Development and Validation of Cyber Safety Behaviors Scale

Abstract

The current study was conducted to develop and validate “Cyber Safet Behaviors Scale. The present study further explored a Positive relationship between cyber safety behaviors and emotional regulation and a negative relationship between cyber safety behaviors and emotional regulation with cyberbullying victimization. Using mixed method research design, the present study recruited a sample (N= 270) including n= 120 males, and n= 150 females with different educational levels i.e., intermediate to post-graduation (M=21.8, SD= 1.83) in Phase 2 total sample size was (N=327) Adults from Lahore, Pakistan. Assessment measures i.e., the Cyber Safety Behaviors Scale, Security Intention Behaviors Scale (Eagleman & Peer, 2015), Cyberbullying Victimization (Lee, 2017) were used. Results showed that Exploratory Factor Analysis yields a Cyber Safety Behaviors Scale with 24 items with five components that indicated 53.78% of the total variance. Confirmatory Factor Analysis confirms the scale validity through model fit indices CMIN/DF= 1.30, GFI = .95, AGFI=.93, TLI= .93, CFA= .94, and RMSEA= .03. and scale structure was established with 19 items comprised of 5 factors. Reliability analysis showed CSBS has Cronbach alpha value α=.73. with final 19 items. The measurement model was perfectly matched with observed data. Convergent and Divergent validity results were also significant (**p<0.01). Hence its established through results scale Cyber Safety Behaviors Scale is valid and reliable tool to measure the proposed phenomena. The CSBS is a brief, comprehensive, and developmentally appropriate measure for young adults to measure cyber safety behaviors related to safety in cyberspace. CSBS is a psychometrically valid & reliable assessment measure that has provided pieces of evidence for the construct validity and reliability.