Cultural adaptation and psychometric assessment of Pain Catastrophizing Scale among young healthy Malay-speaking adults in military settings.
OBJECTIVE
The Pain Catastrophizing Scale (PCS) is designed to assess negative thoughts in response to pain. It is composed of three domains: helplessness, rumination, and magnification. We report on the translation, adaptation, and validation of scores on a Malay-speaking version of the PCS, the PCS-MY.


METHODS
Guidelines for the process of cross-cultural adaptations of assessment measures were implemented. A sample of 303 young military recruits participated in the study. Factor structure, reliability, and validity of scores on the PCS-MY were examined. Convergent validity was investigated with the Positive and Negative Affect Scale, Short-form 12 version 2, and Ryff's Psychological Well-being Scale.


RESULTS
Most participants were men, ranging in age from 19 to 26. The reliability of the PCS-MY scores was adequate (α = 0.90; mean inter-item correlation = 0.43). Confirmatory factor analysis showed that a modified version of the PCS-MY provided best fit estimates to the sample data. The PCS-MY total score was negatively correlated with mental well-being and positively correlated with negative affect (all ps < 0.001).


CONCLUSIONS
The PCS-MY was demonstrated to have adequate reliability and validity estimates in the study sample.
Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, faridzal.harrymen@gmail.com.
F H
FH
Mohd Din
Victor C W
VC
Hoe
C K
CK
Chan
M A
MA
Muslan
D000328:Adult; D058443:Catastrophization / Q000523:psychology*; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008296:Malaysia / Q000208:ethnology; D008297:Male; D008889:Military Personnel; D010146:Pain / Q000523:psychology*; D010147:Pain Measurement; D011594:Psychometrics / Q000379:methods*; D011788:Quality of Life / Q000523:psychology*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014177:Translations; D055815:Young Adult