International Journal of Educational Management

Teachers’ perceptions of fairness, well-being and burnout: a contribution to the validation of the
Organizational Justice Index by Hoy and Tarter
Vincenza Capone Giovanna Petrillo
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validation of the Organizational Justice Index by Hoy and Tarter", International Journal of Educational Management , Vol. 30
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 Teachers’ perceptions of fairness, well-being and burnout: a contribution to the validation of

the Organizational Justice Index by Hoy and Tarter

Abstract

Purpose. The aim of the work is to contribute to the validation of the Organizational Justice Index (OJI) by Hoy and Tarter (2004), a

self-report questionnaire for teachers’ perceptions of fairness in the operation and administration of schools.

Design/methodology/approach. In two studies we validated the Italian version of the OJI. Study 1 included 164 Italian high school

teachers (76.8 % were female) to test structure and construct validity. Study 2 involved 200 teachers (permanent and temporary

teachers) to confirm the structure of the scale, test the construct and criterion validity, and invariance. Findings. Confirmatory factor

analyses confirmed the one-factor solution and that the structure of the scale was the same across teachers. Results revealed high
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internal reliability. The OJI correlated positively with equity, school climate, and job satisfaction, and negatively with depression and

burnout. Research limitations/implications. Since the research approach could lead to common method variance issues, it will be

important to determine the associations of OJI with non-self–report assessments. Practical implications. The OJI can be applied

optimally to: assess potential organizational problems prior to conducting major interventions; investigate school dynamic problems;

target interventions designed to enhance perception of organizational justice; incorporate evaluation of organizational justice as part

of regular employee assessments. Originality/value. Overall findings fill the need of standardized measures of organizational justice

for specific context. The OJI is a valid instrument to measure organizational justice in school, involving different type of teachers.

Keywords: organizational justice, validating scales, teacher, job satisfaction, well-being, burnout

Introduction

The study of organizational justice perceptions has received great attention from the researchers and has

become a relevant topic in organizational psychology, human resource management, and organization

behavior studies (Cropanzano and Greenberg, 1997). Building on Adam’s (1965) equity theory, the concept

of organizational justice has become an important element in understanding how people respond to

organizational demands (Luo, 2007). The employees’ evaluation of their working environment determines

their willingness to continue working with the organization (Workman, 2009). Usually, employees are

attentive to justice of events and situations in their daily lives and across a variety of contexts (Li and

Cropanzano, 2009). They act and react based on their perception of fairness, and if they perceive that are

treated fairly by their organization tend to develop and maintain communal relationships with the

organization (Kim, 2009). Organizational justice has attracted attention as a potential predictor of
1
 employees’ mental health (Maslach et al., 2001). It is well established in the literature that there is an

important association between justice perceptions and job satisfaction, and performance (Bakhshi et al.,

2009). Justice perceptions have been found to be positively associated with psychological well-being, and

negatively with psychological distress (Cropanzano et al., 2005; Judge and Colquitt, 2004), absenteeism

(Lam et al., 2002), emotional states, depression, and anxiety (Kalimo et al., 2003; Spell and Arnold, 2007).

Accomplished researches showed that organizational justice is a predictor of many of the organizational

variables. Colquitt (2001) contended that employees who are treated fairly have trust in their managers.

Extending from this line of research, Workman (2009) showed as organizational justice interacts in the

relationship between self-efficacy and attitudes. Furthermore, when employees perceive that they have self-
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efficacy in their work, and that organizational processes are fair and effective, then they have more positive

attitudes (Mayer et al., 2007). Organizational justice is also an important precondition for increasing activity

that is not formally part of any reward or compensation scheme, but does, however, promote the organization

(Erkutlu, 2011).

Referring to school context, perceived justice is a crucial concept for both teachers and students. It is an

influential concept in creating a peaceful and harmonious workplace (Buluc and Gunes, 2014). Teacher

perception of fairness is a key to satisfaction (Zainalipour et al., 2010), and is related with school climate and

faculty trust (Guy and Di Paola, 2008). Annamalai and colleagues (2010) found that organizational justice

impacts on teachers’ trust in principal.

Some studies highlighted as teachers’ organizational justice perceptions don’t vary according to gender

(Yilmaz and Tasdan, 2009). Whereas, other qualitative studies (Petrillo et al., 2012a) showed that the

condition of temporary teacher affects teachers’ perceptions of justice. Workers exposed to job insecurity

and job changes are ever increasing, however, studies among temporary workers are underrepresented in the

literature (Borgogni et al., 2015). An Italian recent study (Petrillo et al., 2012a) affirmed that permanent

teachers feel to be treated more fairly by their principal than temporary teachers. As to their relationship with

students, temporary teachers are more careful about relational justice, while the permanent ones are more

careful with procedural and distributive justice.

