Portuguese Version of the 12-Item Violence Prevention Climate Scale: Test of Psychometric Properties

Background and PurposeA violence prevention climate is critical for nurses’ well-being but also for nursing practice and the quality of care. This study examined the reliability and factor validity of the European Portuguese version of the 12-item Violence Prevention Climate Scale (VPCS).MethodsData came from a sample of 120 nurses providing care in Portugal. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the structural theory of the scale.ResultsFirst and second-order confirmatory factor analysis models showed identical goodness-of-fit suggesting the adequacy of the models to the sample data. Our results also provide evidence of composite reliability, and convergent and discriminant validity.ConclusionsConsistent with previous studies, data from this study showed that the Portuguese version of the 12-item VPCS is a reliable and valid scale to evaluate nurses’ perceptions of a violence prevention climate.

Nurses Between the Hammer and the Anvil: Analyzing the Role of the Workplace Prevention Climate in Reducing Internal and External Violence

The aim of this study was to test a model including relationships among internal and external violence, workplace violence-prevention climate, exhaustion, and intention to leave (ITL) in a sample of nurses. Data were collected by a self-report questionnaire involving nurses (n = 313) from two multispecialist hospitals in Italy. The survey was cross-sectional and nonrandomized. Path analyses showed the presence of the mediating role of internal violence between workplace prevention climate and exhaustion, as well as the mediating function of both types of violence between workplace prevention climate and ITL. Moreover, an indirect effect through exhaustion between internal violence and ITL was highlighted. These findings suggested that organizations that invest in preventive measures may reduce incidents of violence and, in turn, prevent negative consequences on worker well-being.