Development and psychometric testing of the Attitudes Toward Mental Illness in Pediatric Patients Scale.
OBJECTIVE
To develop the Attitudes toward Mental Illness in Pediatric Patients (ATMIPP) Scale measuring nonpsychiatric provider attitudes toward pediatric patients with mental illness.


METHODS
Responses from 492 nonpsychiatric and 30 psychiatric providers were evaluated for reliability and validity. Cronbach's alpha was used for reliability while factor analysis and known-groups technique were used for validity.


RESULTS
The scale's internal consistency was 0.85. Factor analysis revealed three factors (Comfort, Tolerance, and Unbiasness) accounting for 74.5% of the variance. Compared to nonpsychiatric providers, psychiatric providers had significantly more positive attitudes on the ATMIPP (p < 0.001).


CONCLUSIONS
The ATMIPP has evidence of reliability and validity for the sampled population.
Villanueva
Christina Streich
CS
Center for Pediatric Psychiatry, Children's Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA. christina.villanueva@childrens.com
Scott
Shari Hughes
SH
Guzzetta
Cathie E
CE
Foster
Barbara
B
D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D002648:Child; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D006801:Humans; D001523:Mental Disorders; D011594:Psychometrics / Q000379:methods*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results