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 Several studies showed that organizational justice is an important factor in defining social and psychological

atmosphere in organizations (Capone and Petrillo, 2015). Hence, perceived justice among school personnel

is potentially an important predictor of overall school climate and well-being.

Although the relevant dimensions of organizational justice and their constituent elements are clearly defined,

a number of problems have hindered the development of effective measures: organizational justice

perceptions are sensitive to the context under examination (Paterson et al., 2002). On the subject,

Cropanzano and Greenberg (1997) criticized research for using unvalidated measures, and recommended

developing standardized measures that can be tailored to fit specific organizational contexts. Thus,

appropriate attention should be devoted to the factor structure of organizational justice, and the statistical
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characteristics of the measures used to assess this construct; otherwise the validity of the findings in this field

of research may be questioned.

Hoy and Tarter (2004) created the Organizational Justice Index (OJI) for teachers, a measure of teachers’

perceptions of fairness in the operation and administration of schools. The OJI based on organizational

justice principles, that highlight the well-established tenets of distributive justice, the fairness of the who gets

what; and procedural justice, the fairness of the mechanisms of distribution (Greenberg, 1996). The authors

present ten principles of justice to dissect further the dimensions of justice and how it is operationalized in a

school setting, that are: equity, rewards that teachers receive for their contributions; individual perceptions of

fairness, rewards fairly procedures applied by the principal; voice, referring to teachers’ participation in

decision-making; interpersonal justice, referring to the communication of information respectfully and with

a sense of fairness; consistency rewards the application of rules, regulations and policies fair, in a visible and

consistent way; egalitarian, referring to decision making free of self- interest and directed by the collective

mission; correction, referring to administrators willing to review poor decisions and correct them; accuracy,

referring to the way to take decisions based on accurate information; representative, referring to the decision

making process; ethical, moral standards (honesty, integrity, authenticity, sincerity, equality, impartiality,

trustworthiness, and honor) considered in decisions.

Respondents were asked to describe the behavior of teachers and administrators along a six-point Likert

scale, from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree”. The higher the score, the greater the extent of behavior in

3
 the school. Examples of items included the following: “Teachers are involved in decisions that affect them

(voice principle)”, “The principal adheres to high ethical standards (ethical principle)”, “The principal treats

everyone with respect and dignity (interpersonal justice principle)”, and “Educators in this school follow

courses of action that are generally free of self-interest (egalitarian principle)”.

Factor analysis of the ten items of the index in the original study indicated a strong single factor of

organizational justice with all the items loading strongly on that factor. The alpha coefficient of reliability

was 0.97 (Hoy and Tarter, 2004). High score obtained from the scale implies the positive perceptions about

organizational justice. Furthermore, the OJI has revealed a one-factor structure with high reliability and

validity in some Turkish studies (Taştan and Yilmaz, 2008; Buluc and Gunes, 2014). However, in the
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literature, there is a lack of research that has specifically assessed the psychometric proprieties of the OJI.

Aims and Hypothesis

In two studies, we aimed to evaluate the validity of the Italian version of the Organizational Justice Index

(OJI, Hoy and Tarter, 2004), examining the structure, reliability, convergent and divergent validity (study 1

and 2), and invariance for group (study 2). A further aim of the present research was to expand the original

study analyzing the relation between OJI and some criterion variables such as teacher self-efficacy, teacher

collective efficacy, and psychosocial well-being (study 2).

We expect to confirm the factor structure of OJI as found in Hoy and Tarter’s (2004) work, and in Turkish

studies (study 1 and 2).

We hypothesize that the Italian version of OJI has a high internal reliability, similar to earlier findings in the

U.S. and Turkish samples (study 1 and 2). According previous studies (see introduction), we hypothesize that

our studies test the convergent and divergent validity of the Italian OJI correlating with corresponding

measures. Thus, considering convergent validity, we expect the OJI to be strongly positively correlated with

measures of equity (study 1), job satisfaction, and school climate (study 2). Considering divergent validity

we expect that OJI correlated negatively with measures of depression (study 1) and burnout (study 2). As to

criterion validity, we hypothesize that: 1) the OJI correlates positively with measures of mental health and

teacher self-efficacy (study 2). Furthermore, research on organizational justice has theorized that perceived

justice affects both on individual’s and group reaction to organizational decisions and goals (Argentero et al.,

4
 2009). Unfortunately, few studies have explored the relations among perceived collective efficacy and

organizational justice in school. The few available studies, involving students, suggest moderate positive

relations between perceived collective efficacy and student perceived justice (Petrillo et al., 2012b). So, we

hypothesize a positive correlation between OJI and school collective efficacy (study 2).

Referring to group invariance, we hypothesize that the functioning of the Italian OJI items does not differ

across types of position (permanent vs temporary teachers) (study 2).

Study 1

The purpose of Study 1 was to exam the structure of the scale and convergent and divergent validity.

Methods
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Translation Process

The Italian translated OJI was back-translated to ensure translation equivalency. Psychometric testing of the

OJI (Italian OJI) was then conducted. Two bilingual PhD researchers were involved in the translation

process. One of the researchers who translated the original tool to Italian had a PhD in Social Psychology

from a university in the Italy. The other translator, who had been educated in the United States and had a

PhD in Psychology, translated the Italian OJI back to English, without any discussion with the first

translator. Subsequently, adjustments were conducted to ensure understandability, psychological

equivalence, and the accuracy of the translation from English to Italian. The original and back-translated

English versions did not differ appreciably as judged by the translators.

Procedure and Statistical Analyses (Study 1 and 2).

We used a cross-sectional design to validate the OJI. Research participation was subjected to privacy

information and consent to the processing of personal data in accordance with the applicable law. Each

answer sheet was marked by an alphanumeric identification code previously assigned to each participant as a

guarantee of anonymity.

A researcher was present during data collection, providing support to participants. The data were collected

first from October to February 2013 (study 1), and then from January to July 2014 (study 2) in the school

setting.

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 In both studies, the items of OJI were evaluated with regards to variance and frequency distribution. The

Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) measure of sampling adequacy and Bartlett’s test of sphericity were considered

to test whether the dataset was suitable for factor analysis. In order to test the reliability of the scale, we

computed the internal consistency using Cronbach’s alpha. An internal consistency greater than 0.70 is

thought to be necessary for a valid psychological scale (Nunnally and Bernstein, 1995). For the analysis of

the internal consistency of the scale, the corrected correlation between the score of the item and the OJI was

computed.

Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted, using the maximum likelihood estimation method, to

evaluate the underlying structure of items. In order to evaluate the solution we took into account the
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goodness of fit indexes. The Chi-square (χ2) was used to indicate the difference between observed and

expected covariance matrices, testing the null hypothesis of ideal model fit where the residual covariance

equals zero. We also considered adequate: Comparative fit index (CFI) and the Tucker–Lewis index (TLI)

values above 0.90 (Bentler, 2005; Byrne, 1994), Root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) values

below or equal to 0.06, and Root mean square residual (RMSR), values equal to or below 0.09 (Hu and

Bentler, 1999). Relations between the measures were examined using the Pearson product– moment

correlations. Statistical significance was set at p-value < 0.05. Analyses were computed with SPSS 13.0 and

MPLUS 5.0 for CFA.

Participants

A convenience sample of 164 Italian high school teachers from different regions, mainly in central and

southern Italy, participated in the current study. Of the respondents 76.8 % were female. They were between

29 and 65 years old (m = 48.94 years; SD = 7.33). The 86.0 % were permanent teachers.

Measures

The Italian version of OJI (Hoy and Tarter, 2004): 10 items measuring teachers’ perceptions of fairness in

the operation and administration of schools. Response alternatives are provided on 6-point Likert-type scale:

1 (strongly disagree); 2 (disagree); 3 (disagree somewhat); 4 (agree somewhat); 5 (agree); 6 (strongly agree).

Measure for convergent validity. The sub-scale Equity of the Areas of Worklife Survey (Maslach and Leiter,

1997, Italian version Borgogni et al., 2005) measures perception of fairness in organizational setting.

6
 Respondents indicate their degree of agreement with five statements on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging

from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). In this study α = .78.

Measure for divergent validity. The Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D; Radloff

1977; Italian version by Fava 1983) measures symptoms of depression in community populations. The scale

is a composite of 20 items. Subjects are asked to rate each item on a scale from 0 (rarely or none of the time,

less than 1 day), to 3 (most or all of the time; 5–7 days), on the basis of “How often you have felt this way

during the past week’’. In this study, α = .76.

Results

Confirmatory Factor Analyses

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In order to analyze internal consistency of the Italian OJI, we calculated the corrected correlation between

the score of the items and the scale. Coefficients ranged between 0.56 (item 7) and 0.88 (item 6) and were

considered adequate since they were greater than 0.30 (Nunnally and Bernstein 1995). The means of the

items ranged from 3.77 (item 7) to 4.37 (item 2). The standard deviation was higher than 1 for all items,

ranging between 1.06 (item 9) and 1.33 (item 4). Bartlett’s sphericity test was equal to X2 (45, N = 167) =

866.322 (p < 0.001) and KMO index was 0.94, indicating that correlation matrix was adequate. Skewness

and kurtosis showed a normal distribution in items’ response: kurtosis ranging between 0.64 (item 10) and -

0.04 (item 3), and skewness ranging between -0.34 (item 10) and 0.55 (item 1). Therefore, maximum

likelihood estimation was used in all the analyses. Confirmatory factor analyses were computed to ascertain

the factor structure of the Italian OJI.

