A Summary of Construct Validity Evidence for Two Measures of Character Strengths

The VIA Inventory of Strengths has become the most widely used instrument in the world for measuring the construct referred to character strengths. However, several limitations were noted in its original development. In response, the VIA Assessment Suite for Adults was developed as a battery of instruments intended to address those gaps. The suite includes two inventories providing dimensional measures of the character strengths: the VIA Inventory of Strengths-Revised and the Global Assessment of Character Strengths. Short forms were also developed for each. So far, five reasonably sized samples of adults (total N = 7,924) have provided evidence for the empirical validity of some subset of these instruments, making them the most thoroughly vetted measures of character strengths available today. This article aggregates previously available and new findings on their construct validity. Evidence concerning substantive validity, structural validity, and external validity is reviewed, and in some cases aggregated across samples. The findings generally support the construct validity of the instruments evaluated according to all three standards, with exceptions noted. Recommendations are offered for their use in research and applied settings.