Sense of community responsibility and altruistic behavior in Chinese community residents: The mediating role of community identity

Currently there are no validated scales to evaluate altruistic behavior within Chinese communities. Moreover, the relationship between sense of community responsibility, altruistic behavior, and community identity is unknown. The present study aimed to establish the reliability and validity of a revised version of the Self-Report Altruism scale for Chinese community residents, and to explore the mediating effect of community identity on the association between sense of community responsibility and altruistic behavior. First, this scale was revised by reviewing existing Chinese versions of Self-Report Altruism scale and identifying 20 Chinese items that had the same meaning as the English items. Next, a community sample of 615 Chinese residents were recruited to conduct a psychometric scale evaluation. Results from item analysis, reliability and validity analyses, exploratory factor analysis, and confirmatory factor analysis demonstrated that the revised Self-Report Altruism scale, consisting of 17 items across two dimensions, was reliable and valid. Next, 1172 community residents were recruited from 34 provinces in China for a cross-sectional study to address the study’s second aim. Multiple regression analyses demonstrated that community identity has an indirect effect between sense of community responsibility and altruistic behavior. Implications and directions for future research were also discussed.