Psychometric Properties of the Persian Version of the Staff Observation Aggression Scale-Revised (SOAS-R) in Psychiatric Patients.

Masoud Siratinir,Abolfazl Mohammadi,Muhammad Gooshi,Abbas Ebadi,Abbas Tavallai

doi:10.15171/jcs.2017.032

Abstract

Introduction: In psychiatric settings, aggressive events frequently occur during therapy. The use of a proper standard scale to register aggression can facilitate the assessment and control of aggression and help reduce its frequency and severity. The aim of this study is to evaluate the validity and reliability of the Staff Observation Aggression Scale—Revised (SOAS-R). Methods: This psychometric study of the scale was conducted to determine the validity and reliability of the SOAS-R. The validation of the scale was assessed on the basis of 319 aggressive events in the psychiatric wards of the Baqiyatallah and Roozbeh hospitals. Convenience sampling was used for subject selection. Psychometric properties of SOAS-R were studied in two stages. First, the standard scale was translated according to the International Quality of Life Assessment (IQOLA) translation methodology. The face validity, content, and construct validity of the translated version were then determined. The construct validity of the scale was assessed by comparing the known groups. Results: The internal consistency of the whole scale was 0.99. The intra-class correlation coefficients (ICC) were 0.85–0.99 while kappa coefficient was 0.43 to 0.65 for different aspects of the SOAS-R. The validity of the scale was concurrently assessed by using the Visual Analogue Scale (VAS), with a Spearman-Brown correlation coefficient of 0.90. Conclusion: These results showed a favourable validity and reliability for the Persian version of the SOAS-R for the assessment of aggressive behaviour in psychiatric patients.

Highlights

In psychiatric settings, aggressive events frequently occur during therapy
Redefined the scale's items and introduced the Staff Observation Aggression Scale—Revised (SOAS-R),18 which includes checklist items about specific aspects of aggressive behaviour such as provocation, means used by patients, target of aggression, consequences for victims, and measures to stop aggression
Each aspect has an ordinal scaled structure, whereby higher values correspond to the defined types of increasing aggressive behaviour

Summary

Introduction

Aggressive events frequently occur during therapy. The use of a proper standard scale to register aggression can facilitate the assessment and control of aggression and help reduce its frequency and severity. Conclusion: These results showed a favourable validity and reliability for the Persian version of the SOAS-R for the assessment of aggressive behaviour in psychiatric patients. One type of scale—including the Overt Aggression Scale and the Modified Overt Aggression Scale (OAS, MOAS)—categorizes acts of aggression according to type, such as verbal aggression, physical aggression towards objects, physical aggression towards oneself, and physical aggression towards others Another type— including Staff Observation of Aggression Scale-Revised (SOAS-R)—views aggressive behaviour as part of a behavioural chain.[10] The SOAS-R is a measure to describe aggressive event incidence and characteristics.[11] Due to its simplicity of use, it can monitor a wide range of dangerous behaviours.[12]

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion