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The purpose of this paper is to address the issue of failing to psychometrically test questionnaire instruments when measuring university students’ attitudes towards plagiarism. These issues are highlighted by a psychometric evaluation of a commonly used (but previously untested) plagiarism attitudinal scale.

The importance of psychometric testing is shown through an analysis of a commonly used scale using modern techniques (e.g. Rasch analysis) on 131 undergraduate education students at an Australian university.

Psychometric analysis revealed the scale to be unreliable in its present form. However, when reduced to an eight-item subscale it became marginally reliable.

The main implication of this paper is that questionnaire instruments cannot be assumed to function as they are intended without thorough psychometric testing.

The paper offers valuable insight into the psychometric properties of a previously untested but commonly used plagiarism attitudinal scale.

The paper offers a straightforward and easy to understand introduction to researchers in higher education who use questionnaires/surveys in their research but lack an understanding of why psychometric testing is so critical. While similar papers have been written in other fields which advocate psychometric approaches, such as Rasch analysis, this has not been the case in higher educational research (or mainstream educational research for that matter).

Methodological advances in cross‐cultural scale development have addressed many concerns regarding the development of valid scales. However, several issues remain to be examined – including the potential problems of using language to measure communication phenomena using self‐reported studies and addressing the effect of response scale type on the validity of resultant measures. The purpose of this paper is to expand the cross‐cultural measurement paradigm by comprehensively examining these issues and suggesting a new response scale type that may potentially produce more valid cross‐cultural measures of communication‐based phenomena.

Measures of Hall's concept of context were developed using three types of response scales – Likert, semantic differential, and conceptual metaphoric. The last response scale type is developed within this research. Samples were gathered in 23 countries using existing scale development procedures. The response scales were compared for psychometric properties and validity based on reliability, metric invariance, response styles, and face validity.

Overall all three response scale types adequately measured the construct of context. The newly developed conceptual metaphoric scale performed marginally better on most comparative metrics.

International marketers measure a host of variables related to culture for many purposes. The new response scale type may provide slightly better measures to more accurately reflect communication based constructs – many of which are central to marketing.

The findings indicate that the new conceptual metaphoric response scale type may overcome some existing biases inherent in standard response scale types. In addition, this research provides the first viable and parsimonious measure of Hall's concept of context.

This paper aims to present the results of a systematic review of the evidence on psychometric properties of information literacy (IL) tests.

A two-stage search strategy was used to find relevant studies in two subject and three general databases. A descriptive review of test characteristics and psychometric properties was presented. The review included 29 studies describing psychometric properties of 18 IL tests.

It was found that the classical test theory was applied for all tests. However, the item response theory was also applied in three cases. Most of the psychometric tests were developed in the USA using ACRL IL competency standards. The most commonly used psychometric analyses include content validity, discriminant validity and internal consistency reliability.

Only studies in English language are included in this review.

The study recommends that standards should be developed for the use and reporting of psychometric measures in designing IL tests. Librarians need to be trained in psychometric analysis of tests.

It is the first study that systematically reviewed psychometric properties of IL tests. The findings are useful for librarians who are teaching IL courses.

The paper reports on a review of assessment scales commonly used for assessment of psychiatric illnesses or behaviour problems in adults with learning disabilities. Initially, a literature search was conducted to identify relevant peer‐reviewed journal publications pertaining to relevant scales. Those scales with more publications were reviewed with reference to the scale composition and psychometric properties. In total, eight behaviour scales, one psychiatric illness scale and three combined behaviour and psychiatric illness scales are reviewed.

Recent developments in healthcare contexts increasingly emphasize patient-centred approaches to service quality measures; however, few studies consider this dimension explicitly. The present study develops and psychometrically validates a scale of healthcare service quality explicitly incorporating a patient-centred care dimension from a communicational perspective. The paper also enriches the traditional content of service quality by including equity items and presents the underlying structure of service quality in an emerging country.

The final sample consisted of 869 healthcare users (complete cases in the service quality items derived from 917 surveys received) from Colombia. The authors used a psychometric analytics framework comprising seven processes incorporating exploratory factor analysis, structural equation modelling, and machine learning methods to examine construct plausibility, reliability, construct validity, equity, and criterion/predictive validity (e.g. explaining/predicting subjective well-being and behavioural intentions).

The final scale consists of 17 items and satisfies all psychometric properties. Its validation allows for the discovery and psychometrical confirmation of two essential dimensions: patient-centred communication (eight items) and process quality (nine items).

The authors illustrate three practical uses of the scale: the possibility for diagnoses; hypothesis contrast based on confidence intervals; and estimation of the capacity of the service to satisfy specifications.

Both dimensions reveal users' relevant needs and complement previous studies that have focused on process aspects of healthcare service quality.

In the modern world, life satisfaction has become a quintessential construct for large-scale organizations, and a valid measure to evaluate employee life satisfaction is required. Therefore, this study aims to evaluate the psychometric properties of the satisfaction with life scale (SWLS) in a sample of employees working in the Indian manufacturing sector.

Survey method was used for data collection among a sample of 404 employees. Further, the psychometric properties of SWLS were evaluated with reference to reliability and validity assessment (face, content and construct validity).

The results were found to be significant for SWLS to assess the life satisfaction of employees working in manufacturing organizations in India.

This study attempts to validate SWLS among employees, which is a novel contribution in the field. Also, it suggests that effective application of SWLS can help in identifying and understanding the work-related factors associated with life satisfaction.

The purpose of this study is to produce a framework and instrument that can be used to improve the management of tacit investigative knowledge in policing agencies based upon Dean's (2000) theory of criminal investigation.

