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Factor structure and measurement invariance across gender, age and sport psychology experience of the SPA-R in Spanish athletes

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Abstract

Attitudes towards sport psychology may explain why, or why not, athletes use psychological services. To measure these attitudes, Martin, Kellmann, Lavallee, and Page (2002) created the Sport Psychology Attitudes- Revised instrument (SPA-R), which has been used in different countries in recent years. The objective of this study is to obtain a Spanish version of this instrument and present its first evidence of reliability, validity and invariance in a sample of 332 Spanish athletes. After carrying out the back-translation of the scale, the different factorial models present in the literature were tested, confirming the four-factor structure. The invariance across age, sex and sport psychology experience and confirmatory reliability is demonstrated, permitting the use of this scale in the Spanish-speaking population. The results obtained are compared with the attitudes of athletes from different countries towards the sport psychology service.

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The datasets generated during and/or analysed the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Valencia, Valencia, Spain

    Irene Checa, Víctor M. Arnau & José M. Tomás

  2. Department of Social Psychology, University of Seville, Seville, Spain

    M. Rocío Bohórquez

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  1. Irene Checa
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  2. M. Rocío Bohórquez
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  3. Víctor M. Arnau
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Correspondence to M. Rocío Bohórquez.

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Checa, I., Bohórquez, M.R., Arnau, V.M. et al. Factor structure and measurement invariance across gender, age and sport psychology experience of the SPA-R in Spanish athletes. Curr Psychol 42, 639–647 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-021-01447-7

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