Crafting an ultrashort workplace incivility scale and determining cutoffs for varied risk levels through item response theory

Abstract Workplace incivility (WI), characterized by disrespectful or rude behavior in the workplace, is linked to poor mental health and overall well-being. The Workplace Incivility Scale (WIS) is a popular 7-item measure for assessing WI. There is a current need for an ultrashort conceptually clear version of the WIS. In addition, the cutoffs for varied at-risks of WI, requiring intervention, remains unknown. Using data from 426 employees across diverse organizations, we employed item response theory (IRT) to create an ultrashort WIS and establish cutoffs for high, moderate, low, and at-not risk of WI. Confirmatory factor analyses were utilized to validate WIS construct validity. In supporting convergent validity, WIS was correlated with workplace bullying and poor health-related quality of life. All items demonstrated adequate severity threshold parameters with very high discrimination and good reliability parameters except for item WIS7. We successfully developed an ultrashort and valid 3-item WIS, specifically comprising items WIS2–4, and identified cutoffs for varying levels of WI risk. This streamlined measure aims to reduce response burden and foster a healthier organizational culture. In essence, cutoff points streamline the classification process, allowing for quicker and more standardized identification of at-risk employees. This concise, valid, and reliable ultrashort WIS holds potential for use in intervention studies conducted by organizational and occupational health psychologists, ultimately promoting employee well-being and cultivating a positive workplace environment. The current study further advances the existing theoretical framework rooted in the social interactionist perspective by delineating WI as a distinct and independent construct.