The reliability and validity of the Chinese Short Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale in the general population of Hong Kong

Purpose: To evaluate the reliability and validity of the 7-item Chinese Short Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale (SWEMWBS) in Hong Kong Chinese. Methods: Under “A Jockey Club Initiative for a Harmonious Society” project, a random telephone survey was conducted in 2017 on 1331 Hong Kong Chinese residents aged ≥ 18. A confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted to test the factorial validity. The Spearman correlations of the SWEMWBS with other scales including the 12-item short form health survey (SF-12), family well-being, self-rated health, the global happiness item (GHI), subjective happiness scale (SHS), and patient health questionnaire-4 (PHQ-4), were used to evaluate the convergent and divergent validity. Known-group validity was also assessed. We calculated congeneric reliability based on standardized factor loadings and error variances. Two-week test–retest reliability was assessed in 100 randomly selected respondents using intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). Results: Among the weighted sample, 55.9% were female and 72.9% were 25 to 64 years old. The CFA indicated good validity of the SWEMWBS. The SWEMWBS had moderate correlations with SHS, SF-12 mental component, PHQ-4 and GHI, but a weak correlation with SF-12 physical component. Older respondents, those with higher education level, married, working, with higher household income reported higher level of well-being. The congeneric reliability of the SWEMWBS was 0.85. Moderate to good test–retest reliability was observed (ICC 0.70, 95% CI 0.55 to 0.80). Conclusion: The Chinese SWEMWBS showed good validity and reliability for measuring well-being in the general population of Hong Kong.