Journal of Applied ftychology Copyright 1982 by the American Psychological Association, Inc

1982, Vol 67, No. 6, 826-834 0021 -9O1O/82/67O6-O826S00.75

An Empirical Comparison of Item Response Theory and

Hierarchical Factor Analysis in Applications to the
Measurement of Job Satisfaction
Charles K. Parsons Charles L. Hulin
College of Management University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Georgia Institute of Technology

Responses to the Job Descriptive Index (JDI; N = 1,349) are used to empirically
compare a two-parameter logistic item response theory (IRT) model to a hier-
archical factor analytic model suggested by Humphreys (1962). A hierarchical
model was chosen because the JDI is typically conceptualized as having five or
more dimensions, whereas current IRT estimation procedures are based on the
assumption of a unidimensional trait. The hierarchical analysis allows the in-
vestigator to create a general factor based on the common variance among the
usual common factors. IRT item parameters estimated by a maximum likelihood
algorithm agree very well with the item loadings on the first principal factor and
a general satisfaction factor from a matrix of tetrachoric correlations. These results
are consistent with a hierarchical job satisfaction model that has one general
factor and multiple group factors, as well as a logistic IRT model with two
parameters. The authors conclude that IRT can be applied in the job satisfaction
domain, where data are typically multidimensional, to provide evidence about
the general satisfaction factor. Implications of this research for applications of
IRT are discussed.

Item response theory (IRT) has been pro-
posed as a solution to many measurement
problems (Lord, 1980). The advantages of
IRT models are derived from the following
properties. First, they provide a scale of mea-
surement (called the 6 scale) that is indepen-
dent of the particular items included in a
measurement instrument. Second, they pro-
vide item parameters that are independent
of the sample of persons being measured.
Some of the applications of such measure-
ment models were discussed in Hulin, Dras-
gow and Parsons (1982) and Lord (1980),
and an introduction of IRT and methods was
presented in Hambleton and Cook (1977).
This research was supported in part by Contract
N00O-14-C-O9O4 from the Office of Naval Research,
Charles L. Hulin, principal investigator; and in part by
the Department of Psychology, University of Illinois.
The authors thank Michael Levine for his assistance in
the research as well as several anonymous reviewers who
provided many helpful comments on earlier drafts of
this article.
Requests for reprints should be sent to Charles K.
Parsons, College of Management, Georgia Institute of
Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332.
Although the IRT models are typically as-
sociated with aptitude measurement, Schmitt
(1981) noted that various IRT theorists
(Hambleton & Cook, 1977; Lord, 1977;
Wright, 1977) have suggested that the appli-
cability of the models to attitude measure-
ment is also worth investigating.
Because such applications of the IRT
methods to attitude measurement are rare
and the methods themselves are probably not
well understood by most researchers, it be-
hooves us to examine the extent to which the
results of the newer methods converge with
results from the more traditional methods
when examining issues of interest in attitude
measurement. For example, it is useful to
compare both theoretically and empirically
the more traditional factor analysis methods
to the newer IRT methods for describing the
structure of attitude items. This article briefly
describes the similarity and dissimilarity of
the factor analytic and IRT methods and
then applies both to job satisfaction data to
answer the question concerning the trait that
is basic to a set of observations.

826
 ITEM RESPONSE THEORY IN JOB SATISFACTION DATA 827

The Factor Analytic Model For the model discussed in this article,
Most factor analysis methods are based on P,(0) is given by the formula
a model that can be described as "a formal 1
model about hypothetical components which P,(6) = (1)
1 +e~
account for linear relationships that exist be-
tween observed variables" (Mulaik, 1972, p. The terms a, and b, are called item param-
96; emphasis added).1 In studies of the mea- eters, with a, reflecting item discrimination
surement of job satisfaction, factor analytic and b, reflecting item difficulty for the Ith
methods are used to determine the number item. D is a scaling factor usually set to 1.702
of hypothetical factors and the relations of so that this logistic function closely follows
items to these factors. Because factor analytic a normal ogive curve.
