Evaluation Of The Validity And Reliability Of The Turkish Version Of The Perceived Vulnerability To Disease Scale

Abstract

The spread of communicable diseases and causing disease in many living things is defined as an epidemic. Epidemics lead to an increase in anxiety and fear levels in society. Studies show that disgust also promotes psychologically-based response behaviors that serve as the first line of defense against pathogens, especially in situations such as pandemics. All of these defensive responses are referred to as the "behavioral immune system". The behavioral immune system is involved in triggering perceived vulnerability to infectious disease (PVD). This system is hypersensitive to any sign that might represent a threat from a pathogen, thus minimizing the possibility of infection. Studies show that protective behaviors are based on perceptions of high vulnerability to the disease. This study aims to evaluate the validity and reliability of the PVD-S for Turkish society and language. The study is methodological research conducted between February and April 2021. The participants were university students studying at different faculties. In the reliability analysis of the Turkish version of the scale, the internal consistency of Cronbach's alpha coefficient was 0.712. Test-retest evaluation of the scale yielded an intraclass correlation coefficient of 0.882 and a Spearman correlation coefficient of 0.815. When content equivalent form validity was evaluated, it was found that there was a weak and positive correlation between the SAI and PVD-S scores (r=0.268; p=0.003). The total variance explained by the scale after EFA was calculated as 56.517% and it was found that the scale items were divided into 4 sub-dimensions (infection perception, infection perception reverse-scored, germ avoidance, germ avoidance reverse-scored) using the Varimax rotation method. According to the data we obtained as a result of our study, it appears that the Turkish version of the PVD-S has sufficient psychometric properties and has adequate validity and reliability, especially in the young population.