1

Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology (2020)

© 2020 The British Psychological Society

www.wileyonlinelibrary.com

Why do supervisors abuse subordinates? Effects of

team performance, regulatory focus, and
emotional exhaustion
Xue‐Ling Fan1, Qi‐Qi Wang2, Jun Liu2* , Chao Liu3 and Tao Cai2
1
School of Business, Nanjing University, China
2
School of Business, Renmin University of China, Beijing, China
3
National School of Development, Peking University, Beijing, China

Complementing previous studies on the antecedents of abusive supervision at the

organizational and individual level, this study investigates how a team‐level factor (i.e.,
team performance) influences abusive supervision. Drawing on the conservation of
resources theory, we propose that low team performance may elicit abusive supervision
by making supervisors emotionally exhausted. Furthermore, when faced with low team
performance, supervisors with a high prevention focus may experience greater emotional
exhaustion and thus display more abusive behaviours, while supervisors with a high
promotion focus may be less likely to feel emotionally exhausted and thereby exhibit
fewer abusive behaviours. We tested our hypotheses using three‐wave survey data
collected from 130 teams within an organization. Findings showed that supervisors’
emotional exhaustion mediated the negative effect of team performance on abusive
supervision, while only prevention focus moderated the indirect effect of team
performance on abusive supervision via emotional exhaustion. This study contributes
to the literature on antecedents of abusive supervision, the relationship between abusive
supervision and performance, and leadership literature broadly.

Practitioner points
 As abusive supervision results from psychological stress in a specific form of emotional exhaustion,
organizations need to improve supervisors’ stress‐management skills by designing relevant training or
education programmes, and help them handle or recover from stress.
 The study’s identification of the specific stressor (i.e., low team performance) fostering abusive
supervision can increase organizations’ awareness of the issue and enable them to take appropriate
interventions to reduce abusive supervision.
 Confronted with low team performance, highly prevention‐focused supervisors become more
emotionally exhausted and are therefore more likely to abuse subordinates. Thus, in organizations
where such a stressor (i.e., low team performance) is salient, practitioners can hire supervisors with a
low prevention focus, or assess, select, and promote supervisors based on their prevention focus.

Abusive supervision, defined as ‘subordinates’ perceptions of the extent to which

supervisors engage in the sustained display of hostile verbal and nonverbal behaviors,

*Correspondence should be addressed to Jun Liu, No. 59 Zhongguancun Street, Haidian District, Beijing, China
(email: junliu@ruc.edu.cn).

DOI:10.1111/joop.12307
2 Xue‐Ling Fan et al.

excluding physical contact’ (Tepper, 2000, p. 178), is prevalent in organizations (Tepper,

2007; Walter, Lam, Van Der Vegt, Huang, & Miao, 2015), and its negative effects on
subordinates have been well documented (for reviews, see Martinko, Harvey, Brees, &
Mackey, 2013; Zhang & Liao, 2015). Accordingly, researchers have been striving to
explore why supervisors engage in abusive behaviours. Prior studies have shown that
both individual and organizational characteristics are associated with abusive supervision.
Specifically, supervisors’ characteristics, such as emotional intelligence, agreeableness,
extroversion, conscientiousness, and neuroticism, as well as subordinates’ characteris-
tics, including political skill, cynical attribution, negative affectivity, and conscientious-
ness, can influence abusive supervision (Aquino & Thau, 2009; Aryee, Chen, Sun, &
Debrah, 2007; Grandy & Starratt, 2010; Hoobler & Brass, 2006; Mathisen, Einarsen, &
Mykletun, 2011; Restubog, Scott, & Zagenczyk, 2011; Tepper, Duffy, Henle, & Lambert,
2006). Concerning organizational factors, studies have found that organizational injustice,
organizational sanctions, and aggressive norms impact abusive supervisory behaviours
(Hoobler & Hu, 2013; Restubog et al., 2011; Tepper et al., 2006; Zhang & Bednall, 2016).
These studies have only focused on individual‐ and organizational‐level antecedents, but
overlooked antecedents at the team level.
In fact, work is increasingly conducted by team where leadership occurs (Kozlowski,
Mak, & Chao, 2016). Teams provide the most immediate and relevant context in which
supervisors, as the heads of teams, assume responsibilities and perform their job roles;
thus, team‐level antecedents may directly and substantially affect supervisors’ emotions
and behaviours (Kozlowski et al., 2016; Morgeson, DeRue, & Karam, 2010). Moreover,
because leadership’s primary role is to ensure the accomplishment of team goals, the
degree of team goal attainment may largely determine the presence and frequency of
particular supervisor behaviours (Fleishman, Mumford, Zaccaro, Levin, Korotkin, & Hein,
1991; Kozlowski et al., 2016). Thus, we identify team performance, which indicates the
attainment of team goals, as the team‐level factor that may influence abusive supervision.
Because low team performance may threaten supervisors’ resources (e.g., positive self‐
perceptions) (Jiang & Gu, 2016), based on the conservation of resources (COR) theory,
we conceptualize low team performance as a critical and proximal stressor that engenders
abusive supervision (Mawritz, Folger, & Latham, 2014).
Previous studies have already recognized subordinate performance as an antecedent of
abusive supervision from the supervisor–subordinate interaction perspective at the
dyadic level. These studies have found that both low and high subordinate performance
can trigger abusive supervision because low (high) performance can evoke supervisors’
negative evaluations of them (threaten supervisors’ status) (Khan, Moss, Quratulain, &
Hameed, 2018; Lam, Walter, & Huang, 2017; Liang, Lian, Brown, Ferris, Hanig, & Keeping,
2016; Tepper, Moss, & Duffy, 2011). However, because of the inherent differences in the
implications of team and subordinate performance for supervisors, the psychological
mechanisms and the boundary conditions of the relationship between performance and
abusive supervision may vary depending on the levels of analysis. From a practical
perspective, understanding how the relationship between performance and abusive
supervision operates across levels has important implications for how organizations can
best intervene in abusive supervision and manage teams and the individuals within them.
Moreover, to our knowledge, extant research has predominantly focused on how
abusive supervision impacts team performance (Jiang & Gu, 2016; Priesemuth, Schminke,
Ambrose & Folger, 2014; Wu, Liu, Leung, & Wu, 2013). Nevertheless, such an exclusive
emphasis on supervisors’ one‐way influences on team performance only describes one‐
half of the dynamics of team–leader interactions, which limits our understandings of these
 Why do supervisors abuse subordinates? 3

holistic dynamic interactions. Indeed, leadership in teams entails a relationship that

