InternationalMedicalJournal

\blume 18.Number 4 December.

2011

Validation of the Malay Version of Adolescent

CopingScale

Khairani Omar, MohamadAdam Bujang,Tuti Iryani Mohd Daud,

X'airuzNazri Abd Rahman,Sit X'ongLoh, JamaiyahHaniff,
RozanimKamarudin,X'auzifsmail,SusanMK Tan

@ ZOff Japan International Cultural ExchangeFoundation

& Japan Health SciencesUniversity
 MedicalJournalVol. 18,No.4.pp. 288- 292. December2011
lntemational

Validationof the Malay Versionof AdolescentCopingScale

Khairani Omar'), Mohamad Adam Bujang'?),Tuti Iryani Mohd Daud3),
Fairuz Nazri Abd Rahman3), Sit Fong Loh3), Jamaiyah Haniffo),
Rozanim Kamarudins), Fauzi Ismail6), Susan MK Tan3)

ABSTRACT
Introduclion: Adolescent coping scale (ACS) was developed for adolescentsto assesstheir coping strategies. Coping during
adolescenceis important since they face many challengesduring this period of rapid development.
Objective: To transl^te the short form of ACS into Bahasa Malaysia language and to evaluate its reliability and validity.
Methods: This is a multi-centre, cross-sectional study involving six hospitals, conveniently chosen to represent different
regions of Peninsular Malaysia. A total of 102 patients, aged 12-18 years old, !rho fulfilled the selection criteria, \rere selected
from these hospitals. Two for\vard and backward translations of the ACS were done in Bahasa Malaysia in accordance to the
guideline. Its reliability was det€rmined by test-retest reliability and internal consistency whil€ construct validity was evaluated
using exploratory factor analysis.
Rerrlts. The proportion agreements of th€ items were good (76Ea-87Eot,however the weighted kappa for each item was fain
to moderate (0.26-0.59).Several analyseswere done using exploratory factor analysis and the best result was obtained when the
factors were forced into two factors. The domains of th€ Bahasa Malaysia version of ACS were redefined into two factors, name-
ly non-productive and productive coping strategies, Internal consistenciesfor these two redefined factors were good
{Cronbach'salpha > 0.7r.
Conclusion: The reliability measurements of the Bahasa Malaysia version of ACS were good especially if the domains were
redefided into two domains which were productive and non-productive coping strategies. The difference from the results of the
original version of ACS could be due to socio-cultural factors.

KEYWORDS
validation, adolescentcoping scale, reliability, validity

INTRODUCTION that an individuai'schoice of coping strategiesis fairly consislent.

regardlessol the natureof the concern(Frydenberg,Lewis, 1994).
Thus. thereis a GeneralForm of the ACS which addresses how an
Adolescenceis the lime when coping is vcry important,since individual copes with conccrnsin general.Both the Gereral and
they face manynew experiences and challenges duringthis periodof Spccific Forms of the inslrumentappearin a Long Form (eighty
dcvclopmcnl(Frydenberg,1997).Adolescentsneedto IcarnIo cope items)and a ShortForm (eightecnitcms).
in a varielyof seIIings,includingschool.homeand amongpeers.The The Short Form is recommendedin situationswhcrc it is not
challengesthe adolescentsface today are perhaps more challenging practicalto usean eighty-ileminstrument. It is madeup of onc gcncr-
than jn the past. According to the National Health and Morbidiry ic item from each of the eighteen subscales(in the Long Form) that
Survey(NHMS) 2006(lnstitutetbr PublicHealIh.2008)in Malaysia, m a k e u p o f e i g h t e e nc o n c e p l u a la r e i l so r s t r a t e g i e so l c o p i n g
the prevalence of psychiatricmorbidilyamongstchildrenand adoles (Frydenberg,1997).The eighteeniterns of thc Short Form is then
ccnls was 20.37o,an increaseof 7.37. comparedto the prevalence empirically group into three domainsthat relate tot j) solving the
rate ol 137. in the NHMS 1996sludy (Toh, Ding, Penget al, 19971. problem.ii) rcfcrcnceto othersand iii) non-productive coping.ACS
In addition.local mcdia frequentlyreportson behavioralproblems was developedto enablethe galhcringof data on the vuious copiDg
occurringamongadolescents. Thus,thereis a needon more research styles used by adolescents so that they may be able to understand
and intcrvenlionin the well beingand mentalhealthof adolescenls. t h e i r o w n c o p i n g b e h a v i o ra n d s u b s e q u e n t lm
y a k es e l f i n i t i a t e d
A d o l e s c e n tC o p i n g S c a J e( A C S ) w a s d e v e l o p e db y E I i c a changesIo improvethemselves.
Frydenbergand Ramon Lcwis in 1993.lt is a self:ratingqucslion- The dilemmatacedby researchers in Ihc field of mentalhealthin
nairefor adolescents agedtweivc to eightccnyca$ old (Frydenberg. Malaysiais the availabililyol vaiidatedqucstionnaircs in thc local
Lewis. 1995).It was developedto addresssome of the problcms language(BahasaMelayu). Without validatedqueslionnaires.the
rclatingto copingmeasurement that had bcen raised.Sincemuch of conclusionsdrawn from local studiesusing these questionnaires
a n i n d i v i d u a l ' sc o p i n g b e h a v i o ri s s i t u a t i o ns p e c i f i c .t h e r e i s a could be questioned. Thus,the objectiveof this studywasto translate
Specific Form of Ihc ACS which allows for the measurcmcnlof the ShortForm of ACS inlo BahasaMelayulanguageand to evaluate
responses to a particularself nominated(or administrator nominated) its reliabililvand validitv in the localconlexL
co'rcern(Frydenberg, Lewis, 1993).However.it hasalsobccn shown

