Adaptation of the Couples Satisfaction Index into Russian

Abstract

The commonly used double translation method fails to provide evidence for cross-cultural equivalence of instruments used in multicultural research thus increasing measurement error-variance. This study exemplified the rigorous acculturation steps needed to negate this cross-cultural error-variance by verifying cultural appropriateness and psychometric equivalence between the instruments. Through application of a cutting-edge adaptation methodology, we created a Russian version of the 16-item Couple Satisfaction Index (CSI; Funk and Rogge in J Fam Psychol 21:572–583, 2007) that is semantically, idiomatically, experientially, conceptually, and linguistically equivalent to the original scale. Next, using the data from 406 Russian-speaking respondents, we employed parallel and exploratory factor analyses to explore the factorial structure of the adapted version subsequently named CSI-16(Russian). Internal reliability and convergent validity with another measure used frequently in Russian scholarship were high. Additionally, results suggested that couples’ satisfaction—when assessed as a unidimensional phenomenon—is similar across the two cultures in spite of linguistic, cultural, and socioeconomic differences between the cultures. The CSI-16(Russian) can be used in comparative cross-cultural studies with sufficient assurance of high convergent linguistic reliability and psychometric similarity with the original CSI scale.