A multidimensional model of sexual health scale for men; Design and Psychometrically Evaluation of Iranian version

Introduction: Sexual health plays an important role in men's quality of life, and a relatively high prevalence of related disorders, causes problems in family life. The aim of the present study was to design a multidimensional Persian version of Sexual Health questionnaire and to assess its reliability and validity in the Iranian society. Method: The present study was conducted within the framework of descriptive and correlation based psychometric design. The men's sexual health questionnaire was designed using questions from the Hensel and Fortenberry (2012) Women's Sexual Health Questionnaire. In order to that instead of 5 genital pain questions, was placed six questions related to erectile dysfunction. The participants included 202 men (the age range of 17 to 57) in Tehran who were selected by available sampling method. To determine the reliability of the questionnaire, the equivalence method was used and the validity was evaluated by confirmatory factor analysis. Also, for assessing the convergent and divergent validity, the correlation of the scale was evaluated with Rosen et al (2004) Sex Function Questionnaire. Result: Cronbach’s alphas for the whole questionnaire (0/85) and for the Emotional, Physical, Mental/Attitudinal, Social domain (the range 0.65 to 0.96), suggested good inner consistency of the questionnaire and domains except for Sexual Autonomy. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the original pattern of questionnaire and all indicators except Sexual autonomy (10,11,12, questions). Also, factor loading was not significant for questions 19 (related to Fertility control) and 26 (related to Sexual anxiety). Therefore, Sexual autonomy variable and questions 19 and 26 excluded from the final version of the questionnaire. Except these 5 questions all paths was significant at P <0.01 level. The chi-square indices to degree of freedom, SRMR and CFI, were respectively 1.66, 0.062, and 0.95, which indicate good fit of the model. Finally, correlation patterns between dimensions of the questionnaire with Total sexual health questionnaire indicated good validity of the scale. Conclusion: The result of this study indicate that the "multidimensional Persian version of Sexual Health questionnaire" with 33 items, due to features such as proper reliability and validity, simple scoring and usability by therapists and researchers is an appropriate tool for multidimensional assessment of men sexual health.