Luppo Kuillman

Chapter 4 88 It is important to note that the motivation to act morally does not necessarily lead to morally justifiable decisions. Although an individual may have a high propensity for ethics advocacy and, consequently, a strong desire to report reprehensible conduct, a certain degree of behavioral control is needed. Perceived behavioral control targeted at preventing harm An individual who is motivated to report reprehensible conduct cannot convert this motivation into action without feeling able to do so. Individuals thus need to perceive that they have behavioral control. According to Bandura, the ways in which people behave are generally better predicted by their perceived behavioral control (or “self- efficacy”) than by their factual skills. This is because perceived behavioral control helps individuals to determine what to do with the knowledge and skills that they have (Bandura, 1997). With regard to reporting behavior, it has been shown that self- efficacy is positively related to the intention to report fraud that has been detected (Purnamawati, 2018), and that perceived behavioral control is a positive predictor of whistleblowing intentions (Park & Blenkinsopp, 2009). In the current paper, we argue that perceived behavioral control has a direct effect on reporting behavior, in addition to moderating the relationship between EA and reporting behavior. More specifically, we reason that EA increases the likelihood of reporting reprehensible conduct, but only among people who sense that it would be easy to perform such behavior (Ajzen, 1991). We therefore hypothesize that EA will more strongly increase the likelihood of reporting reprehensible conduct when perceived behavioral control is high, rather than low. To test this hypothesis, we operationalized a construct of perceived behavioral control that is specific to the context of healthcare and in line with the most fundamental precepts of the Hippocratic oath of “First, do no harm.” As such, we introduce the measure “Behavioral control targeted at preventing harm” (BCPH). In summary (see also Figure 1), our research has two aims: 1) to establish whether a relationship exists between attitudes toward ethics advocacy (EA, variable X ) and the likelihood of reporting reprehensible conduct committed by colleagues (RRC, variable Y ), and 2) to assess whether behavioral control targeted at preventing harm (BCPH, variable M ) interacts with the relationship between X and Y.