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Emotional climate: Its concept and measurement in a crosscultural research

Abstract:

A self-report scale on Emotional Climate (EC) is presented. Emotional Climate is conceived of as the accesibility of a group of emotions in the collective mood, related to a social representation both of the current and of the future social milieu (De Rivera, 1992). Aggregated data of individual questionnaires are used as a macropsychological indicator of EC. This paper presents the main results of a research in which participated college students of six different countries. EC shows satisfactory cross-cultural reliability and dimensional validity. We found two dimensions (positive and negative climate) as well as criterion validity results (with affect balance, post-traumatic stress and coping with collective trauma), both of which are coherent with the literature on affect. Nonindependence was tested by the intraclass correlation coefficient, confirming interdependence of responses within groups as a statistical test of evidence for a group level effect. These results allow us to use an individual aggregate measure (mean by country) as an estimate of collective construct (EC). Mean by country EC shows also congruent associations with macrosocial indicators. Between and within countries item differences confirm the sensibility of the scale. © 1997 by Fundación Infancia y Aprendizaje.