RESEARCH ARTICLE
Factor Structure of the Arthritis Body Experience Scale (ABES) in a U.S. Population of People with Osteoarthritis (OA), Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA), Fibromyalgia (FM) and Other Rheumatic Conditions
J.E.A Boyington*, 1, 2, §, R DeVellis2, 3, J Shreffler2, B Schoster2, L.F Callahan2, 4, 5, 6
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2008Volume: 2
First Page: 64
Last Page: 70
Publisher ID: TORJ-2-64
DOI: 10.2174/1874312900802010064
Article History:
Received Date: 22/9/2008Revision Received Date: 7/10/2008
Acceptance Date: 9/11/2008
Electronic publication date: 3/12/2008
Collection year: 2008
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/), which permits unrestrictive use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
Objective
To examine the psychometric properties of the Arthritis Body Experience Scale (ABES) in a US sample of people with osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, fibromyalgia and other rheumatic conditions.
Methods
The ABES, with the scoring direction modified, was phone-administered to 937 individuals who self-identified as having one or more arthritis conditions based on a validated, US, national survey assessment tool. Descriptive statistics of demographic variables and factor analysis of scale items were conducted. Scale dimensionality was assessed using principal component analysis (PCA) with oblique rotation. Criteria for assessing factors were eigenvalues > 1, visual assessment of scree plot, and structure and pattern matrices.
Results
The predominantly female (74.2%) and Caucasian (79.9%) sample had a mean age of 61.0 ± 13.1 years, and a mean BMI of 30.2 ± 7.1. Major arthritis conditions reported were rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis and fibromyalgia. A three-factor structure with cronbach alpha values of .84, .85 and .53 was elicited, and accounted for 72% of the variance.
Discussion
Compared to the two-factor structure evidenced by the original ABES scale in a sample of UK adults, the data from this sample evidenced a three-factor structure with higher variance. The third factor’s cronbach alpha of .53 was low and could be improved by the addition of salient questions derived from further qualitative interviews with patients with arthritis and other rheumatic conditions and from current literature findings.
Conclusion
The observed psychometrics indicate the scale usefully assesses body image in populations with arthritis and related conditions. However, further testing and refinement is needed to determine its utility in clinical and other settings.
