IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/jhappi/v15y2014i6p1333-1345.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Measuring Adolescent Life Satisfaction: A Psychometric Investigation of the Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale (MSLSS)

Author

Listed:
  • Kelly Bradley
  • Jessica Cunningham
  • Richard Gilman

Abstract

Concerns regarding construct bias in psychological assessment have been the subject of ongoing research for a half century. Little research has investigated the psychometric comparability of instruments designed to assess positive perceptions of individuals’ lives. The Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale (MSLSS), is based on a hierarchical factor structure that conceptualizes life satisfaction as an overall satisfaction that is subsumed by five domains believed to be important in youths’ lives: Family, Friends, School, Living Environment, and Self (Huebner in School Psychol Q 19:93–105, 1994 ). A Rasch measurement model was applied, rather than the typical approach of classical test theory such as factor analysis, to each domain to investigate measurement properties and determine equivalence across race at the item level. Results support a restructure of the rating scale categories due to the limited use of certain ratings and suggest revision of items that demonstrate differential item functioning across race. This study will aid in correct applications and proper interpretation of the scores reported for the MSLSS, as well as offering a methodological framework to apply to comparable psychological assessments. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014

Suggested Citation

  • Kelly Bradley & Jessica Cunningham & Richard Gilman, 2014. "Measuring Adolescent Life Satisfaction: A Psychometric Investigation of the Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale (MSLSS)," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 15(6), pages 1333-1345, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:jhappi:v:15:y:2014:i:6:p:1333-1345
    DOI: 10.1007/s10902-013-9478-z
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s10902-013-9478-z
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10902-013-9478-z?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Peter Greenspoon & Donald Saklofske, 2001. "Toward an Integration of Subjective Well-Being and Psychopathology," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 54(1), pages 81-108, April.
    2. E. Huebner & Rich Gilman, 2002. "An Introduction to the Multidimensional Students' Life Satisfaction Scale," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 60(1), pages 115-122, December.
    3. Rich Gilman & E. Huebner & James Laughlin, 2000. "A First Study of the Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale with Adolescents," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 52(2), pages 135-160, November.
    4. Melanie Davern & Robert Cummins & Mark Stokes, 2007. "Subjective Wellbeing as an Affective-Cognitive Construct," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 8(4), pages 429-449, December.
    5. Guy Moors, 2003. "Diagnosing Response Style Behavior by Means of a Latent-Class Factor Approach. Socio-Demographic Correlates of Gender Role Attitudes and Perceptions of Ethnic Discrimination Reexamined," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 37(3), pages 277-302, August.
    6. David Andrich, 1978. "A rating formulation for ordered response categories," Psychometrika, Springer;The Psychometric Society, vol. 43(4), pages 561-573, December.
    7. E. Huebner, 2004. "Research on Assessment of Life Satisfaction of Children and Adolescents," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 66(1), pages 3-33, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Janhavi Ajit Vaingankar & Mythily Subramaniam & Esmond Seow & Sherilyn Chang & Rajeswari Sambasivam & Nan Luo & Swapna Verma & Siow Ann Chong & Rob M. van Dam, 2022. "Youth Positive Mental Health Concepts and Definitions: A Systematic Review and Qualitative Synthesis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(18), pages 1-17, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Carmel Proctor & P. Linley & John Maltby, 2009. "Youth Life Satisfaction: A Review of the Literature," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 10(5), pages 583-630, October.
    2. Veljko Jovanovic & Dragan Zuljevic, 2013. "Psychometric Evaluation of the Serbian Version of the Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 110(1), pages 55-69, January.
