Southeast Asia Psychology Journal (SAPJ)

Psychometric Properties of the Psychological Strain Scale in a Malaysian University Student Sample

Bee Seok Chua — 2025-12-31

The Psychological Strain Scale (PSS) was a 40-item scale developed by Zhang and Lyu (2014) to measure four dimensions of psychological strain, included value, aspiration, deprivation, and coping strain. This study aimed to examine the psychometric properties of the PSS, among university students in Malaysia. A total of 259 students (201 females, 58 males) were selected through snowball sampling from public and private universities. In addition to the PSS, the Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale (DASS-21) and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES) were used to provide concurrent validity evidence of PSS. Findings indicated acceptable reliability level across the four subscales of PSS, with Cronbach’s alpha values of .638 (Value Strain), 698 (Deprivation Strain), .725 (Aspiration Strain), and .809 (Coping Strain). Convergent validity was supported by positive and significant intercorrelations between the four dimensions (r = .286 to r = .624). Concurrent validity evidence was provided with a significant and negative correlations between PSS dimensions and RSES scores (r = –.247 to –.578) and with significant and positive correlations between PSS dimensions and DASS-21 subscales (r = .188 to .533), the results were consistent with theoretical expectations. The findings suggest that the Psychological Strain Scale demonstrates satisfactory reliability and validity for assessing psychological strain among university students in Malaysia.

Faktor mempengaruhi kesejahteraan psikologi guru

Christina Andin — 2025-12-31

Abstrak: Isu mengenai ramai guru mengalami masalah kesejahteraan psikologi semakin mendapat perhatian daripada pelbagai pihak. Oleh yang demikian terdapat keperluan untuk mengenal pasti apakah faktor yang menyebabkan kesejahteraan psikologi guru tergugat. Kajian menggunakan rekabentuk kualitatif dengan menggunakan temu bual separa berstruktur dengan tujuh orang guru dipilih menggunakan persampelan bertujuan. Data kajian dianalisis menggunakan kaedah tematik. Dapatan kajian menunjukkan terdapat lima faktor utama menjejaskan kesejahteraan psikologi guru iaitu beban tugas, masalah pengetahuan dan kemahiran, masalah rakan sekerja, masalah pelajar dan masalah peribadi. Hasil kajian ini boleh dijadikan panduan kepada pihak berkepentingan dalam usaha memperkasakan kesejahteraan psikologi guru.

From Brainwaves to Wellbeing: The Potential Neurotherapy for Anxiety

Jasmine Adela Mutang — 2025-12-31

Anxiety is one of the most widespread mental health problems globally, often causing serious emotional distress and making it hard for people to function well in daily life. Although medications and therapies like CBT can be helpful, some people experience side effects, struggle to access treatment, or do not respond well. This leads to a need for other treatment options. Neurofeedback is a non-invasive method that helps people learn to control their brain activity by showing them their brainwaves in real-time feedback, potentially alleviating anxiety symptoms by promoting neural self-regulation and emotional resilience. This paper explores the use of neurofeedback as a personalised intervention for anxiety, emphasizing its theoretical basis, commonly used protocols, and the relevance of brainwave patterns such as alpha and high-beta frequencies in anxiety symptomatology. It highlights the limitations of standardised neurofeedback approaches and underscores the clinical advantages of tailoring protocols using quantitative EEG (qEEG) assessments. Through a review of global publication trends using the Scopus database (1974–2024), this study reveals a significant rise in research interest, largely dominated by Western countries, with a notable research gap in non-Western regions such as Southeast Asia. The paper also discusses the potential of culturally adaptable and individualised neurofeedback protocols to bridge this gap. The findings emphasise the need for more inclusive, accessible, and personalised applications of neurofeedback to improve anxiety treatment outcomes globally. Continued research and teamwork across different fields are important to create neurofeedback treatments that work well and fit different cultural contexts.

