Rural transformational leadership and participation in village public affairs: the mediating role of public service motivation and the moderating role of rational psychological evaluation

The involvement of villagers in local public affairs is essential for the sustainable development of rural communities and the improvement of residents’ quality of life. This study examines the associations between village transformational leadership and villagers’ willingness to participate in public affairs, focusing on the mediating role of public service motivation and the moderating role of rational psychological evaluation. A cross-sectional survey design was used, and data were collected via a structured questionnaire from 438 villagers in Zhejiang Province, China. The data were analyzed using regression analysis and structural equation modeling (SEM). The results indicate that public service motivation is associated with villagers’ willingness to participate and shows an indirect association through transformational leadership, consistent with the statistical patterns in the proposed model. In addition, the association between public service motivation and willingness to participate is stronger at higher levels of rational psychological evaluation; however, the interaction effect is modest in magnitude and should be interpreted as a conditional association rather than behavioral certainty. This study contributes to the rural governance literature by clarifying the motivational and boundary conditions of leadership and participation and by offering indicative implications for strengthening leadership effectiveness in grassroots governance in similar village contexts.