Validation of a measure of perceived union support

Research on union member attitudes has focused chiefly on union commitment and union instru-mentality, which has provided a limited view of the relationship of the union with its members. In this study a confirmatory factor analysis was done to evaluate the construct validity of a measure of perceived union support by examining its distinctiveness from union commitment and union instrumentality. A total of 287 members of a large telecommunications local in the Midwest com-pleted a survey of union member attitudes. Results showed that perceived union support was a unidimensional scale that was distinct from union loyalty and union instrumentality. However, all three of these constructs were correlated, suggesting the need for future research to examine poten-tial causal linkages. Until recently, very few studies in the applied psychology or management literatures have focused on members ' attitudes to-ward and perceptions of their unions. Starting with Gordon and his colleagues ' pioneering work on union commitment (Gor