Scale development in muscle dysmorphia

Abstract

Scope and Method of Study: The purpose of this study was to develop a scale in muscle dysmorphia (MD) using sound scale developmental techniques as presented in the literature. Eight steps were used in this process. They are as follows, generating an item pool representative of the dimensions from three models of MD, presenting a Likert type set of items to selected Subject Matter Experts (SME), generating a revised set of items following review from SME's, administration to a college population of male and female students ages 18-25 (n = 823), exposing data to an exploratory factor analysis, and finalizing a scale following review of statistical exposure, i.e. factor loadings and reliability.

Findings and Conclusions: An 85-items scale was developed from the eight steps listed above. The name of this new scale is Hale's Scale (HAS). The overall alpha for this new scale is .912. Nine dimensions of muscle dysmorphia were retained for the final instrument. This study is exploratory in nature. Future research is needed to determine convergent validity, sample reliability with various populations, and measurement invariance.