A CRITICAL-EXAMINATION OF THE INTERNALIZATION, IDENTIFICATION, AND COMPLIANCE COMMITMENT MEASURES

The objectives of this study were to examine O'Reilly and Chatman's (1 986) compliance, identification, and internalization scales, and to co mpare the latter measures to the OCQ. Two studies were completed Findi ngs from Study 1 indicated that: (1) Although reliable, the identifica tion measure was redundant with the OCQ; (2) the internalization measu re was reliable and valid in that most items strongly loaded upon a di fferent factor than did items of all other measures; and (3) the compl iance measure obtained some validity only after the removal of two of its items, but possessed weak reliability throughout the analysis. Stu dy 2 examined the applicability of the reconstituted (based upon findi ngs from Study 1) OCQ, internalization and compliance measures in a lo ngitudinal model of the turnover process. Of the three measures, only the OCQ had a significant causal effect within the model. Implications of these findings are examined.