Psychometric Properties of the Persian Version of COVID Stress Scales (CSS) in the Iranian Population

Abstract Background: Recently, 36-item COVID Stress Scales (CSS) was designed for assessing anxiety and stress related to COVID-19 outbreak. The present study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Persian version of CSS in the Iranian population.Methods: A total of 393 participants volunteered to cooperate in the present study via an online survey. They completed a collection of scales, including the CSS, COVID-19 Phobia Scale (C19P-S), and Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI). The CSS reliability was determined by calculating Cronbach alpha and test-retest reliability. The validity assessed by Pearson correlation among the CSS and its subscales with C19P-S and BSI. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to evaluate the structure of CSS. All analysis assessed by SPSS-26 software.Results: Results showed that 45.3% of the participant’s age were in 18-25 years. Moreover, 72.8 % of the participants were female. Also, Cronbach’s alpha for all subscale was between0.83 to 0.92. The test-retest reliability coefficient of CSS was 0.87. The correlation between the CSS, BSI and C19P-S showed that CSS has suitable convergent validity. CFA and EFA showed that the 5-factor of CSS is the best model. Conclusion: To conclude, Persian version of CSS has suitable psychometric properties for utilizing in Iranian population.