Development and validation of COVID-19 Impact Scale

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Public Health
• Mental Health Assessment

Background:

• The prolonged COVID-19 pandemic necessitates updated tools to assess evolving psychological responses.
• Existing measures may not fully capture the multifaceted psychological impact of the pandemic.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate the COVID-19 Impact Scale (CIS).
• To measure psychological stress, including emotional responses and daily living difficulties, related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Main Methods:

• Recruited 2152 participants for scale development and validation.
• Administered the CIS, Fear of COVID-19 Scale (FCV-19S), and other mental health measures.
• Analyzed factor structure, reliability, and validity through exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses.

Main Results:

• Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses supported a robust one-factor structure for the CIS.
• The CIS demonstrated strong correlations with depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, and fear of COVID-19.
• The CIS showed superior explanatory power for depression and anxiety compared to the FCV-19S, which lacked significant correlations with well-being and suicidal ideation.

Conclusions:

• The CIS is a valid and reliable tool for assessing emotional problems and quality of life deterioration due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
• The CIS provides a more comprehensive assessment of pandemic-related psychological distress than the FCV-19S.
• Further research directions and study limitations were discussed.