Self-determination theory goes public: experimental evidence on the causal relationship between psychological needs and job satisfaction

This study puts self-determination theory to an empirical test through a series of discrete choice experiments across three samples of public healthcare workers, for a total of 4,743 subjects. The three replications provide convergent evidence in support of the hypotheses that autonomy, competence, and three types of relatedness – with supervisors, peers, and beneficiaries – simultaneously and independently increase employee satisfaction. Meaningful differences emerge in the relative importance of those five factors. In particular, the fulfilment of one’s need for competence turns out to have the greatest positive impact across experimental replications, whereas the need for autonomy consistently comes last.