Analysis of the Mediating Role of Psychological Empowerment between Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Work Performance

High levels of trust between employees and leaders moderate the relationship between organizational management practices. A collaborative environment encourages employees to have more Psychological Empowerment, which in turn leads to better performance. Based on Intrinsic Work Motivation and Self-Evaluation, this paper uses Perceived Leader Trust as an independent variable, Employee Work Performance as a dependent variable, and introduces Psychological Empowerment to explore the internal mechanism of perceived trust. This paper proposes a total of 28 hypotheses, and 25 hypotheses have been verified. The specific research conclusions are as follows: (1) Perceived Leader Trust has a positive impact on Employee Work Performance. (2) Perceived Leader Trust positively affects employees’ Psychological Empowerment. Perceived Leader Dependence has a significant impact on all dimensions of Psychological Empowerment, but the relationship between Perceived Information Disclosure and Work Meaning is not significant. (3) Psychological Empowerment is positively correlated with Employee Work Performance, in which the four dimensions of Psychological Empowerment are significantly related to Employee Task Performance, while Work Meaning and Autonomy are not significantly related to Employee Relationship Performance. (4) Psychological Empowerment, as the overall perception of employees, plays a partial mediating role between Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Work Performance. This paper verifies the role of Psychological Empowerment between Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Work Performance, and explores the internal mechanism of Perceived Leader Trust from the perspective of employees’ Intrinsic Work Motivation, which promotes the development of organizational management practices.


Introduction
In recent years, interpersonal trust in organizations has become an increasingly important research topic. Especially with the rapidly changing business environment and increasing global competitive pressure, organizations face increasing uncertainty in the course of doing business [1]. Companies have now realized that human resources are the key to improving organizational competitiveness, and one of the most important challenges managers face is to build organizational trust at all levels by allowing employees to participate in organizational issues [2,3].
In organizational management, there are two types of trust that have an important impact on employees' attitudes and behaviors, namely upward trust and downward trust [4]. Employees' perception of their leaders' trust is an important type of trust that has emerged in recent years, and is considered to be an important prerequisite for arousing employees' inner perception [5,6]. Trust and Felt trust are two sides of the same coin. The two are independent constructs, and the most fundamental difference is the difference in the subject of action. The subject of trust is the giver of trust, and the subject of perceiving trust is the perceiver of trust. Sometimes the trust given by the truster may not be felt by organizational citizenship behavior and task performance. Liu Y found that Perceived Leader Trust, as an employee's individual cognition, has a positive impact on employees' knowledge sharing behavior and voice behavior [24]. Ma E [25] found that self-efficacy and psychological safety play a dual mediating role between Perceived Leader Trust and voice behavior [26]. Thongpapanl N T and M Leppäniemi found that normative commitment and affective commitment play a mediating role between Perceived Leader Trust and project performance, and the mediating effect of continuous commitment has not been verified [27,28].

Psychological Empowerment
The effects of Psychological Empowerment on employee attitudes and behaviors include job satisfaction, organizational commitment, job engagement, and turnover intention [29]. Khany explored the impact of trust and Psychological Empowerment on teacher job satisfaction. Employees with a high perception of Psychological Empowerment have higher job satisfaction [30]. The four dimensions of Psychological Empowerment play a mediating role between work-related outcomes and employees' perceptions of their direct leaders [31,32]. Lv M [33] explored the effect of Psychological Empowerment on the relationship between trust in business organizations and employee engagement, and found that Psychological Empowerment had a moderating effect on the relationship between organizational trust and employee engagement. Employees with low perceptions of Psychological Empowerment have a stronger positive relationship between organizational trust and engagement [34]. Sun Y L [35] found that job meaning and self-determination in Psychological Empowerment have a positive impact on employee satisfaction and organizational commitment, work meaning has a negative impact on turnover intention, and self-efficacy has a positive impact on organizational commitment.

