Organizational Frustration Scale

Abstract

The Organizational Frustration Scale (OFS) is a specialized psychological scale developed by P. E. Spector in 1975. It is designed to measure the degree of frustration experienced by employees within organizational settings. Originally consisting of 37 items derived from qualitative responses regarding sources of workplace frustration, the final validated instrument was streamlined to 29 items. These items specifically address frustration stemming from three primary areas: the employee’s job, their direct supervisor, and the broader job environment. Frustration, in this context, is conceptualized as “the interference with an ongoing overt or covert response sequence.” The OFS has demonstrated strong psychometric properties, including high internal consistency and established predictive validity regarding counterproductive work behaviors.

Keywords

Organizational frustration, employee behavior, job dissatisfaction, workplace aggression, organizational psychology, work environment, P. E. Spector, psychological assessment.

Authors

Paul E. Spector

Purpose

The primary purpose of the Organizational Frustration Scale (OFS) is to quantify the level of organizational frustration experienced by workers. By providing a structured, quantitative measure, the scale allows researchers and practitioners to systematically evaluate potential stressors and barriers within the workplace that impede an employee’s ability to complete tasks or achieve goals.

This measurement is critical for understanding the antecedents of various negative workplace outcomes, including withdrawal behaviors, counterproductive work behavior, and negative interactions with colleagues or supervisors. The scale offers insights into how specific organizational factors—such as bureaucratic rules, supervisor incompetence, or excessive workload—contribute to an employee’s sense of being thwarted.

Construct

The central construct measured is Organizational Frustration, defined theoretically as the inhibition or interference with an ongoing behavioral or cognitive response sequence. This frustration is not measured as a general state but specifically as it relates to the organizational context.

The 29 items retained in the final scale focus on three distinct domains of organizational life that act as frustration sources:

• The Job Itself: Including factors like monotony, lack of fulfillment, or excessive demands.
• The Supervisor: Including issues such as micromanagement, lack of trust, or perceived unfair criticism.
• The Job Environment: Including organizational policies, arbitrary rules, or the incompetence of co-workers.

Validity

The validity of the OFS was established primarily through analyses of its ability to predict relevant behavioral outcomes. Predictive validity was demonstrated through significant positive correlations between high scores on the OFS and specific negative worker behaviors.

These validated behavioral outcomes included measures of:

• Sabotage: Deliberate actions taken to damage or disrupt organizational resources or processes.
• Hostility: Measures of aggressive thoughts or emotions directed toward the organization or its members.
• Indirect Aggression: Covert acts of aggression that harm others without direct confrontation.

Reliability

The internal consistency of the Organizational Frustration Scale was assessed using Cronbach’s alpha coefficient. For a second sample of 50 workers, the scale yielded a strong alpha coefficient of 0.88. This value suggests that the 29 items consistently measure the same underlying construct (organizational frustration), indicating high reliability for research and applied settings.

Factor Analysis

A comprehensive factor structure was identified through the application of a principal components factor analysis utilizing a varimax rotation method. This analysis revealed that organizational frustration manifests across six distinct factors in the workplace:

1. Aggression against others (direct acts of harm or confrontation).
2. Sabotage (intentional damage or disruption).
3. Wasting of time and materials.
4. Interpersonal hostility and complaining.
5. Interpersonal aggression.
6. Apathy about the job (lack of interest or emotional investment).

Instrument

Test Type: Self-report psychological inventory/Attitude scale.

Format: 29 items utilizing a 6-point Likert-type response scale.

Language Available: English (Original development language).

Population Group: Employed workers/Adults in organizational settings.

Age Group: Adults (specific age range not specified, implied working adults).

Population Details: The initial development sample included 71 workers from a mental health institution, supplemented by 10 additional workers (secretaries, nurses, custodians, clerical workers, and mental health aides). Normative data are also available from diverse institutional settings, including psychiatric hospitals (31 workers), general hospitals (120 and 140 workers), a county engineering department (44 workers), federal government employees (101 workers), and state research organizations (82 workers).

Test Methodology: Scale means and standard deviations are reported across various normative samples. Scoring involves reversing negatively worded items (Items 7–10 and 12) to ensure that a higher total score consistently represents greater organizational frustration.

Keywords

Workplace conflict, employee retention, job stress, organizational behavior, Cronbach’s alpha, psychometrics, Work Locus of Control Scale.

Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: Not specified in source material.

Affiliation Email addresses: Not specified in source material.

Correspondence Address: Information available via ETS Test Collection, Princeton, NJ (1975).

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The scale was first published in 1975. Permissions and fees for current usage must be sought directly from the author, P. E. Spector, or relevant organizational psychology resource databases.

Note: The author, P. E. Spector, is also known for developing the Work Locus of Control Scale (1988).

Reference’s

Chen, P. Y., and Spector, P. E. (1992). Relationships of work stressors with aggression, withdrawal, theft and substance abuse: An exploratory study. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology 65:177–84.

Fox, S., and Spector, P. E. (1999). A model of work frustration-aggression. Journal of Organizational Behavior 20:915–931.

Spector, P. E. (1975). Organizational Frustration Scale. Princeton, NJ: ETS Test Collection.

Spector, P. E. (1975). Relationships of organizational frustration with reported behavioral reactions of employees. Journal of Applied Psychology 60:635–37.

Spector, P. E. (1988). Development of the Work Locus of Control Scale. Journal of Occupational Psychology 61:335–40.

Items of the Organizational Frustration Scale

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

1. People act nasty toward me at work.
2. I find that every time I try to do something at work I run into obstacles.
3. There are a lot of petty and arbitrary rules at work.
4. I feel thwarted in my efforts to be creative.
5. My supervisor is always chewing me out.
6. My supervisor feels my performance is worse than it is.
7. I find it easy to talk to my supervisor.
8. I feel that I am accomplishing something worthwhile at work.
9. I enjoy my job.
10. The demands made of me at work are reasonable.
11. Policies at work are not fair.
12. My work area is a pleasant place to be.
13. I often feel that I am being run ragged.
14. I am given entirely too much work to do.
15. I find that some of the people I have to deal with are not competent.
16. I often have problems doing my job because of the incompetence of others.
17. My supervisor always seems to be looking over my shoulder.
18. My supervisor does not trust me.
19. I feel trapped in my job.
20. My job is not at all fulfilling.
21. I dread having to interact with my supervisor.
22. I do not like many of the tasks I have to do.
23. My job is boring and monotonous.
24. I get blamed for things that are not my fault.
25. I don’t have the authority to do what I am supposed to do at work.
26. It seems that one person tells me to do one thing and another person tells me to do something else at work.
27. I am told to do things I don’t think I should do at work.
28. I often have to waste time doing administrative tasks at work.
29. I often feel frustrated at work.

Scoring: Responses are scored on a 6-point scale: Agree completely = +3; Agree pretty much = +2; Agree slightly = +1; Disagree completely = −3; Disagree pretty much = −2; and Disagree slightly = −1. Items 1–6, 11, and 13–29 are worded positively (+3 means maximum frustration and –3 means minimum frustration). Items 7–10 and 12 are worded negatively (+3 means minimum frustration and −3 means maximum frustration) and must be reverse-scored for total scale computation.