We implemented CFA to test a one-factor model, as reported in the Hoy and Tarter’s (2004) study. The

initial model showed an adequate fit to data in all fit indices with the exception of the results from chi-square

and RMSEA. Fit indices were listed as follows: χ2= 104.885 (35, N= 164) , p < 0.001; RMSEA = 0.11 (90%

CI: 0.86 - 0.13); CFI = 0.95; TLI = 0.94; and SRMR = 0.030. Further examination of the Modification

Indices revealed that the partial misfit was mainly caused by excessive covariance between Items 9 and 10.

These two items refer to self-assessment of teachers participation in decisions that affect them (Item 9)

and teachers fairly treatment (Item 10). Although much variance in these two items was explained by the

latent dimension of the OJI (as evidenced by high loadings of these two items above 0.84), this covariance
7
 was thought to be partially due to the specific domain of justice referring teachers’ treatments. To account

for this excess of covariance in the model, we respecified the model by allowing residuals of Items 9 and 10

to freely correlate. The respecified model fit the data well with the following fit indices: χ2= 59.699 (32, N=

164) , exact p = 0.02; RMSEA = 0.07 (90% CI: 0.43 - 0.10); CFI = 0.98; TLI = 0.97; and SRMR = 0.027.

Loadings for the OJI ranged from 0.58 to 0.91 and were statistically significant (Figure 1). Average variance

extracted from the CFA was 66%. So, the CFA showed that a single factor of organizational justice was

confirmed, as proposed by Hoy and Tarter (2004). As suggested by Bagozzi and Yi (2012), another criterion

that can be used to suggest the presence of a unique dimension is related to the magnitude of the “residual

correlation” (the portion of the correlation among items that is not explained by common factors); if these
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residual correlations are lower than |0.1|, then the entire substantial correlation among items is explained by

the common factors, whereas non-explained variance is marginal. In our case, all residual correlations were

lower than |0.1|.

------ Please insert Figure 1-----

Reliability analysis

The Cronbach’s alpha of the OJI was 0.95. Eliminating any item did not improve the reliability of the scale.

Convergent and divergent validity

The OJI converged with the dimension Equity of OCS (r = .610, p < 0.001). The OJI correlated, negatively

and moderately, with the CES-D (r = - .394, p < 0.001).

Study 2

The purposes of Study 2 were to 1) re-confirm the structure of the Italian OJI, involving a broader sample; 2)

test the convergent and divergent validity using measures (job satisfaction, school climate, burnout) different

from study 1, and exam the relationships between OJI and some criterion measures such as teacher’s

personal and collective efficacy, and mental health; 3) evaluate the invariance of the OJI for type of teachers’

contract (permanent vs temporary teacher).

Methods

Participants

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 A total of 240 pencil-and-paper questionnaires were distributed, and 200 were returned. The participants

were Italian teachers (n = 100 permanent teacher and n = 100 temporary teachers) of high school of Italy,

between the ages of 27 and 63 (mean = 45.85 years old; SD = 9.01). Of the respondents, 52.2% were female,

and 47.8% were male. The average number of years in the teaching profession was 16.56, with a standard

deviation of 10.44 years, a maximum of 41 years, and a minimum of 1 year.

Measures

The Italian version of Organizational Justice Index (Hoy and Tarter, 2004): 10 items, 6-point Likert-type

scale.

Measures for convergent validity. The Job Satisfaction Scale (JOB_S, Warr et al., 1979, Italian version by
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Magnavita et al., 2009). It considered job satisfaction as a global feeling about the job and a related

constellation of attitudes about various aspects or facets of the job. A seven-point Likert type scale (form 1=

very dissatisfied to 7 = very satisfied) with 17 items. The Cronbach’s alpha was 0.92 in this study.

Questionnaire on School Situation (SSQ; Santinello and Bertarelli, 2002): 28 items evaluating four different

indicators of school climate (Opportunity and participation to school activity, α =.81; School and

organizational relationship, α =.85; Discipline, α =.76; Contextual and structural aspects, α =.71), rated on a

4-point Likert scale (from 1 = completely false, to 4 = completely true).

