Testing the conceptual boundaries of public service motivation and sense of community responsibility: prosocial actions in community and political engagement

With growing polarization and declining civic participation, what promotes engagement? Research finds both public service motivation (PSM) and sense of community responsibility (SOCR) correspond to prosocial behaviours within and outside the workplace, such as organizational citizenship behaviour and volunteering. Combing research on these other-oriented constructs from public management and community psychology, we examine the relative influence of PSM and SOCR on engagement across a range of activities in the community and the political realm. We find SOCR predicts community engagement, while PSM predicts political engagement. Findings have implications in advancing the application of the concepts and further establishing conceptual boundaries.