Fear of COVID-19 and death anxiety: Polish adaptations of scales

Chodkiewicz, J.; Gola, M.

Purpose: We aimed to adapt for the Polish language two scales for studies on the psychological consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic - The Fear of COVID-19 Scale (FCV-19S) by Ahorsu et al. and the Scale of Death Anxiety (SDA) by Cai et al. Methods: Besides the FCV-19S and SDA, the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale HADS (Zigmond and Snaith), the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10) (Cohen et al.), the General Health Questionnaire GHQ-28 (Goldberg), and the Positive Orientation Scale P (Caprara et al.) were used in the study on 756 people aged 18-68 (M = 31.91, SD = 11.30) - 158 men and 598 women. Results: Confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the one-dimensional structure of the Polish adaptation of FCV-19S, with satisfactory internal consistency and Cronbach's alpha equal to 0.84. With regard to the Polish adaptation of the SDA, instead of the 4-factorial structure (as in the original tool), the analysis uncovered a three-factor structure: intrusions/thoughts, anxiety/emotions, and avoidance. Cronbach's alpha coefficient for the entire scale was 0.92. Both tools were significantly, positively correlated with anxiety, depression, and stress levels. Conclusions: Polish adaptations of both tools are characterized by satisfactory psychometric properties, which enable their use in research and clinical practice.