Development and validation of a child physical and sexual abuse prevention scale

Objective: School-based child abuse primary prevention programs are delivered across the country; however, a validated measurement tool that is feasible to deliver to students is unavailable. The purpose of this study was to describe the development and validation of a measurement tool for knowledge and skills related to the primary prevention of child physical and sexual abuse. Methods: Two elementary schools and 404 students participated. Students completed 5 instruments: the Play it Safe!^® scale, 2 scales related to abuse prevention, and 2 unrelated scales. For assessment of the convergent and divergent validity, correlations were estimated and corresponding p-values in SAS version 9.4. Results: For the Play it Safe!^® scale, the mean score was 10.87 out of 14 potential points (SD = 2.73; higher scores = higher knowledge). The internal consistency of the scale was adequate with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.77. We found strong correlations for the 2 convergent validity scales, and weak correlations for the 2 divergent validity scales. Conclusions: This study demonstrates the divergent and convergent validity of a child abuse primary prevention knowledge scale that can be used in school-settings and can assist in the measurement of primary prevention knowledge.