l ) D e p r . t m c no t l F a u j l y M e d i c i n eF. a c u l l yo f M c d i c i n c .U n i v e . s i t K
i e b a D g s a aMna l a y s i a
2) B;ostatisticsUnit. Clinical ResearchCenrrc,Ministry ofHealth
3) PsychiatryDcpartmcnt.Unive.sili KabangsranMrlaysia
4 l C l i n i c a l E p i d c m i o l o gUy n i r ,C l i n i c a lR e s e a r cC
h enircM . i n i s t . yo f H c a l t h
5) Dlsease C o n t r o lD i v i s i o n .M i n i s t r yo f H e a l t h
6) Psychi!try DcpartDcnt.Hospital Selayang
Corrcspondence to: MohamadAdam Bujang
(c maiI adam@crc.sov.my)

@ 2011JapanInternational
CulluralExchangcForndation
& JapanHealthScicncesUniversity
 OmarK. et al.
DESIGN
This is a multi-centre, cross-sectionalstudy, involving six hospi-
tals, conveniently chosento representdiffeaent regions of Peninsular
Malaysia.The study was done in three phases:
i) PhaseI I Translationprocessof ACS into BahasaMalaysia. -
language.
ii) Phase2: Pre-test
iii)Phase3: Validationof BahasaMalaysiaversionof ACS
The approval to conduct the study and permissionto translatethe
questionnairewas obtainedfrom the Ministry of Healrh Researchand
E r h i c a l C o m m i t t e ea n d t h e p u b l i s h e r ,A u s t r a l i a nC o u n c i l f o r
Educational ResearchLtd., respectively, before the commencement
of the study. Informed consent was also obtained from the parents
and pa icipantsprior to the study.
Phos€ l:Tronslolion process ot ACS into Bohoso Moloysio
Longuoge
The translationprocesswas conductedby a group of expertscon-
sisting of languageexperts and medical.personnel.The processwas
done accordingto the guidelines whereby two forward and two back-
ward translationswere done in parallel by two medical and two lan-
guageexperls-The processof translationwas carefully done with the
importance of ensu ng the preservation of contents and the mean-
ings. The aim was to evaluateclarity, comprehension, naturalness
and adequacyof wording.
After the reconcilementof the two forward and backward transla-
tions, sentence-by-sentencerevision was done by the expeft commit-
tee. Translatorswere advised to report any difficulties encountered.
Cood translations were reflected by the production of two English
back translationswhich were almost similar to the originai English
version. After amendmentswere made accordingly, a harmonized
BahasaMalaysia version of ACS was produced.
Phoso2: Pr€-lesl
The translatedBahasaMalaysiaquestionnaireand the original
English questionnairewere tested on 40 adolescentswhose age
rangedbetween12 to 18 yearsold, which was the age rangethat the
ACS was developedfor. The respondentswere selectedftom a group
of adolescents who were bilingual. To ensurethe adequacyof the
respondents'bilingual competency,the respondents had to passthe
languagefl||ency test assessed by the investigators.Only studenls
wbo passedthe test were eligible to participatein the pre-tesrstudy.
The Bahasa Malaysia and English versions were randomly
administeredto the respondents.Subsequently,lhis sessionwas fol-
lowed with a focus group discussionon the questionnaires.The
respondents'responseson their thoughts and suggestionson suitable
words to be used as well on the comprehensionof the lranslatedver-
sion were discussed. The expertcommitteereviewedthe comments
and made appropriateamendments.At the end of the pre-test,a final-
ized BahasaMalaysia version of ACS was produced.
Phose3: Volidotionot BohosoMoloysioversionof ACS
The finalized BahasaMalaysia version of ACS was tested for its
reliabilityand validily. Reliability in lhis study was determinedby
test-retestreliability and intemal consistency.Construct validity was
evaluatedusing exploratory factor analysis. Factor analysis assesses
the internal validation by evaluatingthe faclor loading.
Selection of clinics and respondents
