Equity and relationship quality influences on organizational citizenship behaviors: The mediating role of trust in the supervisor and empowerment

To develop and test an expanded social exchange model of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) that includes characteristics of the social context (i.e. perceived fairness and leader‐member exchange (LMX)) as well as the capacity (i.e. trust in the supervisor and psychological empowerment) to engage in citizenship behaviors.

Data were collected from a matched sample of 183 Hong Kong investment‐banking personnel and their supervisors. Multiple regression was used to test direct and mediating effects.

Analyses provide strong support for the direct effects of trust in the supervisor and psychological empowerment on all dimensions of OCBs. Trust in the supervisor played an important mediating role in all relationships. Only one dimension of empowerment (i.e. impact) acted as a mediator.

This study extends the social exchange conceptualization of OCB to include both equity and interpersonal relationship influences. The influence of empowerment on OCBs highlights the importance of providing employees with the motivation to engage in these behaviors.