The prevailing viewpoint has long depicted employee time theft as inherently detrimental. However, this perspective may stem from a limited understanding of the underlying motives that drive such behavior. Time theft can paradoxically be motivated by neutral and even laudable intentions, such as promoting work efficiency, thus rendering it potentially beneficial and constructive. Across three mixed-methods studies, we explore the motives behind employee time theft, develop and validate an instrument to assess these motives, and examine how they differentially predict time theft behavior. Specifically, in Study 1, we use a qualitative method and identify 11 types of time theft motives. Study 2 embarks on the development of measures of these motives, subsequently validating their factor structure. Study 3 examines their incremental variance in predicting time theft behavior by controlling for personality and demographic variables. Overall, these studies reveal that employees' engagement in time theft can be driven not solely by self-oriented motives but also by others- and work-oriented motives. Further, each of these motives provides incremental value in understanding time theft behavior. Implications for both research and practice emanating from these findings are also discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

---

当时间盗窃促进绩效时：衡量时间盗窃动机的发展和验证。


长期以来，普遍的观点认为员工时间盗窃本质上是有害的。然而，这种观点可能源于对驱动此类行为的潜在动机的有限理解。自相矛盾的是，时间盗窃可能是出于中立甚至值得称赞的意图，例如提高工作效率，从而使其具有潜在的有益性和建设性。通过三项混合方法研究，我们探讨了员工时间盗窃背后的动机，开发和验证了评估这些动机的工具，并研究了它们如何差异化地预测时间盗窃行为。具体来说，在研究 1 中，我们使用定性方法并识别了 11 种时间盗窃动机。研究 2 着手制定这些动机的衡量标准，随后验证其因素结构。研究 3 通过控制个性和人口统计变量，检验了他们在预测时间盗窃行为方面的增量方差。总体而言，这些研究表明，员工参与时间盗窃行为不仅是由自我导向的动机驱动的，还可能是由他人和工作导向的动机驱动的。此外，这些动机中的每一个都为理解时间盗窃行为提供了增量价值。还讨论了这些发现对研究和实践的影响。 （PsycInfo 数据库记录 (c) 2024 APA，保留所有权利）。