Mental Illness: Clinicians' Attitudes (MICA) scale-psychometric properties of a version for healthcare students and professionals.
There are currently no published scales to assess the attitudes of students and professionals across a wide range of healthcare disciplines towards people with mental illness. Secondary analysis from a randomised controlled trial (RCT) of anti-stigma interventions was carried out to test the reliability, validity and acceptability of the Mental Illness: Clinicians' Attitudes (MICA) v4 scale, a modification of the MICA v2 scale in a sample of 191 nursing students. The MICA v4 was found to have good internal consistency (α=0.72) and item-total correlations. Principal component analysis produced a five-factor structure and the scale had acceptable convergent validity. A group of students and professionals within the healthcare discipline (n=5) reported that the MICA v4 had good face validity and suggested its use with students and professionals working in non-mental health settings. The scale had low rates of missing data, good readability and took less than 4min to complete. The MICA v4 scale was found to be a reliable, valid and acceptable measure of foundation year nursing students' attitudes towards mental illness. It has the potential for use with students and qualified staff across a range of healthcare professions and is available for use from the authors.
Health Service and Population Research Department, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London, De Crespigny Park, London SE5 8AF, UK. jheanell.gabbidon@kcl.ac.uk
Jheanell
J
Gabbidon
Sarah
S
Clement
Adrienne
A
van Nieuwenhuizen
Aliya
A
Kassam
Elaine
E
Brohan
Ian
I
Norman
Graham
G
Thornicroft
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006282:Health Personnel / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy*; D008875:Middle Aged; D011594:Psychometrics; D016032:Randomized Controlled Trials as Topic; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D057545:Social Stigma; D013336:Students, Health Occupations / Q000523:psychology*; D055815:Young Adult