Validation of the Mental Health Promoting Knowledge Scale (MHPK-10) for the Portuguese population

Abstract

Introduction: Mental health literacy refers to the knowledge and abilities needed to promote mental health, and valid and comprehensive measures are needed to assess it. In Portugal, there are few validated measures to assess knowledge about the factors that promote positive mental health. Objective: To translate and culturally adapt the MHPK-10 to the Portuguese population. Material and Methods: The sample was recruited through a nonprobabilistic method, for convenience, in several institutions of the Porto Metropolitan Area and through an online questionnaire. The validation included the translation and cultural adaptation of the MHPK-10 original version and the analysis of the psychometric properties: reliability—test-retest and internal consistency, content validity, construct validity and criterion validity. Results: The sample consisted of 1,728 individuals aged between 14 and 95 years. The internal consistency value is reasonable (α= 0.79), and the test-retest values (r=0.72) support the reliability of the instrument. The factor analysis forced to a factor resulted in satisfactory values, explaining a variance of 35.92%. In the criterion validity, a low correlation was obtained (r=0.32). Conclusion: Psychometric properties appear to be reasonable, although additional studies are needed. The present work is a positive contribution to the validation of MHPK-10.