Toward the assessment of psychological empowerment in health promotion: initial tests of validity and reliability.
Because of the importance of empowerment in health promotion, the measurement of empowerment is a priority for health promotion research. The present study sought to develop a valid and reliable instrument to assess psychological empowerment and to resolve the theoretical question of whether psychological empowerment is a topic-specific or general construct. University of Minnesota employees (n = 160) completed two different versions of empowerment questionnaires. One of the questionnaires measured general empowerment; the other was specific to alcohol use prevention. Reasonable reliability was demonstrated in a previously developed general empowerment instrument (Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.84) and for an alcohol-specific instrument (Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.78). Construct validity for the alcohol-specific instrument was demonstrated by appropriate significant correlations between subscales and overall scores for both instruments. Predictive validity tests partially supported the concept that psychological empowerment is topic-specific, although further testing with a more representative population may be needed to resolve this question. The results suggest that the alcohol-specific psychological empowerment instrument could be used in the evaluation of community alcohol abuse prevention programmes.
Rissel
C
C
Public Health Unit, Central Sydney Area Health Service, Camperdown, NSW, Australia.
Perry
C
C
Finnegan
J
J
D000328:Adult; D000437:Alcoholism / Q000517:prevention & control*; D005260:Female; D006293:Health Promotion; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009042:Motivation; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D010865:Pilot Projects; D011581:Psychological Tests / Q000592:standards; D011594:Psychometrics / Q000379:methods*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results