Development and validation of a questionnaire based on the protection motivation theory to predict cigarette smoking preventive behavior in the Iranian university students

Prevention of smoking is very important at a young age and during the student period. Because of the lack of a questionnaire based on the prevention of smoking behavior, this study was conducted to design and standardize a tool according to the protection motivation theory (PMT).

This was an analytical cross‑sectional study where information and opinions of experts and then designing tools and assessing the face validity in the first phase and content validity, construct validity, test–retest reliability, and internal consistency of questions in the second phase were examined. The initial themes and structures were determined based on the literature Review and the opinion of experts. Three hundred students of Yazd Universities were selected by cluster sampling and included in the study. All analyses were performed in SPSS and AMOS software version 24 with a significance level of less than 5%.

The final version of the scale had 39 questions in eight dimensions. The overall Cronbach’s alpha value was 0.89, and for each dimension, it was more than 0.7. The content validity ratio and content validity index for the whole tool were 0.87 and 0.94, respectively. The results of confirmatory factor analysis showed that the latent construct model had good fit (X2/df = 4.31; RMSEA = 0.07; CFI = 0.94; NFI = 0.92; TLI = 0.91, P < 0.001).

In this study, a valid and reliable tool based on PMT to predict smoking behavior in students was introduced. This tool can be used in interventional and etiological studies. It also has questions related to the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid 19) virus and can be used in the coronavirus pandemic.