The effect of organizational justice on employees’ positive organizational behavior through perceived organizational support and organization-based self-esteem

Employee’s positive organizational behavior (POB) can be beneficial to individuals at work and organizations, promoting individual and organizational performances. The current research aims to examine the relationship between organizational justice, organizational support, organizational-based self-esteem and employees’ positive organizational behavior. Using a cross-sectional design, this research examines the relationship between organizational justice, organizational support, organizational-based self-esteem and employees’ positive organizational behavior.

Data obtained from 2566 employees of 45 manufacturing enterprises in China were used to verify the relationships; The results showed that organizational justice was positively related to employees’ positive organizational behavior; organizational justice indirectly influenced employees’ positive organizational behavior through organizational self-esteem; organizational support and organizational self-esteem play a chain intermediary role in the way of organizational justice affecting employees’ positive organizational behavior. The findings significantly extend the literature on positive organizational behavior (POB) through the lens of justice theory and self-determination theory. The study has received the funding support from Shangluo University’s Qinling Light New Liberal Arts Research Fund (25DSSK005).

School of Educational sciences, Shangluo University, Shangluo, Shaanxi, China Faculty of psychology, Research Center of Psychology and social Development, Southwest University, Chongqing, China College of state Government, Southwest University, Chongqing, China Department of Sociology, Faculty of Social Science, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong, China The authors declare no competing interests. Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material.

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To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/. Mengyan, C., Xiaofu, P. & Hanting, Z. The effect of organizational justice on employees’ positive organizational behavior through perceived organizational support and organization-based self-esteem.

Sci Rep (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-43539-z DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-43539-z