Measure for divergent validity. Burnout. According to Schaufeli and Salanova (2007), the central elements

of burnout are emotional exhaustion and depersonalization. These two dimensions of teacher burnout were

measured by Maslach Burnout Inventory- General survey (MBI; Maslach, Jackson and Leiter, 1996, Italian

version Borgogni et al., 2005). Responses are given on a 7-point scale from 0 = never, to 6 = every day.

Cronbach’s alphas for emotional exhaustion and depersonalization were .91 and .75.

Criterion measures. The Teacher Self-efficacy Scale (TSS, Borgogni et al., 2001): 9 items measure teachers’

beliefs in their ability to effectively handle various tasks, obligations, and challenges related to their

professional role. For each item, teachers rated on a 7-point response format (from 1 = strongly disagree, to 7

= strongly agree) their agreement with each question. The Cronbach’s alpha was .92 in this study.

The School Collective Efficacy scale (Borgogni et al., 2001) as constructed to reflect teachers’ individual

perceptions about their school‘s collective capabilities to influence student achievement (9 items). For each

9
 item, teachers rated on a 7-point response format (from 1 = strongly disagree, to 7 = strongly agree) their

agreement with each question. In this study, α = .96.

The Italian Mental Health Continuum Short Form (MHC-SF, Petrillo et al., 2014), consisting of 14 items,

measures the psychosocial well-being as described in Keyes’ model (Keyes et al., 2008). The MHC–SF asks

individuals how much of the time they functioned in a specific manner, from 0 (none of the time) to 5 (all of

the time). The Cronbach’s alpha was 0.90 in this study.

Results

Descriptive statistics and Confirmatory Factor Analyses

Descriptive statistics on each of the 10 items were examined (table 1).

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------ Please insert Table 1-----

Each item’s score was correlated with the total score for the 10-item OJI: all items showing statistically

significant part–whole correlations.

Bartlett’s sphericity test, which was equal to χ2 (45, N = 200) = 2258.099, p < 0.001, and the KMO index

with a result of 0.95, guaranteed that the correlation matrix was suitable for factor analysis.

Items of OJI were subjected to confirmatory factor analysis. The one-factor model fitted the data best. The fit

statistics for the model were as follows: χ2= 59.699 (32, N= 164) , exact p = 0.02; CFI = 0.96; TLI = .094;

RMSEA= 0.081; 90% confidence interval for RMSEA = 0.050, 0.08; SRMR was 0.025. Standardized factor

loadings of items ranged from 0.73 (item 2) to 0.93 (item 6). The single factor explained 60.19% of the

variance. Residuals correlation of items 9 and 10 was 0.41 (p < 0.001). Also In this study, all residual

correlations were lower than |0.1|.

Reliability

Each item contributed to the scale fairly well and all coefficients of item reliability index and item total

correlation were higher than the recommended level of 0.30 (see table 1). The Cronbach’s alpha was 0.97.

Eliminating any item did not improve the reliability of the scale.

10
 Convergent, divergent validity and correlation with criterion measures

As would be expected, the OIJ correlates most strongly with job satisfaction scale. Referring to school

climate, the OJI correlates strongly with all dimensions of SSQ, and in particular with the dimension “School

and Organizational relationship” (table 2). The OJI correlated negatively and moderately with the two

dimensions of burnout included in this study. The OJI generally reveals a consistent pattern of correlations

with the criterion measures. As would be expected, it correlates positively with MHC-SF, and with Teacher

self and collective efficacy scale (table 2).

------ Please insert Table 2-----

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Testing for Factor Invariance

Some procedures were accomplished to test factorial invariance of the 10-item version of OJI. Firstly, we

performed preliminary confirmatory factor analyses, CFA model, in which the single factor was posited

separately for permanent teacher and temporary teacher sample. The model taken into account fitted the data

well in each group: permanent teacher, χ2 = 91.424 (29), p < 0.001; CFI = 0.95; TLI = 0.93; RMSEA = 0.07

(0.062 0.088); SRMR = 0.025; temporary teacher, χ2 = 73.516 (29), p < 0.001; CFI = 0.95; TLI = 0.93;

RMSEA = 0.06 (0.056 0.075); SRMR = 0.034.

Multigroup CFA was subsequently conducted with the aim to examine Configural Invariance (Thurstone,

1947). The model taken into account fitted the data well: χ2 = 208.470 (76), 0.000; CFI = 0.943; TLI = 0.932;

RMSEA = 0.07 (0.072 0.085); SRMR = 0.049. Standardized factor loadings of items were all significant.

Coefficients ranged between 0.75 to 0.90 in the permanent teacher group. Coefficients ranged between 0.71

to 0.91 in the temporary teacher group.

