Mental Health Professionals' Perceptions of Difficult Psychiatric Situations: A Brief Report on Development of the Psychiatric Situations Scale

Background: Few measures have been developed to assess staff perceptions with difficult interpersonal situations. The authors sought to develop a reliable instrument that could measure staff perceptions of difficult interpersonal situations encountered in mental health care. Method: This study presents the preliminary construction and analysis of reliability for a scale measuring discomfort with situations often encountered in mental health care. The Psychiatric Situations Scale was administered to 115 participants in medical, mental health, and administrative disciplines. Results: A 42-item scale was derived from 69 initial items, with an internal reliability of .93. Total scores on the scale were significantly lower for the administrative group than medical or mental health disciplines, suggesting that situations were perceived to be less distressing for the administrative group. Conclusion: The 42-item version of the Psychiatric Situations Scale has good internal reliability. Additional reliability and validity studies are needed to determine further utility of the measure.