Sleep Deprived Employees Engage in More Unethical Workplace

Behavior

Topic(s): Counter-Productive Work Behavior, ethics, Health & Safety

Publication: Journal of Applied Psychology
Article: Building a Self-Regulatory Model of Sleep Deprivation and Deception: The Role of Caffeine and
Social In uence
Authors: D.T. Welsh, A.P.J. Ellis, M.S. Christian, K.M. Mai
Reviewed by: Ben Sher

When employees engage in unethical behavior, organizations suffer. For example, employee theft
or dishonesty can hurt organizations both internally and in terms of public reputation. New
research (Welsh, Ellis, Christian, & Mai, 2014) has identied several key links in understanding the
dynamics that lead to employee deception, which is a type of unethical behavior.

SLEEP DEPRIVATION LEADS TO EMPLOYEE DECEPTION

The authors based their research on past ndings that show that sleep deprived employees are
more likely to engage in unethical behavior (Christian & Ellis, 2011). When faced with an unethical
opportunity, people need to use a certain amount of self-control to prevent themselves from doing
the unethical thing. Researchers call this self-regulation, and people have a certain reserve of
resources that they can use to self-regulate themselves. When people are sleep-deprived, the
brain undergoes physiological changes that deplete the resources available to self-regulate. When
this happens, a person may no longer have the ability to stand up to temptation, and it becomes
more likely that they will actually behave unethically.

THE ROLE OF CAFFEINE AND SOCIAL INFLUENCE

In the current study, the researchers found that tired employees who also consumed caffeine
were less likely to have depleted self-regulation resources. In other words, the lack of sleep did
not affect them as much, and they were more likely to maintain the ability to control themselves
and stand up to the temptation to behave unethically. As we all know too well, caffeine has the
ability to temper some of the effects of sleep deprivation.

A second major nding was that when peoples fatigue lowered their ability to self-regulate, it
didnt always lead to unethical behavior. The authors found a condition that made it more likely
that unethical behavior would result. The condition is called social inuence, which refers to the
inuence that people receive from other people, kind of like peer-pressure. One of the pitfalls of
having a decreased ability to self-regulate, is that you can be more susceptible to the suggestions
of other people who are themselves acting unethically.

IMPLICATIONS FOR ORGANIZATIONS

The major takeaway from this article is that sleep deprivation among employees is bad for
organizations. Besides for some of the more obvious problems that we might expect (i.e. lower
productivity, more mistakes or accidents) sleep deprivation can actually cause employees to act
unethically. As the authors mention, employees are now being asked to work an increasingly
greater number of hours during the week, making sleep deprivation a greater challenge in the
workplace.

The easiest solution is to encourage employees to get enough sleep, and to structure work
schedules and workloads to support that goal. But thats not always an easy thing to do. What else
can organizations do?

Specically, this article provides two ways that organizations can lower the amount of deceptive
behavior that their employees engage in, even if they are sleep deprived. First, caffeine was shown
to help. There may be something to supplying your ofce with a fresh pot of morning coffee.
However, as the authors point out, this doesnt mean that caffeine is the perfect solution.
Technically considered a drug, caffeine does have harmful side effects such as increased anxiety
and heart-rate. So dont go overboard.

Second, organizations should realize the role of social inuence. Even when sleep deprived
employees lose the ability to stop themselves from unethical behavior, it doesnt mean that
unethical behavior will result. In this circumstance, peer-pressure to behave unethically is the real
enemy. If organizations work to create an environment where employees behave ethically, and
strive to hire more ethically inclined individuals, then even the occasional sleep-deprived
employee wont be too much of a problem.
 Human Resource Practices Inuence How Employees Spend their Time at Work
Intelligence Testing: Is It Always the Smartest
Thing to Do?
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