The fear of war scale (FOWARS): development and initial validation (group A)

The emergence of the Ukraine-Russia war led to fear, worry and anxiety among individuals, mostly in the immediate neighbor countries of Ukraine. The purpose of the present study was to develop the Fear of War Scale (FOWARS), aiming to fill the gap in the literature that currently is scarce in valid assessment tools for measuring the fear of war. The sample of the study consisted of N = 1131 participants (n = 670 for group A and n = 461 for group B) Hungarian speaking participants, mainly from Romania and Hungary. Exploratory factor analysis evinced a two-factor model of the newly developed scale, and the final version fulfilled the criteria of the confirmatory factor analysis. The 13-items FOWARS has robust psychometric properties and proves to be appropriate for fear of war assessment in the general population. The phenomenon is measured on two factors, namely experiential and physiological dimensions of fear. The scale is available in the present paper in two languages: English and Hungarian.

俄乌战争的爆发引发了个体的恐惧、担忧与焦虑情绪，其中尤以乌克兰周边紧邻国家的民众反应最为强烈。本研究旨在编制《战争恐惧量表（Fear of War Scale, FOWARS）》，以填补当前学界缺乏有效评估战争恐惧的标准化工具的研究空白。本研究的样本共计1131名匈牙利语使用者（其中A组670名，B组461名），主要招募自罗马尼亚与匈牙利两国。探索性因素分析结果显示，该新编制量表具有两因子结构，最终版本通过了验证性因素分析的检验。该含13个条目的FOWARS具备优异的心理测量学性能，可适用于普通人群的战争恐惧水平评估。其测量的恐惧现象可划分为两个维度：恐惧的体验性维度与生理性维度。本论文中提供了该量表的两种语言版本：英语与匈牙利语。