methods are linear, they are theoretically in- A graphic representation of this model is
correct for discrete variables, such as items represented by an S-shaped curve. The b pa-
with limited scored response options. For rameter reflects the position of the curve on
example, the frequently used job satisfaction the horizontal axis (0), and the a parameter
measure, the Job Descriptive Index (JDI; is related to the slope of the curve at its steep-
Smith, Kendall, & Hulin, 1969) with three est point. Lower b values shift the curve to
item-response alternatives, has frequently the left and lower a values flatten the curve.
been factor analyzed in order to answer ques- A third parameter is frequently added to
tions about convergent and discriminant va- the model when individuals who do not rec-
lidity (Dunham, Smith, & Blackburn, 1977), ognize the correct response are able and have
similarity of factor structure across subpop- a tendency to give a correct response to an
ulations (Golembiewski & Yeager, 1978; item with probability greater than zero. The
Smith, Smith, & Rollo, 1974), and the num- effect of nonzero value for this parameter on
ber of meaningful scales that can be derived an ICC is most obvious at the low level of
from the JDI (Yeager, 1981). 6 where the probability of a correct response
does not approach zero. (The ICC has a non-
zero lower asymptote.) For a job satisfaction
Item-Response Models questionnaire, it can be argued that as the
level of 0 approaches very low values
A formal item-response model states a re- (-•x), the conditional probability of re-
lation between the probability of some type sponding positively to an item goes to zero
of response by an individual and some char- because guessing does not occur. Parsons
acteristic of the individual. A factor analytic (Note 1) has determined empirically that this
model is one type of item-response model; is a tolerably good assumption for the Job
it describes the linear relation between item Descriptive Index. Therefore, the third pa-
responses and constructs. Recently, in the rameter will be set to zero (identical to not
area of psychometrics, there has been an in- including it in the model) for the present ar-
creasing emphasis on ogive or logistic item- ticle (see Hulin. Drasgow, & Parsons, 1982.
response models (Birnbaum, 1968). In most or Lord, 1980, for further discussion on the
applications the probability of an item re- various item response models).
sponse is a function of a unidimensional at- As afinalnote on Equation 1, it is obvious
tribute of the respondent and certain char- that the slope of a linear item response model
acteristics of the item called item parameters.
When unidimensionality is assumed, the
function is called an item characteristic curve 1
This paper will use the term factor rather than com-
(ICC) and gives the conditional probability ponent to denote the hypothetical element that is com-
that a randomly chosen person from the pop- mon to a set of observed variables. The distinction is
ulation of all people at a given value of the important when applying factor analysis because com-
trait gives a particular response. The notation ponents are usually derived to account for the variance
of observed variables, whereas factors are derived to ac-
commonly used denotes the attribute by (0) count for covariance among observed variables (see
and the ICC for the /* item by P, (0). Mulaik, 1972, for further details).
828 CHARLES K. PARSONS AND CHARLES L. HULIN
will be related to the a parameter from the
logistic model. In fact, for the two-parameter
normal ogive model (similar to the logistic
model),
a, = 7 7 = = , (2)
where for the Ith item, a, is item discrimi-
nation and rbi is the biserial correlation be-
tween item and unidimensional 0 (Lord &
Novick, 1968). For the same model, these
authors have also specified the relationship
between a, and the factor loading of item i
on the first principal factor (a,) from the
matrix of tetrachoric correlations. Again, as-
suming unidimensional 0, this relation is
(3)
This relation clearly shows that when the
assumptions of the normal ogive model hold
(including unidimensionality), the relation
between the IRT model and the factor ana-
lytic model is simple. Unfortunately, most
data sets do not meet such an assumption.
Unidimensional IRT Models in
Multidimensional Data
Applications of the IRT model in real data
require understanding the consequences of
violating the model's assumptions. In partic-
ular, what does it mean to apply this unidi-
mensional model to multidimensional data?
Reckase (1979) has presented some results
that compare such an application of a three-
parameter logistic IRT model in data sets of
varying factorial complexity. As more or-
thogonal factors of equal size are present in
the item set, the relation denoted in Equation
3 becomes weaker. On the other hand, the
estimated a parameters do relate highly to
the loading of one of the orthogonally rotated
factors. This is quite interesting, because the
convergence of a model that assumes uni-
dimensionality with one factor of a model
that assumes multidimensionality tells us
what component is being measured by the
former. Based on his results, Reckase also
suggested that stable parameter estimates for
the IRT model require a first principal com-
ponent that accounts for at least 20% of the
test variance.
