BACKGROUND: The fear of public speaking is on of the most prevalent fears in the general population, and it is important to assess its underlying cognitive aspects. OBJECTIVE: To perform the cross-cultural adaptation for Brazilian Portuguese of the Self Statements during Public Speaking Scale (SSPS), a self-assessment instrument designed for the public speaking situation. METHODS: The process of translation and adaptation involved four bilingual professionals, the appreciation and approval of the back-translation by the authors of the original scale, a pilot study on 30 Brazilian undergraduate students, and appreciation by raters who attested to the face validity of the Portuguese version, which was called Escala para Auto-avaliação ao Falar em Público. As part of the psychometric study of the SSPS, the items of the scale were analyzed and its internal consistency was assessed in a sample of 2,314 undergraduate students. RESULTS: The items of the positive self-evaluation subscale received the highest scores. The correlation of the items with the total score was quite adequate, ranging from 0.44 to 0.71, and internal consistency was also good, ranging from 0.78 to 0.90. DISCUSSION: The Brazilian Portuguese version of the SSPS proved to be adequate regarding its psychometric properties. Studies evaluating the remaining indicators of validity and reliability of the SSPS on clinical and non-clinical samples would be opportune and necessary.
Public speaking; social anxiety disorder; instrument; scale; validity
