My job is a game, and I am the owner: How gamification facilitates self-leadership for gig workers

Mengyu Mao, Lanxia Zhang, Jiamin Li and Wladislaw Rivkin

Journal of Business Research, 2024, vol. 183, issue C

Abstract: Previous research has explored antecedents of employee self-leadership in traditional organizational contexts. However, considering the recent emergence of the gig economy, one important question that remains unanswered is: How can self-leadership be facilitated among gig workers who lack traditional organizational structures to promote it? This study aims to examine gameful experience as a malleable antecedent of self-leadership among gig workers. To further expand our understanding of how and when gameful experiences facilitate self-leadership, we draw on the extended self-theory to explore the mediating role of job-based psychological ownership and the moderating role of perceptions of algorithmic transparency. Results from a time-lagged field study with N = 404 gig drivers in China suggest that gameful experiences have an indirect positive relationship with gig workers’ self-leadership through job-based psychological ownership. This relationship is stronger when gig workers have high perceptions of algorithmic transparency. Subsequently, we discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our findings.

Keywords: Gameful experience; Job-based psychological ownership; Self-leadership; Perceptions of algorithmic transparency; Extended self theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:183:y:2024:i:c:s0148296324003813

DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusres.2024.114877

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