Diferencias individuales en la comparación social: propriedades de la escala española de orientación hacia la comparación social / Individual differences on social comparison: properties of the Orientation Spanish Scale towards Social Comparison

ABSTRACT

This paper describes the development and the properties of the INCOM-E, the Spanish language version of the INCOM, a measure to assess individual differences in social comparison orientation that was originally developed simultaneously in English and in Dutch. In both Study 1 (including 212 students), and Study 2 (including 782 employees from primary health care centers), the reliability of the INCOM-E was good (alpha = 0.80), and the factor structure was very similar to that of the English and Dutch versions. As in the American and Dutch samples, in Study 1 the scale had substantial positive correlations with interpersonal orientation, public and private self-consciousness, and neuroticism. Together these variables explained already 44% of the variance of the INCOM-E. There were weak negative correlations with self-esteem, optimism and subjective well-being, and a weak positive correlation with college stress. The scale did not correlated with social desirability. In Study 2, the test-retest reliability over a year was .57. As expected, the scale had low to zero correlations with burnout, psychological wellbeing, job satisfaction and team cohesion, but positive correlations with the frequency of social comparison at work. Possible uses of the INCOM-E, in basic and applied settings, are discussed.