The cross-cultural validity of the Resilience Scale for Adults: a comparison between Norway and Brazil

BACKGROUND The resilience construct is of increasing interest in clinical and health psychology. The Resilience Scale for Adults (RSA) is a measure of protective factors. The evidence supporting its construct validity is good, however evidence of cross-cultural validity is modest. The present study explored the factorial invariance of the RSA across a Brazilian and a Norwegian sample, as well as the construct validity in the Brazilian sample. METHODS The Brazilian sample (N = 222) completed the Hopkins Symptom Check List-25 (HSCL-25), the Sense of Coherence (SOC), and the RSA. The Norwegian sample (N = 314) was included in order to examine the factorial invariance. RESULTS The results indicated that the latent constructs of the RSA (its primary factors) are the same in the Brazilian sample as in the Norwegian sample. The correlations between the subscales of the RSA were significant. In the Brazilian sample, the correlations with HSCL-25 and SOC were negative and positive, respectively, thus supporting its construct validity. CONCLUSION The results indicate that the original factor structure of the RSA based on Norwegian samples remains stable in a Brazilian sample.