Psychometric properties of the short Indonesian version of the Academic Stress Scale and descriptive analysis of academic-related stress among adolescent students

Purpose The Academic Stress Scale (ASS) is widely used for screening academic-related stress among adolescent students; however, its 38 items may be too lengthy for practical application in school settings. Thus, this study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the short Indonesian version of the ASS (SIVASS) and to identify the most prevalent academic-related stress among adolescent students. Method This was a cross-sectional study that consisted of two steps. The first step included translation, back-translation, cultural adaptation, content validation, and item eligibility analysis to shorten the Indonesian version of the ASS. Content validity was assessed by five experts using the item-level content validity index (I-CVI), scale-level content validity index (S-CVI), and kappa statistics. The second step was conducted to evaluate the construct validation and reliability analysis of the SIVASS using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and to identify the internal consistency. A total of 464 students from three schools in Jakarta were randomly divided into two subgroups (n = 232 each) for EFA and CFA. EFA and reliability analysis were conducted using SPSS version 29, and CFA was performed using Lavaan in R. Results Based on the first step results, 18 items of the Indonesian version of the ASS were eligible for further construct analysis. However, EFA results only showed 16 items that were valid for the SIVASS and were categorized into four domains—parent-related, internal-related, friend-related, and teacher-related pressures—with all factor loadings exceeding 0.4. CFA indicated a good model fit (χ 2 = 164.551, df = 100, p < 0.001). Convergent validity was acceptable [average variance extracted (AVE) = 0.73. Reliability analysis demonstrated a high internal consistency (Cronbach’s α = 0.91) and a strong agreement (interclass correlation coefficient = 0.899). “I worry about the possibility of disappointing my parents if I do not do well in school” caused the highest proportion of academic-related stress among current adolescents. Conclusion The SIVASS is a valid and reliable 16-item screening questionnaire for assessing academic-related stress among Indonesian adolescents in diverse educational settings.