Incivility Spiral in Mentoring Relationships: Reconceptualizing Negative Mentoring as Deviant Workplace Behavior

Abstract

The authors apply affecive events theory to explore the mediating role of negative affect between different types of mentor’s negative mentoring behavior and the frequency of protégés instigating incivility against their mentors. Results of mediation analyses employing bootstrapping throw some light on the possibility of an incivility spiral in negative mentoring relationships. Specifically, the authors find signficance for the mediating role of negative affect between mentor’s distancing behavior and frequency of protégés instigating incivility against mentors. Furthermore, mentor’s manipulative behavior was found to be positively associated with instigated incivility by protégés. Findings of the study guide a discussion on human resource development (HRD) professionals’ strategic role in addressing the occurrence of incivility spirals in mentoring relationships.