involves bidirectional influences (Day, Gronn, & Salas, 2006; Kinnunen, Feldt, & Mauno,
2016), and thus, it is possible that team performance influences abusive supervision
reversely.
Conservation of resources theory provides strong evidences for the reverse effect of
team performance on abusive supervision and further helps to identify its mediating
process and boundary condition to clearly differentiate the operations of the relationship
between performance and abusive supervision at the team level from that relationship at
the individual level found in prior studies. According to COR theory, positive self‐
perceptions (e.g., feelings of being successful, feelings of goal accomplishment, feelings
of fulfilling the role), time, and energy are resources that people strive to gain and protect
(Hobfoll, 2001). Because team performance is considered by supervisors as a cue to
generate self‐perceptions and decide subsequent resource allocations (e.g., time, energy),
it is closely related to the number of resources that supervisors have (Li, Wang, Yang, &
Liu, 2016). With low team performance, supervisors may generate negative self‐
perceptions (Li et al., 2016; Wright & Cropanzano, 1998) and may need to invest extra
resources (e.g., time, energy) to identify the causes of the low team performance and find
ways to improve it. Therefore, low team performance may deplete supervisors’ personal
resources, such as positive self‐perceptions, time, and energy, thereby acting as a critical
stressor. COR theory notes that individuals’ resources have an important influence on the
extent to which they behave abusively (Hobfoll, 1989; Lam et al., 2017). Emotional
exhaustion – a chronic state of physical and emotional depletion that results from
excessive job demands and continuous hassles (Wright & Cropanzano, 1998) – captures
individuals’ state of resources and thus can act as the underlying mechanism to explicate
why supervisors are more likely to adopt a defensive strategy by engaging in abusive
behaviours when facing low team performance.
Conservation of resources theory also argues that certain personal characteristics
influence the stress process because these traits shape how individuals cognitively
process information related to the stressor (Hobfoll, 1989). Building on the proposition of
COR theory that changes in the amount of resources (gains vs. losses) largely determine
the degree to which individuals experience psychological stress, and their subsequent
reactions, we identify regulatory focus as a moderator because it captures individuals’
differences in sensitivity to resource losses and gains. Regulatory focus theory outlines
two motivational foci (promotion vs. prevention) and argues that these foci have
pervasive influences on individuals’ information processing style (Higgins, Shah, &
Friedman, 1997). Generally, in contrast with promotion‐focused people, who emphasize
positive outcomes, prevention‐focused people are more sensitive to negative outcomes,
such as low team performance (Brockner & Higgins, 2001). Therefore, when facing low
team performance, supervisors with a high promotion focus may encounter less
emotional exhaustion because they are not as sensitive to resource losses, and may thus
display fewer abusive behaviours. In contrast, when confronted with low team
performance, supervisors with a high prevention focus may be more likely to experience
emotional exhaustion because of their greater sensitivity to losses, and may consequently
exhibit more abusive behaviours. The theoretical model is shown in Figure 1.
This study primarily contributes to the literature on antecedents of abusive
supervision. First, we extend prior research from individual‐ and organizational‐level to
team‐level analysis by identifying low team performance as a critical team‐level stressor
and depicting how and when this stressor influences the emergence of abusive
supervision. Second, we identify regulatory focus as a moderator, thereby noting that
4 Xue‐Ling Fan et al.

Regulatory focus
(promotion focus vs.
prevention focus)

Team Emotional Abusive

performance exhaustion supervision

Figure 1. Theoretical model.

supervisors’ trait capturing their sensitivity to losses also matters in the formation of
abusive supervision except for traits related to self‐control (e.g., self‐monitoring,
conscientiousness) addressed solely in prior studies (Eissa & Lester, 2017; Lam et al.,
2017; Mawritz et al., 2014; Yam, Fehr, Keng‐Highberger, Klotz, & Reynolds, 2016).
Moreover, the combination of team performance (stressful situation) and regulatory focus
(personal trait) in an integrative model is consistent with the ‘person‐situation’ view,
which highlights the simultaneous roles of situation and individual differences in shaping
abusive behaviours (Aryee et al., 2007; Hoobler & Brass, 2006; Wheeler, Halbesleben, &
Whitman, 2013).
Additionally, this study contributes to research on the relationship between abusive
supervision and performance by exploring the underlying mechanism and moderator of
that relationship at the team level to clarify the similarities and differences with findings
found at the dyadic level, and by discussing and verifying the opposite effect of team
performance on abusive supervision.
Last, in contrast with the traditional way that emphasizes the proactive role of
leadership in influencing teams in leader–team interactions, this study focuses on how a
specific type of team output shapes leader behaviours, and further examines the role of
one leader characteristic (i.e., regulatory focus) in influencing such interactions. Thus, we
contribute to leadership literature broadly by providing a more balanced view to
reconsider leader–team interactions.

Theory and hypotheses

COR theory
Conservation of resources theory is a resource‐based theory of stress, where
resource is a core concept and is defined as things that people value in terms of
objects (e.g., car, house), personal characteristics (e.g., self‐esteem, self‐efficacy),
conditions (e.g., social support, job security), and energies (e.g., time, attention).
The basic tenet of COR theory is that individuals strive to obtain, retain, and protect
their resources (Hobfoll, 1988, 1989, 2011). Accordingly, the potential and actual
loss of resources, or a lack of resource gain following resource investment, can
engender individuals’ psychological stress, characterized by a depletion of resources
(Hobfoll, 1989). While COR theory maintains that people must invest resources to
recover from losses, depleted individuals often adopt a defensive posture to
conserve their remaining resources in order to avoid further resource losses, and
may even use counterproductive and/or self‐defeating loss‐control strategies to do so
(Hobfoll, 1989, 2001) – for instance, abusive behaviours (Wheeler et al., 2013). In
support of COR theory, Hobfoll and Shirom (2001) indicated that certain personality
 Why do supervisors abuse subordinates? 5

traits (e.g., resilience) can influence individuals’ appraisals and reactions in stressful
situations, and thus buffer or exacerbate the negative effect of work stressors.
Conservation of resources theory provides a theoretical framework for exploring how
team performance is related to abusive supervision. Drawing on COR theory, low team
performance is conceptualized as a work stressor, which may trigger emotional
exhaustion by causing actual losses of, and posing a threat to, a number of valued
resources noted in Hobfoll’s (2001) extensive list of COR resources, including ‘feeling that
I am accomplishing my goals’, ‘role as a supervisor’, ‘time’, and ‘energy’. Therefore,
supervisors may experience emotional exhaustion in such a stressful situation and
subsequently engage in abusive behaviours. Additionally, regulatory focus, which reflects
a dispositional approach by which people process information regarding the stressor, may
determine the degree of their emotional exhaustion in such a stressful situation and their
likelihood of displaying abusive behaviours.

