Psychometric properties of a brief version of the COVID‐19 Stress Scales (CSS‐B) in young adult undergraduates. (20th June 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Thibault, Tabatha; Thompson, Kara; Keough, Matthew; Krank, Marvin; Conrod, Patricia; Moore, Mackenzie; Stewart, Sherry H.
• Is Part Of: Stress and health. Volume 39:Number 1(2023)
• Page Start: 154
• Page End: 161
• Publication Date: 2022-06-20
• Subjects: anxiety -- coronavirus -- COVID‐19 -- fear -- mental well‐being -- pandemic -- psychometrics -- reliability -- stress -- validity; Medicine and psychology -- Periodicals; Stress (Physiology) -- Periodicals; Medicine -- Periodicals; Stress -- Periodicals; Health -- Periodicals; Medicine -- Periodicals; Stress, Psychological -- Periodicals; Médecine et psychologie -- Périodiques; Stress -- Périodiques; Médecine -- Périodiques; 616.98
• DOI: 10.1002/smi.3175
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1532-3005

Abstract

Abstract: We extracted items to create a brief version of the COVID‐19 Stress Scale (i.e., CSS‐B) and examined its psychometric properties in young adults. A sample of 1318 first‐ and second‐year undergraduates from five Canadian universities (mean [SD] age = 19.27 [1.35] years; 77.6% women) completed an online cross‐sectional survey that included the CSS‐B as well as validated measures of anxiety and depression. The 18‐item CSS‐B fit well on both a 5‐factor and a hierarchical model indicating that the five CSS‐B dimensions may be factors of the same over‐arching construct. The CSS‐B factor structure displayed lower‐order and higher‐order configural and metric invariance across sites but not scalar invariance indicating that the intercepts/means were not consistent across sites. The CSS dimensions were positively related to measures of general anxiety and depression but not so strongly as to indicate that they are measuring the same construct. The CSS‐B scale is a valid measure of COVID‐19 stress among young adults. It is recommended that this shorter version of the scale be considered for use in longer surveys to avoid participant fatigue.