Scale of accountability in higher education institutions: a study of validity and reliability

Despite being generally perceived as a phenomenon restricting freedoms, an ideal accountability behaviour is, actually, an important factor for the improvement of an organization. The aim of this study was to develop a scale that measures accountability in higher education institutions. For the generation of the scale items, the relevant literature was examined in detail both from national and international sources. The views of the academics (N=11) on accountability in higher education institutions were acquired, as well. The scale, whose content and language validity checks were performed, was applied to 200 academics, who worked at Turkish higher education institutions and were chosen through random sampling. As a result of the explanatory factor analysis, which was conducted to explore construct validity, 7 dimensions of the scale were identified. The confirmatory factor analysis which was conducted to check the accuracy of the identified structure showed that the model fit perfectly with that structure (χ2/df=1, 2; RMESA=0.04; NNFI=.95; CFI=.95). The internal consistency of the scale as measured by Cronbach alpha coefficient was calculated as .94. Based on the findings, it can be said that a valid and reliable measurement instrument that measures accountability in higher education institutions was developed