What are We Measuring? Evaluations of Items Measuring Task Performance, Organizational Citizenship, Counterproductive, and Withdrawal Behaviors

This study investigated whether the items on commonly used scales measuring task performance, organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), counterproductive work behavior (CWB), and work withdrawal were judged to represent alternative behaviors. We first found that each scale contained items that were judged (by three independent samples) to represent an alternative construct. Importantly, we empirically verified these suggested scale revisions with an independent sample of multi-source behavioral ratings that showed model fit improvements and factor loading increases when items were moved to the suggested scales. We also found that, compared to the original scales, revised scales measuring task performance and OCB showed (a) more trait variance; (b) improved reliability; (c) lower mean levels; and (d) weaker correlations with nomological correlates.