The Norwegian Occupational Wholeness Questionnaire (N-OWQ): Scale development and psychometric properties

Abstract

Background: Occupational therapy has long emphasized the concepts doing, being, becoming and belonging, and a notion of balance between them. Measures of these concepts are in a developing stage.

Aim: This study aimed to develop and examine the properties of the Norwegian version of the Occupational Wholeness Questionnaire (N-OWQ), which is proposed to measure being, becoming, and belonging, in addition to occupational wholeness as a higher-order concept.

Methods: An anonymous sample of 248 persons over the age of 18 years completed the N-OWQ along with sociodemographic information. Principal Components Analysis (PCA) was performed on the scale items when examining factor structure. Item reduction was based on considerations of communalities, factor loadings, scale consistency if item deleted, and conceptual issues. Internal consistency was assessed with Cronbach’s α.

Results: Following the PCA, the ‘Being’ and ‘Becoming’ scales merged into one five-item ‘Self’ scale (Cronbach’s α 0.77). The ‘Belonging’ scale items were split into two scales comprised by three items each: ‘Closeness’ (Cronbach’s α 0.70) and ‘Relatedness’ (Cronbach’s α 0.73).

Conclusions: The revised N-OWQ merged the ‘Being’ and ‘Becoming’ items into one factor, whereas the ‘Belonging’ items were split into two distinct factors. Internal consistency for all scales were satisfactory.