The effects of psychological empowerment of rural administrators on rural management and development processes: A case study of Roshtkhar village

Organizations have to consider a variety of management mechanisms to adapt to rapid environmental changes. Empowerment is one of these mechanisms which plays a key role in modern organizations in the age of knowledge. Meanwhile, nowadays, rural administration is one of the newly-established organizations in rural areas. The purpose of this study is to investigate the role of psychological capabilities of rural administrators in the rural management and development process in Roshtkhar village. In this field study, 26 villages were selected and 26 rural administrations were considered as the sample population. Using the Cochran formula, 350 households were identified as the sample population. The questionnaires were randomly distributed based on the population and the size of the household in each village. The validity of the questionnaire was assessed by the professors of the Department of Geography and Rural Planning and a group of senior experts in the Roshtkhar governorship. The coefficient of validity of the questionnaire was considered 0.85 for various (economic, social, environmental, developmental) aspects (0.85), and it was found to be 0.89 for the psychological capability aspects using the Cronbach's alpha coefficient. The data were analyzed using t-test in SPSS software and AmosGraphics software. The results indicate that psychological empowerment has a positive effect on improving rural management and development processes. Also, from the perspective of the sample population, the psychological capabilities of rural administrators in the developmental dimension with the t value of -34.05 were lower than the average. On the other hand, it was determined that the greatest effects of the psychological empowerment of rural administrators on rural development in Rastkhahr rural districts were related to the feeling of trust. The factor was at 0.662. Therefore, it is concluded that rural administrators who have higher levels of psychological empowerment have better performance in rural management and development.