Development and Validation of the ClimHealth-K: A Scale for Assessing Perceived Knowledge and Awareness of Climate Change-Related Health Effects

Abstract

Climate change poses a significant threat to human health and is linked to various direct and indirect outcomes, including infectious diseases, heat-related illnesses, and other climate-sensitive conditions. However, standardized tools assessing perceived knowledge and awareness of climate-related health effects remain limited. This methodological study aimed to develop and validate the ClimHealth-K scale for assessing university students' perceived climate-health knowledge. The sample included 449 students from a public university in Türkiye. Items were generated through literature review and evaluated by seven experts to establish content validity using the Davis method. Psychometric analyses included exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses and reliability testing. Item-level content validity index values ranged from 0.86 to 1.00, and the scale-level index was 0.98. Exploratory factor analysis supported a unidimensional structure explaining 62.67% of total variance, and confirmatory factor analysis showed good model fit (χ²/df = 2.27, CFI = 0.977, RMSEA = 0.075). Cronbach's alpha was 0.954, and test-retest reliability indicated moderate stability (ICC = 0.653, p < 0.001). The 11-item ClimHealth-K is a valid and reliable instrument for assessing perceived climate-health knowledge in educational and public health research.

Keywords: awareness; climate change; perceived knowledge; psychometric validation; public health; scale development.