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This study aims to investigate whether individual differences in public service motivation (PSM) between the public and private sectors are a cause or a consequence of choosing a job, testing self‐selection and socialization hypotheses using a longitudinal dataset from a nationally representative cohort in Korea. The study uses two samples from the data of three successive waves (t − 2, t, t + 2) surveyed biennially, finding that "self‐selection" can more persuasively explain the state that employees in the public sector have higher levels of PSM than those in the private sector, with job seekers with high PSM levels being more likely to work in the public sector and with the magnitude of differences in PSM between the public and private sectors maintained through the early years after entry into the workplace, while the levels of PSM, however, decrease in all job sectors. Implications of our findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prior studies examined an individual's level of education as one of the antecedents of public service motivation (PSM). Despite having the same level of education, why are the levels of PSM different among individuals? This study investigates the various components of high school education that may influence graduates' levels of PSM by analyzing longitudinal data (3,592 cases in four waves) of the Korean Education Longitudinal Study. It shows that leadership experience, volunteering satisfaction, peer collaboration, and constructive self‐assessment on achievement in high school Social Studies courses have positive influences on graduates' PSM. This study provides support for the institutional perspective that PSM can be cultivated through processes of institutional socialization, and suggests that the self‐determination theory and the social interdependence theory are useful for understanding the effects of extracurricular activities and peer collaboration on PSM, and that collaborative learning and service‐learning will be valuable in cultivating PSM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]