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Validation investigation of the Power Base Survey
Abstract
Historically, the assessment of power has suffered from a dearth of psychometrically sound instrumentation. As a result, much of the research on power has been of questionable value. The primary purpose of this study was to assess the validity of the Randolph et al. Power Base Survey; an instrument designed to measure social power. A second purpose was to investigate any ancillary relationships between power profiles, leadership styles, and demographic information. This research is significant because the development of a valid power instrument could potentially make substantial contributions to personnel evaluation and placement (i.e. determining worker/worker and worker/job compatibility) in industry, education, mental health, or any other fields where supervisor-supervisee relations play a prominent role. Several groups of subjects participated in the study. A group of business graduate students provided support for the instrument's reliability using a test-retest procedure. A team of expert judges and a group of undergraduates from a business management course provided substantial face validity evidence for the Power Base Survey. The team of expert judges also gathered strong content validity evidence in support of the Power Base Survey. Little criterion-related validity evidence was obtained to support the Power Base Survey using a sample of 40 supervisors and 80 supervisees. However, these results were likely due to the hypotheses that were investigated since it was easy to find support for alternative hypotheses and explanations in the literature, and because the other validation evidence obtained from the study supported the Power Base Survey. The instrument's construct validity appeared to be strong as measured by inter-item correlations, subscale correlations, and correlations between the Power Base Survey and other power instrumentation in the field. In conclusion, the Randolph et al. Power Base Survey fared fairly well in terms of face validity and construct validity after being subjected to an ambitious validation investigation. Direct application of the Power Base Survey seems to be in order, though as with most instruments, additional evidence of validity would be beneficial.
Subject Area
Business education
Recommended Citation
Hewat, Benjamin Whitaker, "Validation investigation of the Power Base Survey" (1992). Doctoral Dissertations Available from Proquest. AAI9305840.
https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI9305840