Validation and reliability of the Turkish version of the life transition scale for parents of children with disabilities: a methodological study

TL;DR

This study validates a Turkish version of a scale to assess how parents of children with disabilities experience life transitions, showing it is reliable and useful for supporting these families.

Contribution

The study provides a culturally adapted and validated Turkish version of the Life Transition Scale for parents of children with disabilities.

Findings

The Turkish Life Transition Scale has four factors: Wandering, Denying, Accepting, and Despairing.

The scale demonstrated high internal consistency with Cronbach’s alpha coefficients ranging from 0.843 to 0.925.

Confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the model’s fit, supporting the scale’s validity in the Turkish context.

Abstract

Parents of children with disabilities often experience significant psychosocial challenges during the process of accepting and adapting to their child’s condition. To better understand and support this life transition, valid and reliable instruments are needed. This study aimed to evaluate the validity and reliability of the Life Transition Scale for parents of disabled children within the Turkish context.

This methodological study was conducted with 154 parents of children with physical or intellectual disabilities attending two special education and rehabilitation centers in eastern of Türkiye. The scale was adapted through translation, back-translation, expert review, and pilot testing. Content validity was assessed using the Davis technique. Explanatory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were performed to assess construct validity. Internal consistency was evaluated using Cronbach’s alpha. Additional analyses included item-total correlations, independent t-tests, and ANOVA for group comparisons.

Explanatory factor analysis revealed four factors—Wandering, Denying, Accepting, and Despairing—explaining 65.5% of the total variance. Factor loadings ranged from 0.619 to 0.830. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the model with acceptable fit indices. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficients were 0.925 for Wandering, 0.889 for Denying, 0.858 for Accepting, 0.843 for Despairing, and 0.935 for the overall scale. Item-total correlations ranged from 0.369 to 0.728, all statistically significant (p < 0.001).

The Turkish version of the Life Transition Scale is a valid and reliable instrument for assessing the life transition experiences of parents of children with disabilities. This scale can inform evidence-based family-centered interventions and policy development to support parental adaptation and well-being.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12887-026-06544-9.

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