A psychometric evaluation of the brief resilience scale among tertiary students in Singapore

Although the Brief Resilience Scale (BRS) has been extensively adapted worldwide, work on the generalizability of the original English BRS to Asian populations remains limited. This research evaluated the psychometric properties of the English BRS through two studies with Singaporean undergraduate freshmen (Study 1 n = 839; Study 2 n = 1,068) using Rasch analyses. Seven key areas (dimensionality, item properties, person responses, targeting, reliability, item bias and rating scale functioning) were investigated for validity evidence of the BRS based on test content, response processes and internal structure. Results from both studies consistently support the English BRS as an adequately valid tool to provide invariant interval measures of resilience in Singaporean university students, although future refinements of the BRS may consider additional items at higher difficulty levels for better targeting and distinction of resilience levels.