Faculty
Keith Leavitt
Scott and Loni Parrish Chair in Business and Professor of Management
Management

Keith Leavitt

541-737-8631

keith.leavitt@oregonstate.edu

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Faculty
Keith Leavitt
Overview
Overview
Background
Publications

Overview

Biography

Research areas: Organizational Behavior; Business Ethics.

Research interests: Social cognition; workplace identity; behavioral ethics; machine learning and work; epistemology and research methods.

Dr. Keith Leavitt's research interests include behavioral ethics, identity and situated judgment, and research methods/epistemology. Specifically, much of his research focuses on how social expectations and constraints inform or inhibit ethical behavior in the workplace. His research has been published in the Academy of Management Journal, the Academy of Management Review, the Journal of Applied Psychology, Personnel Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes (OBHDP), the Journal of Management, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Organizational Research Methods, the Journal of Organizational Behavior, the Journal of Vocational Behavior, and the Journal of Business Ethics. He previously served as an Associate Editor at OBHDP and currently serves on the editorial boards of AMJ, AMR, OBHDP, and JAP. He is currently serving as the Division Chair Elect (third year of the elected five-year leadership track) of the Organizational Behavior Division of the Academy of Management, and is a former Associate Editor at OBHDP.

Keith's work has been featured in over 200 news and media outlets including the New York Times, Forbes, NBC News, Harvard Business Review, Fast Company, Inc. Magazine, Vice News, Wall Street Journal Radio, The Huffington Post, Time Magazine, and prominently on the front of his mother's refrigerator. 

In his spare time, he enjoys mountain biking, fly fishing, skiing, the occasional existential crisis, and trying to ignore rapidly-accumulating indicators of middle-age.  

Credentials

Doctorate in Management and Organization (Ph.D.) University of Washington, Seattle, WA Concentration: Organizational Behavior/ Human Resource Management, Spring 2009. Minors: Research Methods and Sociology (Institutional Analysis).

Master of Science in Business Administration (M.S.B.A.), University of Washington, Seattle, WA. Concentration: Organizational Behavior/ Human Resource Management, Spring 2007.

Master of Science (M.S.) Montana State University, Bozeman, MT Concentration: Applied (Organizational & Social) Psychology, Summa Cum Laude, Fall 2001.

Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) Western Colorado University, Gunnison, CO Concentration: Psychology, cum laude, May 1999.

Career Interests

Research areas: Organizational Behavior; Business Ethics.

Research interests: Social cognition; workplace identity; behavioral ethics; machine learning and work; epistemology and research methods.

Dr. Keith Leavitt's research interests include behavioral ethics, identity and situated judgment, and research methods/epistemology. Specifically, much of his research focuses on how social expectations and constraints inform or inhibit ethical behavior in the workplace. His research has been published in the Academy of Management Journal, the Academy of Management Review, the Journal of Applied Psychology, Personnel Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes (OBHDP), the Journal of Management, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Organizational Research Methods, the Journal of Organizational Behavior, the Journal of Vocational Behavior, and the Journal of Business Ethics. He previously served as an Associate Editor at OBHDP and currently serves on the editorial boards of AMJ, AMR, OBHDP, and JAP. He is currently serving as the Division Chair elect (third year of the elected five-year leadership track) of the Organizational Behavior Division of the Academy of Management, and is a former Associate Editor at OBHDP.

Keith's work has been featured in over 200 news and media outlets including the New York Times, Forbes, NBC News, Harvard Business Review, Fast Company, Inc. Magazine, Vice News, Wall Street Journal Radio, The Huffington Post, Time Magazine, and prominently on the front of his mother's refrigerator. 

In his spare time, he enjoys mountain biking, fly fishing, skiing, the occasional existential crisis, and trying to ignore rapidly-accumulating indicators of middle-age.  

 

 

Background

Experience

  • Professor of Management, Oregon State University College of Business (July 2023-present).
  • Associate Dean for Research and Professor of Management, Oregon State University College of Business (September 2021-present).
  • Associate Dean for Research and Associate Professor, Oregon State University College of Business (July 2020-September 2021).
  • Associate Professor, Oregon State University College of Business (Fall 2015-Spring 2020).
  • Assistant Professor, Oregon State University College of Business (Fall 2011-Present).        
  • Assistant Professor, Army Center for the Professional Military Ethic, United States Military Academy at West Point (Summer 2009-Summer 2011).

