The Mediating Role of Employee Prevention Focus in the Relationship Between Work Group Structure and Employee Adaptive Behaviors

This research explores how work group initiating structure, which includes group behaviors and activities pertaining to completing tasks, adhering to policies and laws, or fulfilling work-role obligations, functions as a primer of employee prevention focus. In addition, the effects of prevention focus are explored for their subsequent influence on the focal work outcomes of functional presenteeism and prohibitive voice. A survey-supported research design was used to test a model based on regulatory focus theory (RFT) by exploring how employees' prevention focus at work mediates the influence of work group initiating structure on the focal outcomes of functional presenteeism and prohibitive voice. The results show that regulatory focus fully mediates the relationship between initiating structure and presenteeism at moderate to high levels of work locus of control, while initiating structure directly impacts prohibitive voice behavior. Theoretical and practical implications for these findings are discussed, and recommendations for future research are included.