Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, China
While studies of group prototypicality have predominantly focused on how leaders influence the attitudes and behaviors of their followers, this research shifts the focus to examine how follower group prototypicality elicits leaders’ responses. Specifically, drawing upon the social identity theory of followership, this study investigates how follower group prototypicality relates to leaders’ propensity for empowering leadership. Through a multi-wave, multi-source field study, our findings indicate that there is an increase in leaders’ trust when followers embody group prototypicality, which, in turn, enhances empowering leadership. Furthermore, we find that both the direct effect of follower group prototypicality on leader trust and the indirect effect of follower group prototypicality on empowering leadership through trust are moderated by the leaders’ level of team identification. These findings provide nuanced insights into how follower group prototypicality influences leaders’ responses, contributing to our understanding of the dynamics of the social identity theory.
