Testing and Extending Schwartz Refined Value Theory Using a Best-Worst Scaling Approach.

The theory of human values discriminated 10 basic values arrayed in a quasicircular structure. Analyses with several instruments in numerous samples supported this structure. The refined theory of human values discriminates 19 values in the same circle. Its support depends on one instrument, the revised Portrait Values Questionnaire. We introduce a forced choice method, the Best-Worst Refined Values scale (BWVr), to assess the robustness of the refined theory to method of measurement and also assess the distinctiveness and validity of a new animal welfare value. Three studies ( N = 784, 439, and 383) support the theory and the new value. Study 3 also demonstrates the convergent and discriminant validity of the 19 values by comparing the BWVr, the revised Portrait Values Questionnaire, and value-expressive behaviors and confirms the test-retest reliability of BWVr responses. These studies provide further information about the order of values in the value circle.

Delivering good service: personal resources, job satisfaction and nurses' 'customer' (patient) orientation.

AIMS: To explore the complex relationships between nurses' personal resources, job satisfaction and 'customer' (patient) orientation. BACKGROUND: Previous research has shown that nursing is highly intensive, emotionally charged work, which affects nurses' job performance and their customer orientation as well as patient or 'customer' satisfaction. This study contributes to the literature by examining how nurses' personal resources relate to their personal satisfaction and customer orientation and the relationships between them. Specifically, this study explores the effects of two facets of emotional labour (deep acting and surface acting), empathic concern, self-efficacy and emotional exhaustion on personal job satisfaction and customer orientation. We also test the moderating effects of inauthenticity and emotional contagion. DESIGN: A quantitative survey. METHOD: Data were collected through a self-completion questionnaire administered to a sample of 159 Australian nurses, in a public teaching hospital, in 2010. The data were analysed using Partial Least Square analysis. RESULTS: Partial Least Square analysis indicates that the final model is a good fit to the data (Goodness of Fit = 0.51). Deep acting and surface acting have different effects (positive and negative) on job satisfaction and 'customer' orientation, self-efficacy has a positive effect on both and emotional exhaustion has a positive effect on customer orientation and a negative effect on job satisfaction. The moderating effects of emotional contagion and empathic concern, in the final model, are discussed. CONCLUSIONS: Understanding the complex interactions between personal resources, job satisfaction and customer orientation helps to increase service providers' (nurses in this study) personal satisfaction and 'customer' orientation particularly in difficult contexts.

The structure of intraindividual value change.

Values are assumed to be relatively stable during adulthood. Yet, little research has examined value stability and change, and there are no studies on the structure of value change. On the basis of S. H. Schwartz's (1992) value theory, the authors propose that the structure of intraindividual value change mirrors the circumplexlike structure of values so that conflicting values change in opposite directions and compatible values change in the same direction. Four longitudinal studies, varying in life contexts, time gaps, populations, countries, languages, and value measures, supported the proposed structure of intraindividual value change. An increase in the importance of any one value is accompanied by slight increases in the importance of compatible values and by decreases in the importance of conflicting values. Thus, intraindividual changes in values are not chaotic, but occur in a way that maintains Schwartz's value structure. Furthermore, the greater the extent of life-changing events, the greater the value change found, whereas age was only a marginal negative predictor of value change when life events were taken into account. Implications for the structure of personality change are discussed.

The best-worst scaling approach: an alternative to Schwartz's Values Survey.

Traditional self-report ratings have some measurement problems that a relatively new method, best-worst scaling (BWS; Finn & Louviere, 1992), may overcome. This alternative method, based on Louviere's BWS, can be used to measure the relative importance or perceived trade-offs among choice alternatives. The method is illustrated as an alternative to the Schwartz Value Survey (SVS; Schwartz, 1992). In a series of samples, it was found that Schwartz values best-worst survey (SVBWS) reproduced Schwartz's (1992) theoretical value structure and supported hypothesized relationships between values and value-expressive behaviors, ethnocentrism, and environmental-related tourism activities. In addition, the SVBWS approach took significantly less respondent time than the traditional SVS approach.