Formative and Reflective Conceptualizations of Broad Discrimination
Abstract
Although there have been many calls for generalized models of discrimination (Dipboye & Colella, 2005; Joseph & Rousis, 2013; Sims & Dalal, 2008), no empirical tests of generalized discrimination have been performed. To address this gap in the literature, this study examined formative and reflective discrimination models across race, gender, age, disability, and religious discrimination. The utility of both models in predicting broad job attitudes were further compared. Results from a large sample of civilian personnel from the United States Department of Defense suggested that the reflective model of discrimination had better utility in predicting a broad job attitudes factor compared to the formative model of discrimination. As such, there appears to be overlap among many types of discrimination, suggesting the presence of a generalized discrimination factor as implied by previous researchers (e.g., Dipboye & Colella, 2005).