title: Assessing the reliability and validity of the John Henry Active Coping Scale in an urban sample of African Americans and white Americans.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The primary focus of this study was to examine the psychometric properties of the John Henry Active Coping scale (JHAC12) among an urban middle-aged sample of African Americans and white Americans.
  
  
  METHODS
  The sample consisted of 75 African Americans and 129 white Americans from South Florida ranging in age from 25 to 54 years. Subjects completed the JHAC12, the Life Orientation Test (LOT), Coping Orientation to Problems Encountered (COPE) subscales, and the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability scale.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Major findings supported the validity and reliability of the JHAC12 among both African Americans and white Americans. For both the African American and white American subsamples, the JHAC12 was correlated with the active coping and suppression of competing activities subscales of the COPE and negatively correlated with the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability scale. In the African American subsample the JHAC12 was positively correlated with the LOT. The JHAC12 was also negatively associated with the behavioral disengagement subscale of the COPE among white Americans. Multiple regression analyses revealed that the proportion of variance in the JHAC12 explained by the various subscales of the COPE, Marlowe-Crowne, and the LOT was 43% for African Americans and 20% for white Americans. Factor analyses suggested two similar and meaningful factors among the African American and white American subsamples. Finally, Cronbach alpha reliabilities revealed similar subsample coefficients.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The implications of the findings are discussed in terms of the JHAC12's ability to assess the construct of active coping among African Americans and white Americans.
authors.affiliation: Department of Behavioral Science, College of Medicine, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40536, USA. afern2@uky.edu
authors.forename: Anita F
authors.initials: AF
authors.lastname: Fernander
authors.forename: Ron E
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Durán
authors.forename: Patrice G
authors.initials: PG
authors.lastname: Saab
authors.forename: Maria M
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Llabre
authors.forename: Neil
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Schneiderman
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000328:Adult; D044383:Black People / Q000523:psychology*; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D005431:Florida; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011594:Psychometrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014505:Urban Population; D044465:White People / Q000523:psychology*; D001741:Black or African American