Finally, we investigated metric invariance and found this model to be tenable: χ2 = 208.589 (120), p < 0.001;

CFI = 0.942; TLI = 0.930, RMSEA = 0.07 (0.075 0.089); SRMR = 0.050. So, we compared Model 0 with a

model that was the same except all latent means were fixed to be equal across groups. A non-significant drop

in model fit was observed, indicating that latent mean differences did not exist between gender groups (∆

CFI = –0.001, p = 0.40).

11
 Discussion and Conclusion

Organizational justice is concerned “with the ways in which employees determine if they have been treated

fairly in their jobs and the ways in which those determinations influence other work-related variables”

(Moorman, 1991, p. 845). Several studies demonstrated that perceived organizational justice explains the

attitudes and behaviors of customers and worker (Cohen-Charash and Spector, 2001; Colquitt et al., 2001).

In school setting, recent studies highlighted as teachers’ perceptions of their jobs was significantly correlated

with perceptions of their students (Nojani et al., 2012). Expanding these findings, an association between

teachers’ justice beliefs and students well-being has been found (Petrillo et al., 2012a). On the other hand,

perceived injustice is considered a critical psychosocial stressor in organizational settings (Moliner et al.,
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2008). It is lead to feelings of resentment and suspect in organizations: unfair situations can indicate

exploitation, lack of control, or social exclusion, thus increasing stress (Judge and Colquitt, 2004), and

burnout (Kausto et al., 2005). Perceptions of unfair or unjust treatment have been associated with many

harmful effects including negative behaviors (Pinder, 2008).

Our study measured teachers’ perceptions of organizational justice. The literature review on measures of this

construct in school leaded to the conclusion that there is a need to test a scale addressing this specific object.

So, this article responded to that call by identifying relevant content for standardized measures of teacher

organizational justice and examining the structure, reliability, construct validity and invariance of OJI (Hoy

and Tarter, 2004), that assess teachers perceptions of the fairness of school.

Overall, the results suggest that the psychometric properties of the Italian version of the OIJ mimic those of

the English and Turkish language versions. However, this study contributes to extend the Hoy and Tartes ’s

(2004) work in several ways, apart from being the first study of an Italian sample. First, the present

investigation aimed to shed more light on the factor structure of OJI, using CFA in both studies. Second, we

used validated measures for testing convergent and divergent validity. Furthermore we analyzed the

relationship between OJI and mental health, teacher efficacy beliefs as criterion measures. Third, we have

tested the invariance of the scale for sub-groups.

Our findings are very satisfactory. The 10-item scale evidenced good reliability. The scale is easy to

implement and its form possesses measurement accuracy. The CFA indicated a good fit for the model of the

12
 one dimensional structure of the teacher Organizational Justice. Further the structure of Italian OJI was the

same across teachers with different type of work contract: test of invariance revealed the equivalency of the

items across teachers, indicating that items content was perceived in exactly the same way in both groups of

teachers, and each group responded to the scale items in a similar conceptual frame of reference. These

results have important implications for substantive research focusing on multi-group comparisons across

teachers especially in Italian context, where temporary teachers are a very important component of school

system.

We employed a number of measures in order to determine the convergence of the OJI with established

measures: the scale were related to all the correspondent measures, supporting our hypotheses. As
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hypothesized, the OJI was found to be negatively correlated with depression and burnout.

The relationship with criterion variables is an important step in validation of an instrument: our findings are a

further important contribution to the study of the psychometric proprieties of OIJ. It has a relationship with

measures of mental health and illness: so organizational justice beliefs may on the one hand improve positive

mental well-being, and personal and collective efficacy beliefs of teachers, and on the other hand, buffer

occupational stress, when dealing with organizational changing and/or when under time pressure.

Construct validation is an ongoing process. Additional works are desirable to completely understand the

psychometric properties of this scale. Although this study provided significant evidence of the convergent

and divergent validity of the OJI, additional work is needed to more fully understand the psychometric

qualities of this scale. For instance, future studies should take a longitudinal research approach in the model

testing. This work measured the constructs cross-sectionally.

The unit analysis used by Hoy and Tarter (2004) was the school. They argued that organizational justice was

an organizational rather than individual property, hence all data were aggregated to the school level. While

we agree with the authors, based on Greenberg’s (1996) definition of organizational justice as individuals’

perceptions of fairness in organizations, for the validation aim we did not use aggregated data because of the

few schools involved. In further studies the validity of OJI should be expanded involving more schools.

The results provide a framework for systematically analyzing data, but the potential causal directions need to

be determined. As a prospective design, it could be useful to test the role of the organizational justice for

13
 well-being and burnout. Further studies should investigate what school characteristics are necessary for

organizational justice and the antecedents that promote those characteristics. Furthermore, self-reported data

could lead to common method variance issues. It will be important to determine the associations of the scale

with non-self-report assessments of the same concepts, and also to use the scale to predict non-self–report

behaviors. A self-report instrument has the potential for social desirability bias. Although we need to

consider this limitation, it is reasonable to think that our data are not highly influenced by this bias because

anonymity was guaranteed in data collection (Roccato, 2006).

