Reliability and Validity of Scales of Centralization, Formalization, and Control

This article examines the reliability and validity of six scales developed by Aiken, Hage, and Hall to operationalize technology, centralization, and formalization. The discussion of the definitions of these constructs suggests a need for revision in the content of the indices of job codification and job specificity. Furthermore, these two indices, designed to operationalize formalization, have serious problems of convergent and discriminant validity while the index of task routineness operationalizes a more limited part of the technology construct than originally proposed by Perrow. The indicators of centralization are found to be both reliable and valid.