Adaptation of the Psychological Wellbeing Scale in Mexican medical students

Abstract

Introduction. The Ryff Scale of Psychological Well-Being is the most widely used instrument for assessing the eudemonic perspective of well-being. Although it has been adapted for the Spanish population, it has not been modified for health science students in the Mexican population. Objective. Adapt and obtain the psychometric properties of this scale for medical students in the Mexican population. Method. The study was conducted with 1,974 undergraduate students, 1,551 from the UNAM Medicine Faculty and 423 from the La Salle University Mexican School of Medicine. The analysis was undertaken using the IBM SPSS Statistics 21 and AMOS 21 SPSS programs. Results. An instrument with a robust structure derived from the exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses carried out was obtained, with satisfactory explained variance, adequate internal consistency obtained through the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient, and appropriate discrimination. Discussion and conclusion. Our adaptation is a suitable version for Mexican medical students with four final dimensions; purpose in life, personal rejection and self-acceptance, personal control, and personal growth.