The Receipt of Task-Related Help: Developing and Validating a Scale

Abstract

Helping behaviors have been subjected to a substantial amount of research attention. However, organizational researchers have disproportionately focused on the help giver, neglecting the recipient of help. To stimulate future research on the recipient of help, I developed a receipt of task-related help scale. In Study 1, I adopted an inductive approach to generate examples of different types of task-related helping behaviors that employees receive at work. Study 1 revealed three general types of task-related helping behaviors - namely, materials, labor, and knowledge. The results of Study 1 were used to guide item development for the receipt of task-related help scale. In Study 2, I provided evidence of the items’ substantive validity. In Study 3, I explored the factor structure of the scale. In Study 4, I verified that the scale assesses three dimensions of task-related help that employees can receive. In Study 5, I developed an initial nomological network for the receipt of task-related help. I hope this research will stimulate future research to adopt the recipient’s perspective to understand helping behaviors at work.