Evaluation of the Dispositional Hope Scale in injury survivors

Hope is a higher-order cognitive construct that encompasses the belief in one’s ability to accomplish personal goals. Hope has been conceptualised as consisting of two constructs – Pathways (the individual’s perceived means available to achieve goals) and Agency (belief in ones ability to succeed in using the identified Pathways). This study aimed to validate a measure of hope, the Dispositional Hope Scale (DHS: Snyder, C. R., Harris, C., Anderson, J. R., Holleran, S. A., Irving, L. M., Sigman, S. T., et al. (1991). The will and the ways: Development and validation of an individual differences measure of hope. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60(4), 570–585]) in a large sample of traumatic injury survivors (N = 1025). The findings support the psychometric properties of the scale, as well as the two-factor structure of Agency and Pathways, in this population. This study provides support for the use of the DHS as a measure of hope in traumatised populations.