Organizational Citizenship Behaviors

Abstract

The Organizational Citizenship Behaviors (OCB) scale, developed by Williams and Anderson in 1991, is a 21-item psychometric measure designed to assess the frequency of various workplace behaviors. The instrument delineates three distinct behavioral dimensions: Organizational Citizenship Behaviors directed at specific Individuals (OCBI), Organizational Citizenship Behaviors directed at the Organization (OCBO), and In-Role Behaviors (IRB). The scale helps researchers differentiate between discretionary efforts that benefit colleagues or the organization and mandatory duties required by the job role.

OCBI includes actions that provide immediate benefit to colleagues, such as helping those who are absent or taking a personal interest in another employee, thereby indirectly contributing to the organization’s overall function. Conversely, OCBO focuses on actions that primarily benefit the institution as a whole, such as providing advance notice of inability to come to work and the adherence to informal rules. IRB captures behaviors recognized by formal reward systems, detailing the expected performance of duties and fulfillment of job requirements.

Keywords

Organizational Citizenship Behaviors, OCBI, OCBO, In-Role Behaviors, IRB, L. J. Williams, S. E. Anderson, organizational commitment, job performance.

Authors

Williams, L. J., Anderson, S. E.

Purpose

The primary purpose of this measure is to provide a clear, empirically validated framework for distinguishing between discretionary workplace behaviors—those that exceed formal job requirements—and mandatory in-role behaviors. By measuring these distinct components, researchers and practitioners can better analyze how different motivational factors and organizational variables influence employee contributions.

The scale is instrumental in predicting outcomes such as job satisfaction, affective organizational commitment, and turnover intentions, offering a tool to understand the motivational drivers behind employee actions that either support specific individuals or the organization at large.

Construct

The scale measures Organizational Citizenship Behaviors (OCB), which are voluntary behaviors that are not part of the formal job description but contribute to the effective functioning of the organization. The construct is operationalized through three hypothesized sub-dimensions:

• OCBI (Organizational Citizenship Behaviors directed at Individuals): Altruistic behaviors aimed at helping specific colleagues or supervisors, such as assisting with heavy workloads or offering personal support.
• OCBO (Organizational Citizenship Behaviors directed at the Organization): Conscientious behaviors intended to benefit the organization broadly, such as adherence to rules, responsible use of property, and maintaining high attendance.
• IRB (In-Role Behaviors): Actions that fulfill explicit, required job duties and are recognized by the formal compensation and reward systems.

Validity

The validity of the scale has been supported through consistent correlations with established psychological and organizational constructs. Specifically, OCBI demonstrated positive correlations with high employee ratings of both intrinsic and extrinsic job characteristics, perceived organizational support, employee self-esteem, employee internal locus of control, and affective organizational commitment. Furthermore, OCBI correlated negatively with turnover intentions, suggesting that employees who engage in individual-focused citizenship behaviors are less likely to leave the organization.

Organizational Citizenship Behaviors benefiting the organization (OCBO) also correlated positively with favorable job characteristics and perceived organizational support. The OCBO subscale similarly showed a negative correlation with turnover intentions (Funderburg & Levy, 1997; Randall, 1999). In contrast, In-Role Behaviors (IRB) correlated positively with perceived organizational support, job satisfaction, affective organizational commitment, interpersonal helping, personal industry, individual initiative, and loyal boosterism. It is notable that studies by Funderburg and Levy (1997) revealed divergent findings for OCBI based on rater source: self-ratings were positively correlated with internal locus of control, while peer ratings showed a negative correlation with the same construct.

Reliability

The internal consistency of the OCB scale’s sub-dimensions has been demonstrated across multiple studies using Coefficient alpha. The reliability estimates varied by subscale, indicating acceptable to strong internal consistency across the measure.

• For Organizational Citizenship Behaviors directed at Individuals (OCBI), Coefficient alpha values ranged from .61 to .88.
• For Organizational Citizenship Behaviors directed at the Organization (OCBO), Coefficient alpha values ranged from .70 to .75.
• For In-Role Behaviors (IRB), Coefficient alpha values demonstrated the strongest consistency, ranging from .80 to .94.

