Development and Psychometric Evaluation of the Sexual Health Protection Scale (SHPS) for Thai Female Adolescents

Abstract

            The objective of this cross-sectional descriptive study was to develop a scale to measure sexual health protective behavior in Thai female adolescents and to examine its psychometric properties during August-November 2006. The item generation was based on an extensive literature search overview of sexual health protection in female adolescents, the conceptual model of sexual health protection to conceptualize the health protection process and qualitative data generated from indepth interviews. The content validity of the Sexual Health Protection Scale (SHPS) was determined by three experts. The face validity evaluation by 12 female adolescents showed the SHPS to be appropriate and comprehensive. To test for construct validity and internal consistency, the SHPS was completed by 450 female adolescents in the southern part of Thailand. The results showed that the evaluation of the construct validity through the factor analysis yielded 107 items with eight factors namely, 1) alertness to search for information on sexual health; 2) guarding against having unsafe sexual intercourse; 3) perceiving vulnerability of safe sex practice; 4) perceived threats of AIDS, STDS and unwanted pregnancy; 5) communication with parents and peers about safe sex; 6) abstinence from sexual activity; 7) assertiveness in seeking information and 8) self-protection. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient on total scale was 0.93. Furthermore, on the validity by contrast group approach, it was found that most of the sexual health protection scores were significantly different between the high risk group and the low risk groups. In conclusion, these findings suggest that the SHPS should be useful for investigators in measuring sexual health protection in the Thai context.

Key words: scale development, sexual health protection, adolescence