Employee Work Performance
The individual factors that affect the Employee Work Performance mainly include personality traits, experience, risk preference and so on. Early research on Employee Work Performance focused on the individual factors of employees. Goldsmith P D found that employees' work experience has a significant impact on job performance. Employees with higher work experience tend to have stronger competencies at work, and therefore tend to have better performance [36]. Cadsby [37] found that risk takers are more inclined to take aggressive measures, and their performance improvement tends to be higher. Hastings R P explored the impact of personality traits on Employee Work Performance. The extraversion personality trait has a more significant effect on relationship performance, and the open personality trait has no significant effect on Employee Work Performance [38].
The organizational factors that affect Employee Work Performance mainly involve the leadership style, organizational culture, and atmosphere of their leaders [39,40]. Wang P found that proper job design can affect job autonomy, integrity, and job feedback, thereby improving Employee Work Performance [41]. Cheng C explored the impact of organizational support on Employee Work Performance based on social exchange theory. Organizational support can positively affect Employee Work Performance, and job well-being plays a moderating role between the two [42]. Farndale's study found that employees who Perceived Leader Trust had better performance in the organization, and had a positive impact on Employee Work Performance through emotional commitment [43]. The more employees perceive leaders, the higher the perception of leaders' dependence and information disclosure [44]. Lau and Wang Hongli [45] evaluated employees' trust from two aspects: perceived superior dependence and perceived information disclosure, and the consistency coefficient was 0.916. Gabriel compiled a questionnaire for employees' trust in their superiors based on the behavioral trust inventory developed by Gillespie, and the internal consistency coefficients of "reliance" and "disclosure" were 0.844, respectively [46]. Drawing lessons from the references [47] in exploring the measurement scales of employees' perceived trust, this paper divides Perceived Leader Trust into Perceived Leader Dependence and Perceived Information Disclosure, and forms a measurement questionnaire including 2 dimensions and 9 items. The specific items are shown in Table 1. Spreitzer [48] compiled a research questionnaire with 12 items, and tested the reliability and validity of psychological empowerment. The results showed that the internal consistency of the four dimensions of psychological empowerment was between 0.8 and 0.85. Chenji, K [49] used the questionnaire developed by Spreitzer to measure psychological empowerment in the Chinese context. Avolio, B.J. [50], Wang, G. [25], Stander, M.W. [51], Reza, Khany [52] and many other scholars have confirmed the consistency and validity of the questionnaire. Drawing on the reference [53], this paper divides Psychological Empowerment into Work Meaning, Ability, Autonomy, and Influence, and forms a measurement questionnaire including 4 dimensions and 12 items. The specific items are shown in Table 2.  [58], and Idewele I's [59] improved Employee Work Performance scale, this paper divides Employee Work Performance into Task Performance and Relationship Performance, including 2 dimensions and 11 items. The specific items are shown in Table 3. Based on Intrinsic Work Motivation theory, positive beliefs and high expectations drive employees to perform better [60]. Perceived Leader Trust means that employees perceive the leader's dependence and information disclosure. The leaders rely more on the knowledge, skills, and judgment of their subordinates when making decisions, which will lead to a strong sense of identity and autonomy for employees, which in turn enables employees to have better performance at work [61][62][63]. When employees feel trusted by their leaders, they get information and clues about work requirements, task completion, and compliance with organizational norms. Workers perform better when they perceive information accurately, receive information, and are willing to respond to information [64]. Perceived Leader Trust may make employees feel better about their organizational members, which can motivate employees to take more responsibility for their work, which in turn improves Employee Work Performance [65]. Therefore, we believe that employees who perceive the trust of their leaders will have better performance. Therefore, the following hypotheses are made: Hypothesis 1d (H1d). Perceived Information Disclosure positively affects Employee Relationship Performance.