The theoretical work by Lord and Novick
(1968) shows us the relation between the
models for the one-factor case, and Reckase's
(1979) Monte Carlo results show us the re-
sults for multiple orthogonal factors. The
correspondence of the IRT analysis of job
satisfaction items to one extreme or the other
will reveal the trait underlying the set of re-
sponses.
However, there are a multitude of possible
factor analytic solutions in a set of data. Fac-
tor analysis investigations of job satisfaction
are usually based on the common factor
model and use factor rotation techniques
based on some mathematical criterion of
Thurstone's (1947) principles of simple
structure. Such rotations explicitly empha-
size the differences between sets of items that
define each factor.
An alternate approach is to examine a fac-
tor that is common to all items. The first
principal factor is an example of such a factor
but suffers from lack of psychological inter-
pretability when multiple factors exist in the
data. Humphreys (1962) has proposed the
use of hierarchical factor models that de-
scribe observed variables as a function of a
general factor and multiple, more specific,
common factors. The specific method will
be described in the Methods section of this
paper.
Regarding general factors, Humphreys
(1962) and Humphreys and Hulin (Note 2)
have noted that the most striking character-
istic of published matrices displaying inter-
correlations among very diverse measures of
cognitive ability, based on large samples and
reliable measures, are the sizes of the smallest
correlations. They are typically positive and
suggest the presence of a general factor of
intelligence that is obscured by most com-
mon factor analytic procedures. Similar ob-
servations can be made concerning factor
analytic studies of job satisfaction. Positive
correlations among the commonly reported
factorially derived scale scores are the most
obvious and general outcome of any such
study. Based on these arguments, the general
factor, as well as the more specific common
factors should be considered when compar-
ing factor analytic results to IRT results.
As described in the opening paragraph, the
advantages of IRT to many measurement
 ITEM RESPONSE THEORY IN JOB SATISFACTION DATA
problems has been thoroughly described else-
where. Strict adherence to the assumptions
of the model in the available computational
procedures would appear to make applica-
tions to many research settings impossible.
Longer scales are certainly one alternative,
but they are not practical in many organi-
zational contexts where research time and
questionnaire space are extremely precious
commodities. Application of the model and
procedures to a multidimensional item set
is useful to the extent that we obtain useful
results, understand the trait being assessed by
the total item set, and are aware that we are
violating an assumption of the model.
With this caveat, the current study at-
tempted to shed light on what trait is being
assessed by the unidimensional IRT model
in multidimensional job satisfaction item re-
sponse data. Specifically, two questions were
asked:
1. Is there evidence to support the pres-
ence of the general factor?
2. Does an IRT procedure that assumes
unidimensionality provide parameter esti-
mates that converge with the general factor
or one of the more commonly cited facet fac-
tors in the Job Descriptive Index?
Method
Subjects
Data consisted of responses to questionnaires by non-
managenal personnel performing a variety of jobs in a
large international merchandising company. Usable
questionnaires were received from 1,632 employees dis-
tributed among 41 units around the United States. Re-
turn rates for questionnaires were approximately 95%.
The surveys were administered by organizational staff
members. Participation was voluntary and participants
completed the surveys on company time. They were
collected and mailed to university researchers. Confi-
dentiality of responses was assured although identifying
information was requested in order to complete a follow-
up study not relevant to the present one. In this sample,
59% of the respondents considered themselves full-time
workers and the other 41% were part time. Thirty per-
cent of the sample was male, the average age was 36.5
years, and average tenure was 6.6 years. Further descrip-
tion of the subjects, questionnaire, and results can be
found in Miller (1979).
Variables and Selection of Data
The Job Descriptive Index (Smith et al.. 1969) was
used as the measure of job satisfaction. The JDI is a
series of adjective checklists that assess satisfaction with
829
the work itself, pay, promotional opportunities, super-
visor, and co-workers. Four scales are included in this
study (the pay scale was omitted). Also, three adjectives
from the co-workers scale ("easy to make enemies," "no
privacy," and "hard to meet") were not included because
they were not common to several other samples that
were originally under study by Parsons (1980). Therefore
60 items from the JDI were used to index job satisfac-
tion.
