The Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity

Background Early adversity (EA) can contribute to the onset, manifestation, and course of various mental disorders. Measuring EA is still conceptually and psychometrically challenging due to issues such as content coverage, item-wording, scaling methods, and validation procedures. Further, despite r...

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Autores principales:	Pascal Schlechter, Jessica Fritz, Matthew Cassels, Sharon A.S. Neufeld, Paul O. Wilkinson
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	Taylor & Francis Group 2021
Materias:	early adversity measurement adversity severity mental health scale development Psychiatry RC435-571
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/cc9cb22662614957b64a1500632f8ed8
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:cc9cb22662614957b64a1500632f8ed82021-11-11T14:23:42ZThe Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity2000-806610.1080/20008198.2021.1981573https://doaj.org/article/cc9cb22662614957b64a1500632f8ed82021-01-01T00:00:00Zhttp://dx.doi.org/10.1080/20008198.2021.1981573https://doaj.org/toc/2000-8066Background Early adversity (EA) can contribute to the onset, manifestation, and course of various mental disorders. Measuring EA is still conceptually and psychometrically challenging due to issues such as content coverage, item-wording, scaling methods, and validation procedures. Further, despite research demonstrating the importance of the severity of EA, most EA scales solely focused on the ‘presence-versus-absence’ indicator of adverse events. Objective To address these potentially relevant gaps, we have developed a 13-item measure of EA, the Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale (YCAS). Beyond a dichotomous assessment of whether a set of adverse events have been experienced, this scale also assesses the respective severity of these events. Methods We evaluated the YCAS in a sample of 596 adolescent students (ages 16–19) and a second sample of 451 medical students (ages 18–30+). Exploratory factor analysis was used to determine the underlying structure as proposed by the data, which was then tested with confirmatory factor analysis. We psychometrically assessed both factor scores and sum scores. Results In both samples, a one-factorial solution was found for both responses to dichotomous items and severity items. Item loadings had a broad range, with minimum loadings of .1-.2 and maximum loadings of .7-.9. Irrespective of the response type, this factor exhibited good reliability (omega total, range: .80 − .89) and was associated with a range of mental-health outcomes, self-esteem, and childhood maltreatment. The fit of the model resembling sum scores was not satisfactory, but the sum score reliability (coefficient alpha, range: .78 − .89) was acceptable and most of the associations with the validation measures held. Conclusions The YCAS allows an efficient, reliable, and valid assessment of EA and its severity. It covers a reasonable breadth of events, whilst simultaneously being parsimonious. We discuss next steps of how to improve this measure to fully capture the complexity of EA.Pascal SchlechterJessica FritzMatthew CasselsSharon A.S. NeufeldPaul O. WilkinsonTaylor & Francis Grouparticleearly adversity measurementadversity severitymental healthscale developmentPsychiatryRC435-571ENEuropean Journal of Psychotraumatology, Vol 12, Iss 1 (2021)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	early adversity measurement adversity severity mental health scale development Psychiatry RC435-571
spellingShingle	early adversity measurement adversity severity mental health scale development Psychiatry RC435-571 Pascal Schlechter Jessica Fritz Matthew Cassels Sharon A.S. Neufeld Paul O. Wilkinson The Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity
description	Background Early adversity (EA) can contribute to the onset, manifestation, and course of various mental disorders. Measuring EA is still conceptually and psychometrically challenging due to issues such as content coverage, item-wording, scaling methods, and validation procedures. Further, despite research demonstrating the importance of the severity of EA, most EA scales solely focused on the ‘presence-versus-absence’ indicator of adverse events. Objective To address these potentially relevant gaps, we have developed a 13-item measure of EA, the Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale (YCAS). Beyond a dichotomous assessment of whether a set of adverse events have been experienced, this scale also assesses the respective severity of these events. Methods We evaluated the YCAS in a sample of 596 adolescent students (ages 16–19) and a second sample of 451 medical students (ages 18–30+). Exploratory factor analysis was used to determine the underlying structure as proposed by the data, which was then tested with confirmatory factor analysis. We psychometrically assessed both factor scores and sum scores. Results In both samples, a one-factorial solution was found for both responses to dichotomous items and severity items. Item loadings had a broad range, with minimum loadings of .1-.2 and maximum loadings of .7-.9. Irrespective of the response type, this factor exhibited good reliability (omega total, range: .80 − .89) and was associated with a range of mental-health outcomes, self-esteem, and childhood maltreatment. The fit of the model resembling sum scores was not satisfactory, but the sum score reliability (coefficient alpha, range: .78 − .89) was acceptable and most of the associations with the validation measures held. Conclusions The YCAS allows an efficient, reliable, and valid assessment of EA and its severity. It covers a reasonable breadth of events, whilst simultaneously being parsimonious. We discuss next steps of how to improve this measure to fully capture the complexity of EA.
format	article
author	Pascal Schlechter Jessica Fritz Matthew Cassels Sharon A.S. Neufeld Paul O. Wilkinson
author_facet	Pascal Schlechter Jessica Fritz Matthew Cassels Sharon A.S. Neufeld Paul O. Wilkinson
author_sort	Pascal Schlechter
title	The Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity
title_short	The Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity
title_full	The Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity
title_fullStr	The Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity
title_full_unstemmed	The Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity
title_sort	youth and childhood adversity scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity
publisher	Taylor & Francis Group
publishDate	2021
url	https://doaj.org/article/cc9cb22662614957b64a1500632f8ed8
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The Youth and Childhood Adversity Scale: a step towards developing a new measure of adversity and its severity

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