Validity and reliability of the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) in competitive sport
Section snippets
Resilience in sport
Resilience is a highly desirable characteristic for athletes to have in sport given the stressors and challenges that they encounter (Fletcher and Sarkar, 2012, Galli and Gonzalez, 2015). Based on their findings, Fletcher and Sarkar recently defined psychological resilience as “the role of mental processes and behavior in promoting personal assets and protecting an individual from the potential negative effect of stressors” (2012, p. 675, 2013, p. 16) and conceptualized resilience as “the
Measuring resilience: The Connor Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC)
The CD-RISC was developed using constructs shown previously to be related to resilience, such as hardiness (Kobasa, 1979), which is a dispositional form of resilience and characteristics derived from the presence of protective factors found in research on resilient individuals (Lyons, 1991, Rutter, 1985). Examples of such characteristics include self-efficacy, the strengthening effect of stress, close relationships to others, and an action oriented approach to situations (see Connor & Davidson,
Measuring resilience in sport with the CD-RISC
To date, there is not a specific measure of resilience developed for the sport context, nor does a measure exist that assesses resilience as a process of positive adaptation following adversity. Although several resilience measures exist in general psychology, only the CD-RISC has received attention in sport. The CD-RISC measures “personal resources or qualities deemed appropriate for positive adaption to adversity” (p. 424; Gucciardi et al., 2011). Thus, the CD-RISC assesses personal
Participants
Participants were 405 (54.8% male and 45.2% female) competitive post-collegiate long distance runners from throughout the United States of America who were at least 18 years of age (M = 34.84, SD = 10.05). The sample was predominantly Caucasian (92.8%), with Hispanic (2.2%) and Asian (1.7%) individuals also represented in the sample. Participants had a mean of 10.53 years of running experience (SD = 8.73). In order to qualify as “competitive,” participants had to have run at least three races
Procedures
Upon receiving Institution Review Board (IRB) approval on the ethics of the study, participants were recruited primarily from running clubs, running stores, and other running organizations. Interested athletes who met the criteria provided above were given access to an online web link via Survey Monkey. All participants provided passive consent and completed the measures. Based on the work of Anderson and Gerbing (1984), the acceptable sample size was determined to be 400 participants (200
Data analysis
MPlus 6.11 (Muthen & Muthen, 2014) was used to a conduct confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) on the three versions of CD-RISC instrument and to model the CD-RISC to affect/emotion and performance anxiety using structural equation modeling (SEM). CFA with Maximum Likelihood estimation was used. In evaluating the fit indices for the CFAs, the following parameters were used as recommended by Hu and Bentler, 1998, Hu and Bentler, 1999, and Bentler (2007): SRMR of .05 or less, TLI of .95 or higher,
Results
The means, standard deviations, and Cronbach's alphas for all the variables and subscales in this study are displayed at the bottom of Table 1. The Cronbach's alphas for most of measures and subscales were all greater than or equal to .70, the recommended criteria when working in early stages of research (Nunnally, 1978). The only exceptions were the PANAS subscales (positive = .69; negative = .65) and the spirituality scale (.67) from the 25-item five factor CD-RISC. Thus, findings in relation
Discussion
The purpose of this study was to further assess the factor structures of various forms of the CD-RISC in a sample of competitive male and female distance runners in the United States of America, test the best fitting scale's measurement properties for gender invariance, and test hypothesized convergent and divergent validity. Overall, the CD-RISC-10 (Campbell-Sills and Stein, 2007, Gucciardi et al., 2011) emerged as the most promising instrument, in comparison to the five factor CD-RISC (Connor
Limitations
Two general limitations characterize this study. Most notably, shortcomings related to the CD-RISC scale and limitations relating to future research examining resilient qualities. Regarding limitations of the CD-RISC as a measure, the CD-RISC solely focuses on resilient qualities at the individual level, has limited evidence for the selection and inclusion of some of the items, was developed and utilized in clinical settings, and has considerable conceptual overlap with coping (see Ahern
