大象传媒

Dive into our monthly Research Roundup, showcasing the latest insights from the business education community to keep you informed of new and noteworthy industry trends. Here are this month’s selections:

Modern Leadership in a Traditional Culture

• Researchers: Yangjie Ke, Li Liu, and Manli Gu, Taylor’s University
• Output: “Paternalistic Leadership and Counterproductive Work Behavior: Mediating Role of Leader Identification and Moderating Effect of Traditionality in Chinese Generation Z Employees,” Frontiers in Psychology, 2025
• Overview: As China’s Generation Z begins to fill the ranks of its workforce, organizations face a cultural crossroads. These young employees—often raised with global exposure but still influenced by Confucian ideals like righteousness and respect—interact with leaders in ways that differ significantly from previous generations. This study explores how paternalistic leadership—a traditional Chinese leadership style combining authoritarianism (strict control), benevolence (personalized care), and morality (ethical example)—affects counterproductive work behavior, such as ignoring instructions or showing up late.
  
  The researchers also examined two psychological factors: leader identification, the extent to which employees feel aligned with their managers, and traditionality, or how strongly an employee values hierarchical, traditional norms. Using survey data from 324 Gen Z employees in mainland China, the study uncovers how these cultural and relational dynamics shape workplace behavior in meaningful ways.
• Findings: Employees who perceived their leaders as benevolent or moral were significantly less likely to engage in harmful work behaviors. Specifically, counterproductive behavior dropped by 33 percent under benevolent leadership and 38 percent under moral leadership. In contrast, employees under authoritarian leadership—where leaders demand obedience—were 25 percent more likely to exhibit counterproductive behavior. The study also found that leader identification fully explained the positive effects of benevolent and moral leadership, but only partially explained the negative effects of authoritarian leadership.
  
  Traditionality played a key role: employees with lower traditional values formed stronger bonds with benevolent and moral leaders, suggesting that personalized and ethical leadership resonates more with Gen Z employees who value openness and equality over hierarchy.
  
  For business leaders, this means that fostering trust and shared values with younger employees may be far more effective than asserting authority, particularly in cultures balancing tradition with rapid modernization.

Stronger Ties Can Lead to Stronger Turnover

• Researchers: Koustab鈥疓hosh, Indian Institute of Management Rohtak; Amit J. Chauradia, University of South Florida; Daniel M. Peat, University of Cincinnati
• Output: “The Ties That Bind: Cohort Influence on Newcomers Staying or Leaving Their Organization,” Sage Journals, 2025
• Overview: The moment a new hire walks through the door, they’re not just starting a job; they’re stepping into a social setting shaped by those around them. Most employees begin alongside others hired around the same time, forming what the authors call a cohort. These cohorts often share onboarding sessions, early training experiences, and a sense of social proximity that can shape how each person feels about the organization. This study examined whether the choices of cohort peers—specifically, the decision to leave the company—had a measurable influence on an individual’s own decision to stay or exit.
  
  Drawing on data from nearly two million employees across 200 companies, the researchers tested whether turnover spreads socially, especially among newer workers. For businesses focused on early retention and workforce stability, the findings offer new insight into how the experience of joining an organization is not only individual but deeply collective.
• Findings: The study found a clear social ripple effect: when more members of an employee’s initial cohort left the organization, the employee was more likely to follow. As more members of a newcomer’s onboarding group left—specifically, with a 10 percent rise in cohort turnover—the newcomer’s own chances of leaving increased by 1.4 percent, even after accounting for their role, company size, and industry. The effect was strongest among employees with fewer personal connections or limited work experience, who may rely more heavily on social cues during early adjustment.
  
  Timing also mattered. Peer influence was most powerful in the first few months of employment, when new hires are typically forming first impressions and building a sense of belonging. These patterns suggest that voluntary turnover is not always an isolated, individual decision. For leaders, this highlights the importance of watching early attrition within entry cohorts and fostering strong peer support to help newcomers feel anchored in the organization.

Familiar Moves in Unfamiliar Territory

• Researchers: Yuval Salant, Jorg L. Spenkuch, and David Almog, Northwestern University
• Output: “The Memory Premium,” National Bureau of Economic Research, 2025
• Overview: When people face unfamiliar challenges, they often fall back on what they already know rather than developing new strategies. This study explores how memory influences decision-making when previous experience offers little practical value. The researchers analyzed nearly 150,000 first-time games of Chess960, a version of chess where the starting positions are randomized. Because standard chess strategies do not carry over, the game offers a clear view into how individuals behave when their usual routines no longer apply.
  
