Development and validation of the college students' time management competence scale

In an era characterized by rapid knowledge progression and intensified academic and social competition, time management skills have become a crucial competency for college students to manage academic responsibilities, balance various life commitments, and enhance personal competitiveness. Although current tools, such as the Adolescent Time Management Disposition Scale (ATMD), have contributed to prior studies, their dimensional frameworks may inadequately capture the psychological and behavioral characteristics of contemporary college students in digitally mediated environments. Thus, the present study aimed to develop and validate the College Students' Time Management Competence Scale (CSTMC).

A total of 861 responses were retained across two independent samples. A 30-item candidate pool was generated through a structured review of Chinese- and English-language literature on time management and self-regulated learning (SRL). A single-round structured expert review involving four experts (two linguists and two subject-matter specialists) resulted in the removal of eight items before pilot testing. The pilot form therefore contained 22 scored items and one additional unscored instructed-response attention-check item used only for response-quality screening. Of the 250 pilot questionnaires submitted, 209 responses met the response-quality criteria and constituted the exploratory factor analysis (EFA) sample; an independent sample of 652 responses constituted the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) sample. Internal consistency, composite reliability, convergent validity, and factor-level discriminant validity were evaluated.

EFA supported a five-factor structure comprising (1) Sense of Time Value, (2) Time Planning, (3) Time Monitoring, (4) Time Regulation, and (5) Sense of Time Efficacy. Together, the five factors accounted for 68.847% of the total variance. The subsequent CFA showed satisfactory model fit: χ ²/df = 1.8676, RMSEA = 0.037, CFI = 0.976, IFI = 0.976, and NFI = 0.949. The final 22-item scale demonstrated satisfactory psychometric properties. Cronbach's alpha was 0.95 for the total scale and ranged from 0.810 to 0.879 across the subscales. All composite reliability (CR) values exceeded 0.70, and all average variance extracted (AVE) values exceeded 0.50, supporting internal consistency and convergent validity.

The findings provide initial evidence that the CSTMC can assess multidimensional time-management competence in college students, including time-value beliefs, planning, monitoring, regulation, and efficacy. The scale offers a theory-informed framework for identifying distinct competence profiles and for developing targeted, low-stakes educational supports, while additional criterion-related and cross-context validation remains necessary.