Measurement Invariance of the Adult Hope Scale across Race/Ethnicity and Gender

Hope is a cognitive trait defined as the perceived capacity to identify strategies (pathways) and maintain motivation (agency) in the pursuit of goals. Hope is most commonly measured using the Adult Hope Scale (AHS). Past work has provided support for the factor structure and reliability of the AHS, but there is limited evidence of measurement invariance of the AHS. The present study examined measurement invariance across race/ethnicity and gender in a large and diverse (n = 3495; 76.9% Women, 32.9% Hispanic, 32.3% Asian/Pacific Islander, 22.1% White, and 12.7% Black/African American) sample of young adults in the United States. Results supported scalar measurement invariance across all race/ethnicity and gender groups and minimal differences in associations between the agency and pathways components of hope or mean levels of hope across groups with the exception of Asian adults reporting lower levels of hope than other groups. These results provide clear empirical support for the consistency of the factor structure and assessment of hope across race/ethnicity and gender and provide an important foundation for examining the potential benefits of hope across diverse populations.