You are not alone: An examination of lesbian and gay (LG) employees changing workplace heterosexism in China

Although research on the experiences of sexual minority employees has made significant progress in the past two decades, most studies have focused predominantly on the negative consequences sexual minority employees encounter in the face of workplace heterosexism. The role of change agent that sexual minority employees may play in terms of disrupting and advocating equal treatment has been overlooked. Further, very few studies related to sexual minority employees were conducted outside of USA. In my dissertation, I link the literature from institutional change and reasoned action theory to examine three research questions in China's context: RQ1: What factors would trigger lesbian and gay (LG) employees to engage in changing workplace heterosexism? RQ2: What behaviors would LG employees display to change workplace heterosexism? RQ3: What factors would impede/facilitate LG employees' engagement in changing workplace heterosexism? Through three studies, this dissertation found that the experience of institutional contradiction derived from LG employees' personal interest of receiving equal treatment and workplace heterosexism is the trigger for LG employees to have the intention to change workplace heterosexism and subsequently display change-oriented behaviors. Once LG employees form the intention to change workplace heterosexism, they display different types of change-oriented behavior (explicit and implicit) in the workplace. In addition, LG employees' organizational continuance commitment and perceived changeability play different roles in shaping LG employees' intention to change and change-oriented behaviors. Taken together, these findings contribute to literature on the experience of sexual minority employees to give researchers and practitioners a deeper understanding of the dynamics of sexual minority employees' behavior. Also, these findings are relevant and important to individuals as well as organizations as they can make extra efforts to build a diverse and inclusive workplace environment.