The siudy population consistedof adolescents,aged 12-18 years
old, who were new relerrals to the child/adolescentpsychiatry clinics
of the participating study sites.The caseswerc selecredfrom the new
cases refen'ed to the outpatient or inpatient attending the child and
adolescentpsychiatryunit in severalMinistry of Health hospitals
who fulfilled lhe inclusion criteria. The caseswere sampledconsecu-
rively.
The hospitalsinvolved were:
a) Central region: Hospital Selayangand Universiti Kebangsaan
Malaysia Medical Centre in the Klang Valley.
289
b) Northern region: Hospital Pulau Pinang in the state of Pulau
Pinang
c) Southemregion: Hospital Permaiin the stateof Johore
d) Easternregion: Hospital Universiti Sains Malaysia in the srare
ol kelantan and Hospilal Kuala Terengganuin the state of
Terengganu
Inc lusion criteria were :
a) Adolescentswhose age rangedfiom 12 to l8 yearsold.
b) Patientswho are able to read and write in BahasaMalaysia.
c) Newly refened patients to the child and adolescentpsychiatry
clinic of rhe participatinghospitalsstatedabove.
Exciteria were:
a) Patientswho have cognitive impairment (such as mental retar
dation) and severepsychosis.
b) Patientswho were illiterate
c) Patientswho have problemsunderstandingBahasaMalaysia
Adm i n i s t r ati o n of Que s I io nnair e
Participantswere given a set of self-administeredquestionnaire.
The estimatedtime to complete the questionnairewas approximately
l0 to l5 minutes.
The questionnaireincluded:
i) I)emographicquestions:age, gender,ethnicity and level of
education
ii)FinalizedBahasaMalaysiaversionofACS
The participants were asked to repeat the procedure two weeks
after the first session.This was to measurethe test-retestreliability.
To ensure the accuracy of the responses,the participants were left
without any interference,especially from rhe project facilitators and
parents,during the administrationof the questionnairc.
Stqti.rtical merhods
For reliability test, internal consistencyand rest-retestreliability
were used.Cronbacb'salpha morc than 0.5 was acceptablewhile 0.?
or morc was consideredgood (Nunally, 1978) and corr€cted item to
total correlation more than 0.2 was acceptable(Streiner. 1995). For
weightedkappa,value lessrhan 0.2 was consideredpoor,0.21-0.40
fair, 0.41-0.60moderate,0.61-0.80good and 0.81-1.00very good
(Altman, I99l). Construcrvalidity was evaluatedusing exploratory
factor analysisusing principle componentanalysis with oblique rota-
tion method. Factor loadings of 0.4 or more were consideredgood
(Raubenheimer,2004). Statisticalanalyseswere conductedusing
STATA version9.0 (StataCorp.,CollegeStation,Texas)and PASW
version18.0.(SPSSInc, ChicagoIL)
RESUTTS
Table I shows the demographicdala of the participantsin the
study. A total of 102 participants were selected for the study. The
mean(SD) age of the participanlswas | 3.7 (2.0) yearsold. Majoriry
of the participantswere Malay.
Rgliobility ot Bohoso Moloyslo version of ACS
The reliability of the BahasaMalaysia version of ACS was derer-
mined by test-retestreliability and internal consistency.For test-
retest reliability, the proportion agreemenrof the items were good
(mnged between 76%-81%), however the weighted Kappa for each
item \ras fair to moderate,as it ranged from 0.26 - 0.59 (Table 2).
The interclasscorrelationcoefficients for the domains werc good as it
rangedbetween0.653 - 0.71 | (Table 3).
With.egard to internal consistency,Cronbach'salpha for the
domain 'referenceto others'was low (< 0.5) and the correcteditem to
 290 Validationof the Malay Versionof AdolescentCopingScale

Table l. Characteristics of the participants Table 2. Test-retest reliability measurementsof the Bahasa
Melayu version of ACS

t2 t4 60 58.8
15 l8 42 4t.2 weighled

A8e in Mean(SD) r3.7(2.0) k^ppa \o/.)

