Scale (PLIS), found a
significant positive relationship between behavioral
integrity and bottom-line achievement by the orga-
nization (r = 19). Although studies show a positive
relationship between behavioral integrity of managers
and behavior, the dependent variables are quite dif-
ferent, (one is an individual-level outcome, and the
other is organization level) and we do not believe that
they should be combined meta-analytically.
Although the findings are suggestive, the strongest
409
suggestion is that is that there is a clear need for
additional primary research on individual behavioral
outcomes as well as on organizational level outcomes.
Due to the scarcity of research relating managerial
behavioral integrity and employee behavior, this
meta-analysis will focus exclusively on the relation-
ship between the behavioral integrity of managers and
attitudes of employees that reflect an individual’s
sense of connection or commitment to their work
or to their organization (Thoreson et al., 2003).
Attitudes of interest to us include job satisfaction,
organizational commitment and positive and/or
negative affect towards the organization. Based on our
understanding of the construct of behavioral integrity,
and using Cohen’s widely used convention for eval-
uating the magnitude of effect sizes, the following
main hypothesis is proposed for this meta-analysis:
Hypothesis 1
There will be strong, positive relationship
between perceptions of the manager’s
behavioral integrity and employee atti-
tudes.
Potential moderators
Recent research suggests that women and men may
have different attitudes and behaviors regarding
ethics. Bjerregaard and Lord (2004), in a study
involving criminal justice students, found that wo-
men were less likely to commit ethical violations and
more likely to view ethical violations as more serious.
In an examination of the effects of team composition
on moral orientation, Baker and Hunt (2003) found
that all-female groups scored significantly higher than
all male groups on moral orientation. Bass et al.
(1998) discovered that female and male sales
managers’ personal moral philosophies were different
in that women were found to be more idealistic.
These researchers suggested that idealism is associated
with more ethical judgments and behavior, thus
implying women may be more aware of and sensitive
to ethical issues. Based on this research, we decided
to examine the potential impact of gender on the
perceived behavioral integrity-employee attitude
relationship. Specifically, we offered the following
hypothesis:
410 Anne L. Davis and Hannah R. Rothstein
Hypothesis 2
The relationship between perceived
behavioral integrity and employee atti-
tudes will be significantly stronger in
studies where the employee samples were
predominantly female than in those
where the sample was predominantly
male.
The second moderator considered was the level
of the manager in relation to the respondent.
Specifically, was the study participant thinking
about an immediate supervisor or someone further
removed from his or her position when respond-
ing to the measure of ethical behavior of the
superior? We expected that there would be a
stronger relationship between the measure of
behavioral integrity and the outcome variable in
those studies where the respondent was considering
his or her immediate boss or supervisor
rather than top management or the ambiguous
‘‘employer.’’
Hypothesis 3
The relationship between perceived
behavioral integrity and employee atti-
tudes will be significantly stronger in
studies where the respondent is consid-
ering his or her immediate supervisor
than in studies where managers more
organizationally distant from the respon-
dent are being considered.
We considered study location (whether con-
ducted within the United States or conducted
outside of the United States) as a proxy for the
potential moderating effects of national culture.
Since, however, we had no clear reason to suspect
how differences, if any, between studies conducted
inside the United States and those conducted out-
side the United States, would display themselves,
and because we realize that study location is a weak
proxy for culture, we considered this an explor-
atory analysis for which we do not offer a direc-
tional hypothesis.
Methods
Literature search
Studies examining the relationship between the
behavioral integrity of managers and the attitudes of
employees were gathered from a variety of sources.
First, an electronic search was conducted of the
following databases: Academic Search Premier,
Business Source Premier, PsychINFO, Psych Arti-
cles, Dissertation Abstracts, and Social Sciences
Abstracts. These databases were selected because they
include journals that publish peer-reviewed, empir-
ical research and they cover a wide range of studies
conducted in a wide variety of organizations. Fur-
ther, some of these databases include both published
and unpublished studies. While these databases
overlap to a large degree, the additional sources
supplied by including all of them were deemed
necessary to ensure a thorough search. The use
of electronic databases makes this a much more
manageable task.
The authors conducted an electronic search of the
Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC)
database to determine if there were any relevant
studies in the military domain. Additionally, several
databases that include unpublished literature were
