Informal Learning in a Social Context: Development and Validation of a Scale

<p>Seeking information, feedback, and help from colleagues and supervisors is an<br>essential means of learning that helps employees and organizations to reach their goals.<br>Unfortunately, previous research has failed to clearly conceptualize these forms of workplace<br>learning and also does not provide us with a validated and generally applicable measurement<br>instrument. We set out to develop and validate such a scale measuring work-related informal<br>learning in a social context. Next to providing a valid and reliable instrument, we explore how<br>different groups of employees respond to it. We collected data in four organizations in Austria<br>and the Netherlands, with a total sample size of 895 employees. These data were used to<br>conduct exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, which showed four distinct factors:<br>information seeking, feedback seeking from the supervisor, feedback seeking from<br>colleagues, and help seeking. Using analyses of variance, we found significant differences<br>between groups determined by age, gender, experience, highest level of education, and<br>function. In conclusion, the Work-related Informal Learning in a Social Context (WILSC)<br>scale is valid in a range of contexts, and thus is an appropriate tool for research as well as<br>human resource development