Voluntary CSR disclosure and CEO narcissism: the moderating role of CEO duality and board gender diversity

This paper seeks to contribute to the existing business strategies and corporate social responsibility (CSR) literature by examining the effect of CEO personality traits on CSR disclosure. Specifically, this paper aims to examine how chief executive officer (CEO) narcissism relates to voluntary CSR disclosure, and whether CEO duality and board gender diversity moderate this relationship. The study examines a sample of 322 S&P 500 firms over the 2012–2019 period (i.e., 1809 observations). Econometrically speaking, the study used the generalized method of moments (GMM). The results show that highly narcissistic CEOs are likely to disclose both socially-related and governance-related CSR activities. Furthermore, CEO duality positively moderates the relationship between CEO narcissism and (a) aggregated CSR disclosure, (b) social disclosure, and (c) corporate governance disclosure. Moreover, board gender diversity positively moderates the relationship between CEO narcissism and (a) aggregated CSR disclosure and (b) social disclosure. These results are robust to alternative econometric specifications and variable definitions.