Organizational Psychology

The paper presents a new psychometric instrument, Experiences in Activity Questionnaire (EAQ) based on combinatorial model of optimal experience created by the second author. The 12-itemquestionnaire includes four scales measuring the subjective experiences of pleasure, meaning, effort, and void within a specific activity. We present the results of validation of this instrument in a crosssectional study using a sample of Russian production enterprise employees (N = 1142) of different levels. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the theoretically expected structure of the instrument, whose scale exhibited acceptable reliability (α = 0.70–0.92; ρ = 0.84–0.90) and theoretically expected associations with indicators of life satisfaction, job satisfaction, affect balance at work, work engagement, emotional exhaustion, and self-reported work performance. The experiences of pleasure, meaning, and effort showed stronger associations with autonomous work motivation, whereas the experience of void was more strongly related to controlled work motivation. The associations of job demands and resources with work experiences showed that optimal experience was mainly predicted by role clarity, absence of role conflict, autonomy at work, and support from supervisor. Using cluster analysis, we found four typical patterns of experiences at work with distinct profiles on other variables. Respondents with a combination of high levels of pleasure, effort, and meaning with low levels of void showed the highest levels of work well-being and performance. A negative experience profile (meaningless and unpleasant effort, void) was mostly characteristic of blue-collar employees who reported low levels of family income. The findings are in line with the predictions of the combinatorial model and support the validity of EAQ, which can be used for research, as well as diagnostic purposes.