The Executive Skills Questionnaire-Revised: Adaptation and Psychometric Properties in the Working Context of Malaysia

Abstract

Executive functions (EFs) are a set of high-level cognitive and behavioral monitoring skills that are important to employees’ work performance. The 25-item Executive Skills Questionnaire-Revised (ESQ-R) measures executive dysfunction in five dimensions (e.g., emotional regulation). Nevertheless, the usability of this newly developed scale for employees remains unclear. The present study evaluated the psychometric properties of the adopted ESQ-R for working adults in Malaysia. A total of 325 employees responded to an online survey consisted of the ESQ-R, Executive Function Index (EFI), self-rated creativity scale (SRCS), and 9-item Utretch Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9) and Employee Well-being Scale. Several CFAs were conducted to compare three competing models. While all models showed a good fit, the 5-factor second-order model that is in line with the theoretical structure is preferable. The ESQ-R showed excellent internal consistency. Moreover, the ESQ-R score was negatively correlated with EFI, creativity, and UWES-9 scores, supporting the convergent, discriminant, and concurrent validity. The ESQ-R score also explained incremental variance in well-being above and beyond scores of the UWES-9 and SRCS. Taken together, the ESQ-R is a useful tool for assessing employees’ executive dysfunction and suggesting intervention programs helping employees with deficits in EFs.

The mediating role of job satisfaction and work engagement in the relationship between self-reported person-job fit and job performance

“…This is because P-J fit is positively associated with creativity, while studies have found that creativity has a positive relationship with well-being (Ma et al, 2021;Tan et al, 2021;Tan et al, 2019). Furthermore, a recent study has shown that executive functioning is positively related to work engagement and employee well-being (Nasir et al, 2021). It is interesting to investigate the relationship between P-J fit and executive functioning and understand the role of the two constructs in job performance.…”

The Mediating Role of Work Engagement in the Relationship between Executive Functioning Deficits and Employee Well-Being

“…A total of 340 participants, of which 324 participants were obtained from Nasir and colleagues’ study [ 50 ], were recruited using the convenience sampling method, where they completed an online survey. After removing 26 cases with empty responses on at least one of the four scales used in this study, the final sample for analysis consisted of 314 working adults (298 were from Nasir and colleagues’ study [ 50 ]) who were working in Malaysia (54.8% females, one missing value). The average age of the samples was 39.60 ( SD = 10.10), ranging from 23 to 80 (five participants did not report their age).…”

“…Nasir and colleagues found that four items (items 4, 6, 19, and 24) of the ESQ-R are not commonly used in the Malaysian context and rephrased those items to ease understanding [ 50 ]. For example, item 4 (“I have a short fuse”) was modified into “I tend to get angry easily”.…”

“…For example, item 4 (“I have a short fuse”) was modified into “I tend to get angry easily”. Nasir and colleagues demonstrated that the ESQ-R with the four modified items has a good model fit, internal consistency, and validity (i.e., convergent, discriminant, and concurrent validities) [ 50 ].…”

“…However, to our best knowledge, this underlying mechanism has not been empirically tested. To address this theoretical gap, we integrated the data of Nasir and colleagues’ study [ 50 ] and newly collected data to examine the hypothetical mediating role of work engagement in the relationship between EF and employee well-being in a sample of working adults in Malaysia. Self-rated creativity was included as a covariate variable in the analysis because creativity is related to EF [ 11 ], work engagement [ 51 ], and well-being [ 52 ], respectively.…”