2025/05/13 by Beatriz Santos, Catarina Pinheiro Mota, Helena Carvalho +5 · 1 voice
Social Sciences · #Family Support in Illness #Psychosocial Factors Impacting Youth #Work-Family Balance Challenges
paper · pdf · doi:10.1007/s10826-025-03044-9
openalex publication_date 2025/05/13 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
Abstract The ability of formal caregivers who work in residential care to regulate their emotions plays an important role in determining the quality of their care. However, there are few instruments to assess affect regulation in this context. This study addresses this gap by providing a preliminary analysis of the psychometric properties of the Affect Regulation Checklist (ARC) in a sample of Portuguese child careworkers in residential care settings. The ARC was administered to 212 careworkers working in 21 residential care institutions in the district of Porto/Portugal ( M age = 40.99 years, SD = 11.05). Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and item response theory (IRT) analysis were used to examine the psychometric properties of ARC. CFA confirmed the three-factor solution proposed by the original authors (suppression; dysregulation; adaptive reflection) and provided evidence of the construct validity of the ARC. IRT analyses showed that all items were moderately to highly discriminant and that some items were more difficult than others. Support was found for the internal consistency and test-retest reliability of the ARC. Overall, the ARC is a psychometrically sound approach for assessing careworkers’ affect regulation strategies in the residential care context.