Only subject records with no missing data on the 60
JDI items were included. Although Lord (1974) has pre-
sented an acceptable solution for estimating both item
and 6 parameters for aptitude tests with omitted re-
sponses, it is based on assumptions that clearly are not
tenable for responses to the JDI. For instance. Lord
(1974. p. 250) stated the assumption that "examinees
wish to maximize their expected scores and that they
are fully informed about their best strategy for doing
this." After eliminating records with omitted responses,
the sample consisted of 1,349 response records.
Parameter Estimation
Parameters for the IRT model were estimated from
the maximum likelihood algorithm, LOGIST (Wood,
Wingersky, & Lord, Note 3). LOGIST requires dichoto-
mous scoring of items, with 1 indicating satisfaction and
0 indicating no satisfaction. The responses scored 0 or
1 by the Smith et al. (1969) procedure were scored as
0. Responses that would have received a 3 were scored
as 1. The justification for this adjustment comes from
Smith et al.'s results demonstrating that question-mark
responses (scored 1) were more frequently given by in-
dividuals with low satisfaction.
Factor Extraction and Rotation
Previous factor analysis studies of the JDI have been
based on Pearson product-moment correlations and
have not considered that the observed variables are bet-
ter described as discrete than continuous. Tetrachoric
correlations are another index of association sometimes
used in test development and can be used if two observed
variables, such as items, are scored dichotomously.
Then, if it is reasonable to assume that the trait under-
lying each item response is continuous, "it is possible
to secure an estimate of what the correlation could be
if the underlying traits were continuous and normally
distributed or if they were so measured as to give normal
distributions" (McNemar, 1969, p. 221). Because Lord
and Novick (1968) have shown the relation between fac-
tor analysis of tetrachoric correlations and the normal
ogive item response model, tetrachorics were used in this
study. This latter requirement excluded the use of con-
firmatory factor analysis (such as Joreskog's, 1970, max-
imum likelihood procedure) to test the fit of the hier-
archical factor model (Lord. 1980, p. 21).
All factoring is based on the 60-item tetrachoric cor-
relation matrix with the maximum correlation of each
item with the other items in the diagonal as communal-
lty estimates (referred to as the reduced matrix). The
principal axes method (Harman. 1967) was used to ex-
tract principal factors.
The direct oblimin routine (Jennnch & Sampson,
830 CHARLES K. PARSONS AND CHARLES L. HULIN
Table 1
First 12 Eigenvalues From Matrix of
Tetrachoric Correlations
Factor Eigenvalue
1 16.76
2 6.00
3 5.31
4 3.60
5 2.32
6 1.93
7 1.81
g 1.48
9 1.31
10 1.16
11 1.07
12 .97
1966) was used to rotate the factors obliquely. The cor-
relations among the oblique factors were then used as
a basis for second-order factoring. One principal factor
was extracted from these correlations by using an iter-
ative extraction procedure that first uses squared mul-
tiple correlations as communality estimates, extracts the
desired number of factors, reestimates communality
from the factor loadings, refactofs the new reduced cor-
relation matrix, and so on until the difference between
two successive communality estimates becomes negli-
gible. The loadings of the first-order factors on the sec-
ond-order factor were used to construct a matrix for
transforming the four oblique first-order factors into a
hierarchical configuration with one general factor and
four orthogonal facet factors. This matrix was con-
structed in the following manner. The loadings of the
four first-order factors on the one second-order factor
(h,) are the first column of the transformation matrix.
Theremainingfour columns represent a diagonal matrix
with v l ~ / j f as the diagonal entries. This matrix was
then premultiplied by the factor pattern matrix from the
direct oblimin rotation. (The reader is directed to
Schmid & Leiman. 1957, for the specific procedures and
rationale.)
