The Facet Satisfaction Scale: an Effective Affective Measure of Job Satisfaction Facets

Job satisfaction facets are theoretically and practically important variables. Most existing facet satisfaction scales, however, have two noteworthy limitations—they often do not clearly assess affective content, and they use non-parallel items. In the current paper, we examined the measurement qualities of the Facet Satisfaction Scale (FSS; [Beehr et al. (Journal of Applied Social Psychology 36:1523–1547, 2006)], a measure that may address the limitations of existing facet satisfaction measures.

Design/Methodology/Approach

We conducted four studies to examine the measurement qualities of the FSS: (a) Study 1 examined the FSS’s factor structure, (b) Study 2 examined its test-retest reliability and construct validity, (c) Study 3 further examined its construct validity, and (d) Study 4 examined the extent to which the FSS assesses the affective and cognitive components of job satisfaction.

Findings

We found that the FSS produced the hypothesized five-factor structure and that the FSS subscales each yielded high levels of internal consistency and test-retest reliability. We also found evidence of the construct validity of the FSS subscales, and we found that the FSS subscales are generally effective measures of the affective component of their respective job satisfaction facets.

Implications

As a result of the current findings, we recommend the FSS when researchers wish to measure the affective component of job satisfaction facets.

Originality/Value

Little previous research has examined the FSS’s measurement qualities. The current studies address this gap by providing evidence for the reliability and validity of the FSS. This is of value because the FSS addresses some limitations inherent to other facet satisfaction measures.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Subscribe and save

• Get 10 units per month
• Download Article/Chapter or eBook
• 1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
• Cancel anytime

Buy Now

Price includes VAT (France)

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Rent this article via DeepDyve

Similar content being viewed by others

Measuring General Job Satisfaction: Which Is More Construct Valid—Global Scales or Facet-Composite Scales?

The Measurement of Subjective Wellbeing: Item-Order Effects in the Personal Wellbeing Index—Adult

Construct Overlap Between Employee Engagement and Job Satisfaction: A Function of Semantic Equivalence?

Notes

We replicated the Study 1 findings using a combined dataset comprising the Study 1, 2, 3, and 4 datasets (N = 456). The fit of the single-factor model (χ 2 = 6675.69, df = 275, p < 0.01; RMSEA = 0.26; CFI = 0.32; TLI = 0.25; SRMR = 0.18), the fit of the hypothesized five-factor model (χ 2 = 1308.62, df = 265; RMSEA = 0.11; CFI = 0.89; TLI = 0.87; SRMR = 0.06), and the difference in fit between the two models (Δχ 2 = 5367.07, Δdf = 10, p < 0.01) we observed within the combined dataset were generally similar to those we observed within the Study 1 dataset.

