Considerations beyond salary: study of job satisfaction among Chinese social work practitioners in different positions

Figures & data

Table 1. Cronbach’s alpha and KMO of job satisfaction scale.

Variables	Obs	Cronbach’s alpha	KMO
1. Salary and benefits	1371	0.8266	0.782
2. Welfare and security	1371	0.8159	0.7971
3. Vocational training	1371	0.8162	0.8833
4. Work independence	1371	0.8092	0.8849
5. Evaluation mechanism	1371	0.8196	0.8914
6. Agency management	1371	0.8156	0.8831
7. Work content	1371	0.8512	0.6703
8. Work environment	1371	0.8387	0.7507
Overall		0.8432	0.8291
Bartlett test of sphericity	Chi-square		4732.833
	Degrees of freedom		28
	p-value		<0.001

Table 2. Rotation factor load, KMO and Bartlett’s test of sphericity.

	Variables	Public recognition factor (Factor1)	Interpersonal relationship factor (Factor2)	Career advancement and development factor (Factor3)	KMO
Social environment	increased social status of social workers,	0.9286	0.109	0.0829	0.7087
	increased perceived recognition of social workers,	0.9179	0.1339	0.0781	0.7303
	respect and appreciation of the profession by the society,	0.8716	0.0817	0.085	0.8617
Interpersonal relationship	having good relationships with colleagues,	0.0675	0.9011	−0.0712	0.6658
	having good relationships with agency managers,	0.1465	0.865	0.0285	0.7106
	having good interactions with service users,	0.1718	0.7644	−0.1762	0.8225
Organizational development	sound promotion mechanism,	0.1412	−0.0537	0.8875	0.5806
	plenty of room for development	0.0606	−0.0725	0.9027	0.5527
Correlation test	KMO	overall			0.7121
	Bartlett	chi-square			5418.081
		df			28
		p-value			<0.001

Table 3. Sample characteristics.

Variable definition and assignment	Observations	Percentage (%)		Mean	SD	Min	Max
Job satisfaction	1371	100	23.938		4.920	8	40
Public recognition	1371	100	59.644		18.247	0	100
Interpersonal relationship	1371	100	72.617		13.547	0	100
Career advancement and development	1371	100	34.690		17.029	0	100
Gender	1371	100	0.723		0.448	0	1
male = 0	380	27.72
female = 1	991	72.28
Age	1371	100	30.48		6.752	18	60
≤25	344	25.09
26–35	739	53.90
36–45	229	16.70
≥46	59	4.30
Marital status	1371	100	0.506		0.500	0	1
unmarried = 0	677	49.38
married = 1	694	50.62
Education level	1371	100	3.77		0.59	1	5
junior high school = 1	3	0.22
senior high school = 2	18	1.31
college = 3	355	25.89
bachelor = 4	906	66.08
postgraduate = 5	89	6.49
Household registration	1371	100	0.381		0.486	0	1
in this city = 0	848	61.85
not in this city = 1	523	38.15
Politics status	1371	100	0.241		0.428	0	1
not member of Communist Party of China (CPC) = 0	1040	75.86
member of CPC = 1	331	24.14
Salary	1371	100	1.78		0.77	1	3
≤4000 RMB = 1	590	43.03
4001–5500 RMB = 2	498	36,32
≥5501 RMB = 3	283	20.64
licensed	1371	100	0.82		0.39	0	1
no licenced = 0	252	18.38
licensed = 1	1119	81.62
Major	1371	100	0.52		0.50	0	1
other professions = 0	657	47.92
social work = 1	714	52.08
Monthly supervision time (hr)	1371	100	2.59		3.57	0	64
Monthly rest time (day)	1371	100	6.81		2.04	0	10

Table 4. Average job satisfaction of each dimension.

Variables	All			Frontline social workers			Agency managers			T test
	Obser-vations	Mean	SD	Obser- vations	Mean	SD	Obser- vations	Mean	SD	T-value	Sig
1.Salary and benefits	1371	2.3115	0.9202	981	2.2671	0.9080	390	2.4231	0.9420	−2.8394	0.005
2. Welfare and security	1371	2.5529	0.9715	981	2.5250	0.9818	390	2.6231	0.9426	−1.6881	0.092
3. Vocational training	1371	2.9336	0.8436	981	2.9286	0.8554	390	2.9462	0.8142	−0.3466	0.729
4. Work independence	1371	2.7002	0.8729	981	2.6453	0.8751	390	2.8385	0.8527	−3.7148	<0.001
5. Evaluation mechanism	1371	2.9212	0.8727	981	2.9888	0.8541	390	2.7513	0.8968	4.5791	<0.001
6. Agency management	1371	3.1014	0.9029	981	3.0979	0.9206	390	3.1103	0.8578	−0.2293	0.819
7. Work content	1371	3.8811	0.8308	981	3.8950	0.8632	390	3.8462	0.7430	1.0474	0.295
8. Work environment	1371	3.5361	0.9037	981	3.5372	0.9258	390	3.5333	0.8470	0.0744	0.941
All	1371	23.938	4.9203	981	23.885	4.99	390	24.072	4.7443	−0.6347	0.526

Table 5. OLS model of job satisfaction of social workers in different positions.

	Model 1 (overall)	Model 2 (frontline social workers)	Model 3 (agency managers)
	Job Satisfaction	Job Satisfaction	Job Satisfaction
Public recognition	0.0681***	0.0644***	0.0745***
	(0.0071)	(0.0084)	(0.0132)
Interpersonal relationships	0.0468***	0.0542***	0.0209
	(0.0107)	(0.0115)	(0.0241)
Career advancement and development	0.1151***	0.1185***	0.1096***
	(0.0083)	(0.0101)	(0.0142)
Female	0.1432	0.0362	0.5050
	(0.2769)	(0.3391)	(0.5189)
Age	0.0267	0.0458*	−0.0184
	(0.0216)	(0.0256)	(0.0470)
Married	0.0289	−0.3754	0.8664*
	(0.2925)	(0.3702)	(0.5044)
Household registration not in this city	0.1812	0.1107	0.2984
	(0.2648)	(0.3410)	(0.4592)
Member of CPC	−0.0421	0.1232	−0.2846
	(0.2747)	(0.3583)	(0.4593)
College diploma above	−0.0323	−0.0938	0.1346
	(0.3023)	(0.3570)	(0.5768)
Monthly average salary 4001–5500 RMB	0.1976	0.1718	0.3367
	(0.2976)	(0.3556)	(0.6728)
Monthly average salary ≥5501 RMB	0.5863	0.2720	0.8533
	(0.3885)	(0.5223)	(0.7683)
Social work major	0.3333	0.4283	−0.0714
	(0.2586)	(0.3118)	(0.4803)
Monthly supervision time(hr)	0.1155***	0.1096**	0.1080**
	(0.0338)	(0.0449)	(0.0545)
Monthly rest time(day)	0.2159***	0.2337***	0.1594*
	(0.0622)	(0.0826)	(0.0941)
Licensed	−0.6509*	−0.6662*	−0.1817
	(0.3575)	(0.3909)	(0.8770)
Constant	9.9123***	9.0825***	12.2522***
	(1.1883)	(1.4117)	(2.3781)
Observations	1371	981	390
R2	0.2688	0.2740	0.2752

1.*p < 0.1, ** p < 0.05, *** p < 0.01; The brackets are robust standard errors.

Data availability statement

The participants of this study did not give written consent for their data to be shared publicly, so due to the sensitive nature of the research supporting data is not available. Data could be available upon request to the research team.