Results
The eigenvalues of the first 12 factors from
the 60-item tetrachoric matrix appear in Ta-
ble 1. First, note that the first eigenvalue is
16.76 which, in terms of proportion of total
variance (27.8%), exceeds the 20% require-
Table2
Correlations of Oblique First-Order Factors
Factor 1 2 3 4
1 1.00
2 .30 1.00
3 .20 .19 1.00
4 .31 .31 .31 1.00
Table 3
Schmid-Leiman Transformation Matrix
Factor h, VT-hi VT-H
1 .518 .855 0 0 0
2 .507 0 .502 0 0
3 .425 0 0 .905 0
4 .640 0 0 0 .768
Note, h, is the loading of the ith first order factor on the
second order principal factor.
ment suggested by Reckase (1979) to obtain
stable parameter estimation results. Four fac-
tors were retained in order to represent the
four satisfaction facets on which the scales
are based. An eigenvalue-greater-than-one
criterion (Kaiser, 1961) is inappropriate for
the tetrachoric correlation matrix. Therefore,
four factors were rotated obliquely; and their
intercorrelations appear in Table 2. The sec-
ond-order factor was extracted from these
correlations and is defined by loadings rang-
ing from .425 to .641. The eigenvalue of the
first principal component (1.82) was sub-
stantially larger than that of the second com-
ponent (.84), thus justifying the choice of the
model that contains one general factor. The
Schmid-Leiman (1957) transformation ma-
trix is presented in Table 3. The values in the
first column (the loadings on the second-or-
der factor) are smaller than those in the other
four columns, indicating that the loadings of
the items on the general factor will be smaller
than the loadings on the facet factors.
The oblique factor pattern matrix was
transformed to the hierarchical factor struc-
ture and appears in Table 4 along with the
loadings on the first principal factor and the
a values from LOGIST.
The factor loadings on all factors were
transformed according to Equation 3 and
compared to the LOGIST a using correlations
that appear in Table 5. First observe that the
correlation between d and the principal fac-
tor loadings (PF) is .966. This is very con-
sistent with the theoretical relation specified
by the normal ogive model. As mentioned
earlier, the first principal factor lacks psy-
chological interpretability when multiple fac-
tors exist in this data. Therefore, the general
factor (G) and facet factors (Fl to F4) are
examined next. The correlation for G is .853,
which is clearly higher than for any of the
 ITEM RESPONSE THEORY IN JOB SATISFACTION DATA 831

Table 4
LOGJST a, Principal Factor Loadings, and Hierarchical Factor Matrix for 60 Job
Descriptive Index Items
Item a, PF G Fl F2 F3 F4
1 .517 .484 .459 -.041 -.027 .100 .546
2 .342 .381 .371 -.045 -.020 .024 .478
3 .850 .625 .574 .036 .065 -.001 .617
4 .677 .530 .509 .035 .043 -.032 .573
5 .853 .614 .529 .108 .160 .029 .427
6 .432 .427 .407 -.065 -.025 .124 .483
7 .768 .594 .510 .100 .097 .117 .404
8 .179 .215 .148 .167 .132 -.024 -.023
9 .796 .609 .502 .198 .149 .057 .322
10 .602 .473 .428 .044 .106 -.049 .434
11 .503 .493 .428 .087 .122 .002 .362
12 .280 .300 .235 .072 .085 .154 .083
13 .651 .532 .508 -.010 -.068 .058 .632
14 .032 .048 .030 .078 .053 -.052 -.013
15 .321 .353 .271 .210 .057 .052 .103
16 .171 .204 .218 -.082 .026 -.089 .353
17 .244 .290 .229 .117 .060 .079 .102
18 .843 .613 .568 .017 .037 .020 .632
19 1.053 .576 .432 .075 -.068 .846 .035
20 .724 .472 .345 .029 -.012 .768 -.031
21 .907 .589 .447 .094 .040 .662 .067
22 .903 .599 .466 .080 .016 .633 .133
23 1.071 .584 .444 .046 -.045 .831 .062
24 .844 .597 .451 .149 .100 .515 .072
25 .657 .486 .351 .081 .056 .655 -.046
26 .873 .542 .403 .046 -.033 .749 .005
27 1.109 .615 .463 .079 .017 .785 .044
28 .532 .465 .365 .352 -.121 .109 .205
29 .943 .634 .445 .706 -.031 -.011 .049
30 .888 .584 .399 .726 -.047 -.038 .007
31 .787 .590 .423 .542 -.040 .141 .062
32 .743 .589 .405 .654 -.026 .062 .006
34 1.087 .679 .483 .596 .070 .112 .033
35 .616 .523 .357 .430 .151 .141 -.071
36 .559 .470 .291 .673 .009 .011 .140
37 .515 .470 .346 .386 -.056 .154 .088
38 1.073 .650 .446 .785 -.057 -.004 .007
39 .689 .539 .358 .699 -.035 -.015 -.045
40 .878 .605 .418 .575 .103 .068 -.027
41 1.209 .666 .455 .728 .044 .021 -.026
42 1.127 .682 .489 .519 .187 .074 .036
43 .020 .057 .047 .180 -.079 -.178 .082
44 .712 .566 .404 .531 .054 .024 .048