Relationship between Perceived Leader Trust and Psychological Empowerment
Overall Psychological Empowerment increases when employees' trust in their leaders' reliability, dependence, and competence increases [66]. Based on the theory of Intrinsic Work Motivation, when employees perceive the dependence and information disclosure of their leaders, their sense of competence, autonomy, and belongingness will be enhanced, and they will have a higher sense of identity with their work, thereby enhancing their overall Psychological Empowerment level [67,68]. When employees perceive positive evaluation and support from their leaders, they attribute it to their self-concept, which significantly affects their Psychological Empowerment perception. Trust improves the relationship and increases the leader's willingness to delegate authority to subordinates [69]. Managers' experience of Psychological Empowerment is related to their trust in organizational leaders, and the success of Psychological Empowerment depends on the trust between employees and managers. Employee's behavior and decision-making are more influenced by leadership or environment [67,70,71]. The trust of leaders is the external environmental factor of employee behavior. Perceiving leaders' trust will obviously increase the internal Psychological Empowerment of employees [72]. Therefore, we argue that the higher the level of trust employees perceive from their leaders, the stronger their perception of Psychological Empowerment. Therefore, the following hypotheses are made: Hypothesis 2h (H2h). Perceived Information Disclosure positively affects Employee Influence.

Relationship between Psychological Empowerment and Employee Work Performance
In work situations, employees with a high perception of Psychological Empowerment tend to have a stronger sense of competence and autonomy, and pay more attention to the impact and value of the work itself [73,74]. This means that employees with a high perception of Psychological Empowerment will respond autonomously when faced with risks and uncertainties at work, and have more input in their work, which will promote employees to have higher work performance. Psychological Empowerment is related to management effectiveness and Employee Work Performance [75]. Meaning at work can increase employee focus and loyalty to work. Perceived competence can make employees more resilient in the face of difficulties and challenges, and have a higher pursuit of goals and tasks [76]. Employees who are more influential at work can coordinate resources more smoothly when completing tasks, and organize that line of work, resulting in high work performance [76,77]. Therefore, we believe that employees who perceive Psychological Empowerment will have better performance. Therefore, the following hypotheses are made: Hypothesis 3h (H3h). Influence positively affects Employee Relationship Performance.

Mediating Role of Psychological Empowerment
Based on the viewpoints of Intrinsic Work Motivation and self-evaluation, when employees perceive the trust of their leaders, they will positively evaluate themselves, thereby improving their sense of competence, autonomy, and belongingness, and enabling employees to generate Psychological Empowerment. To maintain this Psychological Empowerment, employees who perceive the trust of their leaders strive to improve their work performance [78]. Employees who perceive the trust of their leaders will have a sense of responsibility, as well as Psychological Empowerment, which will motivate employees to perform well at work. When employees perceive their own importance at work and have a high level of self-worth experience, employees will increase their motivation to work harder, and Psychological Empowerment just reflects employees' self-evaluation [79]. Achieving the desired effect of Psychological Empowerment requires an increased level of trust between employees and their superiors. Subordinates who perceive higher-level trust Intrinsic Work Motivation, enhance organizational citizenship, and motivate employees to stay in the organization [78,80]. Perceived Leader Trust is the process of stimulating employees' Intrinsic Work Motivation [69]. Psychological Empowerment generated by the Intrinsic Work Motivation makes the tasks assigned by the leaders more meaningful to the employees, and the employees will be better at discovering the value of the work and recognize the tasks assigned in the work more [69,71,79]. This paper argues that Perceived Leader Trust helps to increase the Psychological Empowerment of employees, and the increase of Psychological Empowerment will lead to better performance of employees. Therefore, the following hypotheses are made:

Hypothesis 4 (H4). Psychological Empowerment mediates between Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Work Performance.
Hypothesis 4a (H4a). Psychological Empowerment mediates between Perceived Leader Dependence and Employee Task Performance.

Hypothesis 4c (H4c). Psychological Empowerment mediates between Perceived Information
Disclosure and Employee Task Performance.

Hypothesis 4d (H4d). Psychological Empowerment mediates between Perceived Information
Disclosure and Employee Relationship Performance.

