Development and validation of the sojourn readiness assessment (SRA): Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and translation to Chinese.

This paper reports on the results of three studies that take key steps toward developing and validating a survey instrument to assess the readiness of individuals who are about to sojourn abroad – the Sojourn Readiness Assessment (SRA). The first study presents the development of 20 items to measure three readiness dimensions (knowledge, motivation, and anxiety) and the results of an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) performed on responses from 336 students about to study abroad. The EFA results led us to drop 10 items and one dimension (knowledge). In the second study, we administered a second 10-item version of the SRA to 154 students and ran a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), which confirmed the two-factor structure and further led us to drop two more items. In the third study, we translated the survey to Chinese and administered it to 136 Chinese students who were preparing to come to the U.S. The two-factor structure was confirmed through CFA for the Chinese version of the instrument. The three studies provide initial validity evidence for the Sojourn Readiness Assessment instrument. The need for further studies and some potential uses of the instrument are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]