Team performance and emotional exhaustion

Emotional exhaustion is a core dimension of burnout, which describes feelings of being
emotionally overextended and exhausted by one’s work (Wright & Cropanzano, 1998). It
occurs when individuals’ personal resources are drained by work stressors (Hobfoll, 2001;
Wright & Cropanzano, 1998). Accordingly, low team performance – a significant work
stressor – may engender supervisors’ emotional exhaustion by depleting their personal
resources.
Hobfoll (2001) identified 74 specific resources, among which categories such as
‘positive self‐perceptions (e.g., feeling that I am successful, feeling that I am accomplish-
ing my goals)’, ‘role as a supervisor’, ‘energy’, and ‘time’ are typical types of resources
constituting supervisors’ resource pool and are easily impacted by team performance (Li
et al., 2016). Low team performance may deplete supervisors’ personal resources as it not
only causes actual resource losses, but also threatens their remaining resources.
Leadership literature has emphasized that the primary role of leaders is to lead
collectives (e.g., team, unit, organization) to achieve collective goals, which can be
specified as collective performance (van Knippenberg & Stam, 2014; Yukl, 2002). Team
performance is the key performance indicator for the leadership position (Fiedler, 1967; Li
et al., 2016) and can be regarded as a mirror of the capability to fulfil the role as a leader
(Bass, 1990). People may use team performance as a valuable cue to evaluate leadership
effectiveness (Giessner, van Knippenberg, & Sleebos, 2009; Tu, Bono, Shum, &
LaMontagne, 2018). Low team performance may threaten supervisors’ leadership role
and inhibit their goal accomplishment, which may cause their actual resource losses in
terms of decreasing their positive sense of self (e.g., feeling that I am accomplishing my
goals). Moreover, low team performance requires supervisors to spend extra resources
(e.g., energy, time) to figure out the real causes of poor team performance and find ways to
improve it, thereby posing a threat to supervisors’ remaining resources. Therefore, the
stressful situation (i.e., poor team performance) may deplete supervisors’ personal
resources and thus result in a high level of emotional exhaustion (Maslach, Schaufeli, &
Leiter, 2001).

Hypothesis 1. Team performance is negatively related to supervisors’ emotional exhaustion.

6 Xue‐Ling Fan et al.

Mediating effect of emotional exhaustion

Conservation of resources theory states that resource‐depleted individuals are likely to
choose a defensive strategy of not investing coping efforts and resources in order to
conserve their resource reserves. They may even use a counterproductive strategy to do
so (Hobfoll, 1989, 2001). Consistent with COR theory, supervisors who experience
emotional exhaustion may be unwilling to spend too much effort to comprehensively and
objectively analyse the causes of poor team performance (Tepper et al., 2011). Instead,
they may adopt a less resource‐consuming approach, that is, simply attribute the direct
creators of team performance (i.e., subordinates) as the main cause of low team
performance (Hoobler & Brass, 2006). Thus, supervisors may perceive subordinates as
harmful for their goal attainment and even have aggressive impulses towards subordi-
nates.
Additionally, emotionally exhausted supervisors may be unable to control themselves
effectively, and tend to succumb to their impulses (Yam et al., 2016) because they have
insufficient resources and lack the motivation to utilize their remaining resources to
regulate their responses (Wheeler et al., 2013). Moreover, subordinates are less powerful
and more dependent in the subordinate–supervisor relationship, and thus are more likely
to be particularly vulnerable (Hoobler & Brass, 2006) and be abused by supervisors
(Tepper, 2007). As a result, supervisors may engage in deviant behaviours towards their
subordinates. Indeed, studies have found that when individuals are emotionally
exhausted, they are prone to becoming abusive towards others (Lam et al., 2017;
Wheeler et al., 2013).
Combining this argument with that regarding the negative effect of team performance
on emotional exhaustion, we expect that emotional exhaustion will mediate that negative
effect. That is, poor team performance may act as a work stressor that may induce
supervisors’ emotional exhaustion by depleting their self‐resources. Subsequently,
emotionally exhausted supervisors are more likely to engage in abusive behaviours.
Accordingly, we propose that:

Hypothesis 2. Supervisors’ emotional exhaustion mediates the negative relationship

between team performance and their abusive behaviours towards subor-
dinates.

Moderating effects of regulatory focus

Conservation of resources theory underscores individuals’ cognitive appraisal in the stress
process and points out that certain personality traits influence appraisals and reactions to
work stressors (Hobfoll, 1989; Hobfoll, Freedy, Lane, & Geller, 1990). As COR theory
suggests that it is the actual or potential resource losses caused by the stressor that induce
psychological stress (Hobfoll, 1989), individuals’ sensitivity to the losses may influence
the extent to which they experience psychological stress. Regulatory focus, which
captures differences in the way individuals process information related to resource losses
and gains, is particularly relevant to their reactions in a stressful situation (Higgins et al.,
1997).
Regulatory focus theory identifies two types of regulatory foci (promotion vs.
prevention), which have been shown to exert pervasive impacts on the nature of the goal
pursued, the information processing style, and the behavioural approaches during goal
pursuit (Higgins et al., 1997). In particular, promotion focus predisposes individuals to
 Why do supervisors abuse subordinates? 7

emphasize positive outcomes and resource gains, whereas prevention focus sensitizes
individuals to negative outcomes and resource losses (Koopman, Lanaj, & Scott, 2016).
Therefore, prevention and promotion focus may strengthen or buffer the negative effects
of team performance on emotional exhaustion and subsequent abusive supervision
because of the distinctiveness in supervisors’ sensitivity to resource losses.

Prevention focus. People with a high prevention focus have high security and
conservation needs and pursue the fulfilment of their duties by avoiding errors and
mistakes (Crowe & Higgins, 1997; Higgins & Spiegel, 2004). Prevention‐focused
individuals are sensitive to the presence and absence of negative outcomes and attentive
to the possibility of threat (Higgins et al., 1997). Accordingly, they are highly motivated to
minimize resource losses and are sensitive to such actual and potential losses (Higgins
et al., 1997; Koopman et al., 2016). For supervisors with a high prevention focus, poor
team performance may become more salient as it may decrease their personal resources,
such as a positive sense of self, and threaten their remaining resources (e.g., time, energy).
Confronted with low team performance, they are more likely to be influenced as they care
greatly about the resource losses, and will thus experience more psychological stress in
the form of emotional exhaustion.
However, supervisors with a low prevention focus may be less sensitive to resource
losses and related threats. Therefore, they are less likely to be influenced by poor team
performance and subsequently experience less emotional exhaustion. Accordingly, we
propose the following hypothesis:

Hypothesis 3a. Prevention focus moderates the negative relationship between team
performance and emotional exhaustion, such that the negative relation-
ship will be stronger when prevention focus is high rather than low.

