Preliminary development of a scale to measure stigma relating to sexually transmitted infections among women in a high risk neighbourhood

Table 3 Item-total item correlation and alpha-coefficients if deleted and scale statistics for three factors identified in factor analysis

Item	Factor 1: Female-specific Moral Stigma		Factor 2: Social Stigma		Factor 3: Internal stigma
	r _(i-t)	α _(d)	r _(i-t)	α _(d)	r _(i-t)	α _(d)
1. Dirty					0.547	0.652
2. Violated					0.457	0.703
5. Damaged goods	0.459	0.719
7. Guilty					0.473	0.692
8. Embarrassed					0.591	0.623
9. Clinic discretion*			0.432	0.667
10. Staff discretion*			0.413	0.673
11. Sleeps around	0.598	0.632
12. Should know better	0.563	0.658
13. Isn't careful	0.478	0.697
14. Bad person			0.398	0.676
15. Community gossip			0.443	0.664
16. Staff morals			0.519	0.639
18. Stupid			0.404	0.675
N	120		116		122
Alpha Co-efficient	0.737		0.705		0.729
Mean	3.77		5.16		6.59
SD	2.52		1.81		2.68

*As these items may refer to perceptions of a specific clinic, an alternative Cronbach's alpha score for the social stigma scale, eliminating these two items would be 0.647; other factors were not affected by removal of these items. Note: item 10 score was reversed for factor analysis.

ISSN: 1472-6874