45 .885 .555 .381 .667 -.023 -.026 .003
46 .512 .494 .400 -.097 .497 .119 .133
47 .724 .563 .433 .050 .610 -.025 .067
48 .438 .430 .318 -.047 .711 -.054 -.055
49 .498 .479 .379 -.024 .509 .024 .100
50 .677 .513 .390 .019 .665 -.076 .028
51 .682 .544 .420 -.024 .668 .006 .046
52 .440 .444 .338 -.077 .607 .065 -.003
53 .817 .621 .478 .049 .627 .027 .081
54 .385 .389 .282 .035 .487 .040 -.054
55 .659 .570 .448 .008 .575 .028 .110
56 .539 .476 .352 .010 .693 -.066 -.037
57 580 .457 .339 .065 .585 -.070 -.014
58 .690 .558 .424 -.021 .666 .065 .018
59 559 .526 .407 -.012 .590 .043 .056
60 .559 .513 .386 .065 .542 .029 .017
Note. PF = first principal factor; G = general factor, Fl = supervision satisfaction facet factor, F2 = co-workers
satisfaction facet factor; F3 = promotions satisfaction facet factor; F4 = work satisfaction facet factor.
g32 CHARLES K. PARSONS AND CHARLES L. HULIN
Table 5
Correlations O/LOGIST a With Transformed
Factor Loadings
Factor a factor intercorrelations to be interpreted. In
First principal factor .966
Satisfaction
General .853
Supervision .374
Co-workers -.081
Promotion -.402
Work .036
facet factors. Correlations for the loadings on
the oblique facet factors would be identical
to those for the facet factors in the hierar-
chical structure.
Clearly, the general factor is the psycho-
logically interpretable factor that is most rep-
resentative of 8 from the IRT analysis. The
correlations for the first principal factor also
demonstrate that the theoretical relation for
unidimensional items also holds very well for
the multidimensional items of the JDI. Be-
cause these correlations only reflect the sim-
ilarity of patterns of loadings and a, the root
mean squared difference for these two item
indexes were also computed and are .057 for
PF and. 167 for G. Finally, the means for the
various indexes are .528 for a, .507 for PF,
and .392 for G. As can be seen, there is a
tendency for the a to be larger than what
would be expected from the transformed
loadings.
Discussion
The hierarchical factor matrix provides a
pattern of factor loadings that is psycholog-
ically interpretable and can be compared to
the IRT results. Regarding its interpretabil-
ity, the addition of the general factor to the
already moderately well fitting four-orthog-
onal-factor solution could be criticized for
making the matrix less parsimonious (more
parameters). The obvious response to the
objection is that the orthogonal facets have
little substance in empirical observation. In
addition, parsimony is not the sole or even
the overriding goal of science. If this were the
case, then four-principal factors (without ro-
tation) would be desirable because they ac-
count for the maximum possible variance
with this number of parameters. Another
criticism could be based on using second-or-
der factoring rather than simply leaving the
this case, it can be argued that the higher
order factoring is both a more meaningful
and parsimonious solution because it in-
volves a reduction of the factor intercorre-
lation matrix. The Schmid-Leiman trans-
formation simply used this reduction to de-
fine a general factor, to orthogonalize the
facet factors, and to define all factors in terms
of observed variables. The main advantage
of the hierarchical factor solution is that it
illustrates that items on different scales do
share common variance and this common
variance can be effectively summarized by
one second-order factor. This latter point
would not hold if the oblique rotation had
resulted in factor intercorrelations that were
not described by a single factor. That is, a
single general factor is not a necessary out-
come from the hierarchical transformation
process.
Because of the clear results from the hi-
erarchical solution, the interpretation of the
IRT analysis is clear. The item discrimina-
tion parameters describe the relation of the
general factor, however, we choose to extract
or represent it, to the probability of endorsing
the items. On the other hand, from the per-
spective of IRT, the dimensions of the latent
space represented by the four facet factors
are also related to the probability of item en-
dorsement. When and if satisfactory esti-
mation procedures become available, these
dimensions can be incorporated into a
multidimensional item response model for
the JDI.
