Too Insecure to Be a Leader: The Role of Attachment in Leadership Emergence
The antecedents of leadership emergence have received increasing attention over the past decades. Extant work has found that traits that involve getting along with other members in social relations can help employees emerge as leaders. However, attachment has been ignored, even though it can provide...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2020-11-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Psychology |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.571401/full |
| _version_ | 1818260917922562048 |
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| author | Yang Yang Yongli Wang Hailing Lu Ling Tan |
| author_facet | Yang Yang Yongli Wang Hailing Lu Ling Tan |
| author_sort | Yang Yang |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The antecedents of leadership emergence have received increasing attention over the past decades. Extant work has found that traits that involve getting along with other members in social relations can help employees emerge as leaders. However, attachment has been ignored, even though it can provide a distinct relational perspective to getting along. This study investigates the relationship between attachment and leadership emergence as well as the mediating role of negative emotion and the moderating role of initiating structure in the relationship. Specifically, based on multisource data of 100 employees and their supervisors, the results reveal that avoidant attachment and anxious attachment exert a negative impact on leadership emergence via negative emotion. Moreover, the mediating effect on the above relationship is weaker when employees are at a high initiating structure level. The findings imply that insecurely attached employees can also be leaders if they expend more effort and focus more on task completion. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-12T18:38:57Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-89e3016cf26d4e37ab87d2b285807db7 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1664-1078 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-12T18:38:57Z |
| publishDate | 2020-11-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Psychology |
| spelling | doaj.art-89e3016cf26d4e37ab87d2b285807db72022-12-22T00:15:42ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Psychology1664-10782020-11-011110.3389/fpsyg.2020.571401571401Too Insecure to Be a Leader: The Role of Attachment in Leadership EmergenceYang Yang0Yongli Wang1Hailing Lu2Ling Tan3Business School, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, ChinaBusiness School, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, ChinaSchool of Economics and Management, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, ChinaBusiness School, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, ChinaThe antecedents of leadership emergence have received increasing attention over the past decades. Extant work has found that traits that involve getting along with other members in social relations can help employees emerge as leaders. However, attachment has been ignored, even though it can provide a distinct relational perspective to getting along. This study investigates the relationship between attachment and leadership emergence as well as the mediating role of negative emotion and the moderating role of initiating structure in the relationship. Specifically, based on multisource data of 100 employees and their supervisors, the results reveal that avoidant attachment and anxious attachment exert a negative impact on leadership emergence via negative emotion. Moreover, the mediating effect on the above relationship is weaker when employees are at a high initiating structure level. The findings imply that insecurely attached employees can also be leaders if they expend more effort and focus more on task completion.https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.571401/fullattachmentleadership emergencenegative emotioninitiating structuresocioanalytic theory |
| spellingShingle | Yang Yang Yongli Wang Hailing Lu Ling Tan Too Insecure to Be a Leader: The Role of Attachment in Leadership Emergence Frontiers in Psychology attachment leadership emergence negative emotion initiating structure socioanalytic theory |
| title | Too Insecure to Be a Leader: The Role of Attachment in Leadership Emergence |
| title_full | Too Insecure to Be a Leader: The Role of Attachment in Leadership Emergence |
| title_fullStr | Too Insecure to Be a Leader: The Role of Attachment in Leadership Emergence |
| title_full_unstemmed | Too Insecure to Be a Leader: The Role of Attachment in Leadership Emergence |
| title_short | Too Insecure to Be a Leader: The Role of Attachment in Leadership Emergence |
| title_sort | too insecure to be a leader the role of attachment in leadership emergence |
| topic | attachment leadership emergence negative emotion initiating structure socioanalytic theory |
| url | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.571401/full |
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