A 15-Item Form of the F Scale and a Cross-Cultural Application

Summary

Item analyses of the 30-item F Scale in a sample of 355 Ss, and proportionate selection from the nine inferential item clusters first specified for this measure, permitted development of a 15-item version that correlated .95 with the original scale. Application of the shortened version to 194 American and 311 Italian subjects produced nearly equivalent means, but greater variance in the Italian sample. Reliability coefficients were .83 for the American sample and .90 for the Italian. Five items revealed significant differences, interpretable in accordance with known cultural emphases and historical experiences. Testing time for the 15-item scale was approximately five minutes. Complaints about item content were less insistent than typically encountered with the 30-item scale.