The current findings are important be-
cause they suggest that IRT can be applied
as a reasonably well fitting measurement
model for the JDI and probably other ques-
tionnaire measures of job satisfaction that
can be scored validly in a dichotomous man-
ner. This conclusion does not exclude the
development of item sets that better fit the
unidimensional IRT model or the experi-
mentation with the shorter scales of facet sat-
isfaction to determine whether or not further
improvements can be made.
At the same time, these data strongly sug-
gest the necessity for developing estimation
 ITEM RESPONSE THEORY IN JOB SATISFACTION DATA
procedures for multidimensional item re-
sponse theories that will describe responses
to each item of both a general 0 and a facet
0. It must be emphasized that the appeal of
a multidimensional model over one that em-
phasizes and uses only the general factor
from the hierarchical solution will depend on
the goals of the researcher and the uses to
which the resulting scales are to be put. If the
aim is the prediction of behavioral responses
reflecting general acceptance or rejection of
a work situation, such as turnover or absen-
teeism, then the use of job satisfaction scores
reflecting the general factor will probably
provide predictive power equal to that gen-
erated by a multidimensional approach. On
this point, we could not expect a general fac-
tor to outperform a multiple regression com-
posite of JDI scales in accounting for vari-
ance in a specific criterion. However, the gen-
eral factor may account for more variance
in a wider range of behavioral responses than
any one weighted composite of JDI scales.
In addition, in small samples, the general fac-
tor would not be subject to the sampling error
that severely limits cross validation of least
squares regression equations. Humphreys
and Hulin (Note 2) have commented on this
same point in the domain of ability mea-
surement and job performance prediction.
The fit of the IRT discrimination indexes,
derived assuming local independence and
unidimensionality of 0, to the loadings of the
items on the general factor from the hierar-
chical factoring suggests minimal violence
may be done to our data by fitting it to a
general unidimensional model. So long as we
are aware that assumptions are being made
in this approach that are not entirely correct,
our informed violation of these assumptions
should not mislead us.
However, if the aims of the researcher are
more specific, such as to test specific hy-
potheses about attitudinal or affective cor-
relates of specific behaviors—voting for union
representation in National Labor Relations
Board elections, being absent on specific
days, or volunteering to work overtime—
then more complex multidimensional mod-
els are required. Similarly, if the aims of an
investigator are interventions designed to in-
crease levels of job satisfaction in an orga-
nization, then again, multidimensional mod-
833
els are required to provide evidence about
which specific factors in the work situation
should be changed. We can operate as re-
searchers or practitioners with either model
depending on our aims without making as-
sumptions that we have learned much about
specific causes of job satisfaction when we
use a general factor approach or that we
know much about the antecedents of behav-
iors reflecting general acceptance/rejection of
a job when we use multidimensional models.
Perhaps most importantly, this study has
demonstrated the convergence of evidence
from three quite different approaches to the
study of the meaning of different item re-
sponses on job satisfaction questionnaires.
Convergence among measures based on the
first principal factor, on the general factor
from a hierarchical factor model, and from
a unidimensional latent trait model are en-
couraging. The results of this study provide
some evidence for interpreting what is being
estimated by 0s from the JDI. Both the ne-
cessity and limitation of future developments
stressing multidimensional IRT models in
job satisfaction have been pointed out. Re-
finements of the model will generate more
research aimed at specifying the usefulness
of general and specific job satisfaction mea-
sures.
Reference Notes
1. Parsons, C. K. Empirically investigating the two pa-
rameter logistic model for a job satisfaction question-
naire. Paper presented at the meeting of the Ameri-
can Institute for Decision Sciences. Boston, Novem-
ber 1981.
2. Humphreys, L. G., & Hulin. C. L. The construct of
intelligence in the historical perspective of classical
test theory. Paper presented at the Educational Test-
ing Service Symposium on Construct Validity,
Princeton. N.J., October, 1979.
3. Wood, R. L., Wingersky, M. S., & Lord, F. M. A
computer program for estimating ability and item
characteristic curve parameters (ETS RM 76-6).
Princeton. N.J.: Educational Testing Service, 1976.
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