A considerable body of research supports the link between Machiavellianism and antisocial forms of behavior at work. Yet, meta-analytic findings and existing theory allude to a more complex story, whereby Machiavellian employees’ engagement in antisocial acts is likely to be simultaneously influenced by countervailing situational forces. To promote more nuanced, contextualized knowledge of high Machs’ antisocial tendencies at work, we developed and tested a social context model that describes how multiple situational factors may, at once, provoke and constrain the tendency of such individuals to engage in one notable form of antisocial behavior at work: social undermining. Specifically, we argue that Machiavellian employees likely experience competing motivations to undermine their colleagues as a result of two countervailing situational factors that are relevant to their self-interests: anticipated organizational change and perceptions of coworkers’ exchange quality. To develop our predictions, we draw on trait activation theory’s core assertion that employees’ behavior is multiply determined, such that trait–behavior relations stem from a complex interplay among diverse and potentially competing trait-relevant situational cues. The results of a three-wave, time-lagged survey supported our predictions that anticipated change would strengthen the positive relation between Machiavellianism and undermining, while perceptions of coworkers’ exchange quality would attenuate it. Additionally, the results supported our three-way interaction hypothesis that perceived coworker exchange quality would weaken the two-way interaction effect of Machiavellianism and anticipated organizational change on social undermining. We discuss the implications of our findings, as well as avenues for future research.

大量研究支持马基雅维利主义与工作中的反社会行为之间的联系。然而，元分析结果和现有理论暗示了一个更复杂的故事，即马基雅维利式员工参与反社会行为可能同时受到对抗性情境力量的影响。为了促进对工作中高马赫的反社会倾向的更细致入微的情境化知识，我们开发并测试了一个社会情境模型，该模型描述了多种情境因素如何同时激发和限制这些人在工作中从事一种显着的反社会行为的倾向：社会破坏。具体而言，我们认为，马基雅维利主义的员工可能会因为与自身利益相关的两个相互抵消的情境因素而体验到损害同事的竞争动机：预期的组织变革和对同事交流质量的看法。为了发展我们的预测，我们利用特质激活理论的核心断言，即员工的行为是多重决定的，因此特质-行为关系源于多样化和潜在竞争的特质相关情境线索之间的复杂相互作用。三波的结果，滞后的调查支持我们的预测，即预期的变化会加强马基雅维利主义与破坏之间的正相关关系，而对同事交流质量的看法会减弱这种关系。此外，结果支持我们的三向互动假设，即感知同事交流质量会削弱马基雅维利主义和预期组织变革对社会破坏的双向互动效应。我们讨论了我们发现的影响，以及未来研究的途径。结果支持我们的三向互动假设，即感知到的同事交流质量会削弱马基雅维利主义和预期组织变革对社会破坏的双向互动效应。我们讨论了我们发现的影响，以及未来研究的途径。结果支持我们的三向互动假设，即感知到的同事交流质量会削弱马基雅维利主义和预期组织变革对社会破坏的双向互动效应。我们讨论了我们发现的影响，以及未来研究的途径。