  The study focused on whether players would continue to choose familiar moves, even when those moves were not well suited to the new situation. This mirrors decisions in business where leaders must operate without precedent, making it a valuable lens for understanding how people respond to novelty. By doing so, the researchers aimed to understand how memory shapes decisions in unfamiliar and high-pressure environments.
• Findings: The results showed that players were significantly more likely to choose a move they had used before, even when other options were objectively stronger. This behavior, known as the memory premium, was more pronounced when players had used the move frequently, when the previous game was more recent, and when the current position resembled familiar ones from standard chess. Even after playing multiple games in the new format, players continued to rely on remembered moves.
  
  The study suggests that people often use memory as a shortcut when facing uncertainty, even if better choices are available. For business leaders, this reveals a subtle but important bias. When teams are navigating change, such as entering a new market or adopting a new process, they may unknowingly favor familiar approaches, even when those approaches are no longer the best fit. Awareness of this pattern can help organizations encourage fresh thinking and support better decisions in unfamiliar territory.

Tipping on Thin Trust

• Researchers: Demi Shenrui Deng, Auburn University; Lu Lu, Temple University; Ruiying (Raine) Cai, Washington State University
• Output: “Rethinking Tipping Request: Examining Consumer Reactions in Emerging Tipping Contexts,” Journal of Business Research, 2025
• Overview: Tipping prompts are no longer confined to white-tablecloth restaurants. From coffee shops to self-service kiosks, digital systems now urge customers to tip before service is even provided, fueling consumer frustration. This research explores how “tipflation”—the growing expectation to tip in more places and often at higher percentages than before—affects customer experiences in non-traditional service settings.
  
  The study focused on how tipping requests influence consumer emotions, their perception of whether an employee deserves a tip (known as tipping deservingness), and how satisfied they feel with their tipping decision. Researchers also examined three variables that often shape the experience: whether the tipping request appeared before or after service, whether the employee was present during payment, and whether the employee’s effort was made visible to the customer.
• Findings: Customers reported lower satisfaction when tipping prompts appeared before any service was rendered, especially when there was no visible service effort or a clear indication that the employee was working on their behalf. These early prompts decreased positive emotions and increased negative ones, which in turn reduced the extent to which customers felt the employee deserved a tip. The presence of a service worker during payment did not significantly affect these reactions.
  
  However, when businesses made service effort observable—such as showing a drink being prepared or food being assembled—customers reacted more favorably. These findings suggest that businesses using tipping prompts should not rely solely on automated defaults. Business leaders should reevaluate when and how they request tips and instead find ways to make service efforts visible to support a more trusted and satisfying customer experience.

When the Assessor Is an Algorithm

• Researchers: Jonas鈥疓oergen and Emanuel鈥痙e Bellis, University of St. Gallen; 础苍苍别-碍补迟丑谤颈苍鈥疜濒别蝉蝉别, Erasmus University Rotterdam
• Output: “AI Assessment Changes Human Behavior,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2025
• Overview: As artificial intelligence becomes a fixture in hiring, admissions, and other high-stakes evaluations, a new behavioral phenomenon has emerged. Known as the AI assessment effect, it refers to the tendency for individuals to adjust how they present themselves when they know they are being evaluated by an AI rather than a human. Researchers set out to investigate whether the presence of AI changes self-presentation in meaningful ways, and if so, why.
  
  Drawing on psychological theories of impression management, the authors proposed that people would strategically highlight analytical traits and suppress emotional or intuitive qualities in the presence of AI, based on a common belief that AI favors logic and objectivity. The study aimed to test this effect across a range of real and experimental contexts, and to explore the broader implications for fairness and effectiveness in selection processes.
• Findings: The research revealed that AI assessment does indeed influence behavior. Participants were 11 percent more likely to describe themselves as analytical when they believed they were being assessed by an AI evaluator compared to a human one. In a real hiring scenario, 27 percent of applicants would have been selected under AI assessment but not under human evaluation, purely based on self-described traits. The shift in behavior was linked to a belief shared by 89 percent of participants that AI rewards analytical thinking over emotional insight.
  
  When this belief was challenged—by prompting participants to consider that AI might also recognize intuition—the effect weakened or even reversed. These findings suggest that AI does more than assess; it shapes how people perform and present themselves.
  
  For business leaders, the results raise important questions about how AI tools may unintentionally steer candidate behavior and influence who rises to the top in competitive selection processes.

If you have new research from your school share with the business education community, please submit a summary and relevant links to 大象传媒 Insights via our online submission form at aacsb.edu/insights/articles/submissions.