also searched to ensure as many studies as possible
were retrieved. The databases searched for unpub-
lished literature were System for Information on
Grey Literature in Europe (SIGLE), Sociological
Abstracts, and the Social Sciences Citation Index.
Search terms included: behavioral integrity,
integrity, ethics, ethical climate, ethical behavior,
psychological contract, role model, effective man-
agement, organizational effectiveness, organizational
commitment and job satisfaction. Boolean operators
were employed so that multiple search terms were
used simultaneously. Searching on single terms, such
as integrity or ethics, produced unwieldy results. For
example, a search of the term ‘‘ethics’’ in the Aca-
demic Search Premier database resulted in 41,569
hits. Good time management practices dictated the
use of more efficient search procedures.
When results were achieved in the electronic
searches, titles were initially reviewed to establish
relevance. Many titles were discarded since they
 Behavioral Integrity and Employee Attitudes
were clearly in publications that would not provide
results of empirical studies. Also, book reviews and
theoretical articles were discarded. Overall, the
electronic search yielded 932 titles. Of these 932
titles, 249 abstracts were reviewed for relevance with
44 studies retained for a full text review. This elec-
tronic search yielded nine usable studies.
Due to their particular relevance to the topic
being investigated, a manual search was conducted
of the following three journals: Journal of Business
Ethics, Business Ethics Quarterly, and Business and
Professional Ethics Journal, for the years 1982
through 2003, 1997 through 2003, and 1981
through 1997, respectively. This allowed for the
inclusion of relevant studies that may not have been
identified due to the keywords used in the elec-
tronic searches. Also, the manual search included
studies from years not included in the electronic
databases. This manual search yielded one additional
study.
A snowballing procedure is a common technique
utilized in the literature search for meta-analyses.
With a snowballing procedure, the references in-
cluded in the relevant studies and review articles are
scanned to identify other relevant studies. This
procedure yielded two additional studies.
It is important to note that 11 of the 12 studies
found were in published sources. Despite the
extensive literature search, it is possible that publi-
cation bias may influence the results of this study.
Inclusion and exclusion of studies
Studies were included if they had a measure of
behavioral integrity or a breach of psychological
contracts. Some ways in which behavioral integrity
were measured included the Perceived Leadership
Integrity Scale (PLIS) developed by Craig and
Gustafson (1998), top management support and/or
action for ethical behavior, ethical conflict, and
perceived ethical behavior for ethical managers.
Studies were included only if the measure of
behavioral integrity was reported from the subordi-
nate’s view since behavioral integrity involves the
employee’s perception of the alignment of the
manager’s words and deeds. Studies also had to
include an attitudinal measure such as organizational
commitment or job satisfaction.
411
The type of organization did not limit studies.
Studies conducted in both public and private
organizations, as well as for-profit and non-profit
organizations, were considered eligible for inclusion.
Studies conducted in the United States and outside
the United States were included. However, study
results had to be reported in English to be included in
this meta-analysis.
Studies involving students as proxies for organi-
zational members were not included in this study.
These types of studies would not give reasonable
approximations of behavioral integrity since an
employee’s perception may not be based solely on a
single incident but rather on a pattern observed over
time. The organizational context may play a role in
the subordinate’s perception as well. Studies
involving currently employed students who were
asked to respond based on their current employment
situation were included.
Table I summarizes the studies selected for the
meta-analysis.
Meta-analysis strategy
Meta-analysis is a technique that allows individual
study results to be aggregated while correcting for
various artifacts that can bias relationship estimates.
This meta-analysis was conducted with Hunter and
Schmidt’s (1990) procedures. Each of the primary
studies in this meta-analysis reported effect sizes as
correlations between the independent and depen-
dent variables. In some studies, the primary rela-
tionship of interest was not that between the
measure of behavioral integrity and the measure for
the attitudinal outcome. However, all studies
included these correlations in their results. The
oldest study utilized in this meta-analysis was pub-
lished in 1990.
Several studies included various subcomponents
of job satisfaction such as pay satisfaction, satisfaction
with supervisors, and satisfaction with the work. In
these cases, only the measure of overall job satisfac-
tion was used so that these subcomponents would
not be double counted and overestimate the strength
of the relationship.
Meta-analysis requires that each observed corre-
lation be weighted by that study’s sample size to
provide a weighted mean estimate of the population
 412
TABLE I
Studies used in meta-analysis

