MEASURING STRESS IN THE MILDLY INTELLECTUALLY HANDICAPPED - THE FACTORIAL STRUCTURE OF THE SUBJECTIVE STRESS SCALE

The Subjective Stress Scale (SSS) was developed by Bramston and Bostoc k (1994) to provide a sensitive measure of stress for people with inte llectual disabilities. This study examined the underlying structure of the SSS by analysing responses of 221 intellectually disabled people to the questionnaire. Exploratory factor analysis of the interitem cor relation matrix yielded at feast three solutions that were quire inter pretable: a one-factor a two-factor and a four-factor solution. Factor s in all three solutions bore a strong resemblance to stress dimension s reported for the general population using other stress measures. The results suggest that although the actual stressors vary, persons with mild intellectual disability are affected by the same major stress di mensions as the general population. The results also suggest that the SSS can be used as a much needed measure of subjective stress levels i n people with mild intellectual disabilities.