Evaluation of alternate form reliability for the 9-item versions of the interprofessional socialization and valuing scale (ISVS-9A/9B)

Background

The Interprofessional Socialization and Valuing Scale (ISVS) was developed to measure interprofessional socialization as one adopts and integrates learning into practice. While items for the ISVS-9A and 9B were drawn from three subscales of the original 24-item tool, these parallel forms were validated as a unidimensional measure using Canadian health professional and student populations.

Objectives

The aim was to investigate if the ISVS-9A and ISVS-9B forms are interchangeable and examine their internal structure.

Design

Students completed an 18-question survey that included the nine items from the ISVS-9A followed by the nine items for ISVS-9B.

Settings

Two U.S. academic health science centers provided longitudinal interprofessional education (IPE) in a classroom setting.

Participants

625 students representing 13 programs from one institution and 512 students representing 7 health professions programs from the second institution were included in the study.

Methods

Participants completed the ISVS-9A and 9B as a single form. Intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) and corresponding 95 % confidence intervals were calculated to measure the absolute agreement between the scores from the ISVS-9A and 9B forms. A factor analysis considering the original tool's three subscales was conducted.

Results

592 responses from one institution and 500 responses from the second institution were analyzed. ICC for the ISVS total scores demonstrated good reliability (0.75–0.90). However, the internal structure of the three factors demonstrated moderate reliability (0.5–0.75) and may need further investigation.

Conclusions

This study confirms the use of the ISVS-9A and 9B total score to measure interprofessional socialization in health professional students attending U.S. institutions. Additional research is needed to determine potential reasons for mixed outcomes from studies using ISVS-9A and 9B parallel forms.