Adaptation and Validation of the Dispositional Positive Empathy Scale to the Argentine Adolescent Population

Abstract

Positive empathy implies an expression of happiness or joy, resulting from understanding the positive emotional condition of another person and sharing it. The aim of this research was to evaluate the psychometric properties of the adaptation of the Dispositional Positive Empathy Scale in the Argentine adolescent population. The instrument on which the adaptation was made consists of seven items, originally in English. The sample (n = 303) was made up of 95 males (31%) and 208 females (69%), aged between 11 and 17 years old, high school students. Construct validity was studied by performing a confirmatory factor analysis and the invariance of the scale in relation to the sex and age of the participants. Convergent validity was verified with prosocial behavior towards various goals, differences in levels of positive empathy between sexes and across different age groups, and reliability levels (Ω = .78) were tested. The results indicate that the scale is one-dimensional, coinciding with the original version. A good fit of the model to the data was found (cfi = .98; tli = .96; nnfi = .96; nfi = .95; rmsea = .05). The model remained constant across both sexes and age groups. Positive empathy was related to prosociality and differences were found according to sex and age. The findings show that the psychometric characteristics of the adaptation of the Positive Empathy Dispositional Scale to the Argentine adolescent population are satisfactory.