The Development and Validation of an Arabic Version of an Academic Self-Concept Scale

Abstract

For a sample of 175 Arabic students attending three universities in the United States (one in Los Angeles and two in Colorado), the psychometric results arising from the development and validation of an Arabic version of an existing college level form of a standardized academic self-concept scale are presented. Both exploratory orthogonal and oblique factor analyses lent support to three of the original five hypothesized constructs underlying three factor subscales and afforded evidence in terms of loadings on a fourth factor of the fusion of two remaining hypothesized constructs. Confirmatory maximum likelihood factor analyses indicated that among many alternative first-order and higher-order factor models the one for which five oblique first-order factors were hypothesized yielded overall indexes revealing the closest degree of fit. It was concluded that the Arabic version demonstrated what could be considered satisfactory levels of reliability and homogeneity for all five factor subscales as well as substantial support for the validity of three of its hypothesized constructs.