Establishing the Reliability and Validity of the Caring Factor Survey—Caring for Self Among Protestant Clergy

Clergy play an important role in the health of their congregations and communities. Unfortunately, high rates of chronic disease and burnout exist, and health promotion programs have been limited in their ability to change behaviors. This study psychometrically tested the Caring Factor Survey—Caring for Self (CFS-CS), developed to understand self-care among nurses, with clergy. Initially, five experts established face validity of the survey. Ordained Christian clergy actively ministering in the United States were then recruited for a two-phase study. In phase 1, six clergy assessed the content validity of the survey using the Content Validity Index (CVI). In phase 2, 70 clergy completed the CFS-CS, demographic questions, and two Likert scale questions assessing the importance of and their effort to care for themselves daily. Cronbach’s alpha, average inter-item correlations, and exploratory factor analysis were conducted, as were correlations between the survey and the Likert scale items. During phase 1, individual CVI ranged from 1.00 to 0.83 and scale-level CVI was 0.95, indicating that the content of the scale was adequate. During phase 2, one item, Teaching & Learning, did not perform well. When removed, Cronbach’s alpha and the average inter-item correlation were 0.81 and 0.33, respectively. Correlations between the nine-item survey (CFS-CS, Clergy) and the measures of importance and effort towards caring for self were r = 0.50 and 0.68, respectively, p < 0.001 for both. The CFS-CS, Clergy was found to be a valid and reliable measure for future studies to assess self-care beliefs and attitudes of clergy and their impact on clergy health.