How Does Environmentally Specific Servant Leadership Fuel Employees’ Low-Carbon Behavior? The Role of Environmental Self-Accountability and Power Distance Orientation
Yuhuan Xia, Yubo Liu, Changlin Han, Yang Gao, Yuanyuan Lan
Abstract
Environmental problems caused by excessive carbon emissions are becoming increasingly prominent and have received heightened attention in recent years. Encouraging people to adopt low-carbon behavior to reduce carbon emissions is desirable. Based on social learning theory, we developed and tested a moderated mediation model to investigate when and how environmentally specific servant (ESS) leadership impacts employees' low-carbon behavior (i.e., private low-carbon behavior and public low-carbon behavior). We tested our theoretical framework with a sample of 483 subordinates and their direct supervisors working in northern China. The results indicate that ESS leadership is positively related to employees' low-carbon behavior, and that environmental self-accountability plays a mediating role in this relationship. In addition, power distance orientation strengthens the direct effects of ESS leadership on employees' environmental self-accountability and low-carbon behavior, as well as the indirect effect of ESS leadership on private low-carbon behavior via environmental self-accountability. Our findings contribute to the literature surrounding ESS leadership and low-carbon behavior, and help to promote green development and thus achieve the goals of carbon neutrality and decreasing carbon dioxide emissions.