Thus far, we have developed theoretical underpinnings for the mediating effect of
emotional exhaustion, as well as for the contingent effect of prevention focus. That is,
emotional exhaustion mediates the relationship between team performance and abusive
supervision (Hypothesis 2). Prevention focus moderates the negative relationship
between team performance and emotional exhaustion (Hypothesis 3a). The theoretical
rationales behind the above hypotheses also suggest an integrative moderated mediation
model, that is, prevention focus may moderate the indirect effect of team performance on
supervisors’ abusive behaviours via emotional exhaustion.
Specifically, supervisors with a high prevention focus are more attentive to resource
losses, thereby being more easily influenced by low team performance, which is
characterized by resource losses (Eissa & Lester, 2017; Lam et al., 2017; Mawritz et al.,
2014; Yam et al., 2016). Thus, confronted with low team performance, they tend to
experience higher psychological stress in the form of emotional exhaustion. As a result,
they have insufficient resources to regulate their aggressive impulses and are increasingly
inclined to behave abusively towards their subordinates (Hoobler & Brass, 2006; Yam
et al., 2016). Conversely, low team performance is less salient for low prevention‐focused
supervisors in depleting their resources because they are less sensitive to resource losses
(Higgins et al., 1997). Therefore, in the presence of low team performance, supervisors
who are of low prevention focus are less emotionally exhausted and subsequently less
likely to abuse their subordinates. This logic is built upon the proposition of COR theory
8 Xue‐Ling Fan et al.

that individuals’ differences influence their appraisals of stressors and thus determine
their experiences of psychological stress, which in turn induces different reactive
behaviours (Hobfoll, 1989; Hobfoll et al., 1990). In sum, supervisors with a high
prevention focus are more likely than supervisors with a low prevention focus to abuse
their subordinates when team performance is low, because they will experience a higher
level of emotional exhaustion. Accordingly, we propose the following hypothesis:

Hypothesis 3b. Prevention focus moderates the indirect effect of team performance on
supervisors’ abusive behaviours through emotional exhaustion.

Promotion focus. Unlike prevention focus, people with a promotion focus have high
growth and development needs and pursue the advancement and accomplishment by
approaching ideals (Crowe & Higgins, 1997; Higgins & Spiegel, 2004). Promotion‐focused
people emphasize positive outcomes and are particularly concerned with realizing gains
and precluding non‐gains. Wang and Lee (2006) suggested that motivational orientation
affects the type of information that individuals search for and rely on. Promotion focus
directs individuals’ attention to information related to gains rather than losses (Florack,
Scarabis, & Gosejohann, 2005). Since individuals engage in selective information
processing with the guidance of promotion focus (Yoon, Sarial‐Abi, & Gürhan‐Canli,
2012), highly promotion‐focused individuals are less sensitive to losses due to their lower
awareness of, and more resilience to, information about losses (Conroy & O’Leary‐Kelly,
2014; Higgins & Tykocinski, 1992). For instance, Stam, van Knippenberg and Wisse
(2010) found that promotion‐focused followers cannot be motivated by supervisors’
speech emphasizing negative consequences of not pursuing a vision, whereas they are
highly motivated by speech emphasizing positive outcomes of pursuing a vision.
Accordingly, confronted with poor team performance, supervisors with a high promotion
focus are less sensitive to the loss caused by low team performance and do not inevitably
feel emotionally exhausted.
Compared with highly promotion‐focused supervisors, supervisors with a low
promotion focus may be more sensitive to resource losses (Brockner & Higgins, 2001;
Stam et al., 2010). Thus, they may react more strongly to poor team performance in the
form of experiencing higher emotional exhaustion. Accordingly, we propose that:

Hypothesis 4a. Promotion focus moderates the negative relationship between team
performance and emotional exhaustion, such that the negative relation-
ship will be weaker when promotion focus is higher rather than lower.

Taking the above arguments together, we also expect promotion focus to

moderate the indirect effect of team performance on abusive behaviours through
emotional exhaustion. Because promotion focus directs individuals’ attention to gains
rather than losses, highly promotion‐focused supervisors are insensitive to resource
losses (Conroy & O’Leary‐Kelly, 2014; Higgins & Tykocinski, 1992). Thus, they are
less likely to be influenced by low team performance characterized by resource losses
(Stam et al., 2010) and feel less emotionally exhausted, thereby having sufficient
resources to control their abusive impulses towards their subordinates. In contrast,
supervisors with a low promotion focus are more sensitive to resource losses than
 Why do supervisors abuse subordinates? 9

highly promotion‐focused supervisors (Brockner & Higgins, 2001), and therefore

experience more emotional exhaustion when team performance is low, and are more
likely to engage in abusive behaviours. Accordingly, we propose the following
hypothesis:

Hypothesis 4b. Promotion focus moderates the indirect effect of team performance on
supervisors’ abusive behaviours via emotional exhaustion.

