DEVELOPMENT OF PERCEPTION AND ATTITUDE SCALES RELATED WITH COVID-19 PANDEMIA

Abstract

Aim: The aim of this study is to develop scales that can enable to evaluate perceptions and attitudes associated with the outbreak during the COVID-19 pandemic. Materials and Methods: The research sample was composed of 352 healthcare workers and 507 non-healthcare workers. In the study, perceptions and attitudes regarding COVID-19 were evaluated on five scales: Perception of COVID-19 (P-COVID-19), Perception of Causes of COVID-19 (PCa-COVID-19), Perception of Control of COVID-19 (PCo-COVID-19), Avoidance Attitudes from COVID-19 (AA-COVID-19) and Attitudes Towards the COVID-19 Vaccine (ATV-COVID-19). In the study, scales were evaluated with appearance validity, content validity, structural validity (explanatory and confirmatory factor analysis) and Cronbach alpha internal reliability coefficients. Results: After the explanatory factor analysis, the scales were found to be suitable for factor analysis and had sub-dimensions. The P-COVID-19 scale had "Dangerousness" and "Contagiousness", the PCo-COVID-19 scale had "Macro Control", "Personal Control" and "Controllability", the PCa-COVID-19 scale had "Conspiracy", "Environment" and "Faith", the AA-COVID-19 scale had "Cognitive avoidance " and "Behavioral avoidance", and the ATV-COVID-19 scale had "Positive Attitude" and "Negative Attitude" subscales. The determined sub-dimensions were evaluated by confirmatory factor analysis and good fit indexes were observed. Cronbach alpha coefficients were 0.74 for the P-COVID-19 scale, 0.79 for the PCo-COVID-19 scale, 0.88 for the PCa-COVID-19 scale, 0.88 for the AA-COVID-19 scale, and 0.80 for the ATV-COVID-19 scale. Conclusion: When the validity and reliability analyze of the scales are evaluated together, it can be said that the scales have a valid and reliable structure that measures the perceptions and attitudes regarding COVID-19 both in healthcare workers and non-healthcare workers.