These reliability ranges, supported by research spanning from the original Williams & Anderson (1991) study through subsequent validation efforts (e.g., Van Dyne & LePine, 1998), confirm the scale’s stability and consistency in measuring the three distinct behavioral constructs.

Factor Analysis

The initial validation study by Williams and Anderson (1991) utilized Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) to examine the underlying structure of the 21 items. The analysis successfully confirmed the theoretical structure of the scale, showing that the items loaded clearly onto the three hypothesized dimensions: OCBI, OCBO, and IRB, as expected by the developers.

This empirical support for the trifactor structure is crucial, as it validates the developers’ intent to measure organizational citizenship directed at different targets (individual vs. organization) and to maintain a clear distinction between discretionary OCB and mandatory in-role performance.

Instrument

Test Type: Self-report, Peer-report, or Supervisor-report measure of organizational behavior and performance.

Format: 21 items utilizing a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree).

Language Available: English (Original research language).

Population Group: Working adults, employees, and organizational members.

Age Group: Adults (typically 18+).

Population Details: Applicable across various organizational settings and industries where the assessment of discretionary and mandated performance is relevant.

Test Methodology: Responses are scored based on the 5-point agreement scale, with certain items (R) being reverse scored to mitigate response bias.

Keywords

Organizational psychology, job performance, employee loyalty, turnover intentions, organizational support, job satisfaction, Coefficient alpha.

Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: Not provided in source content.

Affiliation Email addresses: Not provided in source content.

Correspondence Address: Not provided in source content.

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The scale was published in 1991. Items were reproduced from the Journal of Management article with permission from the copyright holder (Williams & Anderson, 1991). Users should contact the original authors or the journal publisher for current permissions and usage fees.

Reference’s

Funderburg, S. A., & Levy, P. E. (1997). The influence of individual and situational factors on the self- and peer ratings of organizational citizenship behavior. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 18(1), 25-41.

Morrison, E. W., & Phelps, C. C. (1999). Taking charge at work: Extrarole efforts to change the workplace. Academy of Management Journal, 42(6), 629-639.

Randall, M. L., Crapanzano, C. A., Bormann, C. A., & Birjulin, A. (1999). Organizational citizenship behavior and the perceived fairness of performance appraisals. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 20(2), 159-169.

Thompson, J. A., & Werner, J. M. (1997). The impact of role conflict and ambiguity on employee performance, turnover intention, and organizational citizenship behavior. Journal of Management, 23(4), 583-597.

Van Dyne, L., & LePine, J. A. (1998). Helping and voice extra-role behaviors: Evidence of construct and predictive validity. Academy of Management Journal, 41(1), 108-119.

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(3), 601-617. Items were taken from Table 1, p. 606. Copyright© 1991. Reproduced with permission.

Items of the Organizational Citizenship Behaviors

IMPORTANT: The following scale items must be preserved in their original language and must not be changed in any way.

Responses are obtained using a 5-point Likert-type scale where 1 = strongly disagree and 5 = strongly agree. The measure can be used for peer, supervisor, or self-reports.

Items for OCBI:

1. Helps others who have been absent.
2. Helps others who have heavy work loads.
3. Assists supervisor with his/her work (when not asked)
4. Takes time to listen to co-workers’ problems and worries
5. Goes out of way to help new employees
6. Takes a personal interest in other employees.
7. Passes along information to co-workers.

Items for OCBO:

1. Attendance at work is above the norm.
2. Gives advance notice when unable to come to work.
3. Takes undeserved work breaks (R)
4. Great deal of time spent with personal phone conversations (R)
5. Complains about insignificant things at work (R)
6. Conserves and protects organizational property.
7. Adheres to informal rules devised to maintain order.

Items for IRB:

1. Adequately completes assigned duties.
2. Fulfills responsibilities specified in job description.
3. Performs tasks that are expected of him/her.
4. Meets formal performance requirements of the job.
5. Engages in activities that will directly affect his/her performance.
6. Neglects aspects of the job he/she is obligated to perform (R)
7. Fails to perform essential duties (R)

Items denoted with (R) are reverse scored.