Relationships between organizations and publics: Development of a multi-dimensional organization-public relationship scale

Abstract

Public relations has long struggled to develop an identity in both scholarship and practice. An increasing number of scholars are adopting the perspective that public relations should be viewed as the management of a relationship between organizations and publics. The current investigation was an attempt to design a multiple-item, multiple-dimension organization-public relationship scale. Results of this investigation show that organizations and key publics have three types of relationships: professional, personal, and community. The organization-public relationship measure developed in this investigation should provide an instrument that can be used to measure the influence that perceptions of the organization-public relationship have on consumer attitudes, predispositions, and behavior, as well as an opportunity to track changes in organization-public relationship perceptions over time. Results of the investigation, conclusions, and suggested applications for future research are presented.