French Adaptation of the Strengths Use Scale

Nicolas Bressoud; Rebecca Shankland; Philippe Dubreuil; Jacques Forest; Karel Belleville; Andrea C Samson; Philippe Gay

doi:10.1177/07342829231205811

French Adaptation of the Strengths Use Scale

J Psychoeduc Assess. 2024 Feb;42(1):119-125. doi: 10.1177/07342829231205811. Epub 2023 Oct 5.

Authors

Nicolas Bressoud^{1

2}, Rebecca Shankland^{3

4}, Philippe Dubreuil⁵, Jacques Forest⁶, Karel Belleville⁷, Andrea C Samson^{2

8}, Philippe Gay⁹

Affiliations

¹ Valais University of Teacher Education, St-Maurice, Switzerland.
² Department of Special Education, University of Fribourg, Fribourg, Switzerland.
³ Laboratoire DIPHE (Développement, Individu, Processus, Handicap, Education), Department of Psychology, Education and Vulnerabilities, Université Lumière Lyon 2, Lyon, France.
⁴ Institut Universitaire de France, Paris, France.
⁵ Department of Human Resources Management, Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières, Trois-Rivières, Canada.
⁶ Department of Organization and Human Resources, ESG UQAM, Montréal, Québec, Canada.
⁷ Department of Psychology, Université de Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, QC, Canada.
⁸ Faculty of Psychology, UniDistance Suisse, Brig, Switzerland.
⁹ UER EN, Vaud University of teacher education, Lausanne, Switzerland.

Abstract

Background: Positive psychology focuses on enhancing attitudes and behaviors that support well-being, with a key pillar being the use of psychological strengths for optimal functioning. This is linked to positive outcomes such as increased happiness and life satisfaction.

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the psychometric validity of the French adaptation of the Strengths Use Scale (SUS), a self-report tool measuring how individuals use their strengths in daily life. The original SUS, developed by Govindji and Linley (2007), has not been thoroughly assessed across languages and cultures.

Method: The French SUS's psychometric properties were examined using data from six independent French-speaking Canadian samples (N = 1397). After removing cases with missing data, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted on a subsample to establish the optimal factor structure. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was then performed to assess the factor structure's goodness-of-fit.

Results: Both EFA and CFA supported a unidimensional structure of the scale. The French SUS demonstrated good internal consistency (α = .94). The one-factor model yielded an RMSEA of .122, indicating some model misspecification. However, allowing residuals of some items to covary improved the model fit (RMSEA = .077).

Conclusion: The adapted French SUS exhibits similar properties to the original and presents no new consistency issues. This study contributes to adapting and validating the SUS in French for research and clinical practice. Future research should focus on developing a shorter version by eliminating redundancies and adapting the scale for children to evaluate positive psychology interventions' efficacy in youth.

Keywords: educational psychology; factor analysis < measurement; strengths-based assessment < assessment of interventions/outcomes; test adaptations < culture/crosscultural.