title: Support for the Multidimensional Adolescent Stress Questionnaire in a Sample of Adolescents in the United Kingdom.
abstract: Adolescence is a time of physical, social and emotional development, and this development can be accompanied by feelings of stress. The Adolescent Stress Questionnaire is a 56-item scale measuring stress in 10 domains. Developed in Australia, the scale has been translated, and its reliability and validity have been tested in a number of countries across Europe, where the 10-factor, 56-item version of the scale has received little support. The present study tested the factor structure, construct validity and reliability in a sample (n = 610) of adolescents in the United Kingdom. Support was found for the 10-factor, 56-item version of the scale, and correlations with self-concept measures, sex scores on stress factors and Cronbach's α-values, suggesting that the scale may be a viable assessment tool for adolescent stress. Results for alcohol-specific analyses support the domain-specific nature of the scale. Future work may seek to investigate the stability of age-specific stress domains (e.g. the stress of Emerging Adult Responsibility) in samples that include younger adolescents.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Public Health, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK.
authors.forename: Michael T
authors.initials: MT
authors.lastname: McKay
authors.affiliation: School of Sociology, Social Policy & Social Work, Queen's University of Belfast, Belfast, UK.
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Percy
authors.affiliation: Research School of Psychology, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australia.
authors.forename: Don G
authors.initials: DG
authors.lastname: Byrne
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000428:Alcohol Drinking / Q000453:epidemiology*; D016010:Binomial Distribution; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D012044:Regression Analysis; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012649:Self Concept; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000175:diagnosis*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires / Q000592:standards*; D006113:United Kingdom
keywords: adolescent; alcohol use; confirmatory factor analysis; stress