Workaholism—defined as a persistent, internally driven tendency to work excessively—has been widely studied, with evidence largely showing detrimental consequences for employees' health and well-being. Yet, most research has focused on workaholics themselves, overlooking how coworkers' workaholic behavior shapes observers. Because coworker workaholism is highly visible in daily interactions (e.g., staying late, working through breaks), it provides salient social cues that may influence others' motivation and performance. However, little is known about its interpersonal effects, the motivational mechanisms involved, and the boundary conditions under which these effects occur.


Drawing on social information processing theory, we propose a depth-of-processing account to explain how coworker workaholism shapes observers' passion. Social cues may be processed at different depths, producing distinct forms of motivation: surface-level processing emphasizes direct guidance and conformity, fostering obsessive passion, whereas deep-level processing emphasizes role modeling and value internalization, fostering harmonious passion. We further examine how these two forms of passion shape outcomes: obsessive passion heightens fatigue and undermines task performance, while harmonious passion alleviates fatigue and enhances performance. Attributional framing serves as a key boundary condition. When coworker workaholism is interpreted as driven by impression management motives, observers are more likely to develop obsessive passion; when attributed to intrinsic motives, they are more likely to develop harmonious passion.


We test our model in an online scenario experiment (Study 1) and a multi-source, multi-wave field study (Study 2). Results consistently support our predictions. By identifying motivational mechanisms and attributional contingencies, this research extends workaholism scholarship beyond its traditional intrapersonal focus, reframes it as a social phenomenon with interpersonal consequences, and broadens social information processing theory by theorizing how the same social cue can be internalized at different depths to produce distinct motivational outcomes.