Validation of the Coping With Discrimination Scale Among Arab/Middle Eastern North African Americans

Objectives: Arab/Middle Eastern North African (MENA) Americans experience high levels of discrimination, which is associated with greater engagement in coping strategies to alleviate the stress. The Coping with Discrimination Scale (CDS; Wei, Alvarez, et al., 2010) remains one of the only measures that assesses responses to discrimination. Given the difficulties of conducting research with Arab/MENA groups, few measures have been validated for use with this population. Thus, the purpose of this study is to validate the CDS among Arab/MENA Americans. Method: The sample consisted of 297 Arab/MENA Americans (n = 139, Christian; n = 158, Muslim). Overall, 143 individuals identified as men and 154 identified as women. The sample's average age was 31.2 years old (SD = 9.5). Confirmatory factor analysis was utilized to assess the preassigned factor structure. Results: Confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the CDS five-factor structure among Arab/MENA participants. All models resulted in poor fit. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was then conducted to identify factors relevant to Christian and Muslim MENA Americans. EFA results were largely similar for both groups and two factors emerged: adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies. Preliminary reliability and incremental validity was explored. Specifically, adaptive (beta = -0.11, p = .009) and maladaptive coping (beta = 0.52, p < .001) predicted anxiety after accounting for participants' experiences of discrimination. Conclusion: This study has implications for utilization of the CDS, with the EFA suggesting a more fitting two-factor structure (maladaptive and adaptive coping) and sensitive interpretation of the scale with Arab/MENA populations.