Gender I 87.5 0.58 0.71

Malc 49 48.0 2 a2.l 0.45 0.53
53 52_0 l 86.8 0.57 o.61
Ethnicily 80.8 0.46 0-65
Malay 83 81.4 5 86.r 0.58 0.70
l4 13.'7 7a_6 0.34 0-50
,7
5 8r.9 0.55 0.61
8 85.9 0.60 0.71
'75.9
Prinary ll 12.7 9 0.36 0.54
89 8',7.3 t0 82.1 0.40 0.48
'7',7.7
Academicachievemenr ll o.24 0.31
5l 50 t2 79.6 o.37 0.48
(mosrlyCradeA andB) l3 75.0 o.32 0.41
Average(GradeC) 30 29.1 t4 83.6 0.51 0.70
t2 .8 l5 83.2 0.4'7 0.59
'79.9
(GradeD andlower) l6 0.39 0.41
9 8.8 l7 77.2 0.32 o.32
Mother'seducationallevel l8 8l.4 0.39 0.48
,| 6.9
Secondaryschool 47 46.1
Table 4. Internal consistenciesand corrected item-total correla-
Terliaryeducation 34 l3-l
tions of the domains
13.7
Farhelseducarionallevel Domains Internalconsistency Correcteditem-total
(Cronbach's alpha) correlation
I 8.8
Secondaryschool 4l 46.1 Based on fie domains in lhe

Tedary education l3 32.4 orisinal English ACS

l3 t2.'7 Solving the problem o.627 0_265- 0491

Reference lo others 0.44',7 0.193- 0.360
Non productive cop;ng 0.715 0.2870.615
Table 3. lnterclass correlation of the domain
scores{test-retest) Based on $e redefined
lnte.class co.rehl:on domains of the Bahasa
(basedon rheorisinal EnslishACS) Melayu ACS

Solvin8 the problem 0.71I Non productive coping 0.761 0.309- 0.574
0.653 Productve coping 0.725 0.328 0.466
Nor produclive coping 0.708

grouped into meaningfulgroups. Similarly, when the items were

total correlation was 0.19 - 0.36. Cronbach'salDha for the other two
d o m a i n sr s o l r i n g l h e p r o b l e mc n d n o n - p r o d u c t i vceo p i n g ) w e r e
acceptable,0.63 and 0.72 respectively and all ihe items had accept
able correcteditem to total correlation values of more lhan 0.2 (Table
4). However,when the domainswere redefinedinto two domains,
namely 'productive' and 'non-productive'coping strategies(Table 5),
the intemal consistenciesfor both domainswere more than 0.? (Table
4) and the correcteditem to total correlationswere acceptable(> 0.2).
Volidiiy lesl
For construct validity, factor analysis was evaluated using
exploratoryfactor analysis.The analysiswas done basedon three dif-
Ierent approachesas below:
i. Number of factors produced was based on Eigen value more
than one.
ii. Number of factors producedwas forced into three factors
(basedon the original instrument).
iii.Number of factors producedwas forced into two factors.
When constructvalidity was basedon Eigen value morc than one,
five factors were Droduced.However. thesefive factors could not be
forced into three factors, basedon the number of domains of the orig-
inal English version of the ACS. the items did noI fall properly into
the three odginal domains namely; solving the problem, referenceto
others and non-productive coping strategies.The three factors con
sisted of a mixture of items from the three o.iginal domains. There
were no definite meaningful groups which can be defined.
If the items were forced into two factors, the groupings became
more meaningful and the factors could be redefined as 'produclive
coping strategies'and'non-productivecoping strategies'(Table 5).
All the items groupedunder the two new domainshad acceptabletac-
tor loadingsof mor€ than 0.4 except item 5 (Table 5) Item 5 was
groupedunder 'non-prcductivecoping strategies',following the origi-
nal version, although the factor loading for that domain was 0.36,
which is slightly less than 0.4. Item 6 could be included in both
domains since the factor loadings for both were greater than 0.4
(Table 5). The items in the'productive coping strategies'werea com-
bination of the other two domains of the original vedion (solving the
problem and referenceto others)
Based on the highest factor loadings for each item and consider-
ing the items groupedin the domains of the original English version,
the items were groupedas below:
Factor1 (non-productive coping):items4,5,6,'l,8,9,1|,12,13
Factor2 (productivecoping):items 1,2,3,6, 10,14,15,16,17,18
 Omar K. et al. 29r

