Psychometric Properties of the Self-Efficacy Scale among Undergraduate Students in Malaysia

@#Background: Self-efficacy (SE) is a person’s belief in his or her own capability to perform and accomplish a task that could produce a favourable outcome, despite facing obstacles. This study aimed to confirm the validity and reliability of an SE scale among undergraduate students at the Health Campus of the Universiti Sains Malaysia. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among the undergraduate students using a self-administered questionnaire. After using a purposive sampling method, 562 students completed the questionnaire. Mplus 8 was employed to conduct the confirmatory factor analysis on the psychometric properties of Bandura’s 18-item SE scale with three factors (internal feeling, competing demands and situational). Then, the composite reliability was calculated for each factor. Results: Most of the students were Malay (73.3%) females (79.0%) who exercised 2.62 times a week for an average of 43.37 min per session. The final measurement model was obtained after removing six problematic items, and the model was deemed fit based on several indices [Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) = 0.067, Standardised Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR) = 0.004, Comparative Fit Index (CFI) = 0.924]. The composite reliability values of the three factors were acceptable (0.65 to 0.84). Conclusion: The simplified 12-item SE scale with three factors displayed good fit indices with regard to the data, and they were considered to be acceptable for the current sampl

Adaptation and Validation of the Malay Version of the Index of Dental Anxiety and Fear (IDAF-4C+) for Malaysian Secondary School Children

Background: Many questionnaires have been developed to measure dental anxiety andfear. Among them is the Index of Dental Anxiety and Fear Scale (IDAF-4C+), which consists of adental anxiety and fear module (IDAF-4C), a phobia module (IDAF-P) and a stimulus module(IDAF-S). The objective of this research was to report the adaptation and validation of the IDAF-4C+ for Malaysian secondary school children.Methods: This was a cross‑sectional validation study. The original English version of theIDAF-4C+ was translated into Malay, back-translated, and then sent for content validation via anexpert validation and face validation by the target student population. Three hundred and seventyquestionnaires were then distributed among 16-year-old school children. Confirmatory factoranalysis (CFA) was conducted for the IDAF-4C module using a bootstrapped maximum likelihoodestimator. Spearman’s rank correlation was used to assess the relationship between the IDAF‑Sand IDAF-4C modules. Intraclass correlation (ICC) was used to determine the stability of theIDAF-S and IDAF-4C modules, while kappa values were used for the IDAF-P module.Results: The response rate was 86.5% for CFA and 76.9% for stability. CFA showed theexistence of only one factor with a reliability estimate of 0.921, obtained via Raykov’s procedure.All items in the IDAF-S module were significantly correlated with the IDAF-4C module (P <0.001). The IDAF-S and IDAF-4C modules were stable, as determined via a two-way mixed modelwith absolute agreement, a single measure and a Case 3 ICC (A, 1). The IDAF-P module showedsatisfactory stability, as assessed via kappa values.Conclusion: The Malay version of the IDAF-4C+ is valid and reliable in measuring dentalanxiety and fear among Malaysian secondary school children.