Methods
Sample and procedures
We collected multi‐wave data from a hypermarket chain located in China. Based on the
type of job, employees of the hypermarket chain were categorized into three types:
business sequence employees, auxiliary business sequence employees, and functional
sequence employees. Specifically, business sequence employees’ activities mainly
revolve around the production chain of business, including salespeople, cashiers, tally
clerk, purchasers, and transporters; auxiliary business sequence employees consist of
security guards, maintenance technicians, and cleaners; and functional sequence
employees are those working within the finance department, human resources
department, etc. Employees in business sequence and auxiliary business sequence
account for nearly 80% of the total employees. Participants in this study included
employees from all the three categorizations, and they did various kinds of jobs. Besides,
according to the function, teams were divided into sales teams, purchasing teams,
cleaning teams, HR teams, etc. In our sample, teams covered all major functions (e.g.,
cashier and financial management).
We distributed 168 questionnaires to team supervisors and 336 questionnaires to two
subordinates of each team supervisor. Each survey was assigned a unique code in order to
match member and supervisor responses. In order to avoid common method bias, we
adopted a multi‐wave, multi‐source design to collect the data. Specifically, supervisors
reported their regulatory focus at Time 1 and evaluated team performance and emotional
exhaustion at Time 2. At Time 3, subordinates reported their supervisor’s abusive
behaviours.
We received 154 questionnaires from supervisors and 308 from subordinates. After
data cleaning, we got 130 and 298 questionnaires from supervisors and subordinates,
respectively. Further, we matched the supervisors’ responses with subordinates’.
Finally, we had 130 matched supervisor surveys and 260 matched subordinate
surveys. Therefore, our final sample size was 130. The effective response rate was
77.38%. In the final supervisor sample, 68.46% of respondents were female, and
31.54% were male. The average organizational tenure was 4.58 (SD = 2.38) years. The
average age was 33.82 (SD = 8.51) years. Among the supervisors, 16.28% had a high
school diploma or below, 81.40% held a college or bachelor’s degree, and 2.33% had
a master’s degree. In the final subordinate sample, 27.27% were male and 72.73%
were female. The average organizational tenure was 2.09 (SD = 1.77) years, the
average age of the subordinates was 28.08 (SD = 5.41) years, and 3.36% had a high
school diploma or below, 95.30% held a college or bachelor’s degree, and 1.34% had
a master’s degree.
10 Xue‐Ling Fan et al.

Measures
All variables were measured on a seven‐point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree to
7 = strongly agree), except for team performance, which was measured on a ten‐point
scale (1 = very poor to 10 = superb).

Team performance
We used the three‐item scale of De Jong and Elfring (2010) to measure team performance
at Time 2. Two of the three items measured the quality and quantity of the output,
respectively. The last one captured the overall assessment of team performance.
Cronbach’s alpha was .901.

Emotional exhaustion
We used the five‐item scale of Maslach and Jackson (1981) to measure emotional
exhaustion at Time 2. One sample item is ‘I feel emotionally drained from my work’.
Cronbach’s alpha was .922.

Regulatory focus
Promotion and prevention focus were each measured by nine items from the scale of
Lockwood, Jordan, and Kunda (2002) at Time 1. Sample items are ‘In general, I am focused on
preventing negative events in my life’ (prevention focus) and ‘I often imagine myself
experiencing good things that I hope will happen to me’ (promotion focus). Cronbach’s alphas
for the scales of prevention focus and promotion focus were .820 and .844, respectively.

Abusive supervision
We used the five‐item scale of Mitchell and Ambrose (2007) to measure abusive
supervision at Time 3. A sample item is ‘My supervisor puts me down in front of the
others’. We averaged the ratings over all subordinates nested within each supervisor to
obtain an aggregate score of abusive supervision for each supervisor to present
supervisor’s abusive behaviours towards the whole team members rather than targeting
at the specific subordinate. ICC (1) = .068 and mean rwg = .925. These indicators suggest
that the data collected at the individual level can be aggregated to the team level.
Cronbach’s alpha was .885.

Control variables
The previous research indicated that supervisors’ demographic variables influence their
abusive behaviours (Hoobler & Hu, 2013; Mawritz, Mayer, Hoobler, Wayne, & Marinova,
2012). In this study, only supervisors’ age significantly impacts abusive supervision. Since
including non‐significant control variables (with dependent variable) in analyses may affect
main hypotheses testing (Becker, 2005), we only controlled for supervisors’ age (in years).

Analytical strategy
We conducted confirmatory factor analyses (CFAs) to confirm the dimensionality and
discriminant validity of our measures. Next, we tested the hypotheses in two interlinked
 Why do supervisors abuse subordinates? 11

steps. We first examined a simple mediation model (Hypotheses 1–2) by using

bootstrapping to test the indirect effect. Second, we integrated the proposed moderator
into the simple mediation model (Hypotheses 3a, 4a), and we empirically tested the
overall moderated mediation hypotheses (Hypotheses 3b, 4b) by using the PROCESS
macro (Preacher, Rucker, & Hayes, 2007). This PROCESS macro facilitates the
implementation of recommended bootstrapping methods and provides a method for
probing the significance of conditional indirect effects at the different values of the
moderator (Preacher et al., 2007).

Results
Table 1 presents means, standard deviations, and correlations for the key variables. Their
correlations were as expected.

Preliminary analyses
Due to the small sample size, we parcelled the items to reduce the bias of parameter
estimations (Bandalos, 2002; Little, Cunningham, Shahar, & Widaman, 2002; Little,
Rhemtulla, Gibson, & Schoemann, 2013; Radulovic, Thomas, Epitropaki, & Legood,
2019). The item‐parcelling technique reduces the number of parameters in a structural
equation modelling analysis and thus maintains a reasonable degree of freedom in the
model, thereby improving the robustness of parameter estimations (Bagozzi & Edwards,
1998).
Specifically, we combined the two items of each construct (i.e., prevention focus,
promotion focus, emotional exhaustion) with the highest and lowest factor loadings by
averaging them and repeated this procedure until we had three to five indicators for each
construct (Hall, 1999). The CFA results demonstrated that our hypothesized four‐factor
model (i.e., team performance, emotional exhaustion, prevention focus, and promotion
focus) was a better fit to the data, x2 (98) = 143.898, RMSEA = 0.060, CFI = 0.962,
TLI = 0.954, compared to more parsimonious models, including a three‐factor model
collapsing prevention focus and promotion focus, △x2 (3) = 228.505, p < .001,
RMSEA = 0.144, CFI = 0.776, TLI = 0.734; a two‐factor one combining team perfor-
mance and emotional exhaustion into one factor based on the three‐factor model, △x2
(2) = 166.686, p < .001, RMSEA = 0.180, CFI = 0.640, TLI = 0.581; and a one‐factor
model with all variables loaded on a single factor, △x2 (1) = 356.059, p < .001,

Table 1. Means, standard deviations, and correlations

Variables Means SD 1 2 3 4 5

1. Supervisor’s age 33.815 8.506

2. Team performance 8.803 1.060 .181*
3. Emotional exhaustion 2.477 1.521 .011 −.394**
4. Prevention focus 4.582 1.240 .086 .008 .147
5. Promotion focus 5.997 .886 .129 .260** −.208* .359**
6. Abusive supervision 1.225 .380 −.182* −.218* .254** −.040 −.181*

Note. N = 130 (teams).

*p < .05; **p < .01; two‐tailed.
12 Xue‐Ling Fan et al.

