Factor structure of Ryff’s psychological well-being scales in Swedish female and male white-collar workers

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Abstract

The present study aimed to investigate the structure of a Swedish translation of Ryff’s psychological well-being scales covering self-acceptance, positive relations, autonomy, environmental mastery, personal growth and purpose in life. Moreover, the consistency of previously reported age and gender profiles of psychological well-being was examined. Analyses were based on data from 1260 white-collar workers aged 32–58 years. The internal consistency coefficients of the translated scales were higher than that of the original Ryff scales. Further confirmatory factor analyses replicated previous findings showing that the proposed six-factor model with a single second-order super-factor had better fit than the single factor model. Besides confirming previously reported age and gender profiles, the study showed age differences in self-acceptance and gender differences in environmental mastery and purpose in life but not in personal growth. The present findings clearly demonstrate the adequacy of the Swedish version of the Ryff scales in female and male white-collar workers.

Introduction

The last few years have witnessed an increasing interest in the positive aspects of psychological functioning, including psychological well-being. Among the issues central to the study of positive psychological functioning are the development of theoretical frameworks and operationalization of related concepts (e.g., Aspinwall and Staudinger, 2002, Snyder and Lopez, 2002). A recent conceptualization of psychological well-being is the multidimensional model proposed by Ryff and co-workers (e.g., Ryff and Keyes, 1995, Ryff and Singer, 1998). While most research pertaining to this model has focused on relating psychological well-being to demographic factors (e.g., Ryff & Keyes, 1995), stressful life events (e.g., Ryff & Singer, 1998), and physiological indicators (e.g., Lindfors & Lundberg, 2002), knowledge concerning the structural basis of Ryff’s psychological well-being scales (Ryff scales) is still limited.

The multidimensional life-span developmental approach to health and well-being developed by Ryff and Singer (1998) involves integrating different theories of individual development and adaptive functioning. Their conceptualization of psychological well-being covers six different dimensions including self-acceptance, positive relations with others, autonomy, environmental mastery, purpose in life and personal growth. These six dimensions have all been operationalized in the Ryff scales that have been shown to exhibit convergent and discriminant validity and reliability (Ryff & Keyes, 1995).

The majority of studies that have used the Ryff scales have aimed at describing and understanding psychological well-being with respect to age, gender, education, and socioeconomic status in different US, Canadian, and British samples (Clarke et al., 2001, Marmot et al., 1997, Ryff, 1989, Ryff and Keyes, 1995, Ryff et al., 2003). Findings are relatively consistent across the different versions of the Ryff scales, showing that environmental mastery and autonomy increase with age, particularly from young adulthood to midlife. In contrast, purpose in life and personal growth decrease with age, with the most pronounced decrement occurring from midlife to old age. However, no age differences have been found for self-acceptance. The results for positive relations with others have been mixed, indicating no age differences or age-related increases (Ryff, 1989, Ryff, 1995, Ryff and Keyes, 1995, Ryff et al., 2003). Gender differences have been established for positive relations with others and for personal growth, with women having higher scores than men for both dimensions, except in the three-item scales where gender differences in personal growth have not been replicated (Keyes et al., 2002, Ryff, 1989, Ryff and Keyes, 1995). Moreover, higher education has been linked with higher levels of psychological well-being, particularly with respect to purpose in life and personal growth (Keyes and Ryff, 1998, Marmot et al., 1997, Ryff et al., 2003). In addition, cross-cultural comparisons of psychological well-being in middle-aged Americans and South Koreans revealed similar age and gender profiles, but the Americans had higher scores on all dimensions of the Ryff scales (Ryff, 1995).

Analyses of the relationships between the six dimensions of the Ryff scales—for both the longer and shorter versions of these scales—have generally revealed moderate to high intercorrelations (Keyes et al., 2002, Ryff and Keyes, 1995). However, the six dimensions have been considered sufficiently distinct to be regarded as separate constructs and confirmatory factor analysis of the underlying structure have reconfirmed the presumed six-factor model with a single second-order super-factor (Clarke et al., 2001, Ryff and Keyes, 1995). In general, studies relating the Ryff scales to other measures aimed at assessing different aspects of well-being (e.g., affect balance, life satisfaction and self-esteem) have generated low to moderate associations and demonstrated that two of the dimensions in the Ryff scales, namely purpose in life and personal growth, belong to a factor separated from previous measures of well-being (Keyes et al., 2002, Ryff and Keyes, 1995). Associations have also been demonstrated for physiological measures, such as salivary cortisol (Lindfors & Lundberg, 2002). However, among the limited number of studies concerning the structure of the Ryff scales most have been based on the English version of the measure. Consequently, it is unclear as to whether these findings are applicable to data from other samples using translated versions of the Ryff scales.

The primary aim of the present cross-sectional study was to examine whether the factorial structure of the multidimensional model of Ryff’s psychological well-being scales (Ryff & Keyes, 1995) holds for a Swedish translation of the measure (Lindfors, 2002). Moreover, the consistency of previously reported age and gender profiles and relationships between demographic factors was examined for each the six dimensions of the scales. Finally, cross-cultural variations in psychological well-being were investigated.

Section snippets

Participants and data collection

The sampling of participants was carried out in concordance with procedures of a previous study (Lundberg, Mårdberg, & Frankenhaeuser, 1994) by the National Bureau of Statistics. The following sampling criteria were used: at least 35 hours regular paid work per week with employment in the white-collar sector between ages 32 and 58. Participants were not selected from the same families or households, although this may have happened by chance. Questionnaires covering demographic information and

Demographic description of respondents

The sample included 55% women and the average age was 45.3 years (SD = 7.2). Most respondents, about 85%, were married or living with a partner. About 81% reported that they had children living at home.

Intercorrelations and internal consistency of the Ryff scales

Intercorrelations between the six dimensions of the Ryff scales ranged from low to modest, with the lowest intercorrelation between environmental mastery and purpose in life and the highest intercorrelation between self-acceptance and environmental mastery (Table 1). Internal consistency

Discussion

Using a Swedish version of the short-form version of the Ryff scales, the present cross-sectional study largely confirmed the previously reported psychometric properties of the original short-form version of the scales. Moreover, the age and gender profiles described for different dimensions of psychological well-being were mostly reproduced.

Considering the psychometric properties in more detail, the internal consistency coefficients for the Swedish version of the Ryff scales were higher than

Acknowledgements

We are indebted to the women and men who volunteered to participate in this study. The research was supported by grants to Ulf Lundberg from the Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation and the Swedish Research Council.

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