Psychometric properties of the Chinese version of the Positive Thinking Scale in individuals after hip fracture surgery

Positive thinking is a form of positive cognition and a coping strategy. The Positive Thinking Scale (PTS) is used to measure positive thinking, but the reliability and validity of the PTS-Chinese have yet to be tested. This study aims to examine the psychometric properties of the PTS-Chinese. A total of 154 patients post-hip fracture surgery completed the questionnaire in a hospital in Taiwan between April 2020 and December 2020. The scales in the questionnaire included the PTS, Automatic Thoughts Questionnaire-Positive, Automatic Thoughts Questionnaire-Negative, Barthel Index, and items related to happiness, demographics, and disease treatment. The results of the confirmatory factor analysis and average variance extracted show that the PTS-Chinese version exhibits construct validity. Scores on the PTS-Chinese version are positively related to scores on the Automatic Thoughts Questionnaire-Positive and happiness items and negatively related to scores on the Automatic Thoughts Questionnaire-Negative. This finding indicates that the PTS-Chinese demonstrates concurrent, predictive, and discriminant validity. The scale also presents acceptable reliability and test-retest reliability. Overall, the PTS-Chinese can be used to evaluate and track the positive thinking of patients. Further studies are needed to assess the psychometric properties of the PTS-Chinese in different cultures and ethnic groups.