Facet Measures and Single Global Rating

JOURNAL OF BUSINESS AND PSYCHOLOGY Volume 8, No. 1, Fall 1993

FACET MEASURES AND GLOBAL JOB SATISFACTION Scott Highhouse
Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis

Alene S. Becker
Anheuser-Busch Companies

ABSTRACT: This research was an attempt to find evidence for Scarpello and
Campbell's (1983) conclusion that a single-item global measure is more content valid than a composite facet measure for assessing overall job satisfaction. The first study investigated responses from employees in three separate plants who completed a facet measure, a single-item global measure, along with items and facets chosen by an employee committee. Results indicated that the employeechosen facets accounted for some incremental variance in the prediction of the single-item measure. A second study investigated the relationship between a single-item and a facet measure of benefit package satisfaction when the entire benefit package domain was included in the facet measure. The magnitude of the relationship suggested that the single-item measure of global benefit package satisfaction involved consideration of more than merely satisfac¢ion with each element in the package. Limitations and alternative explanations for the findings are discussed.

Although job satisfaction is one of the most widely studied topics in organizational behavior and h u m a n resource management, m a n y questions surrounding the measurement of the construct remain unanswered (Brief & Roberson, 1989; Rice, Gentile, & McFarlin, 1991; Scarpello & Campbell, 1983). One important question is w h y single-item measures of global job satisfaction (e.g.,All things considered, h o w satisfied are you with your job?) fail to correlate highly with composite facet job satisfaction measures. Studies comparing facet measures with single-item measures typically find that one measure does not account The helpfulcomments of Mark E. Tubbs and John W. Joneson an earlierversionof thisarticleare

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