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Citizens’ attitudes towards the public sector, public servants, and politicians – Development and validation of practical survey scales

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  • Willems, Jurgen

Abstract

This study reports the development and the validation of three related attitude scales that measure the attitudes of citizens towards the public sector, the public servants, and the politicians respectively. With three samples (n1 = 325, n2 = 320, n3 = 337), scale items were assessed based on item-scale correlations, internal consistency, and social desirability. Moreover, convergent and discriminant validity were verified, based on the relatedness of the three attitude scales with several focal constructs from the public management literature, including public service motivation and citizens’ trust in government. In addition, this study outlines the avenues for further research on how the use of these scales can advance the field of public management, and particularly behavioral public administration.

Suggested Citation

  • Willems, Jurgen, 2020. "Citizens’ attitudes towards the public sector, public servants, and politicians – Development and validation of practical survey scales," OSF Preprints rnjua, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:osfxxx:rnjua
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/rnjua
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Becker, Boris W. & Connor, Patrick E., 2005. "Self-selection or socialization of public- and private-sector managers?: A cross-cultural values analysis," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 58(1), pages 111-113, January.
    2. Matt Henn & Mark Weinstein & Sarah Forrest, 2005. "Uninterested Youth? Young People's Attitudes towards Party Politics in Britain," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 53(3), pages 556-578, October.
    3. Rosseel, Yves, 2012. "lavaan: An R Package for Structural Equation Modeling," Journal of Statistical Software, Foundation for Open Access Statistics, vol. 48(i02).
    4. Matt Henn & Mark Weinstein & Sarah Forrest, 2005. "Uninterested Youth? Young People's Attitudes towards Party Politics in Britain," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 53, pages 556-578, October.
    5. Vogel, Dominik & Willems, Jurgen, 2020. "The Effects of Making Public Service Employees Aware of Their Prosocial and Societal Impact: A Microintervention study," SocArXiv xatcn, Center for Open Science.
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