New Gratitude Scale for Mexican Youth: Validity and Reliability Analysis

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Cross-cultural psychology
• Psychometrics

Background:

• Gratitude is a key strength linked to well-being.
• Cultural context is crucial for developing effective gratitude measures.
• Existing scales may not capture the nuances of gratitude in diverse populations.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a culturally adapted Mexican Gratitude Scale for adolescents and young adults.
• To establish the psychometric properties of the scale, including reliability, internal structure, convergent validity, and criterion validity.
• To provide a culturally relevant tool for assessing gratitude in Mexican youth.

Main Methods:

• A 28-item scale was refined using Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) with 442 Mexican participants (mean age 20.81).
• Psychometric properties were evaluated, including reliability (Cronbach's alpha, omega coefficients), internal structure, convergent validity, and discriminant validity.
• The scale's correlation with related constructs like optimism and hope was assessed.

Main Results:

• A 9-item Mexican Gratitude Scale with a robust two-dimensional structure (personal and emotional gratitude) was established.
• Excellent model fit indices (CFI = .98; NFI = .97) and high internal consistency (personal gratitude ω = .89; emotional gratitude ω = .88) were observed.
• The scale demonstrated good convergent validity, with significant correlations between gratitude dimensions and optimism, positive vision, affective resources, and hope.

Conclusions:

• The Mexican Gratitude Scale possesses acceptable psychometric properties for use with Mexican youth.
• The scale is suitable for application in both general and clinical populations for future research.
• This culturally adapted instrument enhances the assessment of gratitude in a specific demographic and cultural context.