title: Appraisal of life events scale in a sample of Greek infertile women undergoing fertility treatment: a confirmatory factor analysis.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  to examine the construct validity of the Greek version of the Appraisal of Life Events (ALE) scale, originally developed by Ferguson et al. (1999), in a sample of infertile women. As there are no data concerning the validity of the ALE scale in infertile populations, a special focus was placed on construct validity through confirmatory factor analysis (CFA).
  
  
  METHODS
  public hospital in Athens, Greece.
  
  
  METHODS
  cross-sectional study.
  
  
  METHODS
  160 women undergoing fertility treatment with in-vitro fertilisation.
  
  
  METHODS
  the ALE scale was 'forward-backward' translated from English to Greek. The translated instrument was then administered to a set of infertile women for pilot testing. CFA was used to test the construct validity of the ALE scale.
  
  
  RESULTS
  CFA supported the superiority of a model with three correlated first-order factors (challenge, threat and loss) and one second-order factor (stress appraisal) that underlay the first-order factors of threat and loss.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  the ALE scale was found to have a multidimensional structure.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  the assessment of infertility appraisal during in-vitro fertilisation through a valid instrument may lead to the identification of women who are at greater risk of experiencing high stress, not only during fertility treatment but also during pregnancy and postnatal period in case of a successful IVF treatment.
authors.affiliation: Elena Benizelou Hospital, Department of Midwifery, Technological Educational Institution of Athens, 18756 Athens, Greece. clairegourounti@yahoo.gr
authors.forename: Kleanthi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Gourounti
authors.forename: Fotios
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Anagnostopoulos
authors.forename: Georgios
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Alexias
authors.forename: Grigorios
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Vaslamatzis
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000328:Adult; D001007:Anxiety / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D001294:Attitude to Health; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D006115:Greece; D006801:Humans; D007247:Infertility, Female / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy*; D011594:Psychometrics; D012647:Self-Assessment; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires / Q000592:standards; D014175:Translating; D016387:Women's Health; D055815:Young Adult