Academic Misconduct and Research Productivity of Business Scholars

This study investigates whether business scholars’ moral posture is related to their productivity in terms of peer-reviewed publications and research funds. We distinguish between deontological and consequentialist moral postures and take account of the moderating role of researchers’ perceived autonomy and the competition between them. The empirical results show that strong moral postures do not diminish research productivity. Both perceived autonomy and competition foster researchers’ productivity. Interestingly, a deontological moral posture fosters researchers’ productivity in contexts of low competition, but diminishes it in highly competitive settings. The findings suggest that measures for ethical governance in research need to consider not only the moral posture that underlies researchers’ ethical decision making, but also the institutional environment in which researchers are embedded.