Background: Social capital is a novel term which is important because it incorporates contextual perspectives in nursing. It is used to explore the way in which social context and social relations affect health and the everyday life of people. Despite differences in conceptualization, most authors agree that the term refers to civic participation, information channels, shared values, trust, mutual support, and reciprocity among people. The Social Capital Questionnaire (SCQ) was developed in Australia to assess the dimensions of social capital. Aim: The cognitive validation of the SCQ in Greece. Method: In-depth face-to-face semi-structured interviews were conducted with 25 adults living in different, diverse suburbs of the metropolitan area of Athens, the capital of Greece. Following informed consent, participants were recruited using purposive sampling. Data collection was carried out between November and December 2007. The questions were based on the eight (8) original factors of SCQ: “Participation in the Local Community”, “Social Agency or Proactivity in a Social Context”, “Feelings of Trust and Safety”, “Neighborhood Connections”, “Family and Friends Connections”, “Tolerance to Diversity”, “Value of Life”, and “Work Connections”. Participants were asked a question from the SCQ and then a thorough discussion was made about their answers and understanding (concurrent interviewing). Transcripts were made, on which directed content analysis was performed using NVivo 8. Results: It was rather difficult to establish a common perception and understanding among the Greek participants of what constitutes “active participation”, “community”, “multiculturalism” and “neighborhood”, factors central to the SCQ. These words elicited differences in conceptualization among the respondents and are not used spontaneously by them. The terms that were better and more commonly understood were related to trust and safety. The interviews also revealed the issues of multiple questions within one question, specifically regarding the Greek people’s attitudes towards the immigrants (Factor: “Tolerance to Diversity”). The results guided the addition of explanatory notes to some questions and the replacement of some terms in the Greek questionnaire (e.g., “local community” was replaced by “in your area”).Conclusions: The results highlighted the need to develop culture-specific meanings of each term used in social capital surveys. To this end, techniques from both cognitive and psychometric paradigms will be supportive. Social capital measurement tools should be cognitive validated in each cultural or national setting in which they are applied, irrespective of their psychometric properties.
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