Cultural validation of the PERMA-Profiler: A well-being measure for Vietnamese college students

Abstract

Psychological well-being issues have become more prevalent among college students worldwide in recent years, especially during and after the Covid-19 outbreak (Nurunnabi et al., 2020). Given the critical role that psychological well-being plays in improving academic success for college students, researchers have focused on developing and validating various measurement tools to assess it. The PERMA-Profiler has become one of the most widely used instruments. This questionnaire has been tested for validity and reliability across Western and Latin American populations; however, its applicability in Vietnamese contexts remains unexplored. This study aimed to translate and adapt the PERMA-Profiler for Vietnamese college students and determine its validity and reliability using factor analysis, internal consistency, and test-retest reliability. After analyzing the factor structure and reliability, the questionnaire was shortened from 23 items to 18 items, with four factors identified: relationships, meaning and achievement, positive emotion, and negative emotion. Internal consistency of each factor ranged from minimally acceptable to high, with Cronbach’s Alpha values of .65, .89, .85, and .83. Test-retest reliability demonstrated minimal to adequate temporal stability for three of the four factors, with values of .66 (p = .001), .68 (p = .001), and .77 (p < .001) over 11 weeks. These results demonstrated that the adapted instrument provides a reliable and valid tool for assessing psychological well-being among Vietnamese college students.