Why and When Does Perceived Job Insecurity Impact Knowledge Hiding: Examining the Direct, Mediated, and Moderated Effect of Job Involvement, Co-Worker Incivility, and Supervisor Incivility

While most studies seem to be of the view that job-insecure employees are more likely to engage in knowledge hiding, the recent literature has contradicted this view by arguing that employees who work in a highly uncertain environment are also likely to decline from hiding knowledge as they view the act of knowledge exchange to be essential for their internal and external employability. Thus, to have a clearer view of this type of proposition, this study examines the intricate interplay among perceived job insecurity, job involvement, co-worker and supervisor incivility, and knowledge hiding among a sample of 171 blue-collar employees in an unstable labor and economic environment. Structural equation modeling was performed to assess the direct and indirect relationship between perceived job insecurity and knowledge hiding through job involvement, as well as the moderating influence of incivility behavior in the indirect relationship. Results indicate that increasing job insecurity manifests itself in a decreased level of knowledge hiding. While job involvement fails to mediate the relationship between these two variables, it is, however, negatively related to knowledge hiding. Furthermore, both co-worker and supervisor incivility exert negative effects on employee job involvement and positive effects on knowledge hiding. With these results, this study delivers crucial insights into how structural features, contextual factors—such as labor market conditions, occupational structures, and workplace culture of blue-collar work—may weaken the psychological pathways typically proposed in mainstream organizational behavior theories.