Honors & Awards

  • Best Reviewer Award, Academy of Management Review (2025).
  • Scott & Loni Parrish Professor of Business (2024-present).
  • College of Business External Research Award (2024).
  • College of Business Prominent Scholar Award (2022).
  • College of Business Prominent Scholar Award (2021).
  • College of Business Prominent Scholar Award (2020).
  • College of Business Scholarly Impact Award (2020).
  • Best Reviewer Award, Academy of Management Journal (2019).
  • OSU College of Business Betty S. Henry Amundson Faculty Scholar Award in Ethics (2015-2024).
  • Betty & Forest Simmons Excellence in Graduate Teaching Award, OSU College of Business (2018).
  • College of Business Prominent Scholar Award (2018).
  • College of Business Prominent Scholar Award (2017).
  • Finalist, Academy of Management Review 2015 Best Paper Award.
  • Western Academy of Management Ascendant Scholar (early career) Award (2015).
  • College of Business Dean's Professorship in Excellence (2013-2015).
  • College of Business 2013 Excellence in Scholarship Award.
  • Organizational Research Methods 2011 Best Paper Award.
  • Academy of Management Journal 2010 Best Paper Award.
  • 2011 Saroj Parasuraman Award for outstanding publication (presented by the gender and diversity in organizations division of the Academy of Management).
  • Outstanding reviewer award, Academy of Management Annual Meeting (OB division), 2010.
  • Outstanding reviewer award, Academy of Management Annual Meeting (MOC division), 2009.
  • Graduate teaching excellence award, University of Washington Business School, 2007.
  • Kindergartner of the week (with no distinction), Crosby Elementary School, 1982.

Selected Publications

Keck, S., Schumacher, C., Gupta, A., & Leavitt, K. (in-press). How Mega-threats Influence Workplace Cooperation: Effect of #BlackLivesMatter Salience on Cooperation among and between Black and White Coworkers. Academy of Management Journal.

Weng, X., Liu, Z., Qiu, F., Leavitt, K., Wang, X., & Tang, Z. (2025). A Power Dependence Model of the Impact of Leader Impostorism on Supervisor Support and Undermining: The Moderating Role of Power Distance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 110, 963-978.

Leavitt, K., Barnes, C.M., & Shapiro, D. (2025). The Role of Human Managers within Algorithmic Performance Management Systems: A Process Model of Employee Trust in Managers through Reflexivity. Academy of Management Review, 50, 745-767.

Leavitt, K., Zhu, L., Klotz, A., & Kouchaki, M. (2022). Fragile or robust?
Differential effects of gender threats in the workplace among men and women. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 168, 104-112.

  • A Harvard Business Review online article about this paper can be found here.

Leavitt, K., Schabram, K., Hariharan, P., & Barnes, C.M. (2024). The machine Hums! Addressing Ontological and Normative Concerns Regarding Machine Learning Applications in Organizational Scholarship.Academy of Management Review, 49. 448-451.

  • Response piece exchange regarding Leavitt et al., 2021 AMR paper.

Leavitt, K., Schabram, K., Hariharan, P., & Barnes, C.M. (2021). Ghost in the machine: On organizational theory in the age of machine learning. Academy of Management Review, 46, 750-777.

Leavitt, K., Qiu, F., & Shapiro, D.L. (2021). Using electronic confederates for experimental research in organizational science. Organizational Research Methods, 24, 3-25.

  • An earlier version of this research appears in the 2019 AOM Best Paper Proceedings.

Tierney, W., Hardy, J., Ebersole, C., Leavitt, K., Viganola, D., Clemente, E., Gordon, M., Dreber, A.A., Johannesson, M., Pfeiffer, T., Hiring Decisions Forecasting Collaboration, & Uhlmann, E. (2020). Creative destruction in science. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 161, 291-309.

Kalodimos, J., & Leavitt, K. (2020). Experimental shareholder activism: A novel approach for studying top management decision making and employee career issues. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 120, 1-16.

Zhu, L., Restubog, S.L.D., Leavitt, K., Zhou, L., & Wang, M. (2020). Lead the horse to water, but don’t make him drink: The effects of moral identity symbolization on coworker behavior depend on perceptions of proselytization. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 156, 53-68. 

Umphress, E.E., Gardner, R., Stoverink, A., & Leavitt, K. (2020). Feeling activated and acting unethically: The influence of activated mood on unethical behavior to benefit a teammate. Personnel Psychology, 73, 95-123.

Yam, K.C., Barnes, C.M., Leavitt, K., Wei, W., Lau, T. C., & Uhlmann, E.L. (2019). Why so serious? A lab and field investigation of the link between morality and humor. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 117, 758-772.

Leavitt, K., Barnes, C.M., Watkins, T., & Wagner, D. (2019). From the bedroom to the office: Spillover effects of marital sexual activity. Journal of Management, 45, 1173-1192.

Bolinger, A., Klotz, A., & Leavitt, K. (2018). Contributing from inside the outer circle: The Identity-based effects on noncore role incumbents on group relational coordination and organizational climate. Academy of Management Review, 43, 680-703.

Barnes, C.M., Dang, C. & Leavitt, K., Guarana, C., & Uhlmann, E.L. (2018). Archival data in micro-organizational research: A toolkit for moving to a broader set of topics. Journal of Management, 44, 1453-1478.

Schilpzand, P., Leavitt, K., & Lim, S. (2016). Incivility hates company: Shared victimization attenuates attribution-driven negative effects of rudeness. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 133, 33-44.

Leavitt, K., Zhu, L., & Aquino, K. (2016). Good without knowing it: subtle contextual cues can activate moral identity and reshape moral intuition. Journal of Business Ethics, 137, 785-800.

