Using Latent Profile Regression to Explore the Relationship between Religiosity and Work-related Ethical Judgments

Utilizing social structural symbolic interactionist theorizing about self-identity as presented by Weaver and Agle (2002) we obtained data related to five key measures of religiosity believed to be critical for understanding religiosity’s influence on ethical judgments. Using our five key religiosity measures we then fit a latent profile regression model to explore whether and how these constructs related to one another and to work-related ethical judgments. Results revealed that both our analytic and theoretical frameworks (latent profile regression and symbolic interactionism) were helpful in identifying religious profiles which are helpful for understanding the relationship between religiosity and work-related ethical judgments. More specifically, results indicated that extrinsic religious motivation orientation (RMO) may represent a ‘dark side’ to religiosity given higher levels of extrinsic RMO were found in a subgroup who judged unethical situations more favorably than those with lower levels of extrinsic RMO.