Abstract
Robust evidence links students’ positive mental health with academic achievement and provides a compelling rationale for developing and refining strength-based assessments. The Social Emotional Health Survey–Secondary (SEHS-S) assesses adolescents’ social and emotional skills and positive psychological dispositions. Previous studies provide reliability and validity evidence; nonetheless, there is a need for continued refinement and validation across diverse groups. The current study revised and standardized the updated SEHS-S-2020 to validate further its use in secondary schools (Grades 9–12) with a large, diverse adolescent sample. Study participants included 72,740 from 113 California schools (structural validation sample), 10,757 students from 15 randomly selected California schools (criterion validation sample), and 707 students from four additional California schools (test-retest sample). Data analyses examined structural validity, measurement invariance, criterion validity, internal consistency, and response stability. Results supported the SEHS-S-2020 validity across diverse groups of youth in various contexts. The discussion focuses on implications for assessing students’ psychosocial assets and universal school-based screening.
Highlights
Robust evidence links students’ positive mental health with academic achievement and provides a compelling rationale for developing and refining strength-based assessments
The calibration and validation results indicated that the model fit was almost identical, further providing evidence that the full covitality model was successfully replicated with a different sample
The four Social Emotional Health Survey–Secondary (SEHS-S)-2020 domains showed excellent reliability, and subscale coefficients indicated moderate to strong reliability, except for self-control (α = .67, Ω = .64)
Summary
Robust evidence links students’ positive mental health with academic achievement and provides a compelling rationale for developing and refining strength-based assessments. The Social Emotional Health Survey-Secondary (SEHS-S; Furlong et al 2014a) is a strength-based questionnaire developed to create an efficient measure that educators can use to assess and monitor students’ positive psychosocial development. The SEHS-S measures strengths by assessing core psychological mindsets that can enhance positive youth development when fostered through the daily interactions with their family, peers, and other supportive adults in their immediate microsystems (Furlong et al 2019) Administering a measure such as the SEHS-S as part of a complete mental health screening process is one logical step to implement a comprehensive mental health program in schools. It is critical to rigorously evaluate and standardize the SEHS-S to evaluate its efficacy in identifying youth from diverse backgrounds in need of additional mental health support and fostering the flourishing wellbeing of all youth
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