The Upward Ethical Dissent Scale: development and validation

ABSTRACT

Ethical problems in organizations tend to be some of the most public and devastating for members, organizations, and society. Meanwhile, upward dissent is a key mechanism through which wrongdoing can be detected and corrected. However, a confluence of forces suppresses and displaces ethical dissent in organizations. Research identified many of these influential dynamics through limited method approaches. Indeed, additional methodological tools are needed to advance this important line of research. Thus, we modified an established measure of general upward dissent to focus on ethical dissent specifically then validated it. We labeled the modified measure the Upward Ethical Dissent (UED) Scale. As expected, results supported a four-factor structure for the UED Scale. Moreover, construct validity was supported through high positive correlations between UED and upward dissent subscales and moderate negative correlations with acquiescent silence. Additionally, low to moderate correlations are found between competent forms of UED and moral identity variables. Theoretical implications and future directions are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• upward dissent; ethics; voice; silence; moral identity; organizational identification

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

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29 Ibid.

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33 Kassing, “Development and Validation,” 1988.

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36 Kassing, “Speaking Up,” 2002.

37 Ibid.

38 Kassing and Kava, “Assessing Disagreement,” 2013.

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48 Kassing and Armstrong, “Someone’s Going to Hear About This,” 2002.

49 Bisel, Kelley, Ploeger, and Messersmith, “Workers’ Moral Mum Effect,” 2011

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52 Zanin, Bisel, and Adame, “Supervisor Moral Talk Contagion,” 2016.

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59 Kassing and Kava, “Assessing Disagreement,” 2013.

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67 Ibid.

68 Kassing, “Articulating, Antagonizing, and Displacing,” 1997.

69 Scott, Corman, and Cheney, “Development of a Structurational Model,” 1998.

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72 Bisel, Kelley, Ploeger, and Messersmith, “Workers’ Moral Mum Effect,” 2011; Bisel, Organizational Moral Learning, 2018.

73 Kassing and Kava, “Assessing Disagreement,” 2013.

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83 Ibid.

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85 Ibid.

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87 Singleton and Straits, Approaches to Social Research, 2010.

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108 Kassing, “Speaking Up,” 2002.

109 Kassing and Armstrong, “Someone’s Going to Hear About This,” 2002.

110 Kassing and Kava, “Assessing Disagreement,” 2013.

111 Ibid.

112 Ibid.

113 Ibid.

114 Hirschmann, Exit, Voice, and Loyalty, 1970.

115 Van Dyne, Ang, and Botero, “Conceptualizing Employee Silence,” 2003.

116 Gossett and Kilker, “My Job Sucks,” 2006.

117 Singleton and Straits, Approaches to Social Research, 2010.

118 Scott, Corman, and Cheney, “Development of a Structurational Model,” 1998.

119 Brown, Confirmatory Factor Analysis, 2015.

120 Kassing and Kava, “Assessing Disagreement,” 2013.

121 Kassing, “Breaking the Chain,” 2009; Redding, “Rocking Boats,” 1985.

122 Kassing, “Speaking Up,” 2002.

123 Hirschmann, Exit, Voice, and Loyalty, 1970.

124 Bisel, Organizational Moral Learning, 2018.

125 Bisel, Kelley, Ploeger, and Messersmith, “Workers’ Moral Mum Effect,” 2011; Bisel and Adame, “Encouraging Upward Ethical Dissent,” 2019; Zanin, Bisel, and Adame, “Supervisor Moral Talk Contagion,” 2016.

Additional information

Funding

This research was approved by the Institutional Review Board of the University of Oklahoma, No. 15141.