A short form of the Spanish version of the Netherlands empowerment list: development and validation

Abstract

Purpose The Netherlands Empowerment List (NEL) is the only psychometric instrument for evaluating empowerment that has been adapted and validated for use in the Spanish-speaking population. Although the Spanish NEL has demonstrated good psychometric properties, it is relatively lengthy. This study aimed to develop and validate a short form of the Spanish NEL.

Method The sample comprised 406 users of community mental health services, split into two groups. With the development subsample (n = 200), we developed a short form of the Spanish NEL based on the factor loadings obtained through exploratory factor analysis. The validation subsample (n = 206) was then used to evaluate its psychometric properties (internal structure, differential item and test functioning by gender, internal consistency, temporal stability, and validity based on relationships with other variables). Additionally, percentile ranks for each raw score were calculated using the total sample (n = 406).

Results We developed a 12-item short form of the Spanish NEL, confirmed its unidimensionality, and demonstrated that the scale scores had excellent internal consistency and temporal stability. Scores on the Spanish NEL-12 also correlated strongly with measures of empowerment, recovery, hope, and perceived social support.

Conclusion The results suggest that scores on the Spanish NEL-12 provide a valid and reliable measure of empowerment in Spanish-speaking users of mental health services. Furthermore, the study provides preliminary percentile scores to support its use in clinical settings for evaluating empowerment.