“Giving Something Back to Society”: A Study Exploring the Role of Reciprocity Norms in Public Service Motivation

• Author: Oliver Neumann
• DOI: 10.1177/0734371X17698187
• Published date: 01 June 2019
• Date: 01 June 2019

698187ROPXXX10.1177/0734371X17698187Review of Public Personnel AdministrationNeumann
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Review of Public Personnel Administration
2019, Vol. 39(2) 159 –184
“Giving Something Back to
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Society”: A Study Exploring
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the Role of Reciprocity Norms
in Public Service Motivation
Oliver Neumann1
Abstract
Public service motivation (PSM) is often conceived as a predominantly other-
concerned type of motivation. This study challenges this notion by investigating the
role of reciprocity norms, which are rooted in self-concern, as a determinant of PSM.
Taking up a debate on whether PSM may be a manifestation of reciprocity vis-à-vis
society, I draw on a combination of psychological contract theory and social identity
theory to substantiate previous theoretical linkages between these concepts. Using a
sample of 205 Swiss police officers, I then empirically analyze the relationship between
both positive and negative reciprocity norms and PSM. Thereby, I utilize societal
identification, which is a prerequisite for the emergence of shared psychological
contracts, as a moderator. Findings from moderated regression analyses support
the theoretical arguments for the norm-based and affective but not the rational
components of PSM. In sum, this study provides relevant insights into some of the
self-concerned foundations of PSM.
Keywords
public service motivation, reciprocity norms, police, psychological contracts, social
identity theory
Introduction
The provision of public services is heavily dependent on the people who work in gov-
ernment. With public employees being the central driver of government performance,
1University of Bern, Switzerland
Corresponding Author:
Oliver Neumann, KPM Center for Public Management and Institute of Information Systems, University of
Bern, Engehaldestrasse 8, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland.
Email: oliver.neumann@iwi.unibe.ch

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Review of Public Personnel Administration 39(2)
it is of paramount importance that they are well motivated to advance the public weal
(Rainey, 2003). Thus, it comes as no surprise that the concept of public service motiva-
tion (PSM), first proposed by Perry and Wise (1990) to better explain the specificities
of motivation in public work, has been one of the most prevalent concepts in recent
public administration research (Ritz, Brewer, & Neumann, 2016). Defined as “a gen-
eral altruistic motivation to serve the interests of a community of people, a state, a
nation, or humankind” (Rainey & Steinbauer, 1999, p. 24), PSM is a type of prosocial
motivation (Bolino & Grant, 2016). As with other forms of prosocial motivation, the
core of PSM is a “desire to expend effort to benefit other people” (Grant, 2008, p. 49),
whereas the peculiarity of PSM is its embeddedness in the context of public institu-
tions (Bolino & Grant, 2016). Importantly, prosocial motivations such as PSM may
either be self-concerned, other-concerned, or both at the same time (De Dreu & Nauta,
2009; Kim & Vandenabeele, 2010). However, most previous PSM research has not
devoted much attention to said self-oriented aspects as the roots of PSM lie in other-
orientation (Perry, Hondeghem, & Wise, 2010). This empirical study sheds light on an
important and predominantly self-concerned determinant of PSM by analyzing the
role of reciprocity norms vis-à-vis society in PSM. As reciprocal exchanges in today’s
world are usually upheld for the personal benefits each party derives from them
(Godbout, 1992; Nowak & Sigmund, 2005), this study thereby questions the common
notion that PSM is a mainly selfless type of motivation.
While situations of reciprocal exchange, both between two individuals and within
collectives small enough to allow for the monitoring of other members, have been
researched extensively and in various disciplines (see, for example, Cropanzano &
Mitchell, 2005; Falk & Fischbacher, 2006; Nowak & Sigmund, 2005; Rousseau, 1995;
Whatley, Webster, Smith, & Rhodes, 1999), to date, little scholarly attention has been
devoted to acts of reciprocity vis-à-vis anonymous collectives such as a society. Some
notable exceptions include Fehr and Fischbacher (2003), Fehr and Henrich (2003) and
Gintis, Bowles, Boyd, and Fehr (2003) who termed the willingness to perform altruis-
tic acts in anonymous, one-shot situations strong reciprocity, highlighting that such
generosity is not always likely to be returned. In public administration literature,
Koehler and Rainey (2008) have in a similar vein brought up the question of whether
there exists a norm of reciprocity that is effective vis-à-vis a society or nation, stress-
ing that “an individual may feel obligated to offer civic service as to compensate his or
her country for benefits received as a citizen” (Koehler & Rainey, 2008, p. 43). They
argue that an individual’s repayment to society may take the form of increased service-
oriented motivation, or PSM. However, an empirical test of Koehler and Rainey’s
(2008) theoretical argument has not yet been carried out despite the considerable rel-
evance it may hold both for researchers who strive to understand the determinants of
PSM, and practitioners seeking to motivate public employees to serve the public
interest.
The present study fills this void by investigating the research question of whether
internalized reciprocity norms may manifest themselves vis-à-vis society and thereby
play a role in a person’s levels of PSM. Taking up the debate initiated by Koehler and
Rainey (2008), I draw on theory on shared psychological contracts and on social identity

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theory to further underpin the notion that PSM may in part be rooted in reciprocity
norms. Subsequently, I utilize survey data from a sample of state police in Switzerland
and analyze it using moderated multiple regression in an attempt answer the research
question.
The remainder of this study is organized as follows. The “Literature Review” sec-
tion provides a review of the literature on reciprocity norms and PSM. The “Theory
and Hypotheses” section outlines relevant theoretical perspectives on reciprocity vis-
à-vis society and presents the hypotheses. The “Sample, Measures, and Method” sec-
tion details the sample, measures, and methods used. The results from the analyses are
presented in the “Results” section. In the “Discussion” section, I discuss these results
in light of the hypotheses before drawing some conclusions in the final section.
Literature Review
While a few empirical studies on PSM have been published that peripherally tap into
the theme of reciprocity, to date, the role of reciprocity norms in PSM has mostly been
discussed theoretically. Taylor (2007) and Steen (2006), for instance, have both drawn
on the work of Le Grand (2003) to categorize three different types of public employ-
ees: knaves, act-irrelevant knights, and act-relevant knights. Each of these types has a
different motivation to perform public service. Knaves engage in public service based
on self-interested motives, while knights do so without tangible rewards or even at
personal cost. Knights can be further distinguished into act-relevant knights who have
a desire to benefit others out of feelings of reciprocity or obligation, and act-irrelevant
knights who act out of feelings of compassion or a sense of injustice. Taylor (2007)
argues that PSM is likely based on a mix of all three motives, which suggests that it
should be regarded as a not purely selfless or other-oriented prosocial motivation
(Steen, 2006; see also De Dreu & Nauta, 2009). A similar attempt to discern different
types of public servants has been made by Brewer, Selden, and Facer (2000). In their
empirical study, these authors demonstrated that there exist various distinct concep-
tions of PSM in students and practitioners of public administration, using the
Q-methodology. They identified four different groups based on their motives for per-
forming public service: samaritans, patriots, humanitarians, and communitarians.
While samaritans are predominantly motivated by opportunities to help others, patri-
ots are driven by feelings of duty to work for the public good, and humanitarians are
concerned with social justice and with making a difference in society. Last but not
least, communitarians are motivated to perform public service to give something back
to society. Communitarians additionally view citizenship as a special bond between
themselves and others, reinforcing their personal wish to serve their community or
country. Interestingly, the group of communitarians identified by Brewer et al. (2000)
corresponds very closely to the act-relevant knights described in Taylor (2007) and
Steen (2006), and the relevance that reciprocity has for both of these groups suggests
that PSM is to some extent rooted in norms of reciprocity.
The notion that a relationship exists between PSM and reciprocity norms is further
supported in a study by Houston (2011), who investigated whether well-developed

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Review of Public Personnel Administration 39(2)
welfare states crowd out their citizens’ norm of reciprocity, and thereby motives asso-
ciated with PSM. Houston argues that comprehensive welfare programs for the under-
privileged reduce the social obligations of individual citizens because they may feel
that their reciprocal...