The tests for validity were carried out on convenience Italian samples: is needed to identify whether this

result is reproducible in a representative sample.

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Implications

This study has several practical and research implications. Organizational justice in the school workplace is a

key concept to practitioners and administrators: the application of OJI can help them to better understand the

organizations they work.

For researchers having a valid and reliable measure such as the OJI may be useful for both designing

interventions and in evaluating them. From an organizational perspective, measuring organizational justice is

an efficient way to predict faculty trust in colleagues and faculty trust in the principal (Hoy and Tarter,

2004).

The OJI is a tool that can help principals and teachers identify issues relating to the perceived fair of their

school, and hopefully enable them to address this issue and work towards improvement. Working to improve

teachers’ working conditions and job satisfaction means to conceptualize school context as a

multidimensional construct. In other words, measuring the organizational justice is concerned with the rules

developed to distribute or to take decisions on distribution of acquisitions such as tasks, goods, services,

rewards, punishments, wages, organizational positions, opportunities and roles among teachers and school

norms that constitute the basis for these rules (Yılmaz and Tasdan, 2009). It is reasonable to assume that low

organizational justice among teachers leads to a cold and inconsiderate climate in the entire school, which, in

turn, affects the quality of relationships between staff and students (Rutter and Maughan, 2002).

14
 Hoy and Tarter (2004) revealed that the principal of the school is the most important person in developing

organizational justice in schools. Principals can use such an instrument to: 1) assess potential organizational

problems prior to conducting major interventions; 2) investigate school dynamic problems; 3) target

interventions designed to enhance perception of organizational justice; 4) incorporate evaluation of

organizational justice as part of regular employee assessments.

Guskey (2000) suggested that, to be successful, professional development should have a clear focus on

learning and learners. Teachers are the key to success in inclusion: dialogue, participation and collaboration

allow full awareness to all as a community and, in consequence, ensures successful experiences in inclusion.

Teacher justice beliefs are significant in facilitating trust among teachers, which in turn enhances a sense of
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fairness in all component of the school, and participation. In line with a considerable portion of studies (Lin

et al., 2002; Stephenson et al., 2009), our results addressed self-efficacy as related to organizational justice.

Teachers with high levels of self-efficacy tend to commit themselves more productively in their job to adopt

more innovative educational strategies and more efficient management of classrooms (Woolfolk, et

al.,1990), acting also on students performance positively (Multon, et al., 1991). This has important

consequences for teachers’ abilities, because it allows them to create equitable learning environments for

their students. Furthermore, teachers’ collective efficacy was more related to organizational justice than

teachers’ self-efficacy. Besides, collective efficacy is not simply the sum of the efficacy beliefs of

individuals. Rather, it is an emergent group-level attribute (Bandura, 1997). Such results allow for further

consideration about the importance for school leaders of knowing how to build collective efficacy beliefs in

their schools (Capone, Petrillo, 2015). This construct may be significant to understand schools’ efforts to

respond to accountability and equity policy.

The descriptive analysis revealed significant relationships among OJI, job satisfaction, and school climate.

The likely explanation for the findings of this study is that teachers need adequate educational policies and

administration. After all, the satisfaction of teachers’ needs promotes their psychological well-being and

enables optimal functioning and performance (Reis et al., 2000).

The school climate is a relevant variable that, better than all other data, show the quality of relationships

among people at organizational levels. Among the climate dimensions analyzed, the dimension of school and

15
 organizational relationship is the most related to organizational justice . It is plausible that when staff

members feel they are treated fairly and can trust management, they are more committed to their workplace

and work. However, the concept of organizational justice should be expanded to relationships between

teachers and students.

The relevant literature on organizational justice and well-being demonstrated that organizational justice

perception has crucial effects on the display of employees’ well-being and malaise. Though the nature of the

data does not allow to make any causal inference, and therefore it cannot be assumed that organizational

justice promotes individual and organizational well-being, the findings confirmed that the psychological

dimension of perceived school as fair, do entertain a significant relationship with psychosocial well-being,
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personal and collective beliefs, and school climate. These relationships should not be neglected in

community actions, planning and policies. Furthermore, in organizational life, those with a positive

organizational justice perception display less burnout than others (Borgogni et al., 2005). A lack of trust in

the principal and a perceived injustice context may give rise to a sense of isolation in teaching. This may

yield a more rapid use of one’s energy and emotional resources (Hakanen et al., 2006). In our study there