Table5. Factorloadingsofthe itemsfor the redelineddomaittsof the BahasaMalaysiaACS

Fador I Factor 2
Domrin: Non-productivecopitrgstrrt.gies
Q4 Bimbangtentrngapayang akanberlakuke atasd;ri saya. 0.6t0 0.215
worrt abo what |9ould hdppen b ,ne
Meluangkanlebihbanyakmasadcngankawanl€laki atauplrcmpuanssya 0.365 0.498
Spendnok tine with n! borf,iend/Eituriend
Q6 M€mperbaikihubungansayadensanoranglain 0.574 0.522
lnprcv tnr rclatio6hip''ith othen
Q? MenSharapsupayaberlakusesuatuk€ajaiban 0.594 0.t40

Q8 situasitersebut
Sayatidak adacarauntuk menyelesaikan 0.514 0.196
I do not hdveo solutionto thepn'hlen
Q9 perasaan
M€ncarijalanuntukmelepaskan contohnya.menangis,menjeril,minum arak.mengambildadahdll 0.644 0.r00
Find wals h ventm!feelinssJor instaaLe..r)",scrcan,consuneal.ohol. takedru8s
Q masalahilu supayasayabolehmeng€lakkanoya
Tidak m€nShiraukan 0.463 0.255

Ql2 M€letakkankcsalahanarasdiri sendiri 0.633 0.t93

Absolve n ! seIJ oJ w.ons doi ne
Qtl perasaan
Merahsiakan yangsayahadapi 0.753 0.071
Keep to pn,hlem 1onlself

Domain: Productivc coping s.rstegies

Ql Berbincang dengan orang lain renlang saya supaya dapat dibanlu 0.t08 0.571
Talk to tuneone about m! pmblem b htlh he to rcsolve em

Q2 Cuba meny€l€saikan masalah scdaya upaya saya 0.359 0.517

Tr! to rcs.'lv it in ,he be\t possihle '|a!

Q3 Bekerja keras 0.193 0.483

wo* hard

Ql0 Bergaul dengan orang yag nempunyai masalah yd8 sama 0.242 0.431
8e \|ith toneone \|ith the sa'|e prcble,n

QI4 Memohon kepada Tuhan untuk ncminta bantuan dan petunjuk supaya segalanya akan sempurna 0.379 0.459
Ptarlot heh un.l tuidance so that things will turn out well.

Ql5 Melihat kebaikan disebalik sesuatu perkara dan fikirkan yang baik s$aja 0.107 0.646
tnok aI tc h,isht !n1e oJ th. ptoble, anl be optinistic

Ql6 Meminra banruan ahli professional 0.057 0.502

Seek pmlettional help

Ql7 Luangkan masa lapan3 unluk akliviti yanS relaks -o.t77 0.51t
O(up! nt! titv ||irh hohbies or recrcario

Ql8 Menjaga kesihnran dan keccrSasan

Take.aru d tn\ he.lth dn.l\|eU-heing
' l l c m 5 s 3 \ i n c l u d e da \ i . o n - p r o d u r l i r ec o p i n C\ r n r c ! ) r r \ i n r h eo n e i n n lE r g l i \ h r c ^ i o n ) .