References

• Adolphs, R., & Damasio, A. (2001). The interaction of affect and cognition: A neurobiological perspective. In J. P. Forgas (Ed.), Handbook of affect and social cognition (pp. 27–49). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
• Beehr, T. A., Glaser, K. M., Beehr, M. J., Beehr, D. E., Wallwey, D. A., & Erofeev, D. (2006). The nature of satisfaction with subordinates: Its predictors and importance to supervisors. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 36, 1523–1547.
• Beehr, T. A., Nair, V. N., Gudanowski, D. M., & Such, M. (2004). Perceptions of reasons for promotion of self and others. Human Relations, 57, 413–438. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Bowling, N. A. (2005). Dispositional approach to satisfaction with social facets of work (unpublished doctoral dissertation). Mount Pleasant, MI: Central Michigan University. Google Scholar
• Bowling, N. A., & Hammond, G. D. (2008). A meta-analytic examination of the construct validity of the Michigan Organizational Assessment Questionnaire Job Satisfaction Subscale. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 73, 63–77. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Brief, A. P. (1998). Attitudes in and around organizations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Google Scholar
• Brief, A. P., & Roberson, L. (1989). Job attitude organization: An exploratory study. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 19, 717–727. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Cacioppo, J. T., & Petty, R. E. (1982). The need for cognition. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 42, 116–131. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Cammann, C., Fichman, M., Jenkins, D., & Klesh, J. (1979). The Michigan Organizational Assessment Questionnaire (unpublished manuscript). Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan. Google Scholar
• Cammann, C., Fichman, M., Jenkins, G. D., & Klesh, J. R. (1983). Assessing the attitudes and perceptions of organizational members. In S. E. Seashore, E. E. Lawler, P. H. Mirvis, & C. Cammann (Eds.), Assessing organizational change (pp. 71–138). New York, NY: Wiley. Google Scholar
• Campbell, D. T., & Fiske, D. W. (1959). Convergent and discriminant validation by the multitrait-multimethod matrix. Psychological Bulletin, 56, 81–105. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Caplan, R. D., Cobb, S., French, J. R. P., Jr., Harrison, R. V., & Pinneau, S. R., Jr. (1980). Job demands and worker health: Main effects and occupational differences. Ann Arbor, MI: Institute for Social Research.
• Colquitt, J. A. (2012). Organizational justice. In S. W. J. Kozlowski (Ed.), The Oxford handbook or organizational psychology, Vol. 1 (pp. 526–547). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
• Cook, T. D., Campbell, D. T., & Peracchio, L. (1990). Quasi experimentation. In M. D. Dunnette & L. M. Hough (Eds.), Handbook of industrial and organizational psychology (Vol. 1, Second ed., pp. 491–576). Palo Alto, CA: Consulting Psychologists Press. Google Scholar
• Costa Jr., P. T., & McCrae, R. M. (1992). Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO PI R) and NEO Five Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI) Professional Manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources, Inc.. Google Scholar
• Cronbach, L. J., & Meehl, P. E. (1955). Construct validity in psychological tests. Psychological Bulletin, 52, 281–302. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Dalal, R. S. (2013). Job attitudes: Cognition and affect. In I. B. Weiner (Series Ed.) and N. Schmitt & S. Highhouse (Vol. Eds.) Handbook of psychology: Vol. 12. Industrial and organizational psychology (pp. 341–366). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.
• Dalal, R. S., Bashshur, M. R., & Credé, M. (2011). The forgotten facet: Employee satisfaction with management above the level of immediate supervision. Applied Psychology: An International Review, 60, 183–209. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Duffy, M. K., Ganster, D. C., & Pagon, M. (2002). Social undermining at work. Academy of Management Journal, 45, 331–351. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Ewen, R. B., Smith, P. C., Hulin, C. L., & Locke, E. A. (1966). An empirical test of the Herzberg two-factor theory. Journal of Applied Psychology, 50, 544–550. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Faul, F., Erdfelder, E., Buchner, A., & Lang, A.-G. (2009). Statistical power analyses using G*Power 3.1: Tests for correlation and regression analyses. Behavior Research Methods, 41, 1149–1160. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Fenlason, K. J., & Beehr, T. A. (1994). Social support and occupational stress: Effects of talking to others. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 15, 157–176. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Fisher, C. D. (2000). Mood and emotion while working: Missing pieces of job satisfaction? Journal of Organizational Behavior, 21, 185–202. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Fried, Y., & Ferris, G. R. (1987). The validity of the job characteristics model: A review and meta-analysis. Personnel Psychology, 40, 287–322. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Frone, M. R. (2000). Interpersonal conflict at work and psychological outcomes: Testing a model among young workers. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 5, 246–255. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Goldberg, L. R. (1990). An alternative “description of personality”: The big-five factor structure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59, 1216–1229. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Goldberg, L. R., Johnson, J. A., Eber, H. W., Hogan, R., Ashton, M. C., Cloninger, C. R., et al. (2006). The International Personality Item Pool and the future of public-domain personality measures. Journal of Research in Personality, 40, 84–96. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Hackman, J. R., & Oldham, G. R. (1975). Development of the job diagnostic survey. The Journal of Applied Psychology, 60, 159–170. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Hackman, J. R., & Oldham, G. R. (1980). Work redesign. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley. Google Scholar
