Evaluation of a Polish Version of the Dundee Ready Education Environment Measure

The Dundee Ready Education Environment Measure (DREEM) is an instrument that assesses the educational environment.

The aim of this study was to psychometrically evaluate a Polish version of the DREEM instrument.

203 medical students who fully completed the DREEM questionnaire were included in the study. Validity was evaluated through the analysis of construct validity and reliability.

After language validation the internal consistency was assessed. Cronbach's alpha for the overall score was 0.93 and the five subscales were: perceptions of learning 0.86, perceptions of teachers 0.82, perceptions of atmosphere 0.75, academic self-perceptions 0.61, and social-self perceptions 0.61. The exploratory factor analyses, however, yielded dimensions that did not fully correspond to the original DREEM subscales.

Internal consistency of the Polish version of the DREEM scale as a whole was excellent, however for each of five originally developed subscales it was lower and vary a lot; construct validity of Polish version was not compatible with the original structure of the DREEM scale but was reasonable. A new five-factor solution obtained in this study could be a reliable tool for assessing the medical education environment in the Polish circumstances, but it will require confirmation in future study.