Development of the trauma-informed archival practices scale

In response to the growing awareness regarding the potential for emotional trauma in both archivists and members of the public (donors, users, and community members) who interact with records of human suffering and atrocity, there has been a call for the implementation of trauma-informed practices in archival organizations. Several prominent researchers and theorists have suggested policy and practice elements that would support trauma-informed archives based on principles of transparency, empathy and respect; survivor-centered approaches; and creating a culture of caring. While these contributions have been critical to a shifting paradigm of archival practice, to date there is no tool to measure the degree to which organizations have enacted such approaches. A quantitative approach to measuring practices could complement existing qualitative scholarship, documenting progress in this area and supporting research to evaluate whether these practices, if implemented, lead to better outcomes. This study describes the development and evaluation of the Trauma-Informed Archival Practices Scale which contains items derived from the scholarly literature and previous research of the developers. The tool was distributed to archival institutions across Canada, and a factor analysis was conducted with the resulting sample of 167 organizations. The total scale and four subscales related to users, donors, community members, and staff demonstrated adequate reliability and theoretical congruence. The resulting tool may thus be a useful addition to current approaches to research on traumatic aspects of archives and models for ameliorating potential impacts on researchers, donors and archivists.