MARTINS, Anabela Correia    RIBEIRO, José Luís Pais. Desenvolvimento e validação da Escala de Auto-Eficácia para Utilizadores de Cadeira de Rodas . []. , 26, 1, pp.135-145. ISSN 0870-8231.

Studies showed that a person’s confidence in being able to perform a behaviour (self-efficacy) is a good predictor of social participation. As no specifically instrument designed to measure wheelchair users perception of self-efficacy existed, we developed the Wheelchair-Related Self-Efficacy Scale and tested its psychometric properties. An extensive literature review was conducted to identify general and specific self-efficacy outcome measures. The instrument was developed and subjected to wheelchair users to the initial validation and reliability tests. Analyses included descriptive statistics, factor analysis and Cronbach’s alpha. Questionnaires for 73 respondents (46.6% female; mean [SD] age, 39 [14.5] years; and mean [SD] number of years since adoption of the wheelchair, 12 [7.5] years) were analyzed. Using factor analysis with varimax rotation, three subscales explained 58.6% of the variance in our 13-item questionnaire. The domains reflecting three aspects of wheelchair-related self-efficacy: symptoms management, finding strategies and confidence in one’s own abilities. Cronbach’s alpha of the entire instrument was 0.81, and for the three individual scales scores were 0.80, 0.70 and 0.77, respectively. Correlations were moderate-to-high. The psychometric properties of the Wheelchair-Related Self-Efficacy Scale seem to be highly acceptable. Further validation of its use across different cultural settings is required.

: Wheelchair users; outcome measures; self-efficacy.

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