Back to square one: The measurement of Socioemotional Wealth (SEW)

•Not all family firms possess SEW, but they are heterogeneous in their SEW levels and this affects the way they behave and make decisions.•We validate the original FIBER scale (with items drawn from a literature review) and replicate the REI one (whose empirical study was conducted in Austria/Germany) using a very different sample and country setting (Spain). We propose a slightly refined REI scale (RREI scale).•SEW scales may not be universal but depending on the specific cultural or national setting.•As country cultural distance increases, some of the uniqueness related to SEW described in our work for Spain or for Austria and Germany (Hauck et al., 2016) may grow even larger.