I have been working on language validation of some measures in the last years, and many referees comment that "They do not see the need of validating the use of a questionnaire in another language". For all what I studied and so on, a validation of the language is always needed when I translate a measure (e.g., from english to italian). Even if the study is good and coherent, is very difficut to publish it (because journals usually do not care about language validation of already existing measures). Do you have any suggestions or experience to share?
Hello,
Generally speaking, measurement is the assigning of numbers to observations in order to quantify specific targeted phenomena in conducting research. The reliability and validity of the measures are main indicators of the quality of a measuring instrument. As such, the responsiveness of the measure to the anticipated outcomes has a great bearing on the generalizability of the research findings. Therefore, your personal sensitivity to validating translated questionnaires is justified since validity refers to the extent to which an instrument measures what it purports to measure. Alternatively, validity requires that an instrument is reliable, but an instrument can be reliable without being valid. However, a word of caution deems necessary here. While we speak of the validity of a test or instrument, validity is not a property of the test itself. Instead, validity is the extent to which the interpretations of the results of a test are guaranteed , which depend on the faithful and accurate measurement of the construct underlying the instrument. As a result, if a questionnaire is designed to measure the learners' motivation, it should contain prompts that only and only gauge the construct under scrutiny and nothing else.
Best regards,
R. Biria
Both validity and reliability may be affected when any one item of your instrument (questionnaire) changes. In case of translation all items change - no further justification is needed: language validation is a must.
And if I may add: the complexity involved in translating should not be underestimated.
Maybe this is of interest: http://www.who.int/substance_abuse/research_tools/translation/en/
Article Guidelines for developing, translating, and validating a que...
And I find this little book really helpful too:
https://books.google.es/books/about/Translating_questionnaires_and_other_res.html?id=7Pe4AAAAIAAJ&redir_esc=y
Hello,
Generally speaking, measurement is the assigning of numbers to observations in order to quantify specific targeted phenomena in conducting research. The reliability and validity of the measures are main indicators of the quality of a measuring instrument. As such, the responsiveness of the measure to the anticipated outcomes has a great bearing on the generalizability of the research findings. Therefore, your personal sensitivity to validating translated questionnaires is justified since validity refers to the extent to which an instrument measures what it purports to measure. Alternatively, validity requires that an instrument is reliable, but an instrument can be reliable without being valid. However, a word of caution deems necessary here. While we speak of the validity of a test or instrument, validity is not a property of the test itself. Instead, validity is the extent to which the interpretations of the results of a test are guaranteed , which depend on the faithful and accurate measurement of the construct underlying the instrument. As a result, if a questionnaire is designed to measure the learners' motivation, it should contain prompts that only and only gauge the construct under scrutiny and nothing else.
Best regards,
R. Biria
Dear collegue,
All that is important is said in the above answers. Translation forward-backward is a must.
Al the best
Filippo: This is a very important question you ask. Reluctance to realise that measures validated for one language need to be validated for other languages may well rest on (misguided) assumptions that languages (a) essentially consist of the ‘building blocks’ that linguists describe in their theorisations, and (b) remain homogeneous across users, entailing that findings about measures in any one language are enough to decide about individual linguistic ability across the board.
Validation is a must, to use Leopold’s words, both for different languages, which is clear from research on academic and clinical assessment of multilinguals, and for different varieties of ‘the same’ language, as I argue for example in these blogposts:
‘Being multilingual in a single language’:
https://beingmultilingual.blogspot.com/2012/05/being-multilingual-in-single-language.html
‘Little multi-dialectals’:
https://beingmultilingual.blogspot.com/2012/05/little-multi-dialectals.html
My latest article, ‘Assessment of communication abilities in multilingual children: Language rights or human rights?’ deals precisely with these matters:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17549507.2018.1392607
All my best for your research
Madalena
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