Civic Identity in Emerging Adulthood Validation of the Civic Identity Status Scale

Civic identity refers to beliefs, emotions, and experiences of individuals regarding their membership in a particular community and the perceived opportunities for their civic participation. It represents one of the most important predictors of civic engagement, yet there is tittle empirical evidence on its development in diverse samples. To address this gap in the literature, we constructed the Civic Identity Status Scale (CISS) to measure four identity statuses proposed by Marcia. In this study, we tested psychometric properties of the newly developed scale and provided evidence for its score, structure, and criterion validity in Slovenia through the lens of contemporary views on validity by testing a series of structural equation models. A sample of 493 emerging adults (aged 18-29 years) participated in an online survey. We determined criterion validity evidence by correlations of the CISS scores with measures of civic behavior, perceived political interest, trust, and self-efficacy and established generalizabitity evidence by testing the measurement invariance of the CISS across different subsamples. The results suggest that the CISS is a valid and reliable measure. Therefore, we suggest and discuss possible future research directions.