workplace deviance in japan: applying an extended model of deterrence

We test an extended deterrence model in a Japanese workplace setting. In addition to formal punishments imposed by managerial authorities, employees contemplating rule violation are assumed to take into account the certainty and severity of two other types of punishment - socially-imposed embarrassment and self-imposed shame. All three threats are proposed to be deterrents to employee noncompliance with organizational rules. Previous studies using this theory, all of which have been conducted in the United States, find that shame is a stronger deterrent to deviance than is embarrassment. Drawing on previous discussions of cultural differences between Japan and the United States, we develop a rationale for predicting that the effect of embarrassment will be stronger in a sample of Japanese than in previous samples of Americans. In fact, the results from the Japanese sample concerning the relative importance of shame and embarrassments as inhibitors of deviance are remarkably similar to previous results from American samples. Implications of this finding are considered for the debate concerning whether deviance results primarily from factors internal or external to the individual.