Questionnaire
The questionnaire designed in this paper contains four parts. The first part is the research description of the questionnaire, including the basic information of the participants in the questionnaire, which contains 6 items. The second part is the measurement of Perceived Leader Trust, which contains 9 items in total, including 4 items for Perceived Leader Dependence and 5 items for Perceived Information Disclosure. The third part is the measurement of Psychological Empowerment, which contains 12 items, including 3 items each for Work Meaning, Ability, Autonomy, and Influence. The fourth part is the measurement of Employee Work Performance, which contains 11 items, including 5 items on Employee Task Performance and 6 items on Employee Relationship Performance.
The survey subjects selected in this paper are mainly employees of different enterprises and institutions.
First, this paper selected MBA students who had participated in actual work in enterprises and institutions. They came from different industries and regions, which made the sample highly reliable and rich. A total of 110 questionnaires were distributed and 101 questionnaires were returned.
Second, relying on Internet social platforms-"WeChat" and "QQ" to distribute questionnaires to classmates, friends, etc., participating in the work, a total of 207 questionnaires were distributed and recovered.
The questionnaire was issued from June 2021 to August 2021. A total of 317 questionnaires were distributed and 308 questionnaires were collected. The sample recovery rate was 97.2%. After removing 21 invalid questionnaires, 287 questionnaires were obtained, and the recovery rate of valid questionnaires was 90.5%.
NOTE: All methods were carried out in accordance with relevant international and Chinese guidelines and regulations. All experimental protocols were approved by Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Ethics Committee of CAS. Moreover, the informed consent was obtained from all subjects and their legal guardian(s).

Descriptive Statistical Analysis
The specific information is shown in Table 4. It can be seen from Table 4 that there is little difference between male and female ratios (52.96% vs. 47.04%). In terms of age, 94.08% of employees are under the age of 40. This is because most of the employees in the current corporate environment are around 20-40 years old, so the number of questionnaires is the largest. From the perspective of educational background, the proportion of "undergraduate" is the largest (49.48%), followed by "master" (35.19%), with a higher degree of education. The higher percent of masters is because the sample includes more MBA. From the work distribution, most of the samples are "General Employee" (58.54%). From the perspective of working age distribution, there are more samples of "1-3 years" and "4-6 years", accounting for 48.08% and 30.31% respectively. Among them, the proportion of "Private Enterprise" is the largest, at 48.43%.  (1) Reliability analysis of Perceived Leader Trust As shown in Table 5, the CITC values of 9 items in the 2 dimensions of Perceived Leader Trust are all greater than 0.6, indicating that there is a good correlation between the items of the scale. The Cronbach's α value of Perceived Leader Dependence was 0.853, and the Cronbach's α value of Perceived Information Disclosure was 0.871, indicating that the reliability of the scale was good. Data on Perceived Leader Trust is of high quality and can be used for further analysis. (2) Reliability analysis of Psychological Empowerment As shown in Table 6, the CITC values of 12 items of Psychological Empowerment are all greater than 0.6, indicating that there is a good correlation coefficient between the items of the scale. The Cronbach's α corresponding to the four dimensions of Psychological Empowerment is all greater than 0.8, indicating a good level of reliability. The data reliability of Psychological Empowerment is of high quality and can be used for further analysis.
(3) Reliability analysis of Employee Work Performance As shown in Table 7, the CITC values of 11 items in the two dimensions of work performance are all greater than 0.6, indicating that there is a good correlation coefficient between the items of the scale. The Cronbach's α corresponding to the two dimensions of job performance is greater than 0.8, indicating a good level of reliability. The data reliability of job performance is of high quality and can be used for further analysis.

Validity Test of Scale
(1) Validity analysis of Perceived Leader Trust The KMO value and Bartlett's sphericity test results of Perceived Leader Trust are shown in Table 8 (detailed data such as Tables A1 and A2). The KMO value of Perceived Leader Trust was 0.862, and the Bartlett sphericity test was significant at the 0.000 level.
The sample data illustrating the variable of Perceived Leader Trust can be subjected to factor analysis.  Table 9 (detailed data such as Tables A3 and A4). The KMO value for Psychological Empowerment was 0.833, and the Bartlett test of sphericity was significant at the 0.000 level. The sample data illustrating the variables of Psychological Empowerment can be subjected to factor analysis.  Table 10 (detailed data such as Tables A5 and A6). The KMO value of Employee Work Performance was 0.944, and the Bartlett sphericity test was significant at the 0.000 level. The sample data illustrating the variables of Employee Work Performance can be subjected to factor analysis.  Table 11 shows the results of regression analysis of Employee Task Performance on each dimension of Perceived Leader Trust. The multiple correlation coefficient between each dimension of Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Task Performance is 0.663, indicating that there is a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.440 indicates that the data explanation degree of Perceived Leader Trust to Employee Task Performance is 44.0%. In the analysis of variance, F = 76.950, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model is highly significant and statistically significant. In addition, the regression coefficient of Perceived Leader Dependence was 0.483, Sig. = 0.000, the regression coefficient of Perceived Information Disclosure is 0.617, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Perceived Leader Dependence and Perceived Information Disclosure are significantly positively correlated with Employee Task Performance. Therefore, the research hypotheses H1a and H1b hold. (2) Regression analysis of Perceived Leader Trust on Employee Relationship Performance Table 12 shows the regression analysis results of each dimension of Perceived Leader Trust on Employee Relationship Performance. The multiple correlation coefficient between each dimension of Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Relationship Performance is 0.668, indicating that there is a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.446 indicates that the data explanation degree of Perceived Leader Trust on Employee Relationship Performance is 44.6%. In the analysis of variance, F = 78.765, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model is highly significant and statistically significant. In addition, the regression coefficient of Perceived Leader Dependence is 0.428, Sig. = 0.000, and the regression coefficient of Perceived Information Disclosure is 0.494, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Perceived Leader Dependence and Perceived Information Disclosure are significantly positively correlated with Employee Relationship Performance. Therefore, the research hypotheses H1c and H1d hold.  Table 13. The multiple correlation coefficient between Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Work Performance was 0.744, indicating a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.554 indicates that the data explanation degree of Perceived Leader Trust to Employee Work Performance is 55.4%. In the analysis of variance, F = 244.646, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model is highly significant and statistically significant. In addition, the regression coefficient of Perceived Leader Trust is 1.123, and Sig. = 0.000 indicates that Perceived Leader Trust is significantly positively correlated with Employee Work Performance. Therefore, the research hypothesis H1 holds.   Table 15. The multiple correlation coefficient between each dimension of Perceived Leader Trust and Ability is 0.418, indicating that there is a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.174, indicating that the data explanation degree of Perceived Leader Trust to Ability is 17.4%. In the analysis of variance, F = 20.705, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model is highly significant and statistically significant. In addition, the regression coefficient of Perceived Leader Dependence was 0.223, Sig. = 0.003, the regression coefficient of Perceived Information Disclosure is 0.340, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Perceived Leader Dependence and Perceived Information Disclosure are significantly positively correlated with Ability. Therefore, the research hypotheses H2b and H2f hold.

(3) Regression analysis of Perceived Leader Trust on Autonomy
The results of regression analysis on Autonomy of each dimension of Perceived Leader Trust are shown in Table 16. The multiple correlation coefficient of each dimension of Perceived Leader Trust and Autonomy is 0.477, indicating that there is a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.228, indicating that the data explanation degree of Perceived Leader Trust to Autonomy is 22.8%. In the analysis of variance, F = 28.864, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model is highly significant and statistically significant. In addition, the regression coefficient of Perceived Leader Dependence is 0.267, Sig. = 0.000; the regression coefficient of Perceived Information Disclosure is 0.363, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Perceived Leader Dependence and Perceived Information Disclosure are significantly positively correlated with Autonomy. Therefore, the research hypotheses H2c and H2g hold.

