Development of the "yarigai" Scale for human service workers

The purpose of this study was to create a scale measuring the yarigai of human service professionals in the fields of medicine, welfare, and education and verify the scale's reliability and validity. In Study 1, responses to an open-ended questionnaire were collected from 759 service workers, and a provisional scale of 39 items was created. In Study 2, an online survey was administered to 1,999 human service professionals to examine factor structure, reliability, and validity. The factor analysis confirmed a structure of 28 items under the five factors of "growth and positive change in the recipient," "gratitude and trust," "smooth cooperation," "growth as a professional," and "positive evaluation at the workplace." A significant correlation was demonstrated with respect to test-retest reliability. Moreover, correlations were confirmed between work engagement and meaningful work, degree of job utilization and aptitude, and the intention to quit. These results suggest that the scale possesses a certain degree of reliability and validity.