Study Sample Characteristics Independent variable Dependent Observed

size of sample variable uncorrected
correlation

Craig and 299 Faculty and staff at a PLIS* Job satisfaction 0.54
Gustafson (1998) southeastern university in US
Johnson and O’Leary- 103 Employees at a community bank Breach of Job satisfaction 0.59
Kelly (2003) at various locations in central US psychological contract
Kickul (2001) 322 Currently employed MBA students Breach of psychological Negative affect 0.45
at large, midwestern university in the US contract toward the
organization
Koh and Boo (2001) 237 Currently employed MBA students Top mgmt support Job satisfaction 0.38
in Singapore for ethical behavior
Mize et al. (2000) 99 Front-line managers in large Perception of supervisor’s Organizational 0.44
suburban mall ethical behavior commitment
Parry and Proctor- 1354 Employees from public PLIS* Satisfaction 0.49
Thomson (2002) and private sector with the leader
organizations throughout New Zealand
Robinson and 128 Alumni of MBA program in a Breach of Job satisfaction 0.76
Rousseau (1994) Midwestern US management school psychological contract
Ryncarz (1997) 44 Employees in high tech corporation Manager work behavior Job satisfaction 0.69
Anne L. Davis and Hannah R. Rothstein

questionnaire
Schwepker (1999) 152 Salespeople from a variety of industries Ethical conflict Organizational 0.24
in the southern region of the US commitment
Viswesvaran and 150 Mid-level managers at three Perceived ethical behavior Job satisfaction 0.53
Deshpande (1996) different organizations in India of ethical managers
Viswesvaran 77 Mid-level managers at two Top mgmt support Job satisfaction 0.11
et al. (1998) organizations in South India for ethical behavior
Vitell and 61 Management information Top mgmt support Job satisfaction 0.40
Davis (1990) professionals in southeast US for ethical behavior

*PLIS = Perceived leadership integrity scale.

