Development And Aplication Research Of The Multidimensional Life Events Rating Questionnaire For Middle School Students

Objective In order to assess the chronic stress, the Multidimensional Life Events Rating Questionnaire for Middle School Students (MLERQ) was established. The initial reliability and validity were established, the relationship between the levels of life events and sub-health status and health-risk behaviors was analyzed, and the evaluation of the questionnaires was performed to make MLERQ for better use.Methods With the guidance of the research on the establishment and application of the sub-health multidimensional evaluation method for adolescents, one of the National Key Technologies R&D Programs (863 plan), the initial questionnaire was developed on literature review, semi-structured interview, referring to similar questionnaires or scales, focus group discussion, etc. and then administered as a self-reported one to a large sample of middle-school adolescents (n=3 732) from grade one in junior high school to grade three in senior middle school, together with another two scales, Self-rating Anxiety Scale(SAS) and Self-rating Depression Scale(SDS). 8 statistical methods, Students't-test, Pearson correlation analysis, maximum orthogonal rotation factor analysis, etc. were employed to select the items according to the sensitivity, independence, effectiveness and internal consistency, with experts'comments acted as the final decision-making guidance. Cronbach'sαcoefficients, split-half reliability coefficient, construct validity, and the criterion-related validity were well tested. The test-retest validity was well examined on a sample of 114 middle school students.12 752 students from each two classes in middle schools (grade 1 and 2) and high schools (grade 1 and 2) were selected from eight collected cities to carry out the surveys about MLERQ, Multidimensional Sub-health Questionnaire of Adolescents (MSQA), self-injurious behaviors, suicidal psychology and behaviors within one year and network use within half a year, based on the convenient sample principle. Chi-square test was used to describe the rates of high level of life events, sub-health status, self-injurious behaviors, suicidal psychology and behaviors, network use, and to compare their differences in different genders, different residences and different grades, the differences of these rates on different levels of life events were also examined.Results According to the statistical analysis and experts'comments, the selected questionnaire with 5 dimensions and 43 items was eventually formed and showed a good content validity. The test-retest reliability coefficient, Cronbach'sαcoefficient and split-half reliability coefficient were 0.891, 0.923 and 0.880, respectively. The criterion-related validity based on SAS and SDS was 0.435 and 0.512(P<0.01), respectively. Confirmatory factor analysis showed a questionnaire structure identical to the previous design.Survey from 8 cities over the country told that the commonest life events lay in the dimensions of school life, family life and peerage-relationship, the average rate of high level of life events of different dimension was 34.0%, the rates of physical sub-health symptoms, psychological sub-health symptoms, psychosomatic sub-health symptoms, self-injurious behavior, suicidal psychology and behaviors, internet addiction were 11.6%, 11.6%, 10.7%, 19.9%, 15.0%, 10.4%, respectively. The differences of these rates in the three groups,﹤P27, P27~P73,﹥P73, were statistically significant, and the rates value increased with the rise of life events'levels,χ2 value was 867.92, 1 488.32, 1 398.68, 834.20, 148.83, 85.94, 50.37, 797.01, respectively. After all these rates were stratified by gender, residence and grade, the differences of the above rates were also statistically significant, and the rates became higher if the level of life events increased. Logistic regression analysis showed that low level of life event was a protective factor to the occurrence of psychological and behavioral problems, high level of life events was a risk factors.Conclusion After the strict item selection, MLERQ displays good reliability and validity, the rates of high level of life event from middle school subjects has got significant correlation with the rates of sub-health status, self-injurious behavior, suicidal psychology and behaviors and internet addiction, showing the MLERQ, which has got a good empirical validity, can act as an effective tool for assessing the chronic stress from middle school students'life events.