Validation of the Persian version of the Ward Atmosphere Scale

Assessing the characteristics of the atmosphere of psychiatric wards provides managers with valuable information. This tool has had different accreditation features in different countries. This study was conducted to validate the Persian version of the short form of the psychiatry Ward Atmosphere Scale (WAS).

This cross-sectional study was part of a wider research (181 nurses and 299 patients) in selected hospitals of Bushehr and Shiraz cities-Iran in 2019. The psychiatry WAS-short form was validated according to the collected data. The steps of translation and re-translation of the scale were done by two people fluent in Farsi and English. Form validity and content validity were checked by asking the opinions of 11 experts, and the reliability of the questionnaire was checked by determining internal consistency and stability. SPSS software version 22 was used for data analysis.

No items were removed during content validity. The average index and content validity ratio were 0.92 and 0.88, respectively. The Kuder-Richardson coefficient was calculated for nurses and patients, respectively, 0.92 and 0.86. The intracluster correlation between test and retest scores for nurses and patients was calculated as 0.91 and 0.89, respectively.

Considering the validity and reliability of the short form of the psychiatry ward atmosphere scale in Iranian society, it is recommended to be used by researchers and medical staff. Other methods, such as divergent validity and factor analysis of the questions of the revised Iranian version of the questionnaire, are suggested.