The Students' Attitudes Towards Women'S Childbirth Experience - Development and Validation of a Questionnaire for Health Sciences Students (Cave-St)

BACKGROUND: The purpose of this study is to report on the validation process of the Spanish version of a questionnaire that explores health science students’ attitudes towards women’s childbirth experiences. This questionnaire could help inform education programs to enhance the quality of woman-professional interactions, and to improve women’s experiences of childbirth. METHODS: A standardised procedure for the development and validation of the questionnaire included: item development and psychometric pre-validation, Cronbach’s Alpha and split-half coefficients calculation, test–retest and item-total correlation for the reliability analysis. Content validity was undertaken by Delphi method with sixteen panelists over two rounds. We determined the factor structure and refined and validated the questionnaire according to the responses of a cohort of 160 students using principal components factor analysis with varimax rotation. RESULTS: A 52-items questionnaire CAVE-st: (acronym for cuestionario de actitudes sobre vivencias y experiencias en el parto) was developed and validated. The questionnaire had a high construct validity, with a Cronbach´s alpha > 0.92. The intraclass correlations (0.80) indicated adequate test–retest reliability. The results of the exploratory factor analysis revealed fourteen latent components that explained more than the 70% of the observed total variance. CONCLUSIONS: The Spanish version of the questionnaire CAVE-st has been developed and validated. Its psychometrics indicate that it is a valid and reliable tool to assess health sciences students’ attitude towards women´s childbirth experience. Further work to translate and adapt the instrument in other cultures and languages will be undertaken.