Health Education Research, Vol. 4, No. 3, 351-360, 1989
© 1989 Oxford University Press
research-article |
Validation of a self-efficacy scale to predict adolescent smoking
Department of Public Health Education, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC 27412 USA
The purpose of this study was to determine the validity and reliability of a self-efficacy scale to predict smoking in young adolescents. The self-efficacy scale was administered to seventh grade students from an urban school district in a mid-Atlantic state. Data on smoking behavior were collected from 567 students on three different occasions over a six month period. The 36 self-efficacy items included in the survey questionnaire described social and emotional situations in which people are likely to smoke. Factor analyses revealed three subscales: opportunities to smoke, emotional stress, and friends' influence, with a factor loading for each item of 0. 6 or higher. Analyses of variance were used to investigate the relationships between self-efficacy subscale scores and smoking behavior. Smokers and nonsmokers had significantly different subscale scores at each time period and the differences among subscale scores were maintained for future smoking behaviors, when initial smoking status was used as a covariate. The test— retest correlations for the subscales (r > 0.89) indicated good reliability for the self-efficacy scale. Constuct-, content-, and criterion-related evidence for validity substantiated the usefulness of this scale in predicting smoking in young adolescents.