Abstract:

The fear of appearing incompetent (FAI) is a common occurrence in educational and professional settings where demonstrating competence is crucial to one's role. While a few studies have touched upon the emotional distress associated with FAI (Good & Good, 1973; Parlamis, Badawy, Haber, & Brouer, 2019; Tomkiewicz, Bass, & Vaicys, 2005), none have investigated the influence of well-being and social desirability factors in mitigating FAI, which is the central focus of our research.

This study investigates the correlation between mindfulness and fear of appearing incompetent (FAI), and the impact of social desirability (SD) and gender on this relationship. To explore this relationship among students, we employed a cross-sectional design. Our research was conducted at a university in the Northeast USA, where an innovative humanistic management course was developed for undergraduate students. The course integrated various management topics with experiential activities, focusing on mindfulness, meditation, prosocial behavior, dignity, and social innovation. This pioneering pedagogy aimed to foster a holistic approach to business education, emphasizing not just knowledge and skills but also personal growth and self-awareness.

Throughout the semester, 800 undergraduate students enrolled in the course completed several surveys: FAI scale (Good & Good, 1973), mindfulness (Brown, & Ryan, 2003), and social desirability scale (Ballard, 1992), yielding 793 valid responses. Out of the total participants, 432 individuals (54.2%) were male, while 361 individuals (45.3%) were female. In order to examine the relationship between mindfulness and FAI and how social desirability (SD) and gender influence this relationship partial correlation tests were conducted. According to the results, zero-order correlations showed that there was a statistically significant, moderate, negative correlation between FAI and mindfulness (r(751) = -.300, n = 753, p = .000) and low-moderate and positive-correlation between FAI and gender (r(751) =.086, n = 753, p = .019) and SD (r(751) =.214, n = 753, p = .000). However, whilst controlling for gender (1.455 ± .49; 1=male, 2=female) and SD (.516 ± .21; 0=false, 1=true) there was a significant moderate, negative partial correlation between FAI (3.46 ± .67) and mindfulness (4.14 ± .80), r(749) = -.262, N = 753, p = .000. These findings suggest that both social desirability, characterized as the inclination for individuals to present themselves in a positive manner, and gender have a significant impact on the association between mindfulness and FAI. The implications of these findings will be discussed in terms of their contribution to understanding the factors that mitigate FAI, particularly in terms of controlling for confounding variables such as social desirability and gender.

Keywords:

Mindfulness, fear of appearing incompetent (FAI), social desirability (SD), gender.