Work Psychosocial Scale: Development and Validation

Abstract

Since the promulgation in Spain of the Law 31/95 on the prevention of risks at work (PRW) various surveys have been carried out to evaluate psychosocial factors at work. The evaluation of these factors makes it possible to plan how to manage stress-derived pathologies, and lack of motivation and satisfaction at work. Surveys are usually group-administrated in organizations but it is often not possible to carry out an effective psychosocial intervention in the ambits requested by legislation. The present study reports on the development of a new questionnaire called Work Psychosocial Climate Scale (WPCS-16). It was applied by professional psychologists in a sample of 615 workers from four companies in the industrial and service sectors. The results of the factorial analysis of the test determined three factors that we labelled as Work Content (WC), Personal relations (PR) and Role Definition (RD). Our findings suggest that the WPCS-16 is a 16-item test consisting of three subscales that provides a quick and efficient diagnosis of the perception of workers about positive and negative psychosocial factors in their organizations.