Work Control Scale

Abstract

The Work Control scale is a psychological instrument developed by Dwyer and Ganster (1991) designed to quantify an employee’s perception of control within their work environment. This comprehensive measure assesses perceived autonomy across various critical aspects of the job, including the pace and scheduling of tasks, the procedures utilized, the variety of work performed, and the arrangement of the physical workspace. The scale is widely used in occupational and organizational psychology research to understand the relationship between job design and employee well-being.

Keywords

Work Control, Job Autonomy, Organizational Psychology, Organizational Behavior, Job Demands-Control Model, Job Satisfaction, Occupational Health Psychology, Perceived Control.

Authors

Dennis J. Dwyer, Daniel C. Ganster

Purpose

The primary purpose of the Work Control scale is to measure the subjective perception of job control experienced by workers across multiple dimensions of their occupational roles. This measurement is crucial for research examining occupational stress, job design, and the psychological impact of organizational structure, often serving as a key variable in tests of the Job Demands-Control (JDC) model.

By quantifying the perceived degree of influence an employee has over essential job characteristics, the scale helps researchers and practitioners identify areas where increased autonomy might mitigate negative outcomes associated with high job demands, thereby promoting greater employee satisfaction and attendance.

Construct

The Work Control scale measures the psychological construct of Perceived Work Control, which represents an individual’s belief that they have the authority or discretion to influence operational and structural aspects of their job. This construct is multifaceted, encompassing several key domains of control:

• Task Control: Influence over the variety of tasks, the methods used, and the quality of the output.
• Time Control: Discretion over the pace of work, scheduling, and duration of breaks.
• Environmental Control: Ability to influence the physical layout and conditions of the workspace (e.g., lighting, temperature).
• Policy Control: Influence over work unit policies, procedures, and resource allocation.

The overall score reflects a global assessment of control, providing a robust measure of the resources available to the worker to cope with demands, consistent with theoretical models of stress and well-being.

Validity

Validation studies conducted by Dwyer and Ganster (1991) demonstrated that perceived Work Control exhibited theoretically consistent relationships with key organizational outcomes. The measure showed significant positive correlations with several variables:

• Higher reported job workload.
• Increased frequency of sick days taken.
• Greater levels of work satisfaction.

Furthermore, in multivariate analysis, perceived control was found to act as a significant moderator in the relationship between job workload and work satisfaction. This evidence supports the scale’s construct validity by confirming its role as a buffer against job demands, a central tenet of job stress models.

Reliability

The internal consistency of the Work Control scale was assessed using Coefficient Alpha. In the original 1991 study by Dwyer and Ganster, the calculated coefficient alpha for the measure was reported as 0.87. This value indicates strong reliability, suggesting that the 22 items consistently measure the underlying construct of perceived work control across the sample population.

Factor Analysis

While the original scale demonstrated strong internal consistency as a single, comprehensive measure of perceived control, specific details regarding the factor structure (e.g., results of exploratory or confirmatory factor analysis) were not explicitly detailed in the appendix cited by the authors. Given the breadth of items covering task, time, physical, and policy control, subsequent research utilizing this instrument often explores potential sub-dimensions of perceived job control, although the original publication supports treating the scale as a highly reliable unidimensional index of control.

Instrument

Test Type: Self-report psychometric scale

Format: 5-point Likert-type response scale

Language Available: English (Original)

Population Group: Employed workers/Occupational samples

Age Group: Adults (Working population)

Population Details: Developed and validated using samples of general employees across various organizational settings to assess perceptions of control specific to their current job role.

Test Methodology: Respondents indicate the extent to which a statement accurately describes their job, using a scale ranging from 1 = very little to 5 = very much.

Keywords

Job control, Autonomy, Occupational stress, Organizational psychology, Work environment, Task scheduling, Work satisfaction, Job Demands-Control Model, Perceived Control.

Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: Not specified in the primary source material.

Affiliation Email addresses: Not specified in the primary source material.

Correspondence Address: Not specified in the primary source material.

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

Test Year: 1991

Permissions: The items were originally published in the appendix of the journal article by Dwyer and Ganster (1991). The items are generally available for academic research use, often cited as being reprinted with permission from the original journal, Journal of Organizational Behavior. Formal permission should be sought from the journal publisher (Wiley) for commercial or extensive application.

Fee: No formal fee is typically required for academic use of the published items, though institutional access to the source journal may be necessary to obtain the full context.

Reference’s

• Dwyer, D. J., & Ganster, D. C. (1991). The effects of job demands and control on employee attendance and satisfaction. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 12(6), 595-608.

Items of the Work Control scale

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

Instructions and items: Below are listed a number of statements which could be used to describe a job. Please read each statement carefully and indicate the extent to which each is an accurate or an inaccurate description of your job by writing a number in front of each statement. The response options are 1 = very little, 2= little, 3 = a moderate amount, 4 = much, and 5 = very much.

1. How much control do you have over the variety of methods you use in completing your work?
2. How much can you choose among a variety of tasks or projects to do?
3. How much control do you have personally over the quality of your work?
4. How much can you generally predict the amount of work you will have to do on any given day?
5. How much control do you personally have over how much work you get done?
6. How much control do you have over how quickly or slowly you have to work?
7. How much control do you have over the scheduling and duration of your rest breaks?
8. How much control do you have over when you come to work and leave?
9. How much control do you have over when you take vacation or days off?
10. How much are you able to predict what the results of decisions you make on the job will be?
11. How much are you able to decorate, rearrange, or personalize your work area?
12. How much can you control the physical condition of your work station (lighting, temperature)?
13. How much control do you have over how you do your work?
14. How much can you control when and how much you have to interact with others at work?
15. How much influence do you have over the policies and procedures in your work unit?
16. How much control do you have over the sources of information you need to do your job?
17. How much are things that affect you at work predictable, even if you can’t directly control them?
18. How much control do you have over the amount of resources (tools, material) that you get?
19. How much can you control the number of times you are interrupted while you work?
20. How much control do you have over how much you earn at your job?
21. How much control do you have over how your work is evaluated?
22. In general, how much overall control do you have over work and work-related matters?