ABCDE-Psy: Primary assessment scale of acute stress response to critical and potentially traumatic events

Abstract

Objective: The focus of this paper is to present the psychometric validation of the ABCDE-Psy, an hetero-administered psychological assessment scale for measuring people's acute stress response to critical and potentially traumatic events. Method: An item bank is proposed based on a literature review and expert opinion. Its psychometric validation follows the usual scheme of classical test theory. The scale was administered to two samples, the first watching simulated cases (n = 60) and the second participating in real environments (n = 213). Results: The ABCDE-Psy scale shows solid psychometric properties in terms of both reliability (α = .793; 95 % confidence interval 0.764 - 0.822) and validity. Construct validity was supported by a univariate model of the scale based on confirmatory factor analysis (CFI: 0.956, TLI: 0.976, χ2: 2.567, p = .784, R2: 0.681). Conclusions: The results demonstrate that the ABCDE-Psy scale can be used as a reliable and valid hetero-administered measure for primary psychological assessment of the acute stress response to potentially traumatic events. This has important practical and clinical implications and opens up a new area of research in emergency psychology.