• Harvey, P., & Martinko, M. J. (2009). An empirical examination of the role of attributions in psychological entitlement and its outcomes. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 30, 459–476. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Heneman, H. G., & Schwab, D. P. (1985). Pay satisfaction: Its multidimensional nature and measurement. International Journal of Psychology, 20, 129–141. PubMedGoogle Scholar
• Heneman, R. L., Greenberger, D. B., & Strasser, S. (1988). The relationship between pay-for-performance perceptions and pay satisfaction. Personnel Psychology, 41, 745–759. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Highhouse, S., & Becker, A. (1993). Facet measures and global job satisfaction. Journal of Business and Psychology, 8, 117–127. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• International Personality Item Pool: A scientific collaboratory for the development of advanced measures of personality traits and other individual differences. (n.d.). Retrieved October 8, 2012, from http://ipip.ori.org/.
• Ironson, G. H., Smith, P. C., Brannick, M. T., Gibson, W. M., & Paul, K. B. (1989). Construction of a job in general scale: A comparison of global, composite, and specific measures. Journal of Applied Psychology, 74, 193–200. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Jöreskog, K., & Sörbom, D. (1993). LISREL 8: Structural equation modeling with the SIMPLIS command language. Chicago, IL: Scientific Software International Inc.. Google Scholar
• Judge, T. A., Parker, S. K., Colbert, A. E., Heller, D., & Ilies, R. (2001). Job satisfaction: A cross-cultural review. In N. Anderson, D. S. Ones, H. K. Sinangil, & C. Viswesvaran (Eds.), Handbook of Industrial, Work, and Organizational Psychology (pp. 25–52). London: Sage. Google Scholar
• Judge, T. A., Heller, D., & Mount, M. K. (2002). Five-factor model of personality and job satisfaction: A meta-analysis. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 530–541. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Judge, T. A., Hulin, C. L., & Dalal, R. S. (2012). Job satisfaction and job affect. In S. W. J. Kozlowski (Ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Industrial and Organizational Psychology (pp. 496–525). New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar
• Kaplan, S. A., Warren, C. R., Barsky, A. P., & Thoresen, C. J. (2009). A note on the relationship between affect(ivity) and differing conceptualizations of job satisfaction: Some unexpected meta-analytic findings. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 18, 29–54. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Kemery, E. R., Bedeian, A. G., & Zacur, S. R. (1996). Expectancy-based job cognitions and job affect as predictors of organizational citizenship behaviors. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 26, 635–651. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Kinicki, A. J., McKee-Ryan, F. M., Schriesheim, C. A., & Carson, K. P. (2002). Assessing the construct validity of the Job Descriptive Index: A review and meta-analysis. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 14–32. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Krosnick, J. A., & Petty, R. E. (1994). Attitude strength: An overview. In R. E. Petty & J. A. Krosnick (Eds.), Attitude Strength: Antecedents and Consequences (pp. 1–24). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. Google Scholar
• Krosnick, J. A., Boninger, D. S., Chuang, Y. C., Berent, M. K., & Carnot, C. G. (1993). Attitude strength: One construct or many related constructs. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 65, 1132–1151. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Kunin, T. (1955). The construction of a new type of attitude measure. Personnel Psychology, 8, 65–77. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• LeBreton, J. M., Hargis, M. B., Griepentrog, B., Oswald, F. L., & Ployhart, R. E. (2007). A multidimensional approach for evaluating variables in organizational research and practice. Personnel Psychology, 60, 475–498. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Lee, K., & Allen, N. J. (2002). Organizational citizenship behavior and workplace deviance: The role of affect and cognitions. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 131–142. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Locke, E. A. (1969). What is job satisfaction? Organizational Behavior and Human Performance, 4, 309–336. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• MacCallum, R. C., Widaman, K. F., Preacher, K. J., & Hong, S. (2001). Sample size in factor analysis: The role of model error. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 36, 611–637. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Moorman, R. H. (1993). The influence of cognitive and affective based job satisfaction measures on the relationship between satisfaction and organizational citizenship behavior. Human Relations, 46, 759–776. