# Workplace Involution and Employees’ Proactive Career Behavior: The Moderating Role of Construal Level

## TL;DR

This study explores how workplace involution negatively affects employees' proactive career behavior and how a high level of cognitive abstraction can reduce this negative impact.

## Contribution

The study introduces the moderating role of construal level in the relationship between workplace involution and proactive career behavior.

## Key findings

- Workplace involution significantly reduces proactive career behavior in employees.
- A high construal level moderates and buffers the negative effect of workplace involution on proactive career behavior.
- The findings reveal cognitive boundary conditions for the impact of workplace involution on employee behavior.

## Abstract

Workplace involution has become a widespread and salient phenomenon among employees in contemporary Chinese organizations. However, little is known about how workplace involution influences employees’ cognition and behaviors. Drawing on the Job Demands–Resources (JD-R) model and Construal Level Theory (CLT), this study investigated the effect of workplace involution on employees’ proactive career behavior and examined the moderating role of construal level. Study 1 employed a survey design with 284 full-time employees using validated measures of workplace involution, proactive career behavior, and construal levels. Study 2 adopted a scenario-based experimental design that manipulated workplace involution and construal level. Results from both studies consistently revealed that (1) workplace involution had a significant negative effect on employees’ proactive career behavior, and (2) construal level positively moderated this relationship. Specifically, a high construal level buffered the detrimental impact of workplace involution on proactive career behavior. These findings highlight the inhibitory mechanism of workplace involution on employees’ positive career behaviors and elucidate the cognitive boundary conditions underlying this effect. These results have theoretical and practical implications for promoting career proactivity in highly competitive organizational environments.