RMSEA = 0.242, CFI = 0.347, TLI = 0.246. Therefore, the four‐factor model represents
the best fit to the data, and the variables can be discriminated.

Tests of hypotheses
As shown in Model 2 of Table 2, team performance was negatively related to emotional
exhaustion (β = −.410, p < .001). Thus, Hypothesis 1 was supported. As shown in Model
9, emotional exhaustion was positively related to abusive supervision (β = .215, p < .05)
after controlling for team performance. In order to test the indirect effect of team
performance on abusive supervision via emotional exhaustion, we used 5,000 bootstrap-
ping estimates to construct 95% bias‐corrected confidence interval. The analysis revealed
that the indirect effect was significantly different from zero (−0.032, 95% CI: −0.079 to
−0.004). Thus, Hypothesis 2, which states that emotional exhaustion mediates the
negative effects of team performance on abusive supervision, was supported.
As shown in Model 4 of Table 2, the interaction term (team performance x prevention
focus) was significantly associated with emotional exhaustion (β = −.141, p < .05, one‐
tailed). To explicate the interaction, we conducted simple slope analyses. The results (see
Figure 2) suggest that under the low level of prevention focus (−1 SD), the effect of team
performance on emotional exhaustion was negative and significant (b = −0.364,
t = −2.105, p < .05); under the high level of prevention focus (+1 SD), the effect of
team performance on emotional exhaustion was significantly negative (b = −0.836,
t = −4.471, p < .001). However, in a more rigorous way by adopting the conventional
standard (i.e., two‐tailed), we concluded that Hypothesis 3a, which states that prevention
focus moderates the negative effects of team performance on emotional exhaustion, was
not supported.
In order to test the moderated mediation effect predicted by Hypothesis 3b, we
applied a bootstrapping procedure to assess the magnitude of the conditional indirect
effects of team performance on abusive supervision via emotional exhaustion at the
different levels of prevention focus (i.e., +1 SD, −1 SD). To implement this bootstrapping,
we draw 5,000 random samples to replace the full sample and constructed bias‐corrected
confidence intervals to assess whether the conditional indirect effects were significantly
different from zero (MacKinnon, Lockwood, & Williams, 2004). As shown in Figure 3, at
the high level of prevention focus (+1 SD), the size of the indirect effect was −0.045 and
the 95% confidence interval, excluding zero, was [−0.107, −0.005], suggesting a
significant conditional indirect effect. When the prevention focus is low (−1 SD), the size
of the indirect effect was −0.020, and the 95% confidence interval, excluding zero, was
[−0.065, −0.001], suggesting a significant conditional indirect effect. The difference in the
two conditional indirect effects was significant (95% CI: −0.034 to −0.0001), which
indicated that the moderated mediating effect was significant. Therefore, Hypothesis 3b,
which states prevention focus moderates the indirect effect of team performance on
abusive supervision via emotional exhaustion, was supported.
According to Model 6 in Table 2, the interaction of team performance with promotion
focus was not significant (β = −.002, n.s.). Therefore, Hypothesis 4a, stating that
promotion focus moderates the relationship between team performance and emotional
exhaustion, was not supported. Following the same procedures for testing Hypothesis 3b,
we tested Hypothesis 4b. The results showed that promotion focus did not moderate the
indirect effect of team performance on abusive supervision via emotional exhaustion, and
therefore, Hypothesis 4b was not supported.
Table 2. Summary of hierarchical regression analysis

Emotional exhaustion Abusive supervision

Variables M1 M2 M3 M4 M5 M6 M7 M8 M9
＋
Age .011 .085 .073 .066 .096 .096 −.182* −.147 −.166＋
Team performance −.410*** −.408*** −.418*** −.380*** −.380*** −.191* −.103
Emotional exhaustion .215*
Prevention focus .144＋ .164*
Promotion focus −.121 −.121
Team performance 9 prevention focus −.141＋
Team performance 9 promotion focus −.002
R2 0 .162 .183 .202 .176 .176 .033 .069 .107
ΔR2 .162*** .019＋ 0 .036* .038*

Note. N = 130 (teams).

*p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001; ＋p < .10; two‐tailed.
Why do supervisors abuse subordinates?
13
14 Xue‐Ling Fan et al.

Discussion
This study identified a strong effect of team performance on shaping abusive behaviours
and showed that, in addition to organizational and individual characteristics, team‐
relevant factor also contributes to the generation of abusive supervision. We found that
low team performance is a critical work stressor that makes supervisors emotionally
exhausted and subsequently display abusive behaviours. This study also highlighted the
crucial role of supervisors’ regulatory focus in directing their appraisals of low team
performance and their subsequent reactions. By identifying regulatory focus as a
moderator, this study explains why some supervisors are more likely to feel emotionally
exhausted than others, and subsequently display more abusive behaviours when facing
low team performance.
The moderating effects of promotion focus were not supported. According to
regulatory focus theory, promotion focus should have buffered the negative effect of team
performance on emotional exhaustion, because promotion‐focused supervisors are less
attentive to resource losses (Higgins & Tykocinski, 1992) and therefore are less likely to be
influenced by low team performance. Nevertheless, the results showed that such a
negative effect was not weakened even when supervisors have a high promotion focus.
The results might suggest that supervisors are overly concerned about the team
performance; when team performance is low, even if they are promotion‐focused, they
cannot help but become emotionally exhausted and therefore further abuse their
subordinates. Combining these findings with those regarding the moderating effect of
prevention focus, we tentatively conclude that when team performance becomes low,
supervisors will feel emotionally exhausted and display abusive behaviours no matter
which types of regulatory foci they have. However, if supervisors are highly prevention‐
focused, they are more likely to abuse their subordinates as they experience increased
emotional exhaustion. The findings highlight the strong effect of low team performance
on abusive behaviours, thereby further proving that poor team performance is a critical
stressor that can elicit abusive supervision.

7.5

7
Emotional exhaustion

6.5

5.5

5
L ow prevention focus
4.5
High prevention focus

4
Low team performance High team performance

Figure 2. Simple slope analysis for the moderating effect of prevention focus.
 Why do supervisors abuse subordinates? 15

1.00

0.96

Abusive supervision 0.92

0.88 Low prevention focus

High prevention focus

0.84
Low team performance High team performance

Figure 3. The moderating effect of prevention focus on the indirect effect of team performance on
abusive supervision through emotional exhaustion.

