Building better measures of role ambiguity and role conflict: The validation of new role stressor scales

Occupational stress researchers have given considerable attention to role ambiguity and role conflict as predictors of employee health, job attitudes and behaviour. However, the validity of the Rizzo, House, and Lirtzman’s (1970 Rizzo, J. R., House, R. J., Study 2 N = 118 workers primarily employed in the U.S.; Study 3 N = 135 employed U.S. MBA students; Study 4 N = 973 members of the U.S. Air Force (USAF); Study 5 N = 234 workers primarily employed in the U.S.). Across these five studies, we found that the new role stressor scales have desirable psychometric qualities: they displayed high levels of substantive validity, high levels of internal consistency and test–retest reliability, they produced an interpretable factor structure, and we found evidence of their construct validity. We therefore recommend that these new scales be used in future research on role stress.