Development of a Japanese Version of the Mental Health-Related Self-Care Agency Scale

Abstract

Aim: The purpose of this study is to develop the Japanese version of the Mental Health-Related Self-Care Agency Scale (MH-SCA) and to establish its validity and reliability.
Method: Using the committee approach, the MH-SCA was translated from English into Japanese. To ensure the semantic, conceptual, and normative equivalence with the original instrument, the committee included five translators: one adjudicator, two translation reviewers, one self-care specialist, and one experienced researcher in questionnaire design and pretesting. The steps were: prepare, translate, pretest, revise, and document. The finalized MH-SCA-Japanese version (MH-SCA-J) was conducted on 73 Japanese outpatients with depression to address reliability and construct validity for the MH-SCA-J.
Result: The Cronbach's alpha for the MH-SCA-J was 0.93, supporting reliability by determining internal consistency. The total score of the MH-SCA-J was significantly correlated to the scores of CES-D, −0.834 (p<0.01), and to the scores of daily activities, −0.690 (p<0.01). Therefore, concurrent validity was confirmed. Additionally, as a result of having compared a group of depressed people with a group of nondepressed people, the depressed people were clearly differentiated from the nondepressed people by this instrument. These mean scores of MH-SCA-J, 97.16 for the depressed and 131.83 for the nondepressed, were significantly different, t=−7.51 (p<0.01), therefore, clinical validity was confirmed.
Conclusion: In conclusion, the MH-SCA-Japanese version was developed and its validity and reliability were confirmed. These results show that the MH-SCA-Japanese version can be used to measure the self-care agency of people with mental disability.