title: Development and psychometric testing of the Swedish version of the Body Awareness Questionnaire.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This paper is a report of the development and psychometric testing of the Swedish version of the Body Awareness Questionnaire to measure bodily focus of attention.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  The Body Awareness Questionnaire has been identified as an instrument with excellent psychometric properties within the concept of body awareness. It has been used in both research and clinical settings in different contexts. However, a validated Swedish version is not available.
  
  
  METHODS
  A cross-sectional design was applied for adaptation of the Body Awareness Questionnaire and psychometric validation. Data were collected between autumn 2009 and spring 2011 from 120 patients diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, and from 120 students. The 'concurrent think aloud' method was used in a pre-test to determine the usability of the questionnaire. Cronbach's alpha was used to test the internal consistency, and confirmatory factor analysis was performed to test the construct validity.
  
  
  RESULTS
  According to the confirmatory factor analysis, neither the one-factor model nor the four-factor model tested in this study fulfilled the pre-specified criteria in accordance with the Comparative Fit Index, Standardized Root Mean Squared Residual and the Root Mean Square Error of Approximation. The value of Cronbach's alpha for the Swedish version of the Body Awareness Questionnaire was satisfactory.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results indicate that the two models tested in this study do not provide a good fit to the observed data. Further refinement and testing of the Swedish version of the Body Awareness Questionnaire is therefore required. The concept of body awareness may be useful in the management of chronic disease and can be addressed in nursing.
authors.affiliation: Sophiahemmet University College, Stockholm, Sweden. helena.loof@shh.se
authors.forename: Helena
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Lööf
authors.forename: Unn-Britt
authors.initials: UB
authors.lastname: Johansson
authors.forename: Elisabet Welin
authors.initials: EW
authors.lastname: Henriksson
authors.forename: Staffan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Lindblad
authors.forename: Fredrik
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Saboonchi
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001172:Arthritis, Rheumatoid / Q000523:psychology; D001364:Awareness; D001828:Body Image / Q000523:psychology*; D002908:Chronic Disease / Q000523:psychology*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011594:Psychometrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012648:Self Care; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013548:Sweden