Development and validation of the State Hope Scale

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Social Psychology
• Health Psychology

Background:

• Hope is a cognitive construct involving agency and pathways to achieve goals.
• The dispositional Hope Scale (Snyder et al., 1991) measures trait-like hope.
• A need exists for a measure assessing state hope, reflecting current levels of hope.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a brief, reliable measure of state hope.
• To confirm the State Hope Scale reflects agency and pathways components.
• To establish the concurrent and discriminant validity of the State Hope Scale.

Main Methods:

• Four studies were conducted to develop and validate the State Hope Scale.
• The scale comprises 6 items assessing current hope.
• Data were collected using correlational and causal designs.

Main Results:

• The 6-item State Hope Scale demonstrated internal consistency.
• The scale accurately reflects the theorized agency and pathways components of hope.
• The State Hope Scale showed concurrent and discriminant validity and responsiveness to life events.

Conclusions:

• The State Hope Scale is a brief, internally consistent, and valid self-report measure.
• This scale effectively assesses ongoing, state-level goal-directed thinking.
• The State Hope Scale is a valuable tool for researchers and practitioners.