Measuring belongingness: Validation and invariance of the general belongingness scale in Spanish adults

According to Baumeister and Leary (1995) belongingness is an important characteristic of psychological functionality and central to human need. The experience of achieved belongingness is a positive feeling of security and comfort that is the result of feeling part of a community, in personal life, at the workplace, or in any other social contexts. In addition, belongingness is an important predictor of well-being. This study presents the Spanish adaptation of the General Belongingness Scale GBS (Malone et al. 2012), with a test of four different confirmatory models, including bifactor and methods effects model. A sample of 240 Spanish adults replied to the Spanish version of the GBS, the satisfaction with life scale and a short form of the Big Five dimensions. The Spanish version showed best fit with a model representing a one-factor structure and a method factor, associated with reversed-worded items. GBS showed strong invariance by gender; no gender differences in general belongingness were observed. Validity evidences, i.e. correlations with well-being and the Big Five dimensions, were similar to the results with the original English version. We conclude that our results warrant the use of the Spanish version of the General Belongingness Scale in further studies with this construct. Future studies should also assess test-retest reliability and include additional measures for establishing construct and predictive validity: Since belongingness is associated with well-being and other positive outcomes and thwarted belongingness a risk factor for suicidal behavior, belongingness could also be used with clinical samples and psychotherapy outcome studies in order to measure therapeutic change.