INFLUENCE OF PROSOCIAL PERSONALITY TRAIT ON UNETHICAL BEHAVIOUR AMONG UNIVERSITY STAFF

Abstract

This study investigated the influence of prosocial personality trait on unethical behaviour among University staff in Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Anambra State, and Southeast Nigeria. A total number of 209 participants comprising of 35 teaching staff who occupy administrative positions, and 174 non-teaching staff were selected using stratified sampling technique, of which 66(31.5%) were male and 143(68.4% ) were female participants with an age range of 23 - 67 years ,having a mean age of 22.15 and standard deviation of 4.1. Two instruments were utilized for the study, a 12- item scale of Unethical Behaviour Tendency Scale (UBTS) (Tang & Weatherford ,(1997) and a 12- item scale of Prosocial Personality Trait Inventory (PPTI ) adapted from the work of John (1991) based on the model used by Coutinho, Sampaio, Ferreira & Soares (2013), in Portugal, were used for data collection. PPTI yielded a Cronbach alpha internal consistency of .72, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) confirmed the four-factor structure of PPTI in this study. Cross-sectional study that utilized a correlational design was adopted for the study while linear regression statistics was employed for data analysis.Five hypotheses were tested in this study, hypothesis 1, which stated that prosocial personality trait will inversely predict unethical behaviour tendency among university staff, was accepted at P<.000. Hypothesis 2, which stated that prosocial personality trait will inversely predict administrative abuse tendency among university staff was accepted at P<.000.Hypothesis 3, which stated that prosocial personality trait will inversely predict corruption behaviour tendency among university staff was accepted at P<.000. Hypothesis 4, which stated that prosocial personality trait will inversely predict sabotage behaviour tendency among university staff was accepted at P<.000. Hypothesis 5, which stated that prosocial personality trait will inversely predict theft behaviour tendency among university staff was accepted at P<.000.Findings revealed that prosocial personality should be adopted and positively reinforced in the Nigerian University system especially in the employment, placement and redeployment of workers, to shape employee behaviour and stem the tide of unethical behaviour in the workplace.