Psychometric Validation of the Short Form of the Smoking Consequences Questionnaire (S-SCQ) for Brazil

Abstract

Smoking accounts for 24% of deaths in the general population and is also the factor that explains the biggest amount of years of life lost. It is important to understand the expectations regarding smoking behavior. The present study aimed to validate the Short Form of the Smoking Consequences Questionnaire (S-SCQ) for a Brazilian version. The Researchers did the process of semantic adaptation to language and national context. The S-SCQ was applied in a sample of 129 people. The next step was to perform psychometric analyses for the set of 21 items. Exploratory Factor Analysis, with pairwise treatment for missing cases, was used to achieve construct validity. To carry out Factor Analysis, the method of Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used initially. Afterwards, Principal Axis Factoring (PAF) using Varimax rotation with Kaiser normalization was applied. The reliability of the total scale (21 items) showed a Cronbach alpha index of 0.851 and a 0.870 Lambda2 of Gutmann. Quite satisfactory rates were also observed in the subscales. Similarly, the item-overall correlation values also confirmed the scale’s good reliability indices.