 Behavioral Integrity and Employee Attitudes
correlation. The standard deviation of this estimate
across the multiple studies is also computed. This
variation is composed of the true variation in the
population value as well as variation due to artifacts
such as sampling error and measurement error. To
provide a more accurate estimate of the population
correlation and its variability, this meta-analysis
corrected for sampling error. We also examined the
impact of unreliability. Coefficient as were available
for most of the variables used in this study. Four
studies, however, were missing reliability data for
their measure of job satisfaction. The reliabilities for
the other measures of job satisfaction were averaged
and used in those studies where this data was
missing. This was considered acceptable since the
reliabilities of the measures used were relatively close
in value ranging from 0.88 to 0.92. No corrections
for range restriction were made since there was no
indication it was affecting the results.
Meta-analysis results typically include both
uncorrected and corrected estimates of the mean
population correlation. Also reported are the 95%
confidence intervals for uncorrected and corrected
mean population correlations. Confidence intervals
were generated with the standard error of the
weighted mean correlation. They reflect the extent
to which sampling error remains in the estimate of
the mean.
Outlier analysis. Analysis for outliers is an essential
step in meta-analysis since outliers can distort results.
One method for handling outliers is to simply elimi-
nate them if it is believed that these outliers are not
believed to be representative of study findings.
However, due to the limited number of studies
available for this meta-analysis, discarding data was not
a desirable solution. Instead, the procedure known as
Windsorizing was used. Here, effect sizes more than
three standard deviations from the mean of all the
effect sizes were identified and recoded to a value at
two standard deviations. This technique allows the
discrepant values to be included in the analysis, and as a
relatively large value, but they are not so extreme as to
greatly distort the analysis (Lipsey and Wilson, 2001;
Huffcutt and Arthur, 1995).
Identification of moderator variables. While the lim-
ited number of studies included in this meta-analysis
makes the identification of moderator variables
difficult, it is still a worthwhile endeavor. For this
reason, the standard deviation of the population
413
correlation was calculated. This provides an index of
the variation in the corrected population values
across the studies in this sample. One indicator that
moderators may be present in a relationship is the
case in which artifacts such as unreliability fail to
account for a substantial portion of the variance in
the correlations. Hunter and Schmidt (1990)
recommend that if artifacts fail to account for 75% or
more of the variance in correlations then moderators
may be present. Alternatively, a credibility interval
can be calculated to determine the existence of
moderators. This involves using the corrected stan-
dard deviation around the mean corrected effect size.
If this credibility interval contains zero or is suffi-
ciently large, then moderators are likely to exist
(Whitener, 1990).
Identifying moderators requires the coding of
potential moderator variables and then performing
sub-group analyses. As mentioned in the introduc-
tion, this study examined three potential moderators.
Gender was coded based on the proportion of
females in each sample. (subjects were 50% or more
male versus 50% or more female). The level of the
manager in relation to the respondents in the study
was coded based on whether the manager was
the respondent’s immediate supervisor. Location of
the study was coded as in the United States or
outside the United States. Industry and the position
of the respondent within the organization were
considered as possible moderators, however, only
study location was provided consistently enough to
code. Many of the studies included subjects at
varying levels and from various industries so coding
of these potential moderator variables was not
possible.
Results
A total of 12 effect sizes from 12 different studies
were used in this meta-analysis. Total sample size
was 3026. For the eight studies reporting age, the
mean age of respondents was 36.5 years. For the
seven studies reporting tenure, mean organizational
tenure of the participants was 6.61 years. The
settings for ten of the studies were business organi-
zations. Universities were the setting for the
remaining two studies. Nine of the studies were
conducted in for-profit business organizations. In
414 Anne L. Davis and Hannah R. Rothstein
three studies it was not possible to determine
whether the respondents worked in for-profit or
non-profit organizations. In eight of the studies
respondents came from several organizations and
therefore neither the size of the organization nor
type of industry (e.g., manufacturing, service, etc.)
could be determined for these studies.
Overall analysis
The goal of this meta-analysis was to examine the
relationship between a manager’s behavioral integ-
rity and employee attitudes. Table II presents the
results of this meta-analysis. The overall observed r
of 0.48 indicates the strong relationship between
behavioral integrity and employees’ attitudes. The
estimated true population standard deviation was
calculated at 0.10. This standard deviation is adjusted
for sampling error variance but not for measurement
error. When the observed rs were corrected for error
of measurement in both predictor and criterion
variables the overall r increased slightly, to 0.54 with
an estimated true population standard deviation of
0.10. The 95% confidence interval ranged from 0.38
to 0.58 for the uncorrected mean and from 0.49 to
0.64 for the corrected mean. This interval was rel-
atively narrow, indicating that the estimate of the
mean population correlation is fairly precise.
Outlier analysis
