Retesting the Reliability and Factor Structure of PSSQ-29

Abstract

The ‘Psycho-Somatic Screening Questionnaire - 29’ (PSSQ-29) was initially introduced in 2020 in order to serve as a self-reported tool that may measure both mental and somatic symptoms in a research protocol in Greece regarding the impact of COVID-19. PSSQ-29 was then used in two more studies with different populations and conditions. Therefore, the aim of the present study is to test and present the reliability and factor structure of PSSQ-29 after performing an analysis on all data. In this study the dataset of three previous studies was used to answer the research questions. The only tool that was analysed is PSSQ-29 and its individual items for providing Cronbach’s alpha scores, internal-consistency, factor structure and factor loadings in each sample of the three studies. The results show that the Cronbach’s alpha scores range between .955 and .959, while regardless of how many factors were presented in the exploratory factor analysis the items were predominantly loaded into one factor suggesting that PSSQ-29 is likely measure only psychosomatic symptoms as one entity as the initial article that introduced the questionnaire supports. Lastly, a great limitation to this study is that although there are datasets from three different studies, the samples consist of Greek participants and the original data collection was performed throughout the COVID-19 era in Greece. Key words: Psycho-Somatic Screening Questionnaire – 29; PSSQ-29; Psychosomatics; Self-reported Measure