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Niklas, C. D., & Dormann, C. (2005). The impact of state affect on job satisfaction. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 14, 367–388. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Organ, D. W., & Konovsky, M. A. (1989). Cognitive versus affective determinants of organizational citizenship behavior. Journal of Applied Psychology, 74, 157–164. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Organ, D. W., & Near, J. P. (1985). Cognition vs. affect in measures of job satisfaction. International Journal of Psychology, 20, 241–253. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Scarpello, V., & Campbell, J. (1983). Job satisfaction: Are all parts there? Personnel Psychology, 36, 577–600. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Schleicher, D. J., Smith, T. A., Casper, W. J., Watt, J. D., & Greguras, G. J. (2015). It’s all in the attitude: The role of job attitude strength in job attitude—outcome relationships. Journal of Applied Psychology, 100, 1259–1274. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Schleicher, D. J., Watt, J. D., & Greguras, G. J. (2004). Reexamining the job satisfaction-performance relationship: The complexity of attitudes. Journal of Applied Psychology, 89, 165–177. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Smith, P. C., Kendall, L. M., & Hulin, C. L. (1969). Measurement of satisfaction in work and retirement. Chicago, IL: Rand-McNally. Google Scholar
• Spector, P. E. (1985). Measurement of human service staff satisfaction: Development of the job satisfaction survey. American Journal of Community Psychology, 13, 693–713. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Spector, P. E. (1997). Job satisfaction: Applications, assessment, causes and consequences. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Google Scholar
• Spector, P. E., & Jex, S. M. (1998). Development of four self-report measures of job stressors and strain: Interpersonal conflict at work scale, organizational constraints scale, quantitative workload inventory, and physical symptoms inventory. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 3, 356–367. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Stanton, J. M., Sinar, E. F., Balzer, W. K., Julian, A. L., Thoresen, P., Aziz, S., Fisher, G. G., & Smith, P. C. (2002). Development of a compact measure of job satisfaction: The abridged Job Descriptive Index. Educational & Psychological Measurement, 62, 173–191.
• Storbeck, J., & Clore, G. L. (2007). On the interdependence of cognition and emotion. Cognition and Emotion, 21, 1212–1237. ArticlePubMedPubMed CentralGoogle Scholar
• Tekleab, A. G., Bartol, K., & Liu, W. (2005). Is it pay levels or pay raises that matter to fairness and turnover? Journal of Organizational Behavior, 26, 899–921. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Tepper, B. J. (2000). Consequences of abusive supervision. Academy of Management Journal, 43, 178–190. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Tonidandel, S., & LeBreton, J. M. (2011). Relative importance analyses: A useful supplement to multiple regression analyses. Journal of Business and Psychology, 26, 1–9. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Van Katwyk, P. T., Fox, S., Spector, P. E., & Kelloway, E. K. (2000). Using the Job-Related Affective Well-Being Scale (JAWS) to investigate affective responses to work stressors. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 5, 219–230. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Viswesvaran, C., Sanchez, J. I., & Fisher, J. (1999). The role of social support in the process of work stress: A meta-analysis. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 54, 314–334. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Webster, J. R., Adams, G. A., & Beehr, T. A. (2014). Core work evaluation: The validity of a higher-order work attitude construct. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 85, 27–38. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Webster, J. R., & Beehr, T. A. (2013). Antecedents and outcomes of employee perceptions of intra-organizational mobility channels. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 34, 919–941. Google Scholar
• Weiss, D. J., Dawis, R. V., England, G. W., & Lofquist, L. H. (1967). Manual for the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire. Minnesota Studies on Vocational Rehabilitation, 22. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota. Google Scholar
• Weiss, H. M., Nicholas, J. P., & Daus, C. S. (1999). An examination of the joint effects of affective experiences and job beliefs on job satisfaction and variations in affective experiences over time. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 78, 1–24. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar
• Williams, L. J., & Anderson, S. E. (1991). Job satisfaction and organizational commitment as predictors of organizational citizenship and in-role behaviors. Journal of Management, 17, 601–617. ArticleGoogle Scholar
• Williams, M. L., McDaniel, M. A., & Nguyen, N. T. (2006). A meta-analysis of the antecedents and consequences of pay level satisfaction. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91, 392–413. ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

1. Wright State University, 303C Fawcett Hall, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway, Dayton, OH, 45435-0001, USA Nathan A. Bowling
2. Governors State University, University Park, IL, USA Stephen H. Wagner
3. Central Michigan University, Mount Pleasant, MI, USA Terry A. Beehr

1. Nathan A. Bowling