In the original English versionof ACS, the items are grouped
into threedomains.Items4,5,6,7,8,9,11,12 and l3 are groupedin the
'non-productive'
c o p i n g d o m a i n , i t e m s 2 , 3 , 6 , 1 5 , 1 7a n d 1 8 a r e
groupedin the'solvingthe problem'domain,while items 1,10,14and
| 6 arc groupedin the 'reference to others'domain.
ln this study, factor I was namedas 'non-productive
the ilems were similar to thal of lhe original version for non-produc-
tive coping domain (Table 5). All the items had fairly good factor
loadings.
Factor 2 was named as'productive coping'. Factor 2 is a combi-
nation of factors from the original domains 'solving the problem'and
'referenceto others'.The internal consistenciesfor the two redefined
factors were good (Cronbach'salpha> 0.7). Refer to Table 4.
DrscusstoN
This study describeda translation,cross cultural adaptationand
validation of the original English ACS questionnaireto the Bahasa
Malaysia version adapting intemational methodological procedures.
Developing a culturally equivalenttranslatedinstrumentrequires
familiarity with basic problems of linguistic adaptationand cultural
construct inherent in the translation process.A mere word-for-word
translationof an English versioninto anotherlanguageis not ade'
quate to account for linguistic and cultural differences (Hilton,
Skrutkowski,2002).It was found that translationaccordingto mean-
ing (semantictranslation), usingwords acceptable to adolescents was
coping'as beller understoodby adolescents.
tn this study, the test-retestreliability for the BahasaMalaysia
version of the ACS showeda fair to moderatemeasure.Although the
proportion agreemenlof the items were good (7670 86%), Ihe weight
ed Kappa for each item ranged from 0.26 - 0.59 which was fair to
moderate-However. the inlerclasscorrelationcoefficientsfor the
t h r e e d o m a i n sw e r e g o o d ( 0 . 6 5 - 0 . 7 1 ) . F r y d e n b e r ga n d L e w i s
(1993b)reportedcorrelationcoefficientsof 0.44 to 0.84 after two
weeks for the eighteensubscalesof the ACS (Frydenberg,Lewis,
1993).Endler and Parker(1990) reporteda rangeof0.5l to 0.73 after
six weeks for their coping instrument (Endler, Parker, 1990) while
Clyshaw et a/. reported correlation coefficient of 0.6 after five
months (Glyshow, Cohen,Towbes, 1989).
With regard to the internal consistencyof the Bahasa Maiaysia
version of ACS, it was good only for the 'non-productive' domain
(Cronbach'salpha > 0.7) while'solving the problem'domain was
moderareand 'referenceto others' domain (Cronbach'salpha < 0.5)
 292 Validationof the MalayVersionof Adolescent
was not acceplable.However, when the items were re-defined into
lwo domainsnamely.non-produclive coping slrategiesand produc
t i v e c o p i n g s t r a t e g i e s t, h e i n t e r n a l c o n s i s t e n c i e ism p r o v e d t o
Cronbach'salpha more than 0.7 for both domains.This indicatesthat
jt is more suitable to redefine the items into the two domains (non
productiveand productive) in assessingthe coping styles for the local
population.The difference could probably due to the different socio
culruralbaclgroundof lhe Iocalpopulation.
For conslruct\alidiLy. using exploralor) laclor analysis.resJks
for the analysesbasedon 'Eigen value more than one' and 'forced into
three factors basedon the original version' were not satisfactory.The
best solulion for the BahasaMalaysia version of ACS, were to re-
group the items into lwo factors: i) non-productivecoping strategies
and ii) productivecoping strategies.The factor loadingsfor the items
under these two newly defined factors were fairly acceptable.This
was further supportedby the good intemal consistencyvalues mea-
\ured for the lactorsaq menlionedabo\e.
The items which fell under the 'non-productivecoping strategies'
factor (Factor l) were similar with that of the original version. Item 5
was includedas'non-productivecoping'althoughits factor loading
for that domain was slightly less than 0.4. In the original English ver-
sion, item 5 which is "Spendmore time with my boyfriend/girlfriend"
was consideredas a non-productive coping strategy which was
acceptableand approp ate. Thus, the authors decided to include this
item in the'non-productive strategies'as well, basedon the basiccon-
cept and not dependingmerely on the statisticalvalue.
Factor 2 was named as 'productive coping strategies'since the
items which fell under this factor could all be consideredas produc-
tive coping strategies.Lewis et a1 had defined strategiessuch as
