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. 2020 Mar 20;20(1):130.
doi: 10.1186/s12888-020-02520-4.

Psychometric properties of the perceived stress scale in a community sample of Chinese

Feifei Huang  1 , Huijun Wang  1 , Zhihong Wang  1 , Jiguo Zhang  1 , Wenwen Du  1 , Chang Su  1 , Xiaofang Jia  1 , Yifei Ouyang  1 , Yun Wang  1 , Li Li  1 , Hongru Jiang  1 , Bing Zhang  2
Affiliations

Psychometric properties of the perceived stress scale in a community sample of Chinese

Feifei Huang et al. BMC Psychiatry. .

Erratum in

Abstract

Background: The Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) is a globally used and self-report scale measuring perceived stress. Three versions of PSS (PSS-14, PSS-10 and PSS-4) are available which comprise 14, 10 and 4 items respectively. However, the Chinese version of the PSS has not yet been validated in a large community-based general population. The aims of this study were to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Chinese PSS in a large community-based general population and to compare the appropriateness of the three versions of PSS.

Methods: A total of 9507 adults with at least a junior high school education and completed PSS-14 from the China Health and Nutrition Survey were involved in this study. The internal consistency reliability of PSS was assessed using Cronbach's alpha coefficient and confirmatory factor analysis was employed to test the construct validity. Modification index was used for model extension and the critical ratio was used for model restriction.

Results: The internal consistency coefficients were satisfactory for PSS-14 and PSS-10, but not for PSS-4. The corresponding Cronbach's alpha were 0.830, 0.754 and 0.473 respectively. A 2-factor structure was confirmed for the PSS-14 and PSS-10, and all items' standardized factor loadings exceeded 0.4 for either negative or positive factors. Given that item 12 loaded on both negative and positive factors for PSS-14 and the goodness of fit for PSS-14 was not acceptable, PSS-13 (PSS-14 excluding item 12) was studied. The construct validities of PSS-13 and PSS-10 were satisfactory, but the goodness of fit for PSS-10 were better than that for PSS-13.

Conclusions: PSS-13 (PSS-14 excluding item 12) and PSS-10 have satisfactory psychometric properties. PSS-10 are more applicable to measure the perceived stress than PSS-13 in a large community-based general population in China.

Keywords: Perceived stress; Reliability; Validity.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
a Models of modified PSS-14-a; b Models of modified PSS-14-b; c Models of PSS-13; d Models of modified-PSS-13
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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