Development and Psychometric Evaluation of a Measure of Mental Health Literacy in Parents of Adolescents.

Abstract

Background: Parents play an essential role in helping an adolescent who has a mental health concern; however, there are no measures of parental mental health literacy for parents of adolescents. Few measures of mental health literacy assess the underlying components of the construct, and measures that assess facets of mental health literacy in parents are limited in psychometric quality.

Objective: To develop and psychometrically evaluate a theoretically informed measure of parental mental health literacy, the Parental Mental Health Literacy (ParM-Lit) scale.

Method: The ParM-Lit was developed through the generation of items across key domains, expert review of items, and parental feedback. Parents of adolescents (N = 698) completed an online survey including the ParM-Lit and measures of parental attitudes toward help-seeking and knowledge of mental health disorders.

Results: Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses supported a 4- and 5-factor model; however, a 31-item, 4-factor model showed slightly superior fit. Internal consistency of the overall ParM-Lit scale was very good (α = .89), and test-retest reliability was moderate (ICC = .68; 95% CI = .61-.75). The ParM-Lit was strongly associated with parental attitudes towards help-seeking and moderately associated with knowledge of mental health disorders.

Conclusions: The ParM-Lit is the first measure of parental mental health literacy, and our findings support its psychometric properties. This final 31-item measure holds promise for advancing measurement of parental mental health literacy in clinical and research settings.