Development and construct validity of scores on the Community Service Attitudes Scale

This study reports the multistage development of the Community Service Attitudes Scale (CSAS), an instrument for measuring college students' attitudes about community service. The CSAS was developed based on Schwartz's helping behavior model. Scores on the scales of the CSAS yielded strong reliability evidence (coefficient alphas ranging from .72 to .93). principal components analysis yielded results consistent with the Schwartz model. In addition, the CSAS scale scores were positively correlated with gender, college major, community service experience, and intentions to engage in community service. The CSAS will be useful to researchers for conducting further research on the effects of service learning and community service experiences for students.