was a negative relationship between organizational justice and burnout dimensions. Across organizational

settings, the nature of social relationships may indeed expand, or reduce an employee’s capacity for

managing workplace stress (Freeney and Fellenz, 2013). These findings have implications for the

interventions targeted at teachers. We recommend that school principals explore sources of stress, burnout,

and reduced job satisfaction at their school and that educational researchers use validated measures for this

purpose. For this aim a future intervention should be conducted to assess the effects of organizational justice

on these variables. Moreover, because organizational justice seems to explain important organizational

results, it is crucial a better understanding of how schools could increase organizational justice. Planning

development programmes and their evaluation methods in a more targeted and effective way means to take

into account factors as self-efficacy, collective efficacy, job satisfaction, as well as teachers’ justice

perceptions, especially when the role of psycho-social variables are supposed to affect teachers’ health and

well-being. In addition, identifying teachers’ level of self and collective efficacy allows the definition and the

16
 design of specific intervention programmes following Bandura’s (1997) indication about the strategies for

increasing efficacy beliefs.

Finally, this study reports the translation and adaptation of the OJI from English into Italian: this version of

the scale is of interest for research in Italy as well as for cross-cultural research, and making possible cross-

cultural comparisons.

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1986–1990.

Biographical Details:

Vincenza Capone is PhD in Health Psychology. Since 2010 she is temporary professor of Work and
Organizational Psychology at the Degree Course in Psychological Sciences and Techniques (University of
Naples Federico II). Her scientific interests are focused on health workers-patient communication and
personal and collective efficacy beliefs, with particular reference to health organizations and schools.

Giovanna Petrillo is Full professor of Social Health Psychology and Social Organizational Psychology at the
Degree Course in Psychological Sciences and Techniques (University of Naples Federico II). She is the editor
of the Italian journal “Psicologia della Salute” (FrancoAngeli). Her scientific interests are focused on
organizational justice, well-being, and personal and collective efficacy beliefs, with particular reference to
school, community and health organizations.

21
 Table 1. Descriptive Statistics of items of OJI (N = 200)
Corrected Item-Total
Item (Italian Version) Mean SD Skewness Kurtosis Correlation

Il dirigente scolastico agisce in maniera coerente 4.24 1.01 -.19 1.00 .84
ITEM1
Gli studenti in questa scuola sono trattati in modo equo 4.31 0.98 .05 .22 .72
ITEM 2
Il dirigente scolastico non fa favoritismi 4.24 1.07 -.05 .35 .90
ITEM 3
Il dirigente scolastico tratta tutti con rispetto e dignità 4.41 1.12 -.56 .67 .86
ITEM 4
In questa scuola non ci sono trattamenti preferenziali 4.14 1.14 -.20 .31 .88
ITEM 5
Il dirigente scolastico si comporta in maniera equa con tutte
4.22 1.13 -.01 -.13 .91
ITEM 6 le componenti della scuola

Gli insegnanti di questa scuola si comportano in modo tale

3.84 1.16 .14 -.16 .77
ITEM 7 da non favorire il proprio tornaconto personale
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Il dirigente scolastico aderisce a standard etici molto elevati 4.40 1.07 -.10 -.37 .86
ITEM 8
Gli insegnanti sono coinvolti nelle decisioni che li
4.13 1.03 -.03 .27 .85
ITEM 9 riguardano

In questa scuola gli insegnanti sono trattati in modo giusto 4.23 1.01 .01 .31 .86
ITEM 10
 Table 2. Bivariate correlations with validation measures (N = 200)

4. SSQ
Oppor
tunity
2. 3. 5. SSQ
and 7. SSQ 8. 9. MBI 10. MBI
1. Job Teache Collect School
Partici 6. SSQ Contextual Menta Emotional Deperso
OJI satisfa r Self- ive and
pation Discipline and Structural l exhaustio nalizatio
ction efficac Efficac Organizationa
to Aspects health n n
y y l relationship
school
activit
y
OJ
- .
I
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1. .67** -
2. .17** .39** -
3. 47** .56** .40** -
4. .39** .46** .18* .56** -
5. .70** .55** .30** .51** .58** -
6. .39** .38** .31** .44** .41** .56**
7. .39** . 37** .20** .54** .33** .47** .47** -
8. .26** .37** .41** .28** .20** .32** .20** .08 -
9. -.24** -.40** -.20** -.26** -.10 -.18* -.37** -.17* -.37** -
10. -.17** -.25** -.25** -.21** -.11 -.19* -.30** -.16* -.30** -50** -

** p<=.001; * p<=.05
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Structure of OJI. Standardized coefficients

148x157mm (150 x 150 DPI)