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Positive Psychology Scales and Measurements
The Brief Self-Control Scale (Tangney et al., 2004) is a 13-item questionnaire, which asks participants to endorse statements on a 5-point scale where 1 = not like me at all and 5 = very much like me (e.g., “I have a hard time breaking bad habits” and “I do certain things that are bad for me, if they are fun”).
The Eysenck I.6 Junior Impulsiveness Subscale (Eysenck, Easting, & Pearson, 1984) is a 23-item, yes/no questionnaire.
The Self-Control Rating Scale (SCRS; Kendall & Wilcox, 1979) is a 33-item questionnaire. This 33-item questionnaire asks the rater to assess the child using a scale from 1 to 7, where 4 represents the average child, 7 the maximally impulsive, and 1 the maximally self-controlled. It measures the ability to inhibit behavior, follow rules, and control impulsive reactions.
The Social Skills Rating System (SSRS; Gresham & Elliot, 1990) is a widely used inventory of positive child behaviors that caregivers rate on a 3-point frequency scale ranging from 0 _ never to 2 _ very often. This scale was later modified, using 9 face valid self-control items (e.g., “controls temper in conflict situations,” “attends to your instructions”) from the parent version of the SSRS and 10 items from the teacher version of the SSRS as a measure of self-control (Tsukayama, Duckworth, & Kim, 2011; Tsukayama,
Toomey, Faith, & Duckworth, 2010).
The Otis-Lennon School Ability Test Seventh Edition (OLSAT7) is a 40-minute test measuring verbal, quantitative, and reasoning skills. As the test index has a normalized score with a mean of 100 and standard deviation of 16, and the score is highly correlated with IQ, the test is a useful proxy for a longer, more thorough IQ test.
The Raven’s Progressive Matrices (Raven, 1948) is a widely used nonverbal test of fluid intelligence. The test comprises a series of 60 matrices, each of which has one element missing. The task in each case is to select from a set of alternatives the piece that completes the pattern correctly.
The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1965) is a 10-item, 4-point scale questionnaire.
The Kirby Delay-Discounting Rate Monetary Choice Questionnaire (Kirby, Petry, & Bickel, 1999) is a 27-item questionnaire.
In the Delay Choice Task (Duckworth & Seligman, 2005), each student was given $1. They could keep the $1, or trade it in for $2, one week later.
The Big Five Inventory (John & Srivastava, 1999) is a 44-item questionnaire that measures levels of the big five personality traits – openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism.
The Short Grit Scale (Duckworth & Quinn, 2009) is an 8-item measure of grit. The scale is a simplification of the previous 12-item scale. A summary of the study which defined and validated this scale can be read here.
The Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS) is a 5-item survey that measures global life satisfaction (Diener, Emmons, Larsen, & Griffin, 1985).
The Attributional Style Questionnaire (ASQ; Peterson et al., 1982) presents respondents with six positive and six negative events and asks them to provide ‘the one major cause’ of each event if this event were to happen to them. The respondent next rates each cause on three dimensions (external vs. internal, unstable vs. stable, and specific vs. global) using a 7-point Likert-type scale.
Mr. Gresham I enjoyed reading your article about using SSRS to measure the ability of social skills, behavior, academic competence in children with autism. I am interested in using SSRS to make the task of my thesis. you may send me your journals that discuss the use SSRS to measure three areas as above? I am a teacher for autistic children in Indonesia, and now I’m continuing to study master psychology. thank for your attention.
Paulus Suli