The non‐significant effect also might result from the inability of promotion focus to
capture variations in individuals’ sensitivity to resource losses, and thus, it cannot detect
differences in individuals’ reactions to such losses. We infer that, in situations charac-
terized by losses, promotion focus may not work, whereas prevention focus predomi-
nately influences individuals’ reactions. This inference is consistent with research on
regulatory focus fit, which demonstrates that people are more likely to be influenced by
situational stimuli that match their regulatory foci (Byron, Peterson, Zhang, & LePine,
2018; Stam et al., 2010). For example, Stam et al. (2010) found that promotion‐focused
people are more likely to be motivated by vision communication emphasizing a desirable
outcome to approach, whereas prevention‐focused people tend to be motivated by vision
communication emphasizing an undesirable outcome to avoid. Further, differing from
existing research that examines how people’s perceptions of future losses and gains
regulate their present emotions and behaviours as the function of regulatory foci
(Koopman et al., 2016; Stam et al., 2010), this study examined how individuals react to
present losses with the influences of regulatory foci. We found that confronted with losses
caused by low team performance, individuals’ reactions were influenced by their levels of
prevention focus rather than promotion focus. In this regard, the findings advance
understanding of the roles of regulatory foci in dealing with losses.

Theoretical implications
Our study makes several contributions to research on the antecedents of abusive
supervision. First, our findings showed that low team performance elicits supervisors’
abusive behaviours by making them emotionally exhausted, especially when they have
high prevention focus. The findings suggest that team‐relevant factors also contribute to
abusive supervision. The majority of the previous literature has focused solely on how the
characteristics of the supervisor, subordinate, and organization influence abusive
supervision, and has ignored the team‐level factors that may exert the most direct and
proximal impacts on supervisors’ behaviours (for a review, see Zhang & Bednall, 2016).
Our findings expand prior studies by identifying team performance as a team‐level
antecedent, specifying the psychological mechanism by which it influences abusive
supervision, and recognizing out who are more likely to behave abusively. Most
16 Xue‐Ling Fan et al.

importantly, our emphasis on the role of the team‐relevant factor in shaping abusive
supervision may open new avenues for research on the causation of abusive supervision in
team settings.
Second, almost all research on the moderating role of supervisors’ characteristics in
the formation of abusive supervision has emphasized the traits related to self‐control (e.g.,
self‐monitoring, conscientiousness, neuroticism) and argued that it is the self‐control
captured by these traits that determines the occurrence of abusive supervision in the
presence of low subordinate performance, hostile climate, etc. (Eissa & Lester, 2017; Lam
et al., 2017; Mawritz et al., 2014; Yam et al., 2016). Complementing prior research, this
study addressed the role of regulatory focus, which reflects supervisors’ sensitivity to
resource losses (gains), in influencing the emergence of abusive supervision. That is, in
addition to supervisors’ traits related to self‐control capacity, this study demonstrated that
traits capturing the sensitivity to losses also matter in predicting abusive behaviours,
thereby providing a new insight for understanding why some supervisors are more likely
to display abusive behaviours than others in certain situation. Besides, these findings were
consistent with extant research on abusive behaviour, which has shown that the
exhibition of abusive behaviour is simultaneously determined by contextual situations
and individual differences (Aryee et al., 2007; Lam et al., 2017) and that examining the
effects of contextual situations or individual differences in isolation on the emergence of
abusive supervision is not sufficient to provide a full understanding of the phenomenon
(Aryee et al., 2007). The support that the present study provides for the interactionist
perspective underscores the need to adopt such a perspective in order to explore the
antecedents of abusive supervision.
Third, this study provides a clearer and more nuanced understanding of the
relationship between performance and abusive supervision. Specifically, we helped to
clarify the similarities and differences in this relationship across levels. The results showed
that low team performance induces abusive supervision, thus confirming findings at the
dyadic level that it is low rather than high performance that triggers abusive supervision
(Liang et al., 2016; Tepper et al., 2011). Most interestingly, by identifying emotional
exhaustion as the psychological process, we demonstrated that, with low team
performance, abusive supervision is a result of personal resource depletion (i.e.,
emotional exhaustion), whereas prior studies viewed abusive supervision as a strategy
adopted by supervisors to implicitly punish low or high performers because these
subordinates make them look bad or threaten their hierarchy (Khan et al., 2018; Lam et al.,
2017; Liang et al., 2016; Tepper et al., 2011). Compared with prior studies, we conclude
that the reasons for engaging in abusive behaviour vary across levels when facing low
performance. Thus, we provide a new perspective to understand why performance
induces abusive supervision, thereby delineating a more holistic picture of this
relationship.
Fourth, we offer a novel insight for further understanding the relationship between
team performance and abusive supervision by noting that abusive behaviours are also
shaped by team performance, rather than simply shaping team performance. Prior studies
on the consequences of abusive supervision have argued that abusive supervision
significantly inhibits team performance (Jiang & Gu, 2016; Priesemuth et al., 2014). The
logic implied in these studies aligns with leadership literature that has addressed the active
role of leadership in affecting team processes and outcomes (D’Innocenzo, Mathieu, &
Kukenberger, 2016; Schaubroeck, Lam, & Cha, 2007). Conversely, based on COR theory,
this study demonstrated the role of team performance in shaping supervisors’ abusive
behaviours and thus responds to the call for changing the traditional perspective on the
 Why do supervisors abuse subordinates? 17

relationship between ‘leader’ and ‘outcome’ in research regarding abusive supervision

(Zhang & Bednall, 2016).
Last, this study contributes to leadership literature in general by examining the effects
of team‐relevant factors on shaping leaders’ behaviours. Much of the research on team
leadership has focused exclusively on how leaders impact team characteristics, processes,
and outputs, but has ignored their reverse effects on influencing leaders’ behaviours.
According to the functional approach to team leadership, leader behaviours revolve
around team goals and are largely determined by team‐relevant factors (Kozlowski et al.,
2016; McGrath, 1962; Morgeson et al., 2010; Zaccaro, Rittman, & Marks, 2001). Indeed,
leaders are not only the leader of the team, but also the leader in the team (Day, Gronn, &
Salas, 2006). More recently, scholars have recognized the limitations of the imbalanced,
one‐way approach to the study of leadership, and have noted that team leadership entails a
relationship that involves bidirectional influences (Day et al., 2006; Ilgen, Hollenbeck,
Johnson, & Jundt, 2005; Kinnunen et al., 2016). By examining team performance as an
antecedent of abusive supervision, this study responds to such calls.