DEVELOPMENT OF A GROUP COUNSELING MODULE USING EXPRESSIVE ART THERAPY FOR ADOLESCENTS FACING DEPRESSION, ANXIETY, AND STRESS

sabihah johan — 2025-12-31

Delinquent adolescents are those who tend to face turbulent emotions which affect their behavior. The untreated depression and anxiety are focused due to their negative impact on oneself and the surrounding society. Therefore, an appropriate intervention should be given so that quality humans can be developed. Integration between counselling and expressive art therapy is a platform of creative exploration as a healing process in helping relationships. The main objective of this TSE-trd is to assist delinquent adolescents in Malaysia to decrease depression, anxiety and stress among them. A validation stage was carried out by three experts’ counselors, and Cronbach alpha .721 was obtained. A group of delinquent adolescents from aged 16 years to 20 ages involved to check the module validity. Research implications are discussed from theoretical aspects, counselling professionals, counsellors and practitioners in the field of counselling, especially those who deal with delinquent adolescents.

Sounds of the Self: Exploring Music as a Self-Construal Priming Tool

Jonathan Tang — 2025-12-31

Markus and Kitayama identified two types of self-construal, namely interdependent and independent, that reflect cultural differences in self-perception. Based on this framework, research has shown that self-construal influences many aspects of behavior. To investigate causal hypotheses related to culture, researchers have developed various methods for priming self-construal, such as using cultural icons. Given that music is a cultural product that conveys cultural values, it holds potential as a means to prime interdependent and independent self-construals. This study explored whether music could serve as a self-construal priming manipulation. Thirty bicultural participants (ethnically Chinese Singaporeans) were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: a control condition, a Chinese music condition, or a Western music condition. Mixed-model ANOVA results showed significant main effects but no significant interaction effects. Specifically, participants reported significantly lower scores for both interdependent and independent self-construals at the post-test compared to the pre-test, regardless of the music condition. Further analysis revealed significant changes in particular self-construal dimensions, including self-direction vs. reception to influence, consistency vs. variability, and self-interest vs. commitment to others, between pre-test and post-test across all music conditions. These findings underscore the complexity of using music to prime self-construals, which may explain why no studies to date have utilized this priming method. Nonetheless, this study highlights the profound impact listening to music, and even silence, can have on self-perception and identity. Further research is needed to establish the reliability of music-based priming and understand its underlying mechanisms.

HUBUNGAN PENYELIAAN DAN TEKANAN TERHADAP PRESTASI KAUNSELOR PELATIH DI MALAYSIA

SYALIZA ADIHA TEWIRAN — 2025-12-31

Abstrak: Hubungan penyeliaan, tekanan dan prestasi kaunselor pelatih merupakan perkara yang perlu diberi penekanan dalam latihan internship. Kajian ini dijalankan untuk mengkaji tahap kebolehpercayaan instrument dan hubungan antara pemboleh ubah dalam kajian hubungan penyeliaan dan tekanan terhadap prestasi kaunselor pelatih di Malaysia. Kajian ini menggunakan tiga instrumen iaitu The Short Supervisory Relationship Questionnaire (S-SRQ) untuk mengkaji hubungan penyeliaan antara kaunselor pelatih dengan penyelia akademik, Counselling Psychology Trainee Stress Survey (CPTSS) untuk mengkaji tekanan kaunselor pelatih dan Counselor Performance Inventory (CPI) iaitu untuk melihat prestasi kaunselor pelatih. Responden kajian terdiri daripada 183 orang kaunselor pelatih yang menjalani latihan internship di pelbagai organisasi dan agensi di Malaysia. Hasil kajian menunjukkan bahawa kebolehpercayaan yang tinggi (a=.892-.967) dan mempunyai korelasi yang signifikan antara pemboleh ubah kajian. Secara keseluruhannya, kajian ini menunjukkan bahawa hubungan penyeliaan dan tekanan yang dihadapi oleh kaunselor pelatih memberi impak kepada prestasi mereka sepanjang menjalani latihan internship.

