Resumen:
Research has shown that UK university students¿ confidence in engaging with their academic studies
can be usefully measured using the Academic Behavioural Confidence (ABC) scale. The scale is best
considered as a 17-item scale measuring confidence towards grades, studying, verbalising and
attendance. A substantial collaborative study with research partners in Spain created the need for the
ABC scale to be translated into Castellan Spanish, providing an opportunity to carry out a cross-cultural
validation of the scale. A total of 2,056 Spanish psychology students from the universities of Almería
and Granada in south-eastern Spain completed an appropriately translated version of the ABC scale.
Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis showed that the four-subscale structure derived from
equivalent UK students was still the best description of the data, although the fit of the four-factor
model to the Spanish data was not quite as good as it had been with an equivalent UK sample. Possible
explanations for the poorer fit are discussed. A further opportunity arose to validate the Spanish
version of the ABC scale against the Revised Two-Factor Study Process Questionnaire. The findings
showed that the ABC subscales of Grades, Studying and Verbalising significantly correlated with a deep
approach to learning, as predicted, although it is noted that the correlation coefficients, whilst
significant (p < .01), were again not as high as seen with the UK student data. It is nevertheless argued
that the ABC scale in both its Spanish and English versions is a useful way of understanding students¿
orientation to their university study, and can be used in research, as a diagnostic tool or to aid tutors in
creating more effective learning opportunities for their students.
