Ethical Leadership and Organizational Citizenship Behavior: The Mediating Roles of Cognitive and Affective Trust

I proposed that trust mediates the relationship between ethical leadership and organizational citizenship behavior, which is classified into 2 types: organizationally directed (OCBO) and individually directed (OCBI). Participants comprised 104 supervisor-subordinate dyads employed in public-sector organizations in a city in eastern China. The results showed that ethical leadership had a significant main effect on both OCBO and OCBI. In addition, cognitive trust had no significant mediating effect on the relationships between ethical leadership and OCBO and ethical leadership and OCBI, but affective trust fully mediated these relationships. The contribution of the results, limitations in the study, and future directions for research are also discussed.