Practical implications
This study showed that abusive supervision is a result of supervisors’ psychological stress
in a specific form of emotional exhaustion in stressful situations, as their self‐resources
become too depleted to regulate their behaviours. For this reason, we believe that it is
imperative for organizations to detect and evaluate team managers’ psychological stress
and, if necessary, provide counselling services to those who are suffering high
psychological stress to help them handle or recover from this state. In addition,
organizations can design training or education programmes to improve supervisors’
stress‐management skills to help them avoid serious breakdown, thereby reducing their
possibility of displaying abusive behaviours.
This study demonstrated that low team performance can induce abusive supervision
by acting as a critical work stressor that engenders feelings of emotional exhaustion and
thus decreases supervisors’ abilities to regulate their behaviours. Our identification of the
specific stressor (i.e., low team performance) that fosters abusive supervision can increase
organizations’ awareness of this issue and enable organizations to take appropriate
interventions to reduce abusive supervision at its source. For instance, organizations can
redesign performance appraisal standards by ensuring that the team performance goal is
not only challenging but also achievable. By doing so, organizations can motivate team
managers, as well as largely eliminate this worker stressor (i.e., low team performance).
Organizations can also provide training on how to deal with low team performance,
thereby improving team managers’ skills related to handling that stressor.
The results showed that prevention focus strengthens the negative indirect effect of
team performance on abusive supervision via emotional exhaustion. That is, confronted
with poor team performance, supervisors with a high prevention focus are more likely to
feel emotionally exhausted, and display more abusive behaviours. Given that regulatory
focus is a relatively stable trait, organizations may find it easier to identify candidates who
have a high or low prevention focus (Lockwood et al., 2002; Stam et al., 2010).
Accordingly, in organizations where such a stressor (low team performance) is salient,
practitioners can hire team managers with a low prevention focus, or assess, select, and
promote team managers based on their prevention focus.
Even for supervisors who have a high prevention focus, organizations can adopt
interventions to reduce the negative effect of low team performance as much as possible.
18 Xue‐Ling Fan et al.

Studies on regulatory focus have shown that it can also be contextually manipulated
(Keller & Bless, 2006). Such contextual regulatory focus can be induced by creating a
strong situation in which chronic regulatory focus is replaced by contextual regulatory
focus (Brockner & Higgins, 2001; Higgins et al., 1997). As a result, in organizations with a
salient stressor (such as low team performance), organizations should create a situation to
reduce the level of supervisors’ prevention focus. For example, organizations can
decrease their emphasis on punishment for failure (Brockner & Higgins, 2001).

Limitations and future directions

Future investigations will benefit from considering several limitations of our study, along
with our suggestions for advancing research on the relationship between team
performance and abusive supervision. First, despite we used time‐lagged design to
measure variables, we still cannot establish the causality among the variables. The nature
of our research design requires caution about the conclusions we draw from the results.
Longitudinal research or experimental studies can be implemented in the future.
Second, in our argumentations, the actual and potential resource losses drive the
relationship between team performance and emotional exhaustion. However, we failed
to measure the resource losses, which links team performance and emotional exhaustion.
Our approach is consistent with extant published research on COR theory, which tested
the relationship between stressors and emotional exhaustion (Cole, Bernerth, Walter, &
Holt, 2010; Yang, Huang, Tang, Yang, & Wu, 2019). These studies did not examine the
resource losses that link stressors and the state of resources depletion (i.e., emotional
exhaustion) directly, because the role of resource losses in triggering emotional
exhaustion is strongly implied in COR theory. Moreover, the resources which vary in
type are not always measurable. Although, based on the research on COR theory, our
approach is reasonable and appropriate, we do believe that it is a logical direction for
future research to explicitly test out ‘resource losses’ to examine whether or the extent to
which resource losses can explain the observed effects of team performance on emotional
exhaustion here.
Third, the relationship between the interaction term (team performance x prevention
focus) and emotional exhaustion approached significant (i.e., β = −.141, p = .085).
Adopting a conservative interpretation of the statistical results, we concluded the
moderating effect was weak and non‐significant. Such a result may be attributable to the
relatively strong effect of team performance on emotional exhaustion (R2 = .16), which
may reduce the variability in the effect of team performance on supervisors with the
influence of prevention focus in the context of the small sample size (N = 130). The
present study may, therefore, have lacked sufficient statistical power to detect such a
weak relationship in this small sample. Future research can further test that relationship
using a larger sample size.
Fourth, based on COR theory, we proposed and tested the antecedent effect of team
performance on abusive supervision, whereas previous empirical studies on conse-
quences of abusive supervision have demonstrated a reverse relationship between
abusive supervision and team performance (Priesemuth et al., 2014). Accordingly, the
question may arise as to whether there is a reciprocal relationship between team
performance and abusive supervision. Although this study examined the opposite
relationship between team performance and abusive supervision, it did not test the
reciprocal relationship between the two in an integrative model. If a reciprocal
relationship does exist, Time 1 team performance will lead to Time 2 abusive supervision,
 Why do supervisors abuse subordinates? 19

which, in turn, will result in a reduction of team performance at Time 3. Further, Time 3
decreased team performance will induce more abusive behaviour at Time 4, which further
forms a vicious cycle. Therefore, future scholars can test whether team performance and
abusive supervisor are mutually related to each other, and further explore how
supervisors can prevent the vicious cycle if the reciprocal relationship exists. We believe
that the exploration of this aspect will definitely contribute to the understanding of the
relationship between abusive supervision and team performance.

Conclusion
This study reveals that team performance, a specific team‐level factor, can be a crucial
predictor of abusive supervision. Low team performance can become the most proximal
stressor, which engenders supervisors’ emotional exhaustion by depleting their personal
resources, and subsequently forces supervisors to display abusive behaviours. Moreover,
supervisors’ regulatory focus capturing their sensitivity to resource losses influences the
extent to which supervisors experience emotional exhaustion when facing low team
performance. Highly prevention‐focused supervisors experience more emotional
exhaustion and therefore display more abusive behaviours.

Acknowledgements
This research was supported by the China National Science Fund for Distinguished Young
Scholars (No. 71425003).

Conflicts of interest
All authors declare no conflict of interest.

Author contributions
Xueling Fan (Conceptualization; Data curation; Formal analysis; Methodology; Writing –
original draft; Writing – review & editing); Qiqi Wang (Writing – original draft; Writing –
review & editing); Jun Liu (Funding acquisition; Investigation; Project administration;
Writing – review & editing); Chao Liu (Methodology; Writing – review & editing); Tao Cai
(Writing – review & editing).

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding
author. The data are not publicly available due to privacy or ethical restrictions.

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Received 17 January 2019; revised version received 27 January 2020