THE DEVELOPMENT AND VALIDATION OF THE CHILDRENS-HOPE-SCALE

Assuming that children are goal-oriented, it is suggested that their t houghts are related to two components-agency and pathways. Agency thou ghts reflect the perception that children can initiate and sustain act ion toward a desired goal; pathways thoughts reflect the children's pe rceived capability to produce routes to those goals, Hope reflects the combination of agentic and pathways thinking toward goals. A six-item dispositional self-report index called the Children's Hope Scale is i ntroduced and validated for use with children ages 8-16. Results sugge st that the scale evidences internal consistency and is relatively sta ble over retesting. Additionally, the scale exhibits convergent, discr iminant, and incremental validity. Limitations and uses of the scale a re discussed.