[Development and Validation of a German-language Short Form of the Coping Strategies Inventory]

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Psychometrics

Background:

• Stress coping strategies are crucial for managing demands.
• Emotional suppression is linked to pathological states, but lacks validated short assessment tools in German.
• Existing instruments may not fully capture the spectrum of coping mechanisms.

Purpose of the Study:

• To translate the Coping Strategies Inventory into German.
• To develop and validate a short version of the instrument.
• To assess the psychometric properties of the translated short version.

Main Methods:

• Translation of the Coping Strategies Inventory.
• Web-based survey for data collection (n=272).
• Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were employed.

Main Results:

• An exploratory factor analysis identified nine stress coping strategies, differing from the original eight.
• Confirmatory factor analysis supported the nine-factor structure with appropriate psychometric properties.
• The instrument demonstrated convergent validity through significant correlations with personality traits.

Conclusions:

• The short, translated Coping Strategies Inventory is a psychometrically sound instrument.
• It effectively measures nine distinct stress coping strategies.
• The validated instrument is suitable for use in German-speaking countries for stress and coping research.