Police Officer’s Commitment towards Community Policing in Malaysia: Instruments Development and Validation

Abstract

While many researchers have shown that commitment to task is vital for the success of organizational goals. However, the question still remain to what extent can we measure commitment especially to strategy such as community policing within police organizations. Importantly, variations exist depending on societies and cultures. These factors may influence measurement and results. The study therefore set out to investigate factors that are related to commitment of police officers in Malaysia towards community policing using elements of the job characteristic model of community policing, in the end instrument was developend and validated reflecting Malaysian context using structural equation modeling. A total of 197 police officers were surveyed in the state of Malacca with a 45 item instrument developed. Findings indicated that all items (management support, job satisfaction, community support and co-worker support) pass the convergent validity (AVE= >0. 50). The reliability for each construct also passes the .07 cronbach alpha. The above instrument has the ability to test the level of commitment within Malaysian context and can be applied in other context after confirming cultural variation.