ASSESSMENT OF MAJOR LIFE EVENTS FOR HONG-KONG ADOLESCENTS - THE CHINESE ADOLESCENT LIFE EVENT SALE

Previous Chinese research on adolescent life stress adopted life event scales that were directly translated from Western measures. To addres s the methodological and cultural issues overlooked by the ''import'' approach, the present research aimed at constructing a life event scal e for Hong Kong adolescents. Study 1 was conducted to congregate items for the Chinese Adolescent Life Event Scale (GALES). The GALES contai ns 44 items derived from 618 Hong Kong adolescents. Study 2 revealed a dequate test-retest reliability and criterion-related validity for the GALES. Moreover the GALES yielded stronger relationships with depress ion than did the translated life event measures. Results suggest that the GALES is appropriate for assessing life events for Hong Kong adole scents. Both unique features of the GALES and life events found only i n the translated measures are examined Implications for Chinese resear ch on life stress are discussed.