Jg. Hunt et al., The effects of visionary and crisis-responsive charisma on followers: An experimental examination of two kinds of charismatic leadership, LEADERSH Q, 10(3), 1999, pp. 423-448
A single factor, seven-level, repeated measures, unbalanced experiment was
conducted with 191 college undergraduates to test Boal and Bryson's (1988)
assertions that: (1) there are at least two forms of charismatic leadership
under crisis conditions-visionary and crisis-responsive; and (2) once the
crisis condition has abated, the effects of crisis-responsive leadership de
teriorate comparatively faster than other forms of charismatic leadership.
The experiment consisted of four crisis condition leadership treatments (cr
isis-responsive, visionary under crisis, exchange under crisis, and low exp
ressiveness under crisis) and three no-crisis condition leadership treatmen
ts (visionary no crisis, exchange no crisis, and low expressiveness no cris
is) at time one followed by low expressiveness no crisis at time two. Two g
raduate student "leaders" who memorized carefully prepared scripts delivere
d the leadership treatments. Analysis consisted of 28 a priori comparisons
of cell means and repeated measures ANOVA to determine significant main eff
ects as well as interactions. We found support for our hypothesis that ther
e are two forms of charisma (visionary and crisis-responsive) and that, in
the absence of crisis, the effects of crisis responsive charisma decay fast
er than do the effects of visionary charisma.