(4) Regression analysis of Perceived Leader Trust on Influence
The results of the regression analysis of Influence on each dimension of Perceived Leader Trust are shown in Table 17. The multiple correlation coefficient between each dimension of Perceived Leader Trust and Influence is 0.466, indicating that there is a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.217, indicating that the data interpretation of Perceived Leader Trust to Influence is 21.7%. In the analysis of variance, F = 27.219, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model is highly significant and statistically significant. In addition, the regression coefficient of Perceived Leader Dependence is 0.192, Sig. = 0.001; the regression coefficient of Perceived Information Disclosure is 0.434, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Perceived Leader Dependence and Perceived Information Disclosure are significantly positively correlated with Influence. Therefore, the research hypotheses H2d and H2h hold.  Table 18. The multiple correlation coefficient between Perceived Leader Trust and Psychological Empowerment was 0.568, indicating a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.323, indicating that the data explanation degree of Perceived Leader Trust to Psychological Empowerment is 32.3%. In the analysis of variance, F = 94.010, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model has high significance and statistical significance. In addition, the regression coefficient of Perceived Leader Trust is 0.545, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Perceived Leader Trust is significantly positively correlated with Psychological Empowerment. Therefore, the research hypothesis H2 holds.

Regression Analysis of Psychological Empowerment on Employee Work Performance
(1) Regression analysis of Psychological Empowerment on Employee Task Performance  Table 19 shows the regression analysis results of each dimension of Psychological Empowerment on Employee Task Performance. The multiple correlation coefficient between each dimension of Psychological Empowerment and Employee Task Performance is 0.800, indicating that there is a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.640, indicating that the data explanation degree of Psychological Empowerment on Employee Task Performance is 64.0%. In the analysis of variance, F = 86.284, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model is highly significant and statistically significant. In addition, the regression coefficient of Work Meaning is 0.199, Sig. = 0.001; the regression coefficient of Ability is 0.259, Sig. = 0.000; the regression coefficient for Autonomy is 0.506, Sig. = 0.000; the regression coefficient of Influence is 0.376, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Work Meaning, Ability, Autonomy, and Influence are positively related to Employee Task Performance. Therefore, the research hypotheses H3a, H3b, H3c, H3d hold.  Table 20 shows the regression analysis results of each dimension of Psychological Empowerment on Employee Relationship Performance. The multiple correlation coefficient of each dimension of Psychological Empowerment and Employee Relationship Performance is 0.626, indicating that there is a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.392, indicating that the data explanation degree of Psychological Empowerment on Employee Relationship Performance is 39.2%. In the analysis of variance, F = 31.332, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model is highly significant and statistically significant. In addition, the regression coefficient of Work Meaning is 0.115, Sig. = 0.080, indicating that there is no significant relationship between Work Meaning and Employee Relationship Performance. The regression coefficient of Ability is 0.294, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Ability has a significant positive correlation with Employee Relationship Performance. The regression coefficient of Autonomy is 0.097, Sig. = 0.162, indicating that there is no significant relationship between Autonomy and Employee Relationship Performance. The regression coefficient of Influence is 0.350, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Influence is positively correlated with Employee Relationship Performance. Therefore, the research hypotheses H3f and H3h hold, but H3e and H3g do not hold.

(3) Regression analysis of Psychological Empowerment on Employee Work Performance
The results of the regression analysis of Psychological Empowerment on Employee Work Performance are shown in Table 21. The multiple correlation coefficient between Psychological Empowerment and Employee Work Performance was 0.787, indicating a positive correlation between the variables. The coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.620 indicates that the data explanation degree of Psychological Empowerment to Employee Work Performance is 62.0%. In the analysis of variance, F = 320.877, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that the model is highly significant and statistically significant. In addition, the regression coefficient of Psychological Empowerment is 1.240, Sig. = 0.000, indicating that Psychological Empowerment is significantly positively correlated with Employee Work Performance. Therefore, the research hypothesis H3 holds.

Analysis of the Mediating Effect of Psychological Empowerment
In this paper, the independent variable is X, the dependent variable is Y, and the mediating variable is M to construct a Psychological Empowerment Mediation Model. The specific situation is shown in Figure 1.

