Cultural Adaption, Translation, Preliminary Reliability and Validity of Key Psychological and Behavioural Measures for 18 to 25 Year-Olds Living with HIV in Uganda: A Multi-Stage Approach

HIV remains a significant public health issue among young adults living in Uganda.

There is a need for reliable and valid measures of key psychological and behavioural constructs that are related to important outcomes for this population.

We translated, adapted and tested the psychometric properties of questionnaires measuring HIV stigma, HIV disclosure cognitions and affect, antiretroviral therapy (ART) adherence, social support, personal values, and hope, using a multi-step process.

This included: translation, back-translation, expert review, cognitive interviewing, readability and assessments of internal consistency with 93 young adults (18–25 years) living with perinatally acquired HIV in Uganda.

Preliminary criterion validity was assessed by examining relationships between the adapted measures and wellbeing, HIV disclosure behaviour, HIV disclosure intention and viral load suppression.

The measures all showed acceptable reliability and every questionnaire apart from the Agentic and Communal Value Scale was easy to read.

Those scales measuring HIV disclosure affect and cognitions, social support, HIV stigma and hope showed relationships with other constructs suggestive of validity.

There is preliminary evidence to support the use of these measures in research and clinical contexts for young adults living with perinatally acquired HIV in Uganda.