Author Type

Graduate Student

Date of Award

2024

Document Type

Dissertation

Publication Status

Version of Record

Submission Date

October 2026

Thesis/Dissertation Advisor [Chair]

Kidwell, Roland

Abstract

Theft and fraud within family firms can have a significant impact on local, national, and international economies, given that most businesses operating throughout the world are family firms. According to familybusiness.com, 62% of the US workforce is employed by family businesses. Yet, we do not know much about how family firms respond to theft and fraud committed within their firms or the factors that influence their responses. The goal of this dissertation is to better understand a family firm owner’s decision to report theft and fraud committed by family and non-family employees, and whether kinship strength and race/ethnicity have any discernable effects on these reporting intentions. To achieve that goal, this study integrates insights from family firm, sociology, and psychology literatures. It presents a conceptual model and three sets of hypotheses that were tested in this empirical study. The results extend previous literature by providing support that kinship not only influences family employee theft intentions, but family owner reporting intentions as well. In addition, egalitarianism, or race avoidance, was shown to interact with kinship to influence owner reporting intentions.

Extent

169 p.

Comments

Includes bibliography.|Dissertation (PhD)--Florida Atlantic University, 2024.|FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection|Includes bibliography.

Identifier

FA00014394

Format

pdf

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