Analysis of the Mediating Effect of Psychological Empowerment
In this paper, the independent variable is X, the dependent variable is Y, and mediating variable is M to construct a Psychological Empowerment Mediation Mo The specific situation is shown in Figure 1. Step 1: Exploring whether the regression analysis coefficient a of X to M is significa If it is not significant, stop the mediation test; if it is significant, go to Step 2; Step 2: Explore whether the regression analysis coefficient b of Y to M is significa If it is not significant, stop the mediation test; if it is significant, go to Step 3; Step 3: Introducing X and M into the regression equation to explore the combin effect of X and M on Y. If the regression coefficient c of X and the regression coefficien of M are both significant, it means that M plays a partial mediating role. If the regress coefficient c of X is significant, the regression coefficient d of M is not significant, indi ing that M plays a complete mediating role. If the regression coefficient c of X is not nificant, a Soble test is required. If the Soble test is significant, it means that M play partial mediating role; if the Soble test is not significant, it means that there is no mediat effect.

Mediating Role of Psychological Empowerment between Perceived Leader Dependence an Employee Task Performance
As shown in Table 22  Step 1: Exploring whether the regression analysis coefficient a of X to M is significant. If it is not significant, stop the mediation test; if it is significant, go to Step 2; Step 2: Explore whether the regression analysis coefficient b of Y to M is significant. If it is not significant, stop the mediation test; if it is significant, go to Step 3; Step 3: Introducing X and M into the regression equation to explore the combined effect of X and M on Y. If the regression coefficient c of X and the regression coefficient d of M are both significant, it means that M plays a partial mediating role. If the regression coefficient c of X is significant, the regression coefficient d of M is not significant, indicating that M plays a complete mediating role. If the regression coefficient c of X is not significant, a Soble test is required. If the Soble test is significant, it means that M plays a partial mediating role; if the Soble test is not significant, it means that there is no mediating effect.

Mediating Role of Psychological Empowerment between Perceived Leader Dependence and Employee Task Performance
As shown in Table 22:  The above results suggest that Psychological Empowerment plays a partial mediating role between Perceived Leader Dependence and Employee Task Performance, so hypothesis H4a holds.

Mediating Role of Psychological Empowerment between Perceived Leader Dependence and Employee Relationship Performance
As shown in Table 23: Model 1: Regression analysis of Perceived Leader Dependence on Employee Relationship Performance. R 2 = 0.282, F = 77.513, Sig. = 0.000, the regression coefficient of Perceived Leader Dependence is 0.586 (Sig. = 0.000), and the regression effect is significant.
Model 3: Regression analysis of Perceived Leader Dependence and Psychological Empowerment on Employee Relationship Performance. R 2 = 0.455, F = 81.764, Sig. = 0.000, the regression coefficient of Psychological Empowerment is 0.665, the regression coefficient of Perceived Leader Dependence is 0.365, and the significance level has not changed.
The above results indicate that Psychological Empowerment plays a partial mediating role between Perceived Leader Dependence and Employee Relationship Performance, so hypothesis H4b holds.

Mediating Role of Psychological Empowerment between Perceived Information Disclosure and Employee Task Performance
As shown in Table 24:  The above results indicate that Psychological Empowerment plays a partial mediating role between Perceived Information Disclosure and Employee Task Performance, so hypothesis H4c holds.

Mediating Role of Psychological Empowerment between Perceived Information Disclosure and Employee Relationship Performance
As shown in Table 25:  The above results indicate that Psychological Empowerment plays a partial mediating role between Perceived Information Disclosure and Employee Relationship Performance, so hypothesis H4d holds.

Mediating Role of Psychological Empowerment between Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Work Performance
As shown in Table 26:  The above results indicate that Psychological Empowerment plays a partial mediating role between Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Work Performance, so hypothesis H4 holds.

Test Results of Research Hypotheses
A total of 28 research hypotheses are proposed in this paper, of which 25 research hypotheses are valid and 3 research hypotheses are not valid. The specific results are shown in Table 27.  The verification results show that the research hypotheses H2e, H3e, and H3g do not hold. The specific situation is as follows: Perceived Information Disclosure is not related to Employee Work Meaning; Employee Work Meaning and Employee Autonomy are not related to Employee Relationship Performance. In addition, Psychological Empowerment, as an overall mediating variable, played a partial mediating role in the testing of all mediating effects.