An Exploratory Factor Analysis: Validity and reliability of Mental Health Literacy Questionnaire among Sabahan Adolescents

Yusra Afiqah Nurul — 2025-12-31

This study aims to evaluate the validity, reliability and factor analysis of the 33-item Mental Health Literacy Questionnaire (MHLq) among adolescents in Sabah. Data is collected from a pilot sample of 132 participants. The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure of sampling adequacy shows the value of 0.736 and Bartlett’s test of sphericity shows a significant value (p < .001), which confirm the data is suitable for factor analysis. The data was also found to be reliable with Cronbach’s alpha of .867. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) then confirms the three key dimensions of mental health literacy which are self-help strategies (SHS), first aid skills (FASH), and knowledge of mental health issues (KS). The dataset was able to explain 38.12% of the variance. These findings suggest that the scale is a reliable and valid tool for assessing mental health literacy among adolescents in this context, providing a foundation for future research and interventions.

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE WORK-LIFE BALANCE WITH ORGANIZATIONAL COMMITMENT AMONG ACADEMIC STAFF

Nurjianah Affridin — 2025-12-30

Abstract: Undeniably, the digitalization era brings many opportunities and benefits to human resources. However, it also comes with challenges for it to be implemented firmly into policies. As a result, academic staff in Malaysia facing new challenges, because along with the needs to achieve one’s institute’s Key Performance Index (KPI), it is also incumbent upon them to adapt quickly to the new technology. The obstacles would impact the level of the organizational commitment since academic staff need to carry out their duties as usual and simultaneously adapt to the new norm of the digitalization era. To ensure the continuity and success of an educational institution during this era, the organisation must carry out a study to explore which factors play the most crucial role in determining the level of organizational commitment. Therefore, this study was conducted to identify the direct relationship between work-life balance and organizational commitment, in addition to measuring differences in organizational commitment based on position. The study used a quantitative approach with a survey method to obtain the data needed from 101 academic staffs at University of Malaysia Sabah (UMS). From the findings, the analysis has shown that work-life balance was moderately correlated with organizational commitment, where it has been proven to have a significant and positive correlation with organizational commitment. The position, on the other hand, shows no significant difference statistically with organizational commitment. It can be concluded that examining the level of work-life balance could be helpful to measure organizational commitment so that it can easily be used as a catalyst in increasing organizational commitment among academic staff.

TARIF AMERIKA SYARIKAT DAN KESANNYA TERHADAP PSIKOLOGI RAKYAT MALAYSIA

Muhammad Idris Bin Bullare Bahari — 2025-12-31

Kertas konseptual ini bertujuan untuk meneroka impak tarif yang dikenakan oleh AS terhadap kesejahteraan psikologi Masyarakat Malaysia. Walaupun kesan ekonomi oleh tarif sering diteroka, kesan psikologi, khususnya dalam landskap ekonomi global yang saling berkait kurang diberi perhatian. Kertas konseptual ini mengetengahkan satu kerangka teoretikal yang menghubungkan polisi perdagangan, ketidakstabilan ekonomi, dan kesejahteraan psikologi individu. Berpandukan sistem ekologi Bronfenbrenner, teori pemuliharaan sumber, dan model proses stres, kertas ini akan mengutarakan bagaimana tindakan ekonomi antarabangsa mempengaruhi kesejahteraan psikologi terhadap masyarakat Malaysia.

MEASURING GRIT: A PSYCHOMETRIC ANALYSIS OF OVIEDO GRIT SCALE AMONG MALAYSIAN EMERGING ADULTS

Jing Wen Phang — 2025-12-30

Grit is a non-cognitive trait linked to various positive outcomes, including improved academic performance and well-being. The Oviedo Grit Scale (EGO) was developed to measure grit effectively within collectivistic cultures. However, more attention to the psychometric properties of the EGO may be needed to expand its applicability, particularly in the Malaysian context. In this study, 240 Malaysian emerging adults participated in an online survey comprising the Short Grit Scale (Grit-S), EGO, and the demographic section. Our study examines internal consistency reliability, construct validity, and concurrent validity of EGO. Findings from the Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) confirmed the unidimensionality and high reliability of the EGO, along with robust concurrent validity with the Grit-S. Theoretically, this study provides valuable insights into the psychometric properties of the EGO, suggesting it is a suitable measure of grit within a Malaysian sample. Several limitations and recommendations for future research are also discussed.