Development and Validation of the 'Causes and Impact Assessment of Farm Stress' Scale
Year: 2024
Type: preprint
Abstract: Existing farm stress surveys have limited relevance for the current UK agricultural sector by either their age or target national population. The existing measures (for example, Deary et al., 1997; Eberhardt & Pooyan, 1990; Firth et al., 2007; McShane et al., 2016; Truchot & Andela, 2018) are either outdated due to changes in political and economic structure (e.g. Brexit or the prevalence bovine TB/Avian Flu) or have been specifically designed for countries other than the UK (e.g. Australia or France). Moreover, the existing measures appear to focus on the causes of stress, rather than their underlying psychological construct. This is problematic as, although they provide surface-level information about stressors, most farm stressors are predominantly beyond the control of the individual farmer. To develop effective interventions, it is critical that understanding of farming stress is furthered beyond the uncontrollable such as weather and government policy. We need to perceive how management, resilience, and responses to stressors can be identified and developed through behavioural or cognitive change. We have consequently gathered data regarding the contemporary causes of farm stress in previous studies (n ~ 810). After a period of co-construction with a sample (n = 6) of target end-users, we have developed a new and novel scale to measure farming stress; the Causes and Impacts Assessment of Farm Stress (CIAFS) scale. Our scale is based on the ideas of multidimensional response formats from Peters Delusional Inventory (Peters et al 1999) and the Community Assessment of Psychic Experiences (Konings et al 2006). Both scales capture not only the frequency of occurrence but also the participant’s response. Our scale consequently also aims to capture both the cause of farm stress with sub-scales included to ascertain its impact on the farmer's thoughts, emotions, and behaviour. This current study aims to summarise the CIAFS development and to psychometrically validate this new measure. This will be achieved through exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to explore and identify the factor structure within the scale. We will perform reliability analyses as well as validate and confirm the psychometric properties of the factor structure with analysis of concurrent and discriminant validity. The development of this scale will assist us in understanding the factors that cause farm stress and how they impact the psychological well-being of members of the farming community.
Source: OSF Preprints (OSF Preprints)
Authors: Sarah Nyczaj Kyle, Andria Jones, Stephen Dunne, Emma Barkus
Language: English
Topic: Agriculture and Farm Safety
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
SDG: Zero hunger
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7113313043