problem solving, working hard, physical recreation and relaxing as
productive coping (Lewis, Frydenberg,2007). If compared wirh rhe
original version,the items underthe domains'solvingthe problem'
and'referenceto others'were groupedtogetherunder this factor.
Basedon the definitionabove,the itemsfor'solving the problem'are
productivecoping strategies. The items fbr'referenceto others'are
also consideredas productive coping strategiesby our local adoles-
cents, for example 'pray to god for help and guidancc so that things .-
will tum out well' and 'seekprofessionalhelp'. The social cultural
behaviorand belief in our local societyadvocates adolescents
the abovecoping strategiesas some of the ways to resolvetheir prob-
lems. The Spanishversionof ACS had also redefinedthe domains
differently from the original English version to adapl to their local
socialcuhuralbehavior(De Minzi. Christina,2003).
There arc severallimitations in this study. Despite the attempt Io
selectthe participantsfrom all the different regions in the country, rhe
samplepopulationwas skewedsince all the sampleswere taken from
the clinics in the hospitalsand suspectedto have mental health prob-
lems. The samplesize was also small and a bigger samplesize would
yield better results.Majority of the participantswere Malay and other
ethnics were under represented.For future recommendation,the
BahasaMalaysia version of ACS should be conductedin the normal
populationincluding vadousethnicsand using a bigger samplesize.
coNcLusroN
In conclusion,the BahasaMalaysia version of AdolescentCoping
Scale was found to have a fair to moderatetest-retestreliability and a
good internalconsistencyif the domainswere re-definedinto two
CopingScale
domains which were 'productive coping strategies'and 'non-produc-
tive coping strategies'asshown in the constructvalidity analysis.
This study is a preliminary study and a future researchwith better
sample population is required to evaluate further the reliability and
validity of the instrumentin the local community.
FUNDING
This work was funded by the Ministry of Health, Malaysia.
DECLARATION
OF INTEREST
All authorsdeclarethat they have no conflicts of interests.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We wish to extend our deepestg.atitude to the Clinical Research
Centre, Ministry of Health for grant conferment. the dedicated
researchassistantsand all participanlsin this study for their kind
cooperation.
REFERENCES
FrydenbergE. (1997). Adolesce.t coping. th€oreticaland rcscarchpcrspccrivc.London:
Inltnut€ for Public Health. (2008). The Third National Herhh and Morbidiry surv€y
(Nll{\4S III) 2006. Kuala Lunpu. Ministry ofHcalrh, Malaysia.
Toh CL. Ding LM. PengR. d/ a/. (199?).NarionalHc.hh and Moibidiry Surlcy (NHMS Ul
1996.Kuala Lunpur: Instirutefo. Plblic Heallh Ministry ofHealth.
F r y d e n b e . gE , L e w i s R . ( 1 9 9 5 ) . A d o l e s c c n tC o p i n g S c a l e .A d m i n i s t r a t o r ' sM a n u l l .
Melbourne,Ausralia:The Aoslrrlia. Council for EducaiionalResea.chLtd.
F r y d e n b e r gE , L e v i s R . ( 1 9 9 3 ) . M a n u a l , T h e A d o l c s c c n tC o p i n g S c a l e ,M e l b o r r n e :
to use AuslralianCouncil for EducalionalResearch.
FrydenbergE. Lewis R. (1994). Coping wilh differenl conccms:consistencyand varialion
in coping srraregiesusedby adolescedts.
Aust Psychol,29,45-.18.
Nurnaur.lC. (19?8).Psychomefic theory (2^!ed).New York: Mc Gnw HiU.
Slrciner DL, Nordan CR. (1995). Heahh neasuremenl scales:a praclical Cuide ro lhcir
developnentond usc (2" cd). OxfordrOxford Univqsny Press.
Altman DG. (1991).Practicalsratisticsfor medicalrcsearch.London: Chapnan add Hrll.
RaubenheinerJE. (2004). An iten selectionprocedureto naximize scale rcliability and
l a l i d i r y .S A f r J l d d P s y c b o l , 3 0 ( 4 ) , 5 9 - 6 4 .
Hilton A, Skrutkowski M. (2002). T.anslaring instruncnts inro othc! languages:develop
menrand testingprccesses. cancer Nurs,25(l), 1-?.
Endlcr NS. ParkerJDA. (1990). Srare.nd ftan adxiety, depressionand coping sryles.Aus J
Psychol,.12i2),207-220.
Glrsh,w K. Cohen L, Towbes L. (1989). Coping srmtegiesdnd psychological dinress:
prospectivemalysis of edly and middle adolescents.Am J Communiry Psychol. l?.
601 623.
Lewis R, FrydenberyE. (200?). Adolcscentproblem solving efficacy and coping stotegy
nsagc in a topulation ol Austlalian Adolescenrs.In CS Cates (Ed.), 2007. Energing
thoughl and researchon sludent.leacher.nd administalor strcssand coping,35 48.
Dc MinziR, Christin! M. i2003).Copingasesdem in dolesccnts.Adolcsccncc, 18. 12l 330.