Empirical versus theoretical approaches to the measurement of coping: a comparison using the ways of coping questionnaire and the cybernetic coping scale

Thepurposeofthischapteristocompareempiricalandtheoretical approachestothemeasurementofcoping.Toillustratetheseapproaches, weusetheWaysofCopingQuestionaire(WCQ;FolkmanandLazarus,1988) andtheCyberneticCopingScale(CCS;EdwardsandBaglioni,1993),which representempiricalandtheoreticalapproachestocopingmeasurement,respectively.Afterreviewingthegeneralcontextofresearchoncoping,wedescribethe developmentofthesemeasuresandreviewavailableevidenceregardingtheir psychometricproperties.WethenextendtheconfirmatoryfactoranalysesreportedbyEdwardsandBaglioni(1993)toexaminethereliability,unidimensionalityandothercoreaspectsoftheconstructvalidityofthesemeasures, basedonasamplelargerthanthatusedbyEdwardsandBaglioni(1993).We concludebycomparingtheperformanceofthetwomeasuresandbyproviding recommendationsregardingthedevelopmentofcopingmeasures,withan emphasisontherelativemeritsofempiricalversustheoreticalapproaches.