The paper describes the development and large‐scale test of a psychometric scale with a large sample of detectives from the New South Wales Police Force, Western Australia Police, Tasmania Police, Victoria Police and Singapore Police Force. The purpose of the scale is to quantitatively measure the extent to which investigative police adhere to Dean's (2000) four investigative “thinking styles”.

The research produced further empirical evidence of Dean's (2000) theory, but also indicated areas where the scale and theory required readjustment and re‐conceptualisation.

Future research should conduct further large‐scale tests of a revised instrument, which incorporates these changes. In particular, the potential overlap between Dean's (2000) thinking style constructs and other cognitive, psychological and even physiological traits demands further consideration before the instrument can be validated.

Once a robust, valid and reliable instrument is constructed, it may be used to map the tacit investigative knowledge that exists in police agencies and thus, inform the management of that knowledge and the experts who hold it.

This research contributes to the current literature on knowledge management approaches in policing, with a particular focus on the management of tacit investigative knowledge. It also further extends the work of Dean (2000) and his colleagues (Dean et al., 2006, 2007, 2008a, b; Dean and Gottschalk, 2007; Dean and Staines, 2011) in empirically validating Dean's (2000) theory of criminal investigation.

The purpose of this paper is to replicate and refine Parasuraman's 36‐item technology readiness index (TRI) across contexts and cultures to enhance its applicability and generalizability for both researchers and practitioners.

Based on psychometric procedures of scale development, four separate research phases, each one building on the previous, are performed using several samples. Measurement invariance analyses are performed across demographics, industries, and cultures to ascertain the stability of the refined versus the original scale.

A refined 16‐item TRI scale demonstrates sound psychometric properties based on findings from various reliability and validity tests, as well as scale replications employing several samples. The four dimensions remain stable across techniques and samples, while the utility of the refined scale increases due to ease of application. Measurement invariance analyses across demographic groups, industries, and cultures provide further support for the superior stability of the refined TRI.

Assessment of TRI across different contexts and cultures enhances validity, utility, and generalizability by reducing the number of items, building a nomological network, and verifying stability.

Service firms should pay more attention to measurement of customers' technology readiness. For both researchers and practitioners, the refined 16‐item scale benefits from reduced complexity and enhanced utility of TRI across contexts and cultures. Service managers will find the refined TRI less complicated and easier to apply in customer surveys, which greatly benefits service firms attempting to better understand customers' TR when implementing self‐service technologies.

Replication and cross‐validation of new concepts play a valuable role in determining the scope and limit of empirical research findings; they allow researchers to demonstrate how broadly and in what circumstances such concepts can be used. While Parasuraman calls for studies to assess the generalizability of the TRI scale, the current lack of support for TRI's generalizability is an important gap that needs to be addressed. The current study fills that gap, increasing the applicability and generalizability of the TRI scale through refinement, replication and validation across several samples, contexts, and cultures.

Ostracism is being socially ignored or excluded by others. Ostracism leads to serious psychological distress and health issues in the young adults being ostracized. However, there are no psychometrically designed instruments to measure this phenomenon in young adults. This study aims to develop a scale that measures ostracism efficiently and establishes the scale’s psychometric properties.

The research design used for the study is “a mixed-method study using non-experimental research with an exploratory sequential approach and instrument development design.” For the formation of the item pool, theoretical evidence was collected and focus group discussions were conducted. Afterward, content validity was established with the help of subject matter experts, followed by Velicer’s minimum average partial method and maximum likelihood factor analysis to form the instrument’s factorial structure.

Velicer’s minimum average partial method and maximum likelihood factor analysis made two factors as follows: ostracism experience and psychological effect. The instrument developed has a high value of alpha reliability i.e. a = 0.97 and a = 0.96, a = 0.92 for the subscales, respectively.

The sample used for the research was enough to run the analysis, but future studies can go for a more extensive and more diverse sample. The sample was based solely on university students. The current research focused only on the target of the phenomenon, and the whole research process was conducted online because of the Covid-19 pandemic going on. The scale developed can be used in several settings to find out if the individual is being ostracized or not.

The scale’s most important implication is in the colleges and universities where young adults are found and face this problem daily. Likewise, psychologists can also use it in clinical settings. The other important implication of this scale is that it is opening a route to future research as different variables can be studied in ostracism such as depression, physical health and anxiety.

Ostracism is a hidden evil in societies that is not usually talked about. When people are not given equal importance in groups or settings, it leads to serious psychological issues in those individuals. This scale will in the identification of the problem that will lead to a proper solution to this evil.

This work is original and not copied from anywhere. The research was conducted with the sole purpose of developing a scale on the ostracism experiences in young adults. The data is collected in the form of online surveys. The current scale is an attempt at developing a more reliable and valid scale that can be used in social settings.

This paper systematically reviews the evidence of reliability and validity of scales available in studies that reported surveys of students to assess their perceived self-efficacy of information literacy (IL) skills.

Search in two subject and two general databases and scanning of titles, abstracts and full texts of documents have been carried out in this paper.

In total, 45 studies met the eligibility criteria. A large number of studies did not report any psychometric characteristics of data collection instruments they used. The selected studies provided information on 22 scales. The instruments were heterogeneous in number of items and type of scale options. The most used reliability measure was internal consistency (with high values of Cronbach’s alpha), and the most used validity was face/content validity by experts.

The culture of using good-quality scales needs to be promoted by IL practitioners, authors and journal editors.

This paper is the first review of its kind, which is useful for IL stakeholders.