ReviewFrontiers in public health2018
Best Practices for Developing and Validating Scales for Health, Social, and Behavioral Research: A Primer.
Review in Frontiers in public health, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to 2 registered trials, which are not on this map. Cited by 2,017 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Wrist Arthroscopy During Surgical Treatment of Distal Radius Fractures Improves Functional Outcome: a Randomized Controlled Trial
Development and Validation of the Italian Version of the Waddell Chronic Disability Index for People With Low Back Pain
Who cites it
2,017 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- A systematic and critical review of measurement scales for evaluating gastrointestinal symptoms during exercise.Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition · 2026Pooled it
- The Stigmatization of Caregivers of Children With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder: A Systematic Review.Family process · 2026Pooled it
- How is housing insecurity measured among older adults? A systematic review.The Gerontologist · 2026Pooled it
- Behavior Change and Compliance Outcomes of a Novel Web-Based Health Behavior Tool Integrated Into Certified Exercise Practitioner Services: Twelve-Week, Two-Arm, Randomized Pre-Post Trial.Journal of medical Internet research · 2026Trial
- Development and Validation of a Culturally Competent Care Module and Its Effect on Nurses' Cultural Competence and Patient Satisfaction: Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial in a Tertiary Care Hospital in India.JMIR research protocols · 2026Trial
- Evaluating the Role of School-Based Weekly Iron-Folic Acid Supplementation in Shaping Common Morbidity and Growth Outcomes Among Adolescent Girls: Evidence From a Cluster-Randomized Controlled Trial in Central Ethiopia Region.Maternal & child nutrition · 2026Trial
- Generating multiple-choice questions using reverse engineering techniques.Medical education online · 2026Article
- Entrepreneurial and innovative skills in healthcare: Development and preliminary validation of an assessment instrument for Portuguese nurses.International journal of nursing studies advances · 2026Article
- Exploring item comprehension and evaluation in the SELC scale: a qualitative pre-testing study.Scandinavian journal of primary health care · 2026Article
- The development and preliminary validation of a multidimensional assessment scale for loneliness in nursing homes.International journal of nursing studies advances · 2026Article
- Deriving preliminary criterion-anchored cut-off scores for nurse-patient mutuality: A receiver operating characteristic analysis of the Nurse-Patient Mutuality in Chronic Illness Scale.International journal of nursing studies advances · 2026Article
- The Arabic Generalized Anxiety Disorder 2 (GAD-2): Psychometric evaluation among mothers of children with intellectual disabilities.Dialogues in clinical neuroscience · 2026Article
- Adaptation of the CONOCES-BLS scale to citizens: evidence of content validity and preliminary psychometric evaluation.Resuscitation plus · 2026Article
- Psychometric Evaluation of Six DASS-21 Short Forms for Male Survivors.Research on social work practice · 2026Article
- Cultural Adaptation, Validity, and Reliability of the Moral Distress Scale for Prehospital Emergency Health Services Employees: The Case of Türkiye.Journal of religion and health · 2026Article
- Development and validation of the Beliefs in Social Anxiety Scale (BIAS) for Chinese socially anxious adults and adolescents.BMC psychiatry · 2026Article
- Article
- Development and pilot multicentre evaluation of a patient-reported experience measure for acute ischemic stroke care.Acta neurologica Belgica · 2026Article
- Validating DigiHEALTHQUAL for measuring digital health effects on service quality in outpatient care in Germany.NPJ digital medicine · 2026Article
- Psychometric framework for coexistence with large carnivores.Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology · 2026Article
1,957 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Scale development and validation are critical to much of the work in the health, social, and behavioral sciences. However, the constellation of techniques required for scale development and evaluation can be onerous, jargon-filled, unfamiliar, and resource-intensive. Further, it is often not a part of graduate training. Therefore, our goal was to concisely review the process of scale development in as straightforward a manner as possible, both to facilitate the development of new, valid, and reliable scales, and to help improve existing ones. To do this, we have created a primer for best practices for scale development in measuring complex phenomena. This is not a systematic review, but rather the amalgamation of technical literature and lessons learned from our experiences spent creating or adapting a number of scales over the past several decades. We identified three phases that span nine steps. In the first phase, items are generated and the validity of their content is assessed. In the second phase, the scale is constructed. Steps in scale construction include pre-testing the questions, administering the survey, reducing the number of items, and understanding how many factors the scale captures. In the third phase, scale evaluation, the number of dimensions is tested, reliability is tested, and validity is assessed. We have also added examples of best practices to each step. In sum, this primer will equip both scientists and practitioners to understand the ontology and methodology of scale development and validation, thereby facilitating the advancement of our understanding of a range of health, social, and behavioral outcomes.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.