    3. Javier Guzmán & Jaime Alfaro & Jorge J. Varela, 2019. "Sense of Community and Life Satisfaction in Chilean Adolescents," Applied Research in Quality of Life, Springer;International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies, vol. 14(3), pages 589-601, July.
    4. Deniz Yucel & Anastasia S. Vogt Yuan, 2016. "Parents, Siblings, or Friends? Exploring Life Satisfaction among Early Adolescents," Applied Research in Quality of Life, Springer;International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies, vol. 11(4), pages 1399-1423, December.
    5. Carla Zappulla & Ugo Pace & Valentina Cascio & Giovanni Guzzo & E. Huebner, 2014. "Factor Structure and Convergent Validity of the Long and Abbreviated Versions of the Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale in an Italian Sample," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 118(1), pages 57-69, August.
    6. Cristina Serna & Isabel Martínez, 2019. "Parental Involvement as a Protective Factor in School Adjustment among Retained and Promoted Secondary Students," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(24), pages 1-16, December.
    7. Runa Saha & E. Huebner & Kimberly Hills & Patrick Malone & Robert Valois, 2014. "Social Coping and Life Satisfaction in Adolescents," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 115(1), pages 241-252, January.
    8. Timothy R. Johnson & Daniel M. Bolt, 2010. "On the Use of Factor-Analytic Multinomial Logit Item Response Models to Account for Individual Differences in Response Style," Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics, , vol. 35(1), pages 92-114, February.
    9. Kosher, Hanita & Ben-Arieh, Asher, 2017. "Religion and subjective well-being among children: A comparison of six religion groups," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 63-77.
    10. Ben-Arieh, Asher & Shimon, Edna, 2014. "Subjective well-being and perceptions of safety among Jewish and Arab children in Israel," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 100-107.
    11. Keith Zullig & Eugene Huebner & Scott Pun, 2009. "Demographic Correlates of Domain-Based Life Satisfaction Reports of College Students," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 10(2), pages 229-238, April.
    12. Richard Sawatzky & Pamela Ratner & Joy Johnson & Jacek Kopec & Bruno Zumbo, 2009. "Sample Heterogeneity and the Measurement Structure of the Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 94(2), pages 273-296, November.
    13. K. Levin & C. Currie, 2014. "Reliability and Validity of an Adapted Version of the Cantril Ladder for Use with Adolescent Samples," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 119(2), pages 1047-1063, November.
    14. Miloš Kankaraš & Jeroen K. Vermunt & Guy Moors, 2011. "Measurement Equivalence of Ordinal Items: A Comparison of Factor Analytic, Item Response Theory, and Latent Class Approaches," Sociological Methods & Research, , vol. 40(2), pages 279-310, May.
    15. Guven, Cahit & Senik, Claudia & Stichnoth, Holger, 2012. "You can’t be happier than your wife. Happiness gaps and divorce," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 82(1), pages 110-130.
    16. Chang, Hsin-Li & Yang, Cheng-Hua, 2008. "Explore airlines’ brand niches through measuring passengers’ repurchase motivation—an application of Rasch measurement," Journal of Air Transport Management, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 105-112.
    17. Susana Marques & J. Pais-Ribeiro & Shane Lopez, 2011. "The Role of Positive Psychology Constructs in Predicting Mental Health and Academic Achievement in Children and Adolescents: A Two-Year Longitudinal Study," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 12(6), pages 1049-1062, December.
    18. Satish Kumar & Filomena Maggino & Raj V. Mahto & Riya Sureka & Leonardo Salvatore Alaimo & Weng Marc Lim, 2022. "Social Indicators Research: A Retrospective Using Bibliometric Analysis," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 162(1), pages 413-448, July.
    19. Jennifer Oser & Marc Hooghe & Zsuzsa Bakk & Roberto Mari, 2023. "Changing citizenship norms among adolescents, 1999-2009-2016: A two-step latent class approach with measurement equivalence testing," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 57(5), pages 4915-4933, October.
    20. Ivana Bassi & Matteo Carzedda & Enrico Gori & Luca Iseppi, 2022. "Rasch analysis of consumer attitudes towards the mountain product label," Agricultural and Food Economics, Springer;Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA), vol. 10(1), pages 1-25, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:jhappi:v:15:y:2014:i:6:p:1333-1345. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.