Author(s)

Jamie S. Bodenlos^1*, Andrew Malordy¹, Marleah Noonan¹, Aubreyanne Mayrsohn¹, Brian Mistler²

¹Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Geneva, USA.
²Ringling College of Art and Design, Sarasota, USA.

The purpose of this study was to develop and validate a scale measuring attitudes towards prescription drug use for nonmedical reasons. Participants (N = 310) were recruited from a small northeastern college and completed the Prescription Drugs Attitudes Questionnaire (PDAQ), the College Alcohol Problems Scale (CAPS-R) and answered questions about current substance use. Principal components analysis of the PDAQ yielded a two-factor structure accounting for 58.2% of the total variance in attitudes toward prescription drugs where the factors represented items concerning Recreational and Achievement-Oriented attitudes. The PDAQ had good internal consistency (.94) and convergent validity with a measure of alcohol problems (r = .37), alcohol use (r = .44), and illicit drug use (r = .36). The PDAQ is a reliable and valid scale that can be used by researchers and clinicians to understand and prevent prescription drug abuse among youth.

Drugs, Attitudes, Prescriptions, Scale Development, Psychometrics

Bodenlos, J. , Malordy, A. , Noonan, M. , Mayrsohn, A. & Mistler, B. (2014). Prescription Drug Attitudes Questionnaire: Development and Validation. Psychology, 5, 1687-1693. doi: 10.4236/psych.2014.514176.