Corruption-Related Indicators Across Institutional, Organizational, Economic, and Sociopolitical Domains: A Sequential Exploratory Study

Corruption research encompasses institutional, organizational, economic, and sociopolitical indicators that are related but not interchangeable. This study identifies literature-derived corruption-related indicators, assesses their content relevance through expert evaluation, and examines how specialized participants’ relevance ratings are empirically grouped. A sequential exploratory multi-stage design was applied. An integrative literature review generated a preliminary indicator pool; 18 experts assessed its content relevance; and the resulting conceptual pool was operationalized into a 20-item questionnaire administered to 376 specialized participants using a five-point Likert-type scale. Principal component analysis retained four components explaining 67.66% of the total variance. These components correspond broadly to institutional governance and corruption control; firm-level organizational mechanisms and corporate integrity; macroeconomic indicators and development outcomes; and sociopolitical context, elite capture, and accountability. The components summarize patterns of covariation among participants’ relevance ratings rather than causal mechanisms, relationships among the underlying socioeconomic phenomena, or direct measures of corruption or economic performance. The study provides an exploratory, perception-based, and literature-grounded framework for organizing corruption-related indicators and offers a basis for subsequent research using objective indicators, longitudinal designs, and comparative country-level analyses.