When Work and Love Mix: Perceptions of Peers in Workplace Romances

Abstract

Workplace romances are a contemporary and pervasive phenomenon with implications for interpersonal and organizational communication scholars. The present study aimed to discover how an organizational peer (male or female) dating another organizational member (another peer or superior) impacted employee perceptions of and responses to the peer. Full-time employees completed measures assessing communication and relational perceptions based on a 2 (peer sex) × 2 (status dynamic) design. Employees reported they would feel less solidarity and trust and were more likely to engage in information manipulation with a peer dating a superior compared to a peer dating another peer. In addition, trust in the peer mediated the relationships between peer's partner status and coworkers' solidarity and information manipulation with the peer. Peer sex and partner status also interacted to affect trust and solidarity.

Keywords:

• Deception
• Honesty
• Solidarity
• Trust
• Workplace Romance

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 2008 meeting of the International Communication Association.

Notes

Notes. Status of peer's romantic partner was coded as 1 = partner was a peer and 2 = partner was a superior.

∗statistically significant at p < .01.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sean M. Horan

Sean M. Horan (Ph.D., West Virginia University, 2009) is an Assistant Professor in the College of Communication at DePaul University

Rebecca M. Chory

Rebecca M. Chory (Ph.D., Michigan State University, 2000) is an Associate Professor of Communication Studies at West Virginia University.