Leavitt, K and Sluss, D.M. (2015). Lying for who we are: An identity-based model of workplace dishonesty.  Academy of Management Review, 40, 587-610. 

  • Finalist for the 2015 Academy of Management Review Best Paper Award.

Erez, A., Schilpzand, P., Leavitt, K., Woolum, A., & Judge, T. A. (2015). Inherently relational: Interactions between peers’ and individuals’ personalities impact credit giving and evaluations of individual performance. Academy of Management Journal, 58, 1761-1784. 

Reynolds, S. Dang, C.T., Yam, K.C., & Leavitt, K. (2014). Poor engagement or strong disengagement? Alternative views of the role of moral knowledge in everyday immorality. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 123, 124-137. 

Leavitt, K. (2013). Publication bias might make us untrustworthy, but the solutions may be worse. Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 6, 298-302.

Leavitt, K., Reynolds, S., Barnes, C.M., Schilpzand, P., and Hannah, S.T. (2012). Different hats, different obligations: Plural occupational identities and situated moral judgments. Academy of Management Journal, 55, 1316-1333. 

Uhlmann, E.L., Leavitt, K., Menges, J.I., Koopman, J., Howe, M.D., & Johnson, R.E. (2012). Getting explicit about the implicit: A taxonomy of implicit measures and guide for their use in organizational research. Organizational Research Methods, 15, 553-601. 

  • Finalist for the 2012 Organizational Research Methods Best Paper Award.

Leavitt, K., Fong, C.T., & Greenwald, A.G. (2011). Asking about well-being gets you half an answer: Intra-individual processes of implicit and explicit job attitudes. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 32, 672-687.

Reynolds, S., Leavitt, K., and Decelles, K. (2010). Automatic ethics: The effects of implicit assumptions and contextual cues on moral behavior.Journal of Applied Psychology, 95, 752-760.

Leavitt, K., Mitchell, T., & Peterson, J. (2010). Theory pruning: Strategies for reducing our dense theoretical landscape. Organizational Research Methods, 13, 644-667. 

  • Winner of the 2011 Organizational Research Methods Best Paper Award and the Outstanding Publication Award from the RM division of the Academy of Management.

Hekman, D., Aquino, K., Owens, B., Mitchell, T., Schilpzand, P. and Leavitt, K. (2010). An examination of whether and how racial and gender biases influence customer satisfaction ratings. Academy of Management Journal, 53, 238-264. 

  • Winner of the 2010 Academy of Management Journal 2010 Best Paper Award, and the Outstanding Publication Award from the GDO division of the Academy of Management.

Martell, R.F. and Leavitt, K. (2002). Reducing the performance-cue bias in work behavior ratings: Can groups help? Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 1032-1041.

  • This paper was based upon my M.S. thesis, several years before beginning doctoral study.

Publications

Academic Journal
Management

“Lead the Horse to Water, but Don't Make Him Drink: The Effects of Moral Identity Symbolization on Coworker Behavior Depend on Perceptions of Proselytization”

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Luke Zhu, Simon Restubog, Keith Leavitt, Mo Wang and Le Zhou "Lead the Horse to Water, but Don't Make Him Drink: The Effects of Moral Identity Symbolization on Coworker Behavior Depend on Perceptions of Proselytization" Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 53-68 pages 2020 View on: Google Scholar

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Academic Journal
Finance

“Experimental Shareholder Activism: A Novel Approach to Organizational Research”

Decision making processes and consequent policy decisions of top management teams often have tremendous impact on employee careers and wellbeing, but the difficulty of accessing executive decision making has made studying such processes especially difficult. Whereas scholars have often relied on their own professional networks to gather small samples of executives or leveraged proxy measures compiled from publicly-available documents, we propose and demonstrate an alternative approach which we term Experimental Shareholder Activism (ESA). ESA allows researchers to directly study executive leadership via the shareholder proposal process—under Rule 14a-8—by purchasing relatively small amounts of stock in a company, and experimentally manipulating features of shareholder proposals to elicit responses from key stakeholders within the company. This approach allows for the direct examination of executive decision making with the benefit of quasi-experimental design. We describe the method, identify vocational and career-relevant areas of inquiry best suited to ESA, and discuss manipulations readily embedded in shareholder proposals. We then provide a toolkit for scholars interested in studying executive decision making on employee career and Human Resource-related outcomes, and demonstrate the viability of such an approach via a pilot experiment.
Full Details

Jonathan Kalodimos and Keith Leavitt "Experimental Shareholder Activism: A Novel Approach to Organizational Research" Journal of Vocational Behavior Elsevier 2020 View on: Google Scholar

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Academic Journal
Management

“Creative destruction in science”

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Warren Tierney, Jay Hardy, Charlie Ebersole, Keith Leavitt, Domenico Viagnola, Elena Clemente, Anna Dreber, Magnus Johannesson, Thomas Pfeiffer, Hiring Decisions Forecasting Collaboration and Eric Uhlmann "Creative destruction in science" Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 291-309 pages 2020 View on: Google Scholar

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