The gender effects on corporate social responsibility decoupling of the hospitality and tourism firms

ABSTRACT

From the risk preference perspective of gender stereotype, this study investigates the impacts of female CEOs and female directors on corporate social responsibility (CSR) decoupling using data from Chinese listed hospitality and tourism firms spanning 2009–2020. The results obtained through the cluster-adjusted fixed effects regression method show that female CEOs are negatively correlated, suggesting that firms with a female CEO are unlikely to engage in CSR decoupling, while female directors are positively correlated, indicating that firms with a higher proportion of female directors are more likely to pursue CSR decoupling. And performance shortfall strengthens the negative impact of female CEOs. These findings could contribute to the gender diversity literature, CSR decoupling literature, and the behavioural theory of the firm, and offer practical insights for both firm decision-makers and policymakers.

KEYWORDS:

• CSR decoupling
• female CEOs
• female directors
• performance shortfall
• the hospitality and tourism firms

Disclosure statement

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

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 71902093], the Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province [grant number ZR2021MD081], the Shandong Humanities and Social Sciences of University Fund [grant number J16YF28], and the Social Science Fund of Beijing [grant number 16GLB037].