Validity and reliability of the Turkish version of the COVID-19 stress scale

Abstract

It has been shown that the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has negative effects on individuals’ mental health. It has been seen that various measurement tools used in evaluating these effects tend to be uni-dimensional and have limited psychometric evaluation. This study aims to show the reliability and validity of the Turkish version of COVID Stress Scales (CSS), which evaluates the distress associated with COVID-19 in six different dimensions. The sample of the study consists of 457 volunteering adults who met the inclusion criteria via an online form. Sociodemographic data form, CSS, Depression-Anxiety-Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21), and Fear of COVID-19 Scale (FCS) were applied to the participants. The scale had a Cronbach alpha coefficient of 0.947. Total-item correlation coefficients of the scale items were found to range between 0.381 and 0.730 (p<0.01) and Cronbach's Alpha values were found to range between 0.944 and 0.946 if an item is reduced. Cronbach alpha coefficients of scale sub-dimensions were found as 0,849 for danger sub-dimension, as 0,896 for socio-economic consequences sub-dimension, as 0.916 for xenophobia sub-dimension, as 0.920 for contamination sub-dimension, as 0.882 for traumatic stress sub-dimension and as 0.804 for compulsive checking sub-dimension. Exploratory Factor Analysis and Confirmatory Factor Analysis applied while evaluating the factor structure of the CSS showed the reliability of the six-dimensional structure of the scale. A positive statistically significant association was found between CSS total and sub-scale scores and DASS-21 sub-scale and total scores and FCS (p<0.001). The present study shows that the Turkish version of CSS can be used reliably in both clinical practice and academic studies. Our results also show that the Turkish version of CSS has good psychometric properties