The Development of an Interpersonal Stressors Scale: Identifying Self-Imposed and Other-Imposed Interpersonal Stressors

While there has been research focused on interpersonal relationships and their impact on stress and well-being, no instrument has been developed to comprehensively evaluate interpersonal stressors. This research sought to develop and validate an Interpersonal Stressors Scale (ISS) for Chinese college students through three studies. Focus groups were used to generate the initial item pool (Study 1). Then two large samples (N-1 = 511; N-2 = 330) were collected to explore the factor structure of the ISS and subsequently examine its reliability and validity estimates (study 2 and 3). Initial results indicated a model with 27 items and five first-order factors (interaction difficulty, behaving as expected, social criticism, relationship maintenance, and indebtedness avoidance) as well as two second-order factors (self-imposed stressors and other-imposed stressors) with strong psychometric properties. Criterion-related validity estimates indicated these two kinds of stressors were both associated with stress while having different relationships with general anxiety, depression, social anxiety, interpersonal satisfaction, and self-efficacy in social interactions. The nature and function of the structure for the ISS were discussed as well as the practical and research implications.