Design and validation of a scale of self-efficacy in thesis advising

Given the lack of instruments to measure the sense of efficacy in thesis advising, the objective was to design and validate a scale to assess self-efficacy in thesis advising (EA-AT), under an instrumental study, with 601 undergraduate advisors between 25 and 65 years of age, assigned to education, medicine, nursing, nutrition, psychology, administration and accounting, selected under a non-probabilistic purposive sampling in seven universities in three regions of Peru. The scale design was based on 15 indicators found in the scientific literature. Content validity was analyzed with Aiken's V coefficient, internal structure with exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and reliability with Cronbach's Alpha coefficient. The results indicate that all items reached a favorable evaluation (V > .70), when applying the EFA only nine items saturated in a single factor that explains 60.38% of the total variance of the scale and their factor loadings range between .61 and .86. Robust analyses (X2 = 94.737; p = .000; CFI = .986; GFI = .983; AGFI = .97; RMSEA = .07) show that the unidimensional structure is satisfactory and the reliability acceptable (alpha = .943; 95% CI = .92-.95). It is concluded that the EA-AT is a brief measure and presents initial psychometric evidence of validity and reliability in Peruvian thesis advisors.