Work

Measuring HIV Stigma at the Family Level: Psychometric Assessment of the Chinese Courtesy Stigma Scales (CCSSs)

Year: 2014

Type: article

Abstract: Courtesy stigma is the stigmatization a person perceives or experiences due to their association with a stigmatized individual or group. Most HIV-related stigma scales have been developed for people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHAs), but not for their HIV-uninfected family members. To date, few measurement scales have been designed to measure the degree of stigma among both PLWHAs and their HIV-uninfected family members at the family level. We developed a set of courtesy stigma scales and estimated their reliability and validity from 256 PLWHAs and 256 of their HIV-uninfected family members. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were performed in two independent samples: a development sample (N = 216) and a validation sample (N = 296), respectively. Two factors ("public stigma" and "self-perceived stigma") had high internal consistency reliability (Cronbach's alpha coefficient between 0.83-0.90) and good construct validity (standardized factor loading range: 0.37-0.95) in both samples. These findings document that the newly developed brief instrument is a psychometrically sound measure of HIV-related stigma among both PLWHAs and their HIV-uninfected family members.

Source: PLoS ONE

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0092855

Authors: Hongjie Liu, Yongfang Xu, Yehuan Sun, Levent Dumenci

Institutions: University of Maryland, College Park, Guangxi Center for Disease Prevention and Control, Anhui Medical University, Virginia Commonwealth University

Language: English

Topic: HIV/AIDS Research and Interventions

Subfield: Infectious Diseases

Field: Medicine

Domain: Health Sciences

SDG: Good health and well-being

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $2,382