Development of Terrorism Impact Scale; Initial Validity and Reliability Analyses

Abstract

This study describes the development and psychometric properties of Terrorism Impact Scale (TIS). Items generated were based on two focus groups with journalists, personnel from security forces and experts from different walks of life, in-depth interviews conducted with religious scholars and a preliminary questionnaire administered to the survivors of terrorist attacks, witnesses and general public in Lahore. Initially, a pool of 200 items was generated tapping different types of impact of terrorism in the society (e.g., emotional, psychological, and socio-cultural). An expert opinion based pool of 95 items was retained for initial empirical evaluation on four groups (students, general public, terror attack survivors, and security forces, N = 280). The factor analytic strategy generated 5 clusters with 64 items, labeled as State Affairs, Psychosocial Distress, Civic Affairs, Governance Issues, and Resilience. TIS demonstrated significant construct validity and reliability overall and for its 5 subscales. Item analysis and alpha coefficients revealed significantly high internal consistency for the measure. Further analysis of data revealed significant differences among participant groups for impact of terrorism.