Discussion
(1) Perceived Leader Trust positively affects Employee Work Performance The regression coefficients of Perceived Leader Dependence and Perceived Information Disclosure on Employee Task Performance are 0.483 and 0.617; the regression coefficients of Perceived Leader Dependence and Perceived Information Disclosure on Employee Relationship Performance are 0.428 and 0.494. This result shows that employees will more actively complete the tasks assigned by their leaders because they perceive their leaders' dependence and information disclosure, and thus have better performance at work.
(2) Perceived Leader Trust positively affects employees' Psychological Empowerment level The empirical results show that Perceived Leader Trust has a positive impact on the overall Psychological Empowerment of employees. Perceived Leader Dependence has a significant positive effect on the Work Meaning, Ability, Autonomy and Influence of Psychological Empowerment, and Perceived Information Disclosure has a positive impact on employees' Ability, Autonomy, and Influence. Perceived trust based on dependence and information disclosure is built on the emotional connection, interpersonal interest, and support of leaders and subordinates, while employees' perception of Psychological Empowerment is closely linked to superiors' communication and support. Therefore, Perceived Leader Trust can positively affect employees' Psychological Empowerment.
(3) Psychological Empowerment positively affects Employee Work Performance The empirical results show that employees' overall Psychological Empowerment has a positive impact on Employee Work Performance. Employees with high Psychological Empowerment tend to be proactive in their work, and have more input in their work, which in turn promotes employees to have higher Employee Work Performance. The four dimensions of Psychological Empowerment can positively affect Employee Task Performance, the Ability and Influence of Psychological Empowerment have a positive impact on Employee Relationship Performance, and Work Meaning and Autonomy have no significant impact on Employee Relationship Performance. The reason for this result is that Employee Relationship Performance is more dependent on the performance and influence of employees at work. However, employees' perception of Autonomy emphasizes the degree of employees' self-determination of work, which is not much related to Employee Relationship Performance.
(4) Psychological Empowerment plays a partial mediating role between Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Work Performance Psychological Empowerment, as a whole, plays a partial mediating role between Perceived Leader Dependence and Employee Task Performance, and partially mediates between Perceived Leader Dependence and Employee Relationship Performance. When employees feel the trust of their leaders, their Employee Work Performance is positively affected, and the effect of Perceived Leader Trust can be explained by changes in employees' Psychological Empowerment.

Conclusions
Based on the research results of previous scholars, this paper constructs a theoretical model of Perceived Leader Trust, Psychological Empowerment and Employee Work Performance, and proposes 28 research hypotheses. Among them, Perceived Leader Trust is divided into Perceived Leader Dependence and Perceived Information Disclosure; Psychological Empowerment is divided into Work Meaning, Ability, Autonomy, and Influence; Employee Work Performance is divided into Employee Task Performance and Employee Relationship Performance. This paper adopts a combination of online (WeChat and QQ) and offline (MBA students) methods to collect 308 research data, verify the theoretical model and research hypothesis constructed in this paper through empirical analysis, and finally draw the research conclusion.
(1) Perceived Leader Trust has a positive impact on Employee Work Performance. (2) Perceived Leader Trust can positively affect employees' perception of Psychological Empowerment. Among them, Perceived Leader Dependence has a significant impact on all dimensions of Psychological Empowerment, but the relationship between Perceived Information Disclosure and Work Meaning is not significant. (3) Employees' Psychological Empowerment perception is positively related to their work performance. Among them, the four dimensions of Psychological Empowerment are significantly related to Employee Task Performance, and the relationship between Work Meaning and Autonomy and Employee Relationship Performance is not significant. (4) Psychological Empowerment, as the overall perception of employees, plays a partial mediating role between Perceived Leader Trust and Employee Work Performance.
Funding: This research received no external funding.

Institutional Review Board Statement:
The study does not require approval.
Informed Consent Statement: Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.
Data Availability Statement: Any data requirements can be obtained by contacting the corresponding author.

Conflicts of Interest:
The authors declare no conflict of interest.