DEVELOPMENT OF AN EVALUATIVE INSTRUMENT TO ASSESS KNOWLEDGE, COMPETENCY, AWARENESS AND PROFESSIONAL SENSITIVITY OF EXERCISE PROFESSIONALS WHO INTERACT WITH FEMALE CLIENTS WHO HAVE EXPERIENCED SEXUAL ABUSE

Abstract

An evaluative instrument (the Sexual Abuse Assessment Tool, or SAAT) was developed to assess the competency of exercise professionals to incorporate sensitive training practices when interacting with women who have experienced sexual abuse. Twelve content experts rated the relevance of each assessment item, after which items were dichotomized as being relevant or non-relevant. The readability of the SAAT was a grade level of 13.1. Of the 64 test items comprising the final version of the SAAT, the range of domain-content validity index values was narrow (0.86-0.87) and the scale content validity index, defined as the average of the item-content validity index values for all assessment items, was 0.87. Future research efforts should be aimed at documenting the reliability of the SAAT, broadening the assessment to include male survivors of abuse, exploring the possibility of creating a shorter version of this evaluative tool, and administering the SAAT to fitness leaders.