Future research directions
As identified in the limitations, there is a need for a sport-specific measure of resilience as mentioned by several scholars (Fletcher and Sarkar, 2012, Galli and Gonzalez, 2015, Galli and Vealey, 2008, Gucciardi et al., 2011, Sarkar and Fletcher, 2013, Sarkar and Fletcher, 2014a). Specifically, developing a sport-specific measure of resilience that considers the three pivotal components-adversity, positive adaptation, and protective factors-in a tripartite fashion to realize a complete and
Conclusion
In conclusion, our findings, in combination with those of Gucciardi et al. (2011), offer some initial psychometric evidence for the use of the CD-RISC-10 in sport performers. The CD-RISC-10 exhibited a strong factor structure and gender invariance, was internally reliable, and predicted both affect and anxiety in the expected directions. The CD-RISC-10 is a shorter, less time consuming and easy to administer survey, making it appear to be advantageous to use in measuring resilient qualities of
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Brooks Sports, Trail Runner Magazine, Fleet Feet Savannah, Salt Lake Running Company, Mountain Trails Foundation, and the Sports Guide Magazine for data collection assistance.
References (42)
On tests and indices for evaluating structural models
Personality and Individual Differences
(2007)- et al.
The Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC): testing the invariance of a uni-dimensional resilience measure that is independent of positive and negative affect
Personality and Individual Differences
(2010) - et al.
A grounded theory of psychological resilience in Olympic champions
Psychology of Sport and Exercise
(2012) - et al.
The Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC): dimensionality and age-related measurement invariance with Australian cricketers
Psychology of Sport and Exercise
(2011) - et al.
Relation of resilience with sport achievement and mental health in a sample of athletes
Procedia Social and Behavioral Sciences
(2010) - et al.
Explanatory style and resilience after sports failure
Personality and Individual Differences
(2003) - et al.
A review of instruments measuring resilience
Issues in Comprehensive Pediatric Nursing
(2006) - et al.
The effect of sampling error on convergence, improper solutions, and goodness-of-fit indices for maximum likelihood confirmatory factor analysis
Psychometrika
(1984) - et al.
The role of ego-control and ego-resiliency in the organization of behavior
- et al.
Psychometric analysis and refinement of the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC): Validation of a 10-item measure of resilience
Journal of Trauma Stress
(2007)
Evaluating Goodness-of-fit Indexes for Testing Measurement Invariance
Structural Equation Modeling
Development of a new resilience scale: the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC)
Depression and Anxiety
Trauma, resilience, and saliostatis: effects of treatment on posttraumatic stress disorder
International Clinical Psychopharmacology
Psychological resilience: a review and critique of definitions, concepts and theory
European Psychologist
Psychological resilience in sport: A review of the literature and implications for research and practice
International Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology
“Bouncing back” from adversity: athletes' experiences of resilience
The Sport Psychologist
Normality tests for statistical analysis: a guide for non-statisticians
International Journal of Endocrinology and Metabolism
Emotions in sport
Establishing factor validity using variable reduction in confirmatory factor analysis
Educational and Psychological Measurement
Fit indices in covariance structure modeling: sensitivity to underparameterization model misspecification
Psychological Methods
Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: conventional criteria versus new alternatives
Structural Equation Modeling
Cited by (78)
Patient Resilience Does Not Conclusively Affect Clinical Outcomes Associated With Arthroscopic Surgery but Substantial Limitations of the Literature Exist
2024, Arthroscopy, Sports Medicine, and RehabilitationRevisiting grit: How much does it overlap with resilience?
2023, International Journal of Educational ResearchPsychometric Properties of the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) in Spanish Adolescents
2024, Spanish Journal of PsychologyAthlete Resilience Trajectories Across Competitive Training: The Influence of Physical and Psychological Stress
2024, Journal of Clinical Sport Psychology