1096 Attitudes Towards Mental Health Service for Sleep Scale (AMHSUS): Development and Psychometric Evaluation

Abstract Introduction Poor sleep health is prevalent at the population level and is especially high among college students. There are numerous evidenced-based mental health treatments for sleep disturbance [e.g., Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I) and mindfulness-based therapies], but mental health care for sleep continues to be underutilized. The novel Attitudes Towards Mental Health Service Utilization for Sleep (AMHSUS) scale was developed to assess attitudes towards the use of mental health services for sleep disturbance to gain a fuller picture of individual and population-level barriers and facilitators. Methods An initial 20-item scale covering four hypothesized dimensions was developed via team consensus, then refined and reduced to 16 items in response to feedback from a graduate student panel. The scale was tested using a sample (n=367) of university students (Mage= 19.0; female= 71.1%; white=43.1%; Black= 31.3%) in the southern region of the United States. Results An exploratory factor analysis yielded four factors: “Severity,” “Facilitators,” “Barriers,” and “Priority.” All but one of the original items were retained. The total scale demonstrated good internal consistency, with a Cronbach’s alpha of .71. Reliability was appropriate for two of the four factors, “Severity” (∝=.83) and “Facilitators” (∝=.82), but questionable for “Barriers” (∝=.63) and poor for “Priority” (∝=.46). Conclusion Future directions include testing the scale for convergent and discriminant validity, revising the “Barriers” and “Priority” subscales, and removing items as needed. AMHSUS shows strong psychometric potential and, with some modifications, will be a valuable tool for sleep health research. Support (if any)