Outlier analysis identified only one study (Viswesvaran
et al., 1998) where the reported correlation was
further than three standard deviations from the mean
correlation. This correlation was recoded to a value
at two standard deviations (from 0.11 to 0.13).
However, this resulted in only a trivial change in the
TABLE II
Overall results of the meta-analysis
Total Cases Observed Mean Observed
N mean r corrected r variance
3026 12 0.48 0.54 0.01
mean r weighted by study weight (from 0.4761 to
0.4766). This change was small due to the relatively
small sample size for this study. Therefore, it was
decided to retain the original correlation for this
study for all further calculations.
Sensitivity analyses
It is recommended by Hunter and Schmidt (1990) to
remove any large studies that may dominate the
results of a meta-analysis. The sample size for one
study in this review is appreciably larger than the
others. To determine its impact on the overall
results, it was removed from the calculation of the
mean r. Without the large study, the result was
reduced by only a small amount (from 0.47 to 0.46).
Due to the small effect the removal had on the
overall results, the authors decided to retain all of the
studies.
Of the 12 studies in this review, 9 included job
satisfaction as the attitudinal outcome measure. The
four studies with other outcome measures (i.e.,
organizational commitment, satisfaction with the
leader, and negative affect) were removed to deter-
mine if their inclusion affected the results of this
meta-analysis. The mean r increased only slightly
(from 0.48 to 0.50). Here, the population standard
deviation increased from 0.10 to 0.14.
Publication bias
Since all but one of the studies used in this meta-
analysis were from published sources, there is a
possibility that publication bias is affecting results.
While journal editors want to ensure published
studies are those conducted with scientific rigor,
other criteria may affect whether or not a study is
Sampling Population 95% 95%
error variance Confidence Credibility
variance interval interval
0.002 0.01 [0.38, 0.58] [0.34, 0.76]
 Behavioral Integrity and Employee Attitudes
published. There is evidence to suggest that pub-
lished research is biased toward statistically signifi-
cant findings (Dickerson, 2005). Also, six of the
twelve studies included came from a single source –
Journal of Business Ethics. In order to detect possible
publication bias, a funnel plot was constructed with
effect size on the x-axis and sample size on the
y-axis. As seen in Figure 1, the funnel plot appears
to be relatively symmetric indicating little or no
publication bias (Lipsey and Wilson, 2001).
An additional test for publication bias is the Fail-
safe N. Orwin’s approach determines the number of
‘‘missing’’ (unretrieved) studies with an average
effect size of zero needed to reduce the observed
mean effect size to a level specified by the researcher
to be no longer theoretically or practically impor-
tant. We used Orwin’s formula to determine the
number of findings required to reduce the current,
large correlation (0.48) to a small one (0.10). Results
indicated that 47 studies averaging a zero effect
would have to be added to the results of the
retrieved findings in order to change the conclusion
regarding the magnitude of the effect from large to
small (Cooper, 1998). In other words, nearly four
unretrieved studies must exist for each one we
retrieved. This suggests that the current findings are
relatively robust to the effects of unretrieved studies.
Moderator analysis
Only 24% of the population variance was ac-
counted for by sampling error variance, thus sug-
gesting the presence of moderators in this study.
The credibility interval (see Table II) is large en-
ough to support the existence of moderators. In
Funnel Plot of Included Studies
1500
1000
500
0
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8
Figure 1. Funnel plot of included studies.
415
this case, moderators affect the magnitude rather
than the direction of the relationship. Based on this
meta-analysis, we can conclude that the relationship
is positive, although not identical in all settings.
Table III presents the results of the moderator
analysis.
Gender
Studies with predominantly male subjects showed a
slightly smaller relationship between perceived
behavioral integrity and attitudes (uncorrected
mean r = 0.47) than did studies with predominantly
female subjects (uncorrected mean r = 0.52).
However, the difference was not significant, and
there is a large amount of overlap in the 95%
confidence intervals, suggesting gender may not be
operating as a moderator. Due to the small number
of studies used in this analysis, and the fact that we
were not able to code gender at the level of the
individual employees, further research is needed
before firm conclusions about the role of gender
can be drawn.
Distance between manager and respondent
Studies were classified as (1) immediate boss if
participants were asked to respond with respect to
their immediate supervisor or (2) top management
if participants were asked to respond with respect
to top management. As shown in Table III, there
was a significantly and considerably stronger rela-
tionship when respondents were asked to respond
with respect to their immediate boss (r = 0.50) than
when responding with respect to top management
(r = 0.29) and the 95% confidence intervals of the
two groups do not overlap. Caution must be used
when interpreting these results, however, since
there were only four studies in the immediate boss
category and three studies in the top management
category.
Location
Eight of the studies were conducted in the United
States and four were conducted outside the United
States. Those conducted outside of the United States
were carried out in Singapore, New Zealand, and
India (2). Our results do not indicate that location of
the study is a moderator, since there is only a small
difference between uncorrected mean r for these two
groups of studies. The uncorrected mean r for studies
416 Anne L. Davis and Hannah R. Rothstein

TABLE III
Results of moderator analysis

Total Cases Uncorrected Observed Sampling Population 95% confidence

N mean r variance error variance interval
variance uncorrected
mean r

Conducted 1208 8 0.50 0.020 0.004 0.02 [0.38, 0.62]

in US
Conducted 1818 4 0.46 0.007 0.002 0.01 [0.38, 0.54]
outside US
Mostly male 2674 9 0.47 0.013 0.002 0.01 [0.38, 0.56]
Mostly female 352 3 0.52 0.003 0.005 0.00 [0.39, 0.65]
Level: 1796 4 0.50 0.001 0.001 0.00 [0.43, 0.57]
immediate boss
Level: top 466 3 0.29 0.009 0.006 0.00 [0.14, 0.44]
management

conducted within the United States was 0.50 while
the uncorrected mean r for studies conducted out-
side the United States was 0.46, and there is a large
degree of overlap in the 95% confidence intervals of
the two sets of studies. Due, however, to the small
numbers of study, and the heterogeneity of the non-
US group, further research is needed before any
conclusions can be drawn about the role of national
culture/location.
Discussion
The current meta-analysis demonstrates a strong
positive relationship between the perceived behav-
ioral integrity of managers and the attitudes of their
employees. In accordance with Cohen’s widely used
convention for evaluating the magnitude of effect
sizes, a correlation effect size greater than 0.40 is
considered large. This meta-analysis certainly dem-
onstrates a large effect size with a weighted mean
corrected r of 0.53. A bare bones meta-analysis that
did not correct for reliability of either the indepen-
dent or dependent variable yielded an uncorrected
mean r of 0.48 – again, a large magnitude effect size.
The narrow confidence interval indicates a fairly
precise estimate of the mean effect, reinforcing the
strength of the relationship found here. Since sam-
pling error accounted for only a small portion of the
population variance, we proceeded to examine three
moderators. Whether or not the study was con-
ducted within the United States does not seem to
moderate the relationship between behavioral
integrity and employee attitude. This moderator
analysis is rather weak, however, since location of
the study was used as a stand in for the nationality of
the individuals within each study, and of the national
culture in which the organization operates. In this
regard, it is important to note that in one study that
was conducted within the United States (Robinson
and Rousseau, 1994); the sample was comprised of
10% foreign nationals. This may have been true in
other studies as well but the data was not provided.
Furthermore, we had only a limited sample of
nations outside of the United States; we would
encourage additional, and more rigorous, examina-
tion of the possible moderating effects of nationality
and national culture.
Our moderator analysis suggests small, if any,
gender differences in the relationship between
behavioral integrity and employee attitudes. On the
other hand, our analysis included only a small
number of studies, and a fallible classification of
studies as predominantly male or female, so it is
difficult to draw any firm conclusion based on this
limited data. With the increasing number of wo-
men in both the workforce and the management
ranks that has occurred over the past quarter cen-
 Behavioral Integrity and Employee Attitudes
tury, this is clearly an area that deserves further
examination.
Finally, looking at the level of the manager, studies
were classified as (1) immediate boss if participants
were asked to respond with respect to their immediate
supervisor or (2) top management if participants were
asked to respond with respect to top management. As
shown in Table III, there was a considerably stronger
relationship when respondents were asked to respond
with respect to their immediate boss (r = 0.50) than
when responding with respect to top management
(r = 0.29), and the 95% confidence intervals of the two
groups do not overlap. Caution must be used when
interpreting these results, however, since there were
only four studies in the immediate boss category and
three studies in the top management category.
Overall, when managers demonstrate greater
behavioral integrity, employees are more satisfied
with their job, with the organization’s leadership,
and are more committed to the organization. While
this study did not investigate the link between
behavioral integrity and firm performance, other
studies have demonstrated positive links between job
satisfaction and firm performance and organizational
commitment and firm performance. Job satisfaction
has also been linked to behavioral outcomes such as
lower absenteeism and turnover. Thus, it is plausible
to expect that behavioral integrity is related to
behavioral outcomes as well as attitudinal ones.
Limitations
One of the major limitations of this meta-analysis is
the small number of studies retrieved. Given the
relatively recent refinement of the definition of
integrity to include behavioral integrity, there were
few studies available to meta-analyze. However, one
of the purposes of meta-analysis is to identify gaps in
the existing literature where future research efforts
need to be directed to gather empirical data. Addi-
tionally, it should again be noted that this meta-
analysis included only one unpublished study. While
a thorough literature search was conducted, there
may be more unpublished studies out there.
Since only 24% of the population variance was
accounted for by sampling error, there is a high
probability that there are moderators in the rela-
tionship between behavioral integrity and attitudinal
417
outcomes. The first sub-group analysis did not pro-
vide support for location of the study as a moderator.
Perhaps nationality of the subjects would have been a
better moderator to test if there is reason to believe
that different cultures interpret behavioral integrity
differently but the data was unavailable. The second
sub-group analysis did not provide support for gen-
der as a moderator, but this analysis is tenuous due to
the nature of the how the studies were classified as
predominantly male or female. Further, it is not
known whether there was any response bias in these
studies with respect to gender. The third sub-group
analysis did provide support that level of the manager
may be a moderator. The small number of studies
included in this analysis, however, makes it difficult
to draw any firm conclusions.
Future research
Future research should investigate gender differences
with respect to behavioral integrity since other
research does support the idea that men and women
hold differing views and take different actions when
confronted with ethical situations. The level of the
manager with respect to the respondent in the study
is clearly an area requiring further investigation. The
behavioral integrity of the employee’s immediate
supervisor appears as though it may have a stronger
relationship to employee attitudes than the behav-
ioral integrity of top management. If this is the case,
researchers and practitioners may want to consider
how behavioral integrity can be incorporated into
management/leader development programs. All of
the studies retrieved for this meta-analysis were
conducted at one point in time. Longitudinal studies
should also be undertaken to determine the long-
term impacts of behavioral integrity on organiza-
tional outcomes.
Clearly, further research is needed with respect to
behavioral integrity and its relationship to both
attitudes and behaviors. While this meta-analysis
uncovered several studies dealing with attitudinal
correlates, the literature search found a dearth of
studies dealing with behavioral correlates. Concrete
demonstrations of how a manager’s word-deed
alignment can affect the organization’s people and its
bottom line, in the form of new primary research in
this area, could make a valuable contribution to the
418 Anne L. Davis and Hannah R. Rothstein
development of greater commitment to ethically
sound business practices.
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 Behavioral Integrity and Employee Attitudes 419

*Vitell, S. J. and D. L. Davis: 1990, ÔThe